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Milford Church -- Centenary. May 4, 2003

Homily by Rev. Robert Forde.

Bishop John, fellow priests, and good people of Milford:

"Christ yesterday, and to-day and the same for ever." (Hebrews, ch. 13,)

This is a sacred place. To-day is a sacred time. We are very privileged to be here.

Throughout the history of Christianity, there have been many sacred times and places.
Scripture tells us : 'When the fullness of time had come God sent his Son, born of a woman.' The angels proclaimed the Good News through the shepherds to the world: "Fear not , to-day is born to you a Saviour." The time was the first Christmas Night and the place was Bethlehem.

There would come another place and another time. Calvary (Golgotha) was the place and 3 oclock on the first Good Friday the time. From the sixth hour until the ninth hour Jesus hung on the Cross. His voice was heard in the darkness: 'I have finished the work you gave me to do' and with a loud cry, he breathed his last breath.

Bethlehem and Calvary are for all time sacred places, sacred because they are so close to Jesus Christ, our Saviour. Christianity is a historic religion, a religion of sacred times and places and at the centre is the man Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God.

This was the Good News that St. Patrick and his companions brought to Ireland in the fifth century.
St. Ita of Kileedy, who lived about 550, St. Berehert of Tullylease, the convert Englishman, who came to us about the year 700, and the other saints of that time whose names are not recorded, these saintly people
brought the teachings of Jesus Christ to this area, this parish.
In due time, they set up their own sacred places, they built churches, schools, oratories and to-day there remain but a few inscribed stones, few in number but very precious, as they remind us of the sacred places of those distant ancestors of ours.

Time passed, the population increased and the faith grew stronger. By the Middle Ages, a number of churches had been built in the area, Knawhill, Ballinakill, Deliga, Cloncrew. Four old cemeteries now contain the remains of these pre-reformation churches and the ruined walls of a strange little oratory, called 'The Teampallin,' can still be seen not far from the old Castle, now also in ruins.

These ancient, pre-reformation churches were sacred places to these people, our ancestors. They brought their children to them to be baptised in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. To these churches they came to worship on Sundays. Marriages were special times for each family and of course to these places they brought their dead to say a last, prayerful farewell. At these sacred times in their lives, God was very close to them, especially in their little churches.

Who were these people? We do not know. They left no records. But we are certain they were predecessors of the people of to-day and their ruined churches are stark reminders of their deep faith in a good God, a faith which they were very careful to pass on to us.
Once again, time passed along and we come to modern times and to the two churches which immediately preceeded this beautiful building, which we are honouring to-day.

About the year 1750, a church was built at Shroneapookeen, a small townland about a mile from the present village and it served both Milford and Tullylease .
It was the 18th century, the century of the Penal Laws, according to which a catholic in Ireland had no rights. Legally, a catholic was a non-person. Catholics were forbidden by law to be educated, to open a

school, to practise their religion. Priests were banished and churches were closed. Much depended on how strictly the local landlord imposed the law.
This church at Shroneapookeen was probably built during the second half of the century, when the penal laws were being relaxed. It was a very simple church in a secluded area, which did not attract attention. Fr. O'Donoghue was the last priest in charge and he was buried there in 1827.

The following year, 1828, Fr. Robert O'Riordan was appointed parish priest. In 1829, with the help of Daniel O'Connell, Catholic Emancipation was passed, giving total freedom to catholics. Fr. O'Riordan, availing of the liberal laws, immediately built a new church, not hidden away in a glen or valley, but in the centre of the village. Some years later, it was described as a commodious modern building. This church served the people of Milford for the entire 19th century and Fr. Bob, as he was affectionately known, was parish priest for 41 of those years.

Fr. William Cosgrave and Fr. William Fitzgerald were parish priests for short periods. In 1888, Bishop Robert Browne appointed an energetic, charismatic parish priest to Milford, Fr. William Coghlan.
A native of Churchtown, he was educated in Maynooth and was curate in Charleville for 6 years before being appointed to Milford. His relatives are present here to-day and we welcome them.

The following year, during a visitation of the parish by Bishop Browne, it was decided that the old church was beyond repair and that a new church should be built. A parish committee was formed and an architect, Mr. Maurice Alphonsus Hennessy, was appointed.
Maurice Hennessy, who had his offices in South Mall in Cork, was a very well known and respected architect throughout Munster from about 1875 to his death in 1909. His work included churches in Limerick, Durras, Skibbereen, Rathcormac, Belgooly, Kinsale, and especially churches in Charleville and Timoleague, both of which are similar in design to Milford, though of course much larger.

The Contractor was a local man from this parish, Denis Linehan, an honest man, who was very well known and respected. We welcome representatives of the Linehan family, who have also joined us to-day. They can be very proud of the work of their ancestors. The beautiful stone was all quarried locally and the colourful stained glass was by a firm in Youghal. The parish priest got wholehearted support from the people of the parish who, according to the Examiner, 'voluntarily taxed themselves to the extent of 7s 6d in the pound to provide the greater part of the £3,400 required for the erection of the church.'

This church was opened and consecrated one hundred years ago on this day, May 4, and probably at this very time. Looking around the church to-day, how beautiful it looks and how well it has survived the test of time. Thanks to you the people of the parish and to your present parish priest, Fr. Dick Hegarty, who is taking such great care of it.

What extraordinary faith and devotion, and indeed courage, the people of Milford showed when they built this church. The year was 1900. The disastrous years of the famine were a mere 50 years before. In some of the townlands of the parish, up to 60 even 70% of the population died during the famine, or emigrated immediately afterwards. Indeed there were people present in the church on that morning, who lived through the famine and who could vividly remember it.
The struggle for ownership of the land was still in progress and we had not obtained our freedom.

Despite all the disadvantages the people and their priests chose this piece of land as a sacred place and on it put a building, which they consecrated to God. It would be that sacred place, where the people would come to meet their God in a very special way, in good times and in times that were not so good, in times of joy and in times of sorrow.
What extraordinary faith and devotion.

