Declan & The Déise
I've been spending a lot of my free time over the last year on the coast of West County Waterford. A beautiful part of the world, with stunning mountain & sea views along with quaint fishing villages, and still only one hours drive from Cork city. Part of this area is an Irish speaking or Gaeltacht area, where the Irish language is spoken as the main language of communication, alongside English. Gaeltacht na Rinne as it's called, is made up of two parishes or communities, An Rinn (Ring) and Sean Phobail (Old Parish) and is collectively home to about 1900 souls in all. I find it a great place to prayer walk & to reflect, & recently I began to wonder why these two communities had these names.
An Rinn means Headland or Peninsula, but why is the other community called Old Parish? As I began to talk to the locals I discovered that Sean Phobail or Old Parish is exactly what it says on the tin....the oldest parish or Christian community in Ireland!
While the ministry of St.Patrick was the main wave to bring Christianity to Ireland in the fifth century, there was a Christian ministry that existed many decades before Patrick arrived, led by a man called Declan. In fact, it was because of St. Declan's ministry that almost the entire Déise tribe of County Waterford became the first of the Irish to convert from paganism. We know from historic annals that the Déise were the only Irish tribe that Patrick did not evangelise during the many years of his ministry on the island of Ireland.
Ardmore is a beautiful seaside village just a few miles down the coast from Old Parish on the way to Cork. It still has a fantastic old Irish Round Tower from the early Christian period known as St. Declan's Tower, & local history credits Ardmore as the main base from which Declan began his ministry, founding the first community or parish, just down the road at Old Parish/Sean Phobail.
Why is this important to me, you may well ask? Well, the beliefs & practices of the early Celtic Christian Church in Ireland were very similar to the Irish Christian Fellowships of today. With the exception of monasticism, and the obvious time issue differences, these guys were our forerunners, the very first to take the Gospel command of Jesus to heart by bringing the Good News to the very "Ends of the Earth." The island of Ireland, along with Scotland, was in the Roman worldview of the New Testament, Ultima Thule" or Ends of the Earth, given that the Romans saw both lands as being on the edge of the world.
As I've prayer walked the roads and lanes of Old Parish & Ring this Summer, I kept thinking of those who must have done something very similar over 1600 years ago, praying for a nation that was then, and is now, largely pagan. And yet a few decades later a great move of God hit this land back then..... We need Declans in today's Ireland, and I thank God that many are being raised up. But my prayer is that many more would be raised up, so that every tribe on this island would once again change this nation to an Island of Saints & Scholars.
How can I resist the GAA call that has been shouted out so often recently when Waterford were playing in the Munster Hurling finals. But I call it for a spiritual victory Na Déise Abú.....Victory to the Déise, the Spiritual Déise of today!
An Rinn means Headland or Peninsula, but why is the other community called Old Parish? As I began to talk to the locals I discovered that Sean Phobail or Old Parish is exactly what it says on the tin....the oldest parish or Christian community in Ireland!
While the ministry of St.Patrick was the main wave to bring Christianity to Ireland in the fifth century, there was a Christian ministry that existed many decades before Patrick arrived, led by a man called Declan. In fact, it was because of St. Declan's ministry that almost the entire Déise tribe of County Waterford became the first of the Irish to convert from paganism. We know from historic annals that the Déise were the only Irish tribe that Patrick did not evangelise during the many years of his ministry on the island of Ireland.
Ardmore is a beautiful seaside village just a few miles down the coast from Old Parish on the way to Cork. It still has a fantastic old Irish Round Tower from the early Christian period known as St. Declan's Tower, & local history credits Ardmore as the main base from which Declan began his ministry, founding the first community or parish, just down the road at Old Parish/Sean Phobail.
Why is this important to me, you may well ask? Well, the beliefs & practices of the early Celtic Christian Church in Ireland were very similar to the Irish Christian Fellowships of today. With the exception of monasticism, and the obvious time issue differences, these guys were our forerunners, the very first to take the Gospel command of Jesus to heart by bringing the Good News to the very "Ends of the Earth." The island of Ireland, along with Scotland, was in the Roman worldview of the New Testament, Ultima Thule" or Ends of the Earth, given that the Romans saw both lands as being on the edge of the world.
As I've prayer walked the roads and lanes of Old Parish & Ring this Summer, I kept thinking of those who must have done something very similar over 1600 years ago, praying for a nation that was then, and is now, largely pagan. And yet a few decades later a great move of God hit this land back then..... We need Declans in today's Ireland, and I thank God that many are being raised up. But my prayer is that many more would be raised up, so that every tribe on this island would once again change this nation to an Island of Saints & Scholars.
How can I resist the GAA call that has been shouted out so often recently when Waterford were playing in the Munster Hurling finals. But I call it for a spiritual victory Na Déise Abú.....Victory to the Déise, the Spiritual Déise of today!
posted by Tom Burke(Tomás De Búrca) at
Monday, September 03, 2007
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