Ireland and Her Queen, Our Lady of Knock

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    JMJ

 

Blessed Feast of Our Lady Knock, Queen of Ireland, Queen of Heaven and Earth! Greetings to family, friends and newcomers. May God’s grace and mercy be with you and your families.

August 15th is the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Body and Soul into Heaven.  At this time of year, we remember fondly our pilgrimages to Ireland. It is in this land that we composed 2 songs: "Queen of Heaven" At St. Patrick's College, Maynooth Seminary and "I Will Meet You Again on the Other Side" at Our Lady of Knock Shrine. 

 

We have traveled in large pilgrimages and small pilgrimages (with Fr. Bill McCarthy from My Father’s House, Moodus, CT and Dr. Rosalie Turton of the 101 Foundation, Washington, NJ) with many great stories to share and many warm memories. But most importantly, we learned about the faith of the people, their struggles, their history which includes wars, persecution of the Church, Penal Laws, the Great Famine, civil unrest, and more.  Yet this people remained faithful to God and the Blessed Virgin Mary through the suffering and in good times especially through the power of the Holy Rosary.

For those who have never been on a pilgrimage, we would like to experience it. Pilgrimage is a time of prayer. It can be a time to reconnect more deeply with God, to pray for our families and situations – a time to surrender and rest in the Goodness of the Lord. We also meet good people who have the same belief and attitude. We are still in contact with pilgrims. We pray for each other. Because we are going to Holy Places, shrines, monasteries, and apparition sites in various places and speaking and listening to visionaries, we are taken out of our “comfort zone.” We pray, we sing, laugh and we cry, and go home tired, yet filled with the Lord.

In this blog, we are going to share memorable moments from our journeys with Fr. Bill, Rosalie and the pilgrims.

To prepare for our first pilgrimage to Ireland with Fr. Bill McCarthy which would be during Christmas season, we spent time learning about the history of Ireland, and the Saints who helped bring the Catholic Faith to Ireland. We read about these faithful men and women. We composed a song in honor of St. Patrick using the words of the Irish Blessing. There is much history about St. Patrick his miracles, his 40 day fast and penitential exercises on the mountain, Croagh Patrick.  The whole purpose of his prayer was to obtain special blessings and mercy for the Irish race, whom he evangelized.   Christianity grew and monastic culture flourished in the 700-800’s. Ireland became known as the “Land of Saints and Scholars.” We also composed the song, "St. Patrick," for this pilgrimage.

 Banner for our 1^st Ireland pilgrimage

Two outstanding memories in this Christmas season pilgrimage:

As we had Mass @ the Shrine of Our Lady of Knock in the late afternoon (which was dark) an elderly gentleman stood by the banner, touched it and prayed for 5 minutes.

During Christmas season, everyone says “Happy Christmas,” there is singing on the street corners of Christmas songs until the Epiphany, Jan. 6^th.

Our Lady of Knock

On Aug. 21, 1879, after 100 day novena of Masses and Holy Communions, a heavenly apparition appeared on the gable wall of a small parish Church in Knock in County Mayo. There stood Our Blessed Mother, St. Joseph and St. John the Evangelist holding a book. A Lamb standing before a Cross on a plain altar surrounded by angels also appeared. No words were spoken.  They appeared to float about two feet above the ground, and each would occasionally move toward the visionaries, and then away from them. The Blessed Virgin Mary was clothed in white robes with a brilliant crown on her head. Where the crown fitted to her brow, she wore a beautiful full-bloom golden rose. She was praying with her eyes and hands raised towards Heaven. St. Joseph wore white robes, stood on Our Lady's right, and was turned towards her in an attitude of respect. St. John was dressed in white vestment, stood was on Mary's left, and resembled a bishop, with a small miter. He appeared to be preaching and he held an open book in his left hand. Behind them and a little to the left of St. John was a plain altar on which was a Cross and a Lamb with adoring angel. The 2 hour apparition was witnessed by fifteen people. Miraculous healings were reported soon after in the area.  It has become a major center of pilgrimage. 

Apparition Church of Our Lady of Knock  where the Apparition took place  on Aug 21, 1879

               

Fr. Martin Mannion & Fr. Bill McCarthy celebrating Mass at the gable wall

New Basilica of  Our Lady of Knock seats 10,000 people

      Mosaic over the Basilica Altar 

      

Grave of one of the 15 Witnesses in the cemetery of Knock

SCENERY

The scenery in Ireland is spectacular from the fields of Glendalough to Sligo, Donegal, Foxford, Limerick, Northern Ireland and Achill Island. You can see it in the video of “St. Patrick.”

We all know about rainbows. One year in Ireland, it rained a lot. Every day we saw rainbows during this pilgrimage.