What extraordinary devotion also they had for the Mother of God, when they dedicated this church to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Belief in this Doctrine of the Assumption was wide-spread in the Church for centuries, but it was not officially defined by the Pope as an infallible doctrine until 1950, almost 50 years after the dedication of this church.

Here are the words of Pope Pius XII, as he defined the Doctrine of the Assumption in 1950:
"We define it to be a divinely revealed dogma that the immaculate Mother of God, ever virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life , was assumed, body and soul, into heavenly glory."

The Blessed Virgin Mary is the only human being, body and soul, in Heaven to-day. She takes a very personal interest in the priests and people of Milford, who dedicated their church in her honour.

A hundred years have passed since the consecration of this church. During that century, great events have happened in the world:
World War I, the Rising of 1916, the Troubles of 1921, the bleak days of the 30s, especially for a rural farming area like Milford, World War II, the tragic emigration of the 50s and 60s, when so many of our people, especially our youth, were compelled to leave this area to earn a living and, in modern times, the changing pattern of rural society, when our rural values and way of life are being challenged.
And all the while, this church, this sacred place, remained unchanged as a place of calm and stability, where people dropped in, knowing they would meet their God and find peace.

The consecration of a church is a very special event. This church here, being a place of exceptional character and beauty, and being totally free of debt, was consecrated on the day it was opened. The crosses, surmounted by candles, which you see on the church walls, mark the places which Bishop Robert Browne anointed with the holy oils on that opening day.
To understand the real meaning of a Church, we must return to the history of God's chosen people in the Bible.
God chose a special group of people and made a covenant, an agreement, with them. He said to them " If you will be my people and obey my commandments, I will be your God and I will be with you always."
They broke their agreements many times and each time God renewed it. When God rescued them from their exile in Egypt, Moses led them through the desert for 40 years and God fed them with food from Heaven.
He ordered them to make a portable box made of special wood and gold and into it they placed the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments, which Moses got at Mount Sinai. They called it The Ark of the Covenant and it was constantly enshrouded in a cloud to indicate the presence of God.

When eventually they arrived in Jerusalem, they built a special Temple and part of that Temple was
called The Holy of Holies, into which they placed the Ark of the Covenant. It was the most sacred part
of the Temple and it was separated from the rest of the building by a large curtain or veil
No person was allowed to enter the Holy of Holies, except the High Priest and he only once a year.

The Holy of Holies gave meaning and purpose to the whole Temple, for there, shrouded in mysterious darkness, was the very throne of God . It was this that made the Temple the house of God. It was here he dwelt among them and answered their craving for his friendship, a friendship which they had not known since he banished their First Parents from Paradise, where they had walked with God in the cool of the evening Here in the Temple they could meet and worship God and show their love for him, as they remembered and recalled all the great things he had done for them. This was indeed the holiest place on earth.

But there came a day and an hour that changed everything. When Jesus Christ died on the Cross at 3 o'clock on Good Friday, darkness came over the whole earth, there was a great earthquake, rocks were split, and the veil or curtain guarding the Holy of Holies in the Temple in Jerusalem was torn asunder from top to bottom.
From that moment, the holiest place on earth was no longer in the Temple in Jerusalem.
The Holy of Holies was and is Jesus Christ, the Son of God, walking this earth as one of us and present in the Eucharist in the Tabernacles of our churches. That is the reason why we are celebrating this church of the Assumption of Our Lady here in Milford to-day.

On May 4, 1903, this church was consecrated, set aside for the worship of God.
The Preface of the Mass at the Consecration of a Church is interesting. Every time you go to Mass, you will hear the priest saying to you, the people :
"The Lord be with you, Lift up your hearts, Let us give thanks to the Lord our God;"
Then, after a slight hesitation, he changes his tone of voice. He is no longer talking to you, the people, but to God Himself: "Father, All Powerful and Everliving God"
As a finite, mortal being, the priest in our name dares to address the infinite God. But that is what God wishes us to do. The Preface continues:
"All-powerful and Ever-living God, we thank you now for this house of prayer, in which you bless your family as we come to you in pilgrimage"
How important it is to say thanks, thanks to God for the faith which enables us to come in here and understand the true meaning of this building. It is a house of prayer.
A special thanks to God for making it his house, his home, and inviting us to come in. In this church, God acknowledges us as his family on our pilgrim way through life to our true home in Heaven.

The Preface of the Mass of Consecration continues: " Here, Father, you reveal your presence by sacramental signs." The All Powerful everliving God reveals his presence in this Church by sacramental signs. Let us give examples:
When the Scriptures are read in church, as they were to-day, it is God Himself who speaks.
When a child is baptised in church, it is God who baptises.
When two people exchange their marriage vows, it is God who joins them together.
These indeed are signs through which God reveals his presence.

But there is no more precious presence of God on earth than the presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. The Mass and the Eucharist are God's greatest gifts.
Let us quickly look at one aspect of the Mass.

Immediately after the Consecration in the Mass, the priest says:
"Father calling to mind the death your Son endured for our salvation, his glorious Resurrection and Ascension
into Heaven, and ready to meet him when he comes again, we offer you in thanksgiving this holy and living
sacrifice."
The Church teaches us that this memorial at the Consecration is not a mere calling to mind of the great events of the past. Rather by the power of the Holy Spirit, the Death and Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus Christ are recalled and made powerfully present to us.
These eternal events happened once in time and can never be repeated. Jesus can never die again, death has no power over him. But at the memorial at the Consecration of the Mass, these saving events of the life of Jesus Christ are re-presented, perpetuated, made present again at that moment.

Therefore, never again can we say, I cannot pray, or my prayer is of no value, or the Mass means nothing to me. At that moment after the Consecration , Jesus Christ offers his death on the Cross, his Resurection and his Ascension, made powerfully present at that moment. He offers them to His Father in Heaven and he invites us to join him in that offering. Therefore, our prayer in the Mass is of infinite value.

