Celtic and Old English Saints 14 May =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * St. Carthage the Younger * St. Dyfan =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
St. Carthage (Carthach, Mochuda) the Younger, Abbot ---------------------------------------------------------------- Born at Castlemaine, Kerry, Ireland; died near Lismore, Ireland, on May 14, c. 637. This is another saint that is often known by a name of endearment, as Simon Bar Jonas was, and still is, called Peter. Carthage was born in Kerry, the son of a chieftain called Fingen and his wife Maeve. His biographers say that while he was tending his father's swine, a party of monks went by singing psalms and the boy was so entranced that he followed them to their monastery and spent the night outside so he might hear the singing. His father's servants found him the next day and took him back to his home, but when Fingen heard the reason for his son's desertion, he sent him to the abbey, asking that he might be admitted to the community. He became a disciple of the abbot Saint Carthach the Elder (f.d. March 5) who ordained him and so Carthage the Younger was known by his baptismal name which was Chud or Cuddy to which the abbot added the prefix of affection Mo so making Mochuda. About 590, he became a hermit at Kiltlaugh and then at Bangor under Saint Comgall (f.d. May 11). After visiting several monasteries, Carthage settled for a time at Rahan in Offaly in 595 where he ruled over 800 monks, attracted by his learning and spiritual power. It was at Rahan that the trial of strength took place between him and a local wizard, or druid, in which Mochuda caused an apple tree to produce leaves in the depth of winter, then to blossom and bear fruit.. Two British monks tried to drown him because they felt it was time for the monastery to have a new abbot. He also was probably a bishop at Fircall. Carthage wrote a rule in metrical verse, a later version of which still exists. [See "The Celtic Monk: Rules and Writings of Early Irish Monks" trans.by Uinseann O'Maidin OCR; Cistercian Studies Series No. 162, Cistercian Pub., Kalamazoo, 1996.] After 40 years, the foundation provoked the jealousy of monasteries on adjacent lands, and Carthage and his monks were driven away by Blathmac, a local ruler, at Easter in 630, together with a collection of lepers for whom they were caring. After refusing a site offered them by the King of Cashel, they came to the River Blackwater and built another monastery there, which was to become as famous as Lismore. There is a story that when the saint was building the abbey, a woman asked what he was doing, and he replied in Irish that he was building a little "lios", the word for enclosure. The woman answered "nil se uos beag ach liosnor", "not a little enclosure but a big one", and that is how it came to be known as Lismore. Carthage survived long enough to give his monks a firm foundation to what was to become one of the most famous of all Irish monastic schools. One of its students was Saint Cathal (f.d. May 10), who was elected bishop of Taranto, Italy, during his return from the Holy Land. Saint Carthage was exceptionally strict about the holding of property; at Rathan he would not allow the community to have horses or oxen to help in the tillage. Nevertheless, the Lismore Crosier is a treasured item of Irish art--now residing in the National Museum at Dublin. The saint retired to a cave near Lismore where he spent the last eighteen months of his life as a hermit, but when he died in 637, he was buried in the abbey church at Lismore. At Rahan there are remains of three churches, one of which serves as the Church of Ireland parish church. At Lismore there were once twenty churches, but only a few fragments remain. The Church of Ireland Cathedral may stand on the site of the monastery (Bowen, Flanagan, Neeson, Attwater, Benedictines, Carthage, Delaney, Montague). Troparion of St Carthage the Younger tone 6 Taking the name of thy spiritual father at baptism, O holy Carthage/ thou didst exchange a royal, but pagan, heritage for the monastic life./ As in this world thou didst care for those/ who suffered in their bodies the corruption of leprosy,/ now, we implore thee, intercede with Christ our God / that He will cleanse our leprous souls and save us. St. Dyfan (Deruvianus, Damian), Martyr (Roman Martyrology has 26 May) ---------------------------------------------------------------- 2nd century. Dyfan is said to have been one of the missionaries sent to the Britons by Pope Saint Eleutherius (f.d. May 26) at the request of King Saint Lucius (f.d. December 3). His church of Merthyr Dyfan shows the popular tradition that he ended his days on earth in martyrdom (Benedictines). Sources: ======== Attwater, D. (1983). The Penguin Dictionary of Saints, NY: Penguin Books. Benedictine Monks of St. Augustine Abbey, Ramsgate. (1947). The Book of Saints. NY: Macmillan. Bowen, Paul. When We Were One: A Yearbook of the Saints of the British Isles Complied from Ancient Calendars. Delaney, J. J. (1983). Pocket Dictionary of Saints, NY: Doubleday Image. Flanagan, L.A. (1990) Chronicle of Irish Saints. The Blackstaff Press, Belfast. Montague, H. P. (1981). The Saints and Martyrs of Ireland. Guildford: Billing & Sons. Neeson, E. (1967). Book of Irish Saints. Cork: Mercer Press. For All the Saints: http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/ss-index.htm Icons of Celtic Saints for the church or the prayer corner at home: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/celt-saints/message/1306 These Lives are archived at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/celt-saints ***************************************** ------------------------------------ Yahoo! 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