Festivities and services to mark the great tradition Ireland and Scotland share will take place this weekend at Christ Church in Dublin, writes Aonghus Dwane.
An fheile
nach do reub an cuan
nach do mhill mìle bliadhna
(the humanity
that the ocean could not break
that a thousand years has not severed)
Thus did the great Scottish Gaelic poet Sorley Maclean describe the affinity between Ireland and Scotland. The first Irish who went there (without much welcome) were labelled Scotii (meaning raiders), giving Scotland its name.
The ancient kingdom of Dal Riada linked both countries. Scottish Gaelic's parent tongue is Irish.
These bonds will be celebrated tomorrow in a one-day festival, Colmcille @Árdteampall Chríost (Colmcille @Christ Church), including lectures on the saint, an Anglican service in Irish, Urnaí na Nóna, and an evening concert of Scottish Gaelic and Irish music and song.
Columba, or Colm Cille (meaning the dove of the church), was born in Gartan, Co Donegal, in AD521. He copied a book of psalms belonging to St Finnian secretly, which led to the first legal judgment on copyright: "To every cow its calf and to each book its copy." The Colm Cille copyright tradition will be explored in a lecture by Ronan Sheehan.
Following a battle in which many died, Colm Cille went into penitential exile to Scotland, where in 563 he founded a monastery on Iona, from where Christianity spread throughout Scotland.
In the seventh century, a disciple of Colm Cille, Dallán Forgaill, composed an elegy to the saint, Amra Choluim Chille: "Colum no longer has life or church/How shall a fool declare it - even Nera?/God's prophet, whom he placed in South Sion/Has just passed away."
An evocative visual response to the Amra has been created by artist Brian Ferran, which will be exhibited at Christ Church.
Iona is today home to an ecumenical religious community. From Reformation times to the present, a tradition of worship in Gaelic has continued in Presbyterian churches in Scotland, particularly in the Western Isles and Highlands.
Large congregations join in unrehearsed psalm-singing, led by a precentor (he who leads the praise). Taking part in the Christ Church celebration will be the Scottish Gaelic Psalm Singers. Their evocative sound has been likened to the rise and fall of waves washing against the walls of the church.
Numerous churches of different religious denominations in Ireland and Scotland are dedicated to Colm Cille/Columba. It is said that the saint visited Connemara, and the traditional pattern is still observed on his feast day, June 9th.
Upgrading Clancy from Inis Mór will lecture at Christ Church on the Columban folklore tradition, while Macdara Ó Conaola from neighbouring Inis Oírr will sing at the concert.
Also performing will be well-known singer Róisín Elsafty (who works with the Béal Binn Irish language community in Bray, Co Wicklow) along with Scottish Gaelic singer Mary Smith.
St Colm Cille and the breadth of Gaelic culture, which transcends frontiers of land, history and religion, will be re-imagined: "The humanity . . . that a thousand years has not severed."
Aonghus Dwane is Republic of Ireland Officer with Colmcille (Éirinn's Alba). Details of Colmcille@Christ Church are available from 01-453 8870 and www.colmcille.net