On the 4th of May, 1903, this church was consecrated to God. To-day, exactly one hundred years later, 4th of May , 2003, Bishop John will consecrate this new altar. By words and sacramental signs, he will show us the sacredness of the altar, as he anoints it with Holy Oils and consecrates it to God as a place where God becomes present for us in a most intimate and mysterious way. Attend carefully to what Bishop John does and listen to the words he uses.

To day, as we celebrate the centenary of our church, it evokes special memories for all of us.
You recall your First Communion, your Confirmation, your Marriage in this church, with all the memories it brings back.
You recall the Christmas visits to the Crib as a small child and later with your own children.
You remember the quiet visits to the church to ask God for guidance in times of trial and difficulties.
You remember the sad funerals of your dear friends.
Your life has been entertwined with this church over the years, and to- day in this centenary Mass relive it with the good Lord.

To-day too you remember and pray for all those who influenced your life - your parents, your priests, your teachers, your friends, your neighbours. Many are gone to eternity. This is your memorial book containing some of their names and pictures. It will be placed on the altar at the Offertory of the Mass.

We remember also all those who are entered in the Baptismal and Marriage Registers of the parish. The first baptismal entry for this church was Edmund Fox, son of Patrick and Brigid Fox, who was baptised by Rev. William Coghlan on 11 May, 1903.
The first entry in the Marriage Register was Michael Guiry of Doonagh and Nora O'Brien of Lyra, who were married on 16th July, 1903. Rev. W. Coghlan was present.
There are hundreds of names entered in these registers, many totally forgotten. But the gentle Jesus has not forgotten them.
We recall to-day all our emigrants scattered throughout the world, the many priests, brothers and sisters from our parish who have done and are doing such great work for God, the hundreds of young people , who have left this parish to earn a living.
We pray for all our parishioners who await the Resurrection in foreign cemeteries, far from their native parish.
We bring them all to the Altar of God in this church which they knew so well, remembering the great doctrine of the Communion of Saints -- that the saints in Heaven, the Souls in Purgatory and we here on earth are all members of the great family of God.
We ask Our Lady of the Assumption to take care of this parish and of all our parishioners and we ask her to ask her Son to pour his blessings upon us all.

"Christ yesterday, and to-day and the same for ever."

Solemn Consecration

Taken from the Cork Examiner, Monday Morning, May 4th 1903

The solemn rites of opening the new Church of the Assumption at Milford, Co.Cork was performed yesterday by his Lordship the Most Rev. Dr. Browne, Bishop of Cloyne. The sacred function was marked with all the ceremony which the church is wont to associate with so auspicious an event and a goodly concourse of clergy and an extremely large congregation were present at the first Mass offered up within the walls of the Church.
An event of so much significance in the religious history of an individual parish would under any circumstances be a memorable on to all those privileged to take part in it, but the happy conditions which have left the Church free from the smallest encumbrance in the way of debt, and which, therefore enabled the impressive ceremonial of consecration to the solemnised, rendering the occasion one of deep interest in diocesan annals also. The zeal on the part of the Reverend Parish Priest the Rev. Wm. Coughlan and the whole hearted support accorded to his efforts by the people of the parish, who voluntarily taxed themselves to the extent of 7s 6d in the pound to provide the greater part of the £3,400 required for the erection of the Church, the result must be one for sincere pride and congratulation. An idea of the greatness of the task they have so successfully accomplished may be better appreciated when it is remembered that Milford is the third Church consecrated in the Diocese, the other two being Mitchelstown and Carrigtwohill.
The new edifice which stands on a commanding site in the village, is of beautiful proportions, and was designed and completed by Mr. M.A. Hennessy architect of Cork. It is treated in the Early English period of Gothic Architecture, and consists of nave, double isles, sanctuary, side chapels, gallery and sacristy. It measures in extreme length 90 feet and in breath 48 feet. The isles are divided from the nave by arcades of five bays each, with pointed arches borne by octagonal pillars, with moulded caps and bases. The isles are lighted by coupled two-light windows and the clearstory by trefoil lights. The interior produces a pleasing picture, the roofs are of wrought pine, stained and varnished with massive timbers with well wrought and graceful curved bases. The exterior is a fine piece of work, the mellow tints of the local stone contrasting harmoniously with the buff shades of the dressings, particularly the front gable, is worthy of attention. A massive pointed doorway leads to the Church, above is an elegant rose window, while towering upwards from the gable stands the belfry, crowned by a floriated cross. The east and a chancel gable, are equally bold and
striking, and are admirably grouped with the adjoining sacristy. The high altar is of Carrara marble with pillars of Cork red, serpentines, etc. and is an exquisite piece of workmanship. It is lighted by two tall lancet windows. The side Alters are of polished oak neatly finished and are consecrated to the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph. The Church is furnished with pews over the whole aisle space and the entire appointments have been carried out in a most complete and tasteful manner.

In most unfavourable contrast to the new building, the old Church, from which it is separated by some twenty yards or so, was probably the most unsuitable amongst the few of its kind left in the South. The structure was originally a mill, and occupied a very unsuitable situation. It was a low simple structure altogether without ornament, and entirely inadequate to the needs of the congregation. The change from this dilapidated structure to the fine new Church just consecrated is amply illustrative of the Church's new career.

The Mass which succeeded the consecration and opening was celebrated at eleven o'clock and was presided over by his Lordship the Bishop, the celebrant being Rev. T. Crowley CC Milford. The assistants at the throne were - The Very Rev. Canon Morrissey PP Banteer and the Very Rev. Canon O'Connell PP Kanturk, the other clergy present were very Rev. Canon Higgins PP Castletownroche, the Rev. W. Coughlan PP Milford, the Rev. Father Frawley CC Freemount, the Rev. Father Brown Queenstown, the Rev. Father Murphy English Mission and the Rev. Father Moore CC Newtownshandrum.

Sermon by the Very Rev. Canon Higgins P.P.

