THE problem of being "overchurched" was addressed by a Church of Ireland diocesan secretary at the 20th Roscrea conference yesterday. The theme of the conference, which took place at the weekend at Mount St Joseph's Cistercian Abbey, Roscrea, Co Tipperary, was "The Monastic Midlands".
Canon Joseph Condell, rector of Roscrea and diocesan secretary of Limerick and Killaloe, said this oversupply of church buildings was not just a problem for the Church of Ireland but should also concern the State, State agencies and local groups". They (the churches) were part of our heritage, he said, "part of what we are". Due to the attachment felt by many Church of Ireland members to the churches, the issue was one of "great sensitivity" and needed "to be approached similarly".
He quoted Jesus when, after feeding the 5,000, he had said: "Gather up the fragments that remain. Let nothing be lost." The churches were part of a heritage we would lose "at our peril", he added.
Dr John Feehan, of UCD, told the conference that "for most creatures where they are is who they are, so precisely are they made for a specific place". The quotation, from Wendell Berry, was intended to highlight how different the midlands were during Ireland's monastic age. "It was a very, very watery landscape", he said. The Shannon and its lakes flooded much of the area, "which was an archipelago". Speaking of his book The Celtic Monk, which was launched at the conference and deals with the rules under which Irish monastic houses operated, an tAthair Uinseann O Maidin, from Mount Melleray, quoted an old monk's hymn translated by Frank O'Connor.
"To go to Rome is little profit, endless pain. The God you seek in Rome, you find at home, or seek in vain." He had hoped to include this in his book, but had been unable to secure the rights in time.
An tAthair Ciaran O Sabhaois, of Mount St Joseph's, told the conference he was "flabbergasted at the number of saints in the midlands". He had established 50. At that time there were 10 monastic sites within a 10 mile radius of Roscrea alone. More generally, he said it had been established there were 113 saints by the name of Colman.
On a tour of Clonmacnoise, Prof Liam de Paor described as "a load of nonsense the story that Dervorgilla, wife of O'Rourke of Breffni, who was abducted by Dermot McMurrough, had been responsible for the English coming here. "She has been blamed ever since in romantic nationalism for the Normans", he said, dismissing the notion. Prof de Paor was standing at the door of the "Nuns' Chapel", built by Dervorgilla in 1167.
Earlier, guiding the party through Clonmacnoise, Mr Con Manning, senior archaeologist with the Department of Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, explained how the OPW had tricked people there in times past. The local people used to take clay from near the church of St Ciaran, as they believed it killed eel worm in potatoes. Attempting to prevent too, much clay being removed, thus endangering the building's foundations, the OPW secretly kept replacing the removed clay with "false" stuff. No one knew the difference.
At the close of the conference yesterday, the convenor, Mr George Cunningham, said enough was not being done to educate children about their heritage. He wished to "sound a word of warn on the matter, saying heritage should not be taken for granted. If people are not aware of their heritage, you cannot protect it", he said.
