Saint Coemhan of Anatrim, November 3
November 3 is the day on which the Irish calendars commemorate Saint Coemhan, who is associated with a monastic foundation at Anatrim, County Laois. Father Edward Carrigan describes the circumstances...
View ArticleFeast of All the Saints of Ireland, November 6
November 6 is the Feast of All the Saints of Ireland and below is a tribute from the 'Irish Bollandist' himself, dear old Canon O'Hanlon, whose monumental efforts are such an inspiration to anyone who...
View ArticleSaint Colmán the Pilgrim, November 7
On November 7 we commemorate a Saint Colmán who is called 'the Pilgrim' on the later Irish calendars. The 12th-century Martyrology of Gorman records at this day:Colman lergrinn loigt[h]ech, Colmán,...
View ArticleSaint Benen of Armagh, November 9
November 9 is the feast of Saint Benen (Benignus), a saint listed in the household of Saint Patrick as the chanter or psalm-singer. Last year I presented an account of his life by Archbishop John Healy...
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Saint Áed Mac Bricc, November 10
November 10 is the feast of Saint Áed Mac Bricc and below is a paper on his life and the locality associated with him by the nineteenth-century scholarly Anglican cleric, George T. Stokes. As I...
View ArticleIrish Devotion to Saint Martin of Tours
November 11 is the feastday of one of the fathers of Gaulish monasticism, Saint Martin of Tours, whose Life by Sulpicius Severus influenced the future writing of hagiography. Martin was a saint much...
View ArticleSaint Sinell of Cleenish, November 12
On November 12 we commemorate Saint Sinell of Cleenish island in County Fermanagh. Saint Sinell was one of the disciples of Saint Finnian of Clonard, 'tutor of the saints of Ireland' and in his turn...
View ArticleSaint Caillin of Fenagh, November 13
November 13 is the feast of Saint Caillin of Fenagh, a saint of whom many stories are told. The character of some of these tales gave the writer of the following account, the 19th-century Anglican...
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Saint Laurence O'Toole, November 14
Pictorial Lives of the Saints (1878)November 14 is the commemoration of a twelfth-century saint, Laurence (Lorcán) O'Toole, whose life and career I have only recently begun to research. It seems that...
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Saint Fintan of Rheinau, November 15
November 15 is the feast of a ninth-century Irish saint who laboured in continental Europe, Fintan of Rheinau. In the article below the Irish Ecclesiastical Record's German specialist, Father J.F....
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Saint Columbanus of Bobbio, November 21
The Martyrology of Donegal at November 21 contains the entry 'COLUMBAN, Abbot, who was in Italy'. Behind this stark sentence lies a rich and multi-layered story of a complex and important Irishman and...
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St Columbanus: 'A Man of Firsts'
St Columbanus is a man of firsts in Irish history. The first Irish writer to leave a literary corpus, he is the first Irishman in the surviving literature to describe himself as Irish and to give an...
View ArticleThe Death of Saint Columbanus, November 23
Below is the text of a most interesting paper which seeks to explain why Saint Columbanus is commemorated on 21 November, when the day of his repose or natalis is held to be on 23 November. The dating...
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The Tomb and Relics of Saint Columbanus
Below is a short paper by Margaret Stokes on the tomb and relics of Saint Columbanus written in the late 1880s. As we are dealing with scholarship well over a century old I would treat the theories of...
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Saint Columbanus and the Dangers of the Forest
We continue the octave of posts in honour of the 1400th anniversary of the death of Saint Columbanus with a glimpse into how the saint dealt with the dangers of life in the forests. I am particularly...
View ArticleSaint Columbanus and the Miracle of Water from the Rock
Canon O'Hanlon brings us another vignette from the Life of Saint Columbanus, this time heavily-laden with Old Testament allusions, as he describes how our saint is able through his prayers to make...
View ArticleSaint Columbanus at Annegray
We continue the octave of posts in honour of the 1400th anniversary of the death of Saint Columbanus with a portrait of the way of life he pursued at Annegray. It reveals a tension familiar to the...
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Saint Columbanus: a divisive figure?
Although there is no doubt of the historic importance of Saint Columbanus, it must also be acknowledged that he was in some ways a controversial figure. To my yellowing copy of Columbanus in his Own...
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Naomh Columbán san Eoraip
We conclude the octave of posts in honour of the 1400th anniversary of the death of Saint Columbanus with a review of his life and legacy from the late Cardinal Tomás Ó Fiaich, whose collection...
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Saint Regulus and the Relics of Saint Andrew
November 30 is the feast of Saint Andrew the Apostle and last week I attended a lecture by Scottish historian Michael Turnbull on Saint Andrew and the Emperor Constantine. It was a fascinating account...
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