After the First Gospel, the Very Rev. Canon Higgins PP, preached a powerful and eloquent sermon appropriate to the occasion. Taking for his text: "I rejoiced in the things that were said to me; we shall go into the House of the Lord" (Psalm CXX1,VI) He said - My Lord Bishop, beloved brethren, - We are assembled to participate in an impressive ceremony suggestive of many thoughts and to see a building specially devoted to the service of Almighty God. Before we part the Son of the Eternal Father will come amongst us to sanctify more by His Sacramental Presence the house solemnly blessed by His Minister when, if I may so express myself, He takes possession of the mansion prepared for his abode. Henceforth, it will be a place of worship, the House of the Lord. To Him who has supreme dominion over them, all things belong, and He is bound by no limitations of space, but He has signified His Divine will that particular localities be assigned wherein special worship should be paid to Him. Nobody reading that chapter of the inspired story in which Jacob's journey to Mesopotamia is recorded can fail to observe how the place where he slept in the open air, where God designed to speak to him in prophetic words of great import, and to show him that strange communication between Heaven and earth was deemed sacred by the servant of the Lord, for awaking from his favoured sleep, he said "Indeed the Lord is in this place, and I know it not"; and trembling he said, "How terrible is this place! This is no other but the House of God and the Gate of Heaven". Then to distinguish by a visible token the singular holiness of the ground "he took the stones which he had laid under his and set it up for a title, pouring oil on top of it and he called the place Bethel which before was called Luza". By all these ceremonies the patriarch did in primitive times we are doing today. He dedicated to God a special place in creation which he would be most unwilling to see used for any profane purpose and would be indignant if he found it had been desecrated.
You, my dear brethren, have selected a site and on it you have set up stones for a title, and you come to offer them to the Lord, from your hand the Bishop receives them, blesses and consecrates them, and prays that what you have built to be the House of God may prove, in a certain sense, to be the Gate of Heaven for you and your posterity. The Lord has no need of Temples made by hands to add to His own intrinsic glory. He needs no definite abode in this universe to serve as the seat of His grandeur and power, as earthly monarchs have their places; for when we are under the broad canopy of the sky we can commune with His Divine Majesty ever present and can regard the wide world around us as one vast temple where everything in nature should dispose us to raise our minds to the mighty Maker of all and to the Giver of all good. But for us, poor finite creatures something more is required than the solitary worship inspired by the contemplation of God's works to keep us mindful of our obligations to the Creator. We have to guard against our propensity to love created things for their own sake, to become inordinately attached to them and forget of Him by Whom they were made. Hence the necessity for a place of meeting where, social beings as we are, we may unite in acts of adoration, praise and prayer, gain warmth of feeling by combined worship, and form one family in the sight of Our Father who is in Heaven.
Thus do we find in every form of religion men have shown a natural desire of congregating for formal prayer and sacrifice, and, though the heathen may offer his supplication to his idol and venerate in secrecy, as the Jew or the Christian can speak in solitude to God, we know that the most uncultivated barbarians meet in a body to maintain a community of sentiment and to add solemnity to the rites of their religion. Some of the rude monuments the Pagan inhabitants of this country raised up in the places where they collected to worship the sun or other object of idolatry are still in existence, and if we travel afar we shall be struck with astonishment on seeing the remains of the huge and massive temples erected in honour of false deities in other climes. This desire of meeting for religious worship may be the result of some manifestation of the Divine Will made in the beginning of the world, or it may be an innate tendency of the human mind. Whatever be its origin, it is pleasing to God, and therefore when we read of His dealings with the Israelites in the desert, we have Him directing Moses to construct the Tabernacle in a most elaborate manner, and set it in their midst, to denote their place of sacrifice, and be their centre of reunion.
In later times, when the people of Israel had, in fulfilment of the promise made to Abraham, become a great nation, we learn how magnificent was the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem, and how, so long as the Jews refrained from sin and idolatry, it was not only an object of profound veneration to them, but was dear unto God as the place where His glory dwelt. It was a wondrous spectacle to Jew and Gentile, for wealth had been lavished on it and great was its splendour. Not many miles from that temple, while it was yet in all its beauty, a Child was born amid the humblest surroundings, on a bleak night in winter, who grew to manhood and was heard to say once upon a time that, though the birds and the foxes had their habitations, He had not a place whereon to lay His head. Little would have thought who should have looked on Him in the manger at Bethlehem, or should have heard Him utter those words as He walked along the way, that a day was to arrive when the noblest and the richest temples in the world would be His dwelling places, and be dearer to God, and more tenderly revered by men than the courts and the altars of the temple of Solomon. That Child of a Hebrew maid was the Son of God become man for our salvation, who praise and glory to His name is coming here today. He is coming not as God came of old to the Temple of Jerusalem, when he indicated his presence by a cloud. Holy Scripture, describing the dedication of that great House of God, to which the Ark of the Covenant had been brought, says: "And it came to pass, when the priests were out of the sanctuary, that a cloud filled the house of the Lord. Then Solomon said: The Lord said that He would dwell in a cloud. Behold I have built a house for thy dwelling, to be thy most firm throne for ever." Exultant beyond expression must have been the joy of Solomon, as he gazed on that wonderful cloud, and in it discerned a sign of the presence of the Almighty, and of the Divine approved bestowed on the work he had accomplished.
How far more intense should not be your sentiments of gladness and of gratitude, for you are to have not merely a figurative representation of the presence of God in this Church but to have God Himself under this its roof, reposing in the Tabernacle that your hands have made. In this doctrine of our faith lies the explanation of our strong attachments to our places of worship, be they grand or be they little; and from it the heretic and the unbeliever may learn why Catholics contribute so freely and so bountifully the means to build and to endow them, and why the toil of the workman and the skill of the artist are never so willingly applied as they are in making and decorating a home for Jesus in the Sacrament of His love. It is our belief that the Incarnate Son of God has not left us orphans, but stays with us, day and night, all the year around, in the Tabernacle on our altar, concealing indeed, His Divinity and His humanity under a Sacramental veil, but yet, as we are assured by His own unerring word, really present, true God and true man, the only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. We believe that He is there to welcome and graciously grant us audience whenever we come reverently before Him; that He offers Himself daily in sacrifice to his heavenly Father, through the ministration of his priests, like He offered Himself on Calvary, and that He gives us His Flesh to eat and his Blood to drink in the Holy Communion even as He gave them on the eve of His Passion to his beloved apostles in the guest chamber at Jerusalem. It is no matter of surprise then that each of us should say, in the words of the text: "I rejoiced in the things that were said to me. We shall go into the House of the Lord."
