Clayton & Bell, Vetrata con San Lorenzo O'Toole (XIX secolo); Dublino, Cattedrale
Saint Laurent de Dublin
Abbé de Glendalough, et archevêque de Dublin (+ 1180)
Saint Laurent O'Toole appartenait à cette famille
royale qui donna tant de rois à l'Irlande. Elu pour devenir évêque, il fut un
modèle de sainteté. En 1179, nous le trouvons au concile général du Latran où
le Pape Alexandre III le créa son légat pour toute l'Irlande. Venu en
Angleterre pour être médiateur entre le roi Henri II et le roi d'Irlande, il
devint otage et ne put rentrer dans son pays. Il partit donc pour la France.
Accueilli par les chanoines de Saint-Victor à Eu en Normandie, il rendit son
âme à Dieu dans la paix et la pauvreté totale.
"...il tomba malade à Eu au cours de l’automne
1180. Il fut recueilli par les chanoines de l’abbaye de Eu où il mourut en
odeur de sainteté. Les miracles se multipliant sur son tombeau, l’archevêque
fut canonisé par le pape en 1225..." (Ville
d'Eu - patrimoine, chapelle, abbatiale où se trouve le gisant de saint
Laurent O’Toole, un des plus anciens de la région)
Lorcan
Ua Tuathail ou Lawrence O'Toole (1128–1180) - diocèse de Pembroke, Ontario (en
anglais)
En Normandie, l’an 1180, le trépas de saint Laurent
O’Toole, évêque de Dublin. Dans les circonstances difficiles de son temps, il
défendit avec énergie la discipline de l’Église et s’appliqua à rétablir la
concorde entre les princes. En allant au-devant du roi Henri II d’Angleterre,
il obtint lui-même les joies de la paix éternelle.
Martyrologe romain
SOURCE :http://nominis.cef.fr/contenus/saint/96/Saint-Laurent-de-Dublin.html
Relic of St Laurence O'Toole (Lorcán Ua Tuathail) in
Collégiale Notre-Dame et Saint-Laurent, Eu, Normandy. It includes the skull of
the Saint
Saint Laurent O’Toole
Archevêque de Dublin,
† 1181
Laurent était le plus jeune des fils de Maurice
O’Thuataile, prince riche et puissant de la province de Leinster en Irlande.
Maurice profita de la naissance de son fils, pour terminer ses querelles avec
Donald, comte de Kildare. Il le pria de tenir cet enfant sur les fonts sacrés,
et le fit porter à Kildare, afin qu'il y reçût le baptême. Lorsque Laurent
était dans sa dixième année, son père le donna en otage à Dermith , Roi de
Méath. Ce prince se conduit en barbare envers l'enfant qu'on lui avait remis,
et le fit garder dans un lieu désert, où il fut traité avec la dernière
inhumanité ; sa santé fut bientôt réduite à l'état le plus fâcheux. Maurice,
informé de tout, força Dermilh à remettre son fils entre les mains de l'évêque
de Glendenoch, qui eut soin de l'élever dans la piété, et qui le renvoya depuis
à son père.
Maurice alla remercier l'évêque, et crut devoir mener
avec lui Laurent, qui avait alors douze ans. Il dit au prélat qu'il avait
quatre fils ; que son dessein était d'en consacrer un au service de Dieu , et
qu'il voulait en laisser Je choix à la décision du sort. Laurent entendit ce
discours. Charmé de trouver cette occasion de faire connaître ses sentiments,
et jugeant d'ailleurs qu'il y avait de la superstition dans le projet de son
père, il s'écria avec empressement : « Il est inutile d'avoir recours au
sort. Je ne désire rien tant que de prendre Dieu pour mon héritage, en me
dévouant au service de l'Eglise. » Maurice le prit alors par la main
pour l'offrir au Seigneur ; puis il le présenta à l'évéquë, après l'avoir mis
sous la protection de saint Coëmgen. Ce Saint qui avait fondé le grand
monastère de Glendenoch, était patron du diocèse de ce nom, qui fut depuis uni
à celui de Dublin. Le maître prit un soin extrême de son disciple , qu'il
voyait avancer chaque jour dans la pratique de toutes les vertus.