Every sanctuary opened for the reception of the Blessed Sacrament and for the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a comfort and joy to us in our journey through life and so has it been wherever the Gospel of Christ has been authoritatively preached from the day of Pentecost to the present hour, for true Christians loved the House of God, not only as their place of assembly for public prayer and for instruction, but they venerated it more affectionately and held every stone of it sacred, because within its enclosure was the Divine Substance that had been prefigured by the mantra kept in the holiest part of the Jewish temple, and because on its altar was renewed every morning the sacrifice offered for the redemption of the world. In the first ages of Christianity it was not possible to celebrate the Divine Mysteries with any becoming display of pomp or ceremony.
The Church, like its Heavenly Founder was poor and persecuted. Though it had its custody the marvellous legacy of the Blessed Sacrament, it had neither the resources nor the opportunities of showing, in its external observances, anything like befitting respect to the Divine Gift. Of the Church in its early life it may well be said in the words of Saint Paul that it was "as I have nothing, yet possessing all things." When Our Saviour ate the Pascal supper with His apostles, and bequeathed to them the Sacrament of the Eucharist that His presence might be perpetuated in His Church through their agency and that of their successors in the priestly office, He selected a private house for the occasion. Sending Saint Peter and Saint John to make the necessary preparations, He said to them: "Behold, as you go into the city, there shall meet you a man carrying a pitcher of water; follow him into the house where he entereth in and you shall say to the man of the house: The Master saith to thee, where is the guest chamber where I may eat the Pasch with my disciples. And he will show you a large dining room furnished, and there prepare."
In poverty He lived from His birth to His death, and the circumstances in which he condescended to be placed as mortal man did not permit the Lord of all creation to choose a more pretentious scene for this act of infinite love. He entrusted to His Church what to use the words of Solomon, "the heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain," but He left it no store of worldly wealth; and, therefore, when His Apostles and Disciples came together to celebrate the Eucharistic Sacrifice after He had gone to His Father and had sent His Holy Spirit on them, they assembled in the homes of the faithful, as we are informed by several passages of Holy Writ.
The same custom had to be observed for long years after the Apostolic age, for the Christian name of odious to the Pagans and to the Jews. In Rome, the mighty capital of the world, the faith had been preached by St. Peter and St. Paul and in the midst of the worldliness, luxury and depravity abounding in that city, the seed sown in the name of God had fructified, so that many were led to believe in Christ., though to profess such belief meant for them a cruel death. For 300 years they associated in secret, and to this day, my brethren, visitors to Rome explore with interest the labyrinthine excavations beneath its surface to view the sanctuaries where in time of trial, martyrs, confessors, and virgins invoked God, received the Sacraments, and heard the Holy Mass. In those obscure hiding places altars were set over the dead bodies of those who had fallen victims to heathen fury for the cause of Christ, and amongst the sepulchres of their brethren who had died a natural death, but the death of saints.
Painting and sculpture, the work of their holy hands, are to be seen in the darksome recesses to attest the natural inclination they had to make good impressions on the soul by the senses, and to dress and decorate the House of God, so that even when the altars were hidden in dens and caverns the same spirit that animates you in loving the beauty of God's house was in the hearts of those whose faith was like your own, but whose social condition was so dissimilar. After a protracted term of frightful persecution peace came to the afflicted children of the Church and a Christian emperor was seated on the throne of the Caesars. History tells of the churches built and enriched by him and by his mother St. Helen, not alone in the western part of his empire, but in the Far East, in the native country of our Redeemer and on the very spot where that Blessed Redeemer commended His soul to His father and died. His Christian subjects imitated the example of their Imperial master, for no sooner had they obtained freedom than they turned it to good account by providing more worthy receptacles for the Sacrament of the Altar. Then did the Cross of Christ appear on the summits of the fabrics that had risen as it were by miracle.
The Pagans saw it and wondered as in our day we have wondered to see the sign of our salvation that was reviled by Protestants, and is still decried by numbers of them as a superstitious emblem and a graven thing to be avoided, finding its way to the roofs of Protestant churches and to the monuments they erect above their dead. Catholics have ever loved the cross, in whose honour the Church holds a feast on this very day, the 3rd of May, and they have never been ashamed of it; and the Catholic tradition brings along the sign of the cross from the frescoes on the walls of the Roman catacombs to the walls of the Church in Milford where one will find the same rites and ceremonies, the same liturgy and practices, the same Seven Sacraments and daily Sacrifice that one would have found under the pavement of Rome in the time of the Caesars. We inherit them all in a direct line of succession in the faith. We have never lost the inheritance like those who are seeking now to regain it partially by a process of imitation that seems to be dependent on the caprices of fashion.
My dear brethren, when St. Patrick came under the standard of the Cross, to preach to our ancestors and bring them from the darkness of Paganism to the light of truth, he told them of the Blessed Eucharist. Christian altars supplanted those of the Druids in our island, and the converts, naturally turned their attention to devising some fitting tabernacle in which the Divine Presence might rest amongst them. As we may well conjecture, the first oratories they built were poor and simple probably of wattles, and very unworthy of their destination, yet having, like the widow's mite, a merit of their own before Heaven. Between the death of our Apostle and the Danish invasions, a considerable development in architecture took place in Ireland. Churches of stone were erected and scholars who are competent to offer an opinion on the subject affirm that remains of some of these specimens of early Irish art, small in their dimensions but solid in their construction, are here and there throughout the provinces and in the little islands on our coast.
When the Normans set foot on that coast to conquer Ireland, and bring it under English rule, all Western Europe professed a common religious belief; and this momentous event in our history occurred about a time when wonderful structures, beautiful in their design, stately and symmetrical in their proportions, and splendid in their adornment, were springing up to the glory of God in many lands across the sea. Whatever evil the strangers brought in their train upon the nation they subdued, they were not slow in displaying their religious zeal by building churches and monasteries. Some of our native chieftains emulated them, and in those ages called dark, but whose architectural monuments here and elsewhere would alone prove their intellectual cultivation, the Blessed Sacrament was enthroned in spacious, lofty and beauteous temples in which the praises of God and of His Virgin Mother and of His saints were sung by priest and monk. It is well to remember too, that if in those ages the bulk of the population was wanting in secular learning, it was strong in faith; and whilst contemporary records tell much about the munificence of the wealthy, they give ample account of the manner in which the poor made sacrifices of their time and labour, and laid themselves often under heavy tributes to have their share in the glorious movement.
What a change, my dear brethren, passed over the face of the land when England revolted from God to the command of a lustful and rapacious King, and strove, but strove in vain, to seduce Ireland from her allegiance to the Pope, the Vicar of Christ, and compel her to abjure the faith preached by Patrick. Churches and monasteries were pillaged and plundered until there remained but their bare walls. The faithful would be permitted to worship in them in this desecrated state to which they had been reduced, provided they conformed to the pernicious doctrines of their heretical governors. They were asked, amongst other outrages on their religious belief, to call the Holy Mass and act of idolatry, and to deny the real presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. You know the reply they made. You know the story of their fidelity to God and to His Christ. I need not speak of the ruthless persecution endured by our forefathers for hundreds of years, nor tell how rather than become apostates and bend their knees to Baal, they abandoned the churches and the shrines there were dear to them, as a bird forsakes the violated nest. England apostatised. Ireland remained faithful.
If you cross over the channel you will see in England the old churches of the middle ages still standing and still in use. They lift their spires amid the smoke of the factories and the bustle of the streets and show their grey towers amongst the trees in rural valleys. Never does a Catholic visit one of those ancient structures, built in the days of faith and now employed for Protestant worship, without experiencing a depressing sensation as if of loneliness or of want; for, whilst recognising much to remind him of the ceremonial of the true religion and to recall the past to his mind, he sees no tabernacle and knows that Jesus is not there where once he has a home; and feels as did the Magdalene on the morning of the Resurrection when, having looked with bitter disappointment into the tomb, she exclaimed: "They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him." Why do we not see those venerable churches here? Because whey they were diverted from their original purpose and were intended to serve as preaching-houses for heretics, no congregations were found to occupy them, so they fell into disuse and most of them disappeared.
A few medieval cathedrals and churches, no longer in our possession, are seen in our cities. One of them in Dublin is called by the name of the National Apostle, St. Patrick, under whose invocation it was dedicated to God when it was ours. Another is nearer to you, in Limerick and, strange to tell, retains the name of God's holy Mother, Mary, in whose honour it was founded by an Irish King named O'Brien. These survived the wreck, for they chanced to be in important situations where English garrisons, were established or where English State officials, merchants or adventurers had settled down, holding opinions that St. Patrick would surely have disowned and denounced, and having no respect for the Mother of God.
But throughout the country at large our parochial churches were either wilfully demolished by the hands of the spoiler, or they crumbled into ruins when the Irish people could no longer frequent them without becoming traitors to God and His truth. Their scanty remains are in many of our graveyards where the relics of those who praised God in them lie mingled with the clay awaiting the resurrection of the body; and the ivy-clad lateral walls and the broken gables are the sole remnants of the small but numerous churches in which our fathers bent the knee to God. Within these walls that we should esteem even in their decadence, Mass was said, the Sacraments were administered , the work of God was preached, and sorrowful hearts were comforted in days of old, when all, both Irish and English were one in faith as Christ and His Heavenly Father are one. England kept the buildings and lost the faith, Ireland kept the faith and lost the buildings.
When the Catholics were forced to quit their churches, that were now to become haunts of the birds and the beasts, they met in privacy, as did the early Christians, and practised their religion at the peril of their lives. They assisted at the Mass as often as they had the opportunity. Sometimes it was said in one of their humble homes. Sometimes, as at Bethlehem, a stable gave shelter to the King of the Kings when prudence demanded such a subterfuge. The sacred requisites for the proper, but lowly, celebrations were borne in fear to the deep covert, of the woods or to the brow of the mountain, and in retreats like these, whilst sentinels were stationed at outposts to give warning of the approach of soldiers, the persecuted Catholics adored the God in whom they trusted, and prayed to Him with a devotion and fervour that, by the help of His grace, may be imitated, but can never be surpassed. In our glens, or on the hills, we have particular places and large boulders, called in the Irish tongue by the name of the Mass or by a similar appellation, to revive the memory of the use they served in days gone by, when to honour our God according to His own law and the dictates of conscience was a felony by the law of the land.
At intervals in the penal times the veritable dark ages of the Irish Church, the faithful were permitted to assemble unostentatiously for their devotional exercises. In the beginning of 1743 this partial toleration was extended to them but in that year a frightful cry was raised against Papists, as their adversaries chose to name the Catholics, who were true to the Pope and who believed that in their loyalty to him, as their spiritual Sovereign, they were loyal to God. Protestant bishops and ministers wrote inflammatory pamphlets and made their pulpits ring with unchristian declamation against the suffering people. The laity only too eagerly followed the guidance of their clerical advisors and counselled the arrest of all the Catholic priests. Some of them even went so far as to demand the extermination of every member of our church. In compliance with this unholy clamour the Lord Lieutenant issued a proclamation proffering a heavy reward for the capture of bishop, secular priest or friar and for information given of anybody who dared to afford protection to one of our bishops.
Thereupon all the Catholic places of worship were of necessity closed, while the worshippers were again obliged to seek refuge in obscurity. In the spring of the next year a priest of the dioceses of Meath, Father John Fitzgerald said Mass at a terrible risk in a house in Dublin. It was an old, frail, tottering house. When the celebration was over, and the congregation had quietly stolen away the priest and nine other persons were crushed to death beneath the floor of an upper roof that fell on them. The sad calamity caused a great sensation and it would seem to be our destiny that something of a sensational kind is always required to secure for us even small instalments of justice; but, be that as it may, in consequence of this fatal accident, there was a little mitigation of the decrees against the Catholic form of worship and permission was again granted for the opening of our oratories.
To the great relief of the sorely distressed people Mass was said publicly in the capital city on St. Patrick's Day. Ever since that blessed day we have had our churches or chapels as they were contemptuously called by the dominant party and timorously by our own and by reason of their poverty and unsuitableness they scarcely even merited that name. Through dread of profanation the Blessed Sacrament was not reserved in them. It had to be kept in close exclusion by the priests. It was Hidden Life of Nazareth repeated in the Irish Church for all the long series of years we were subjected to persecution. With the relaxation of the penal laws Catholics began to raise their heads in the land wherein God had placed them and as link after link fell from the chain that bound them, they made efforts to improve the condition of their modest sanctuaries, but there were various difficulties to encounter. One of the greatest was to acquire a patch of ground on which to build. Protestant landlords often gave the accommodation, and I take the opportunity of gratefully acknowledging that in our own day, we not infrequently experienced the same kind liberality from proprietors who are not members of our Church.
Nowadays, when the old fireside tradition are fading away, and are so uncongenial with the taste and thought of our young men, who take but small interest in the history of our Church or of our country, it is not easy for many amongst us to realise how mean and miserable and ill-adapted to the sanctity of their purposes were almost all our chapels at the beginning of the last century. About ninety years ago evidence concerning their condition was given before a committee appointed by the British Legislature, when there was hope of obtaining some assistance from the State for improving them, but the hope was not fulfilled. The Government that has spent millions on an alien Church which oppressed Catholics and forced them to pay tithes for the support of its own clergy and their families would not give a penny for such an object. From the testimony of the men who were examined by the committee, amongst whom were Protestants of rank and position as well as Catholic bishops and priests, we learn that most of the chapels were wretched, thatched fabrics, with earthen floors. One witness, a gentleman who acted as a land agent for an English nobleman on estates in this and in an adjoining county, stated that the chapels on the property with which he was officially connected were - these are his words - "very wretched, thatched chapels, so irregular in the line of their roof that they looked like several cabins joined together".