Laurent n'avait encore que vingt-cinq ans, lorsque
la mort enleva l'évêque de Glendenoch, qui était en même temps abbé du
monastère. On l'élut abbé : mais il ne voulut point accepter l'épiscopat,
alléguant pour cause de son refus, la disposition des canons qui exigeaient
qu'un évêque eût trente ans. Il gouverna sa communauté qui était fort
nombreuse, avec une piété et une sagesse admirables; et durant les ravages d'une
famine qui dura quatre mois, il devint comme un autre Joseph, le sauveur du
pays, par ses immenses charités. Mais Dieu voulut que sa vertu fût
perfectionnée par les épreuves. De faux frères qui ne pouvaient souffrir la
régularité de sa conduite, ni le zèle avec lequel il condamnait leurs
désordres, employèrent la calomnie pour noircir sa réputation. Il n'en repoussa
les traits que par le silence et la patience. Ses ennemis furent confondus, et
on rendit à sa vertu la justice qu'elle méritait.
Cependant Grégoire, archevêque de Dublin, mourut. On
lui donna pour successeur Laurent, qui ne pouvait plus alléguer le défaut
d'âge, parce qu'il avait trente ans. Il fut sacré par Gélase, archevêque
d'Armagh. Il se fit un devoir de remplir ses obligations avec une application
infatigable, et de veiller tout à la fois sur lui-même et sur son troupeau.
Toujours il avait présent à l'esprit le compte qu'il devait rendre au souverain
Pasteur des âmes confiées à ses soins. Il réforma d'abord les mœurs du clergé,
et ne choisit que de dignes ministres. Ses exhortations pleines de force,
produisaient partout de grands fruits, et l'on eût rougi de ne pas pratiquer
les vertus dont il donnait lui-même l'exemple.
Sa cathédrale, dite de la Sainte-Trinité, était
desservie par des chanoines séculiers. Il les engagea vers l'an 1163, à
recevoir la règle des chanoines réguliers de l'abbaye d'Arrouaise, fondée dans
le diocèse d'Arras, il y avait environ quatre-vingts ans, et qui jouissait
d'une si haute réputation de sainteté, qu'elle devint le chef-lieu d'une
congrégation nombreuse. Cet établissement du saint archevêque a subsisté
jusqu'en 1541, que Henri VIII changea la communauté en chapitre. Laurent prit
lui-même l'habit de chanoine régulier, et il le portait toujours sous celui qui
était propre à sa dignité. Il mangeait au réfectoire, gardait le silence aux
heures prescrites, et assistait à matines qui se disaient à minuit.
Ordinairement il restait dans l'église jusqu'au jour, puis, il allait prier
pour les morts dans le cimetière. Jamais il ne mangeait de viande. Il jeûnait
tous les Vendredis au pain et à l'eau , et souvent il ne prenait ces jours-là
aucune nourriture. Il portait un rude cilice, et prenait fréquemment la
discipline. Indépendamment des malheureux qu'il assistait par ses aumônes, il
nourrissait chaque jour dans son palais trente pauvres et souvent plus. Il
avait le même zèle pour les besoins spirituels de son troupeau ; il était
surtout très exact à leur annoncer la parole de Dieu. Pour ranimer sa ferveur,
il passait de temps en temps quelques jours dans la solitude. Il se retirait
ordinairement au monastère de Glendenoch , dont un de ses neveux était abbé ;
mais il logeait de préférence dans une grotte située à quelque distance du
monastère, et dans laquelle saint Coêmgen avait autrefois vécu. Lorsqu'il
sortait de la retraite, comme un autre Moïse qui vient de
s'entretenir avec Dieu, il paraissait rempli d'un feu céleste et d'une lumière
toute divine.