We can have, no doubt, for other witnesses, Catholic and Protestant, gave similar evidence that this was the general state of our chapels then, and indeed some have been in a still more lamentable plight, for the property he managed was not among sterile mountains or unproductive swamps, but in fertile plains, where many a field of wheat was reaped and pasture was abundant. These poor substitutes for the churches that had been levelled or ruined, were also said to be altogether insufficient to contain the congregations, and several witnesses declared that numbers of the devout worshippers had not even the broken thatch to protect them, but were to be seen Sunday and holiday kneeling in the dust of the mud, exposed to the glare of the sun in summer and to the wind and rain, the snow and hail at other seasons of the year. A century has not elapsed since that evidence was tendered and oh, my brethren, have not we great reason to be grateful to God for what He in His mercy has done for us! Well may we say with the Psalmist: He hath not done in like manner to every nation." If the witnesses who appeared before that Committee could arise from their graves and survey the country today they would see many wonderful changes in every department of society. They would be surprised at the practical results of scientific study as exhibited in the advance made in our social state.
Yet, perhaps what would be to them the most surprising phenomenon, little less than a mystery, is the progress the Catholic Church has made in its struggle for liberty of worship and the proofs of that progress that would meet their eyes in every dioceses of Ireland, for instead of thatched chapels little better than hovels, they could see elegant and commodious churches in our parishes, and they would be lost in amazement when looking at Cathedrals like our own in Queenstown, that bear no small resemblance in their strength and beauty and majestic bearing to the noble edifices of medieval times. Nor would their wonder be less on hearing that all these were build on what is known as the voluntary principle - that is to say, by the money given freely and liberally by the Catholics themselves, the children of those who begged like Lazarus at the rich man's gate, and, like Lazarus, were refused even a crumb. It is quite credible that one or other of these supposed resurgents would say, as Judas Iscariot said when Mary Magdalene brought the ointment of great price to the supper table at Bethany and poured it on our Saviour's feet that the money spent on the churches was a wasteful expenditure and might have been more profitably employed in the promotion of other benevolent or industrial or commercial enterprises. Yet our Blessed Lord thought otherwise when he bade the murderers not to molest Mary, and commended her living act of piety. And, indeed, we need not call back the dead to protest against our endeavours to honour Jesus Christ, for we hear such talk among living men. Occasionally, but very rarely it is heard from Catholics whose faith is feeble and whose hands are close. Even from their own lower level such economists, who would seem to think any house built of rubble and rough case good enough as a dwelling place for their Redeemer, should admit what the Catholic Church has effected within the past fifty years to give employment to architects, tradesmen, labourers and others, and to promote, as certainly no other institution has done, an artistic taste where it had been suppressed by iniquitous laws and by woeful misgovernment.
You may dear brethren of Milford, were stirred by impulses higher and holier than the motives of the world when you determined to erect this beautiful church and desert the very humble house in which you had hither to worship God. You come here today as Mary Magdalene came to the supper table to make an offering "of great price" to your Lord and Master, and you do so with a willingness and a cheerfulness that enhance the worth of the donation, for to your credit let it be told you did not rest content till you paid the full amount you had promised. You feel you are not poorer but richer as you look, with laudable complacency on what you have done for the honour and glory of God, and feel happy in thinking that you have not erected a building like a barn, that would suit the taste of parsimonious economist, to be the permanent abiding place of the Blessed Sacrament in the parish. You rejoiced in the things that were said to you: We shall go into the house of the Lord. What you have achieved will bring joy to your friends and kinsfolk in foreign parts who knelt beside you in the little chapel now doomed to destruction for, as the Saviour said to the Magdalene you will have this act of piety and generosity published as a memorial of you throughout the world. You sought not in deed, the applause of men but you loved the beauty of God's house and if even a cup of water bestowed in His Name and with upright intention will deserve a reward, what reason have not you to expect a great blessing for yourselves and your children! Whilst everyone here rejoices in the completion of the work, let me be permitted, and feel I am now spokesman on behalf of very many to congratulate your Parish Priest, who has done his own part of it under personal difficulties. He has borne "the burden of the day and the heat, " when another would not unreasonably have sought rest and repose. You are aware in what an infirm state of health he has been since the foundations were laid. The cares attendant on an understanding of this kind are serious and absorbing, for any priest who has to superintend all the operations and to estimate and meet the costs of the work. They often lead to sleepless nights. Still more harassing must not these anxieties have been for him suffering in body, when so pre-occupied in mind. He has a soothing consolation in the ceremony of this day, a small foretaste, as it were of the grander recompense that awaits him. May God, if it His Holy Will, restore his health, and spare him long to minister free from trouble and disquietude at this Altar which you and he now present to the Divine Majesty! And as the presentation is made in the month of May it is but fitting I should conclude with a word suggested by the season of the year. It is know to us as the month of Mary, for a pious custom, sanctioned by the approval of the church, has consecrated it to the special honour of her "of whom was born Jesus", as the Evangelist, St. Matthew, says. Those who believe in Jesus, the Son of God, and profess to be thankful to Him would be, I would not say unreasonable, but unnatural, if they did not love the Mother that bore Him. You my dear brethren, devoted children of the church have never dissociated one from the other in your thoughts and affections since you learned to breathe a prayer; and coming now to present your offering to the Divine Son, you find Him with Mary, His Mother, as the wise men from the East found them together in Bethlehem, for the Sacramental Presence of the Son will bring the Mother before your minds. Jesus is our great Mediator with the Eternal Father, for it is through His merits alone we hope for grace and for salvation; but we believe that at the throne of the Son, who is of the same divine nature as the Father, we have a powerful intercessor in the Mother, who was predestined to great glory from all eternity, and to whom, when dying on the Cross, tenderly confided to the care of His beloved disciple, St. John.
Whenever, then, you visit our Blessed Lord in the Adorable Sacrament of the Altar, let your act of homage be the more agreeable to Him by honouring Her from who He was pleased to take human flesh and blood, to whom He lovingly submitted Himself in his childhood and His youth with whom he spent the greater part of His life when he walked the earth, May that Immaculate Mother obtain for you the grace to love her Son, and serve Him faithfully, that each of you may be found worthy to enter one of the many mansions in His Father's House to dwell there in joy for ever and ever.