Malheureusement la plupart de ses diocésains avaient
peu de piété, et il voyait ses soins perdus par rapport à eux. Ils étaient
insensibles à la crainte des jugements de Dieu, et à tous les motifs que le
saint évêque faisait valoir ; mais ils furent bientôt en proie aux calamités
qu'il leur avait prédites. Le malheur public servit à purifier la vertu des
bons chrétiens, et à ramener au Seigneur un grand nombre de pécheurs qui
avaient été jusqu'alors incorrigibles. Diermeth ou Dermot, Roi de Leinster,
ayant ravi la femme du roi Méath, celui-ci implora la protection de Rodéric,
monarque d'Irlande. Dermot fut dépouillé de ses états. Richard de Clare,
communément appelé Strongbow, comte de Pembroke, vint à son secours avec
plusieurs gentilshommes anglais, et ce qu'il avait de plus brave parmi ses
vassaux. Il débarqua à Waterford, et fit la conquête d'une grande partie de
l'Irlande. Dermot étant mort en 1172. Strongbow, institué son héritier, réclama
le royaume de Leinster. Il prit Dublin, où il mit le feu, et massacra une
partie des habitants. Durant ce désastre, Laurent s'occupa des moyens de
pourvoir au soulagement des malheureux ; il les exhortait tous à faire un
bon usage de leurs afflictions, et il adoucissait leurs maux autant qu'il était
en lui, en tâchant de fléchir les vainqueurs.
Cette conquête ne fut commencée que par quelques
gentilshommes particuliers. Mais leurs succès donnèrent bientôt de l'ombrage à
la cour d'Angleterre. Le roi d'Angleterre rappela Strongbow et ses associés ;
mais ceux-ci protestèrent que c'était au nom du Roi qu'ils avaient conquis
l'Irlande. Henri crut devoir passer dans cette île. Il vint à Dublin en 1172,
et y reçut l'hommage de tous les princes, sans en excepter Rodéric, Roi de
Connaught, monarque d'Irlande ; tous le reconnurent pour leur seigneur el 'pour
leur souverain.
Quelque temps après, saint Laurent fut obligé de faire
un voyage en Angleterre pour les affaires de son diocèse. A son arrivée , le
Roi se trouvait à Cantorbéry. Il alla l'y voir. Les moines de Crist'schurch le
reçurent avec la distinction due à sa sainteté , et le prièrent de chanter la
messe le lendemain. Laurent passa la nuit devant la châsse de saint Thomas de
Cantorbéry, auquel il recommanda le succès des affaires qui l'amenaient en
Angleterre. Le lendemain , comme il allait à l'autel, un insensé , qui avait
entendu parler de sa sainteté, lui déchargea sur la tête un coup si violent,
qu'il fut renversé par terre. Sa folie était d'en faire un martyr et un autre
saint Thomas. On crut que le coup était mortel, et tous exprimèrent leur
douleur par leurs larmes. Le saint évêque revenu à lui-même, demanda de l'eau
qu'il bénit avec le signe de la croix , et voulut qu'on s'en servît pour laver
sa plaie. Son sang s'arrêta sur-le-champ, et il dit la messe. L'auteur qui
rapporte ce miracle, et qui en fut témoin oculaire, assure qu'on remarqua après
la mort du Saint, qu'il avait une fracture au crâne. Le Roi voulut faire mettre
à mort l'assassin ; mais Laurent intercéda pour lui, et obtint sa grâce.
Le Pape Alexandre III, pour procurer la réformation des mœurs et l'extirpation
des hérésies , avait assemblé le troisième concile général de Latran, à Rome,
en 1179. II s'y trouva trois cents évêques. Saint Laurent y alla d'Angleterre ,
avec l'archevêque de Tuam et neuf évêques, cinq Irlandais et quatre Anglais. Il
exposa au Pape l'état de l'église d'Irlande, en le priant de remédier aux
désordres qui y régnaient, et d'en maintenir les libertés. Alexandre acquiesça
à sa demande, il fit les règlements qu'il désirait, et le créa légat du
Saint-Siège dans le royaume d'Irlande. Laurent partit de Rome, bien résolu
d'exécuter avec zèle la commission dont il était chargé.
A son arrivée en Irlande, il trouva son diocèse
affligé d'une famine cruelle qui dura trois ans. Il se fit une loi de nourrir
tous les jours cinquante étrangers et trois cents pauvres. Cela ne l'empêchait
pas de fournir aux besoins d'un grand nombre de personnes qui étaient dans
l'indigence. Les mères qui ne pouvaient entretenir leurs enfants, les
exposaient à la porte du palais de l'archevêque, ou dans les lieux par lesquels
il devait passer. Le Saint en prenait soin, et souvent il en nourrissait
jusqu'à trois cents à la fois.