After Benediction,
His Lordship the Most Rev. Dr. Browne, before imparting the Episcopal blessing, said that there were characteristics associated with the ceremony that had a special glory of their own. Was it not a proud thing to find a church so absolutely complete to the smallest particular as they found that church on the opening day? It was a church beautiful in its proportions and its design. It was solidly built and exquisitely finished. His Lordship was proud to think that building had been raised by the parish and that it was so well done. He should praise the architect who had planned a structure most suitable for worship, and also the builder who had constructed it; but thanks were most of all due to the people of Milford itself. It was they who paid for the church down to the last penny. It was not alone that the structure was complete and he had never seen a church so complete on the day of its opening - but there was not one pin's worth wanting. It was beautifully furnished: it had a beautiful marble altar, its isle was finished, the stations of the cross were in place, the sanctuary flame was suspended to burn before the Blessed Sacrament, and the whole structure was a glorious offering to God and religion in the parish. He thanked the people from his heart, and it should be recorded not for mere worldly praise, but for the edification of all and the glory of God, that their liberality was spoken of through the whole extent of the diocese. There was not a householder in the parish who had not offered more than one third of his cess to the building of their beautiful church. The people had paid seven and sixpence out of every pound for which they were assessed for taxes on their holdings.
t was a glorious record and he hoped that God for whose honour they had done so much, would bestow on them His best reward. The church was now consecrated, and to convey what that meant he might tell them that there were only three churches in that large diocese of Cloyne that had been solemnly consecrated. Theirs was the third. It could not be consecrated if even one pound of debt remained on it; but his Lordship had the satisfaction - and it was the first time he had exercised it - of performing the glorious ceremony of consecration. He had blessed the walls, inside and outside, he had anointed the doors with holy chrism, and, as the bishop of the diocese, he had invoked that to all those who should enter it would be a place of peace and salvation. He trusted that the prayer would be realised, and that their church would be a home of peace and a heaven of refuge. The church had cost £3,400 in all and it thought that the money was expended wisely by their parish priest, and that they were satisfied with the results. Their parish priest himself had made an offering of £125 to the work. He was sure that they would recognise the obligation of keeping the sacred edifice properly, and that the now almost universal custom of a penny collection on Sundays in the ordinary way for a parochial fund which had worked splendidly elsewhere, would provide the means for the purpose. When his Lordship called his mind back to the old church where, thirty years ago, he used to worship as a boy, he thanked God that the spirit of faith was so much alive in the parish, and that in God's providence the day would come when he could stand on that altar before them - many of them his companions and some the children of those amongst whom he then lived. He prayed God's blessing on them all, and that Heaven might hearken to their supplications in spiritual and temporal things. His Lordship then imparted the Episcopal Blessing, and the ceremony ended.

The contract for the erection of the church was creditably carried out by Mr. D. Linehan, Freemount.

Taken from the Cork Examiner, Monday Morning, May 4th 1903.