Déronog, un des rois d'Irlande, avait offensé Henri
II; Laurent fit un voyage en Angleterre, dans l'espérance de parvenir à
les réconcilier. Mais Henri ne voulut point entendre parler de paix, et il
s'embarqua pour la Normandie immédiatement après l'arrivée du Saint. Laurent se
relira dans le monastère d'Abingdon, où il passa trois semaines. Il partit
ensuite pour la France, afin de faire de nouvelles tentatives auprès du Roi
d'Angleterre. Henri persista toujours dans son refus. Il se laissa cependant
toucher à la fin, et Laurent obtint tout ce qu'il demandait. Le Roi s'en
rapporta même à lui sur les conditions.
Après avoir rempli la commission que la charité lui
avait fait entreprendre, il tomba malade, et la fièvre qui le prit en chemin,
l'obligea de s'arrêter en route. Il se retira dans le monastère des chanoines
réguliers de la ville d'Eu, qui est à l'entrée de la Normandie. Cette maison,
qui était alors une dépendance de l'abbaye de Saint-Victor de Paris, appartient
aujourd'hui à la congrégation de France. Le Saint dit en y entrant : C'est
là le lieu de mon repos pour toujours, j'y demeurerai, parce que je l'ai
choisi. Il se confessa à l'abbé, qui lui administra l'Extrême-onction et
le Saint-Viatique. Quelqu'un lui ayant proposé de faire son testament, il
répondit : « De quoi me parlez-vous ? Je remercie Dieu de n'avoir pas
un sou dans le monde dont je puisse disposer. » II mourut le 14 Novembre
1181, et fut enterré dans l'église de l'abbaye. Thibaud, archevêque de Rouen,
et trois autres commissaires firent, par ordre du Pape Honorius III, une
information juridique sur plusieurs miracles opérés par l'intercession du saint
archevêque de Dublin, et envoyèrent leur procès-verbal à Rome. Honorius
canonisa le serviteur de Dieu, en 1226, et il parle, dans sa bulle, de sept
morts ressuscites. L'année suivante, le corps de saint Laurent fut levé de
terre. La châsse qui le renferme se garde encore dans l'abbaye de Notre-Dame
d'Eu, et est placée au-dessus du grand autel.
On a donné quelques petites portions de ses reliques à
d'autres églises. Celle de l'abbaye où reposent les corps de plusieurs comtes
d'Eu, de Ponthieu, etc., ainsi que ceux de plusieurs princes de la maison de
Bourbon, est présentement divisée en deux vastes églises, dont l'une sert de
paroisse et porte le nom de saint Laurent, qui est le principal patron de la
ville. On y célèbre tous les ans trois fêtes en son honneur ; l'une au mois de
Novembre, l'autre au mois d'août, et la troisième au mois de mai. A quelque
distance de la ville est une chapelle bâtie à l'endroit où le clergé et les
magistrats allèrent le complimenter, lorsqu'ils eurent appris son arrivée. La
ville d'Eu est remplie de monuments qui attestent sa vénération pour saint
Laurent, et on n'y en voit plus aucun d’Henri II, qui l'honora souvent de sa
présence.
Si la vertu, le zèle, les prières et les miracles de
saint Laurent ne touchèrent point plusieurs pécheurs endurcis, dont il désirait
la conversion, nous ne devons pas nous en étonner. Nous savons que la plupart
des Juifs , surtout des pharisiens, refusèrent d'écouter le Sauveur du monde.
Si les travaux d'un pasteur étaient toujours suivis du succès, il ne
pratiquerait pas la patience qui conduit à la perfection, et qui mérite la
couronne. La perversité, la malice, l'opiniâtreté des pécheurs ne doit donc ni
le troubler, ni le décourager. Plus leur aveuglement est grand, plus leurs
maladies spirituelles paraissent désespérées, plus il est obligé de les
supporter avec patience, et de prier avec ferveur pour leur salut. Il peut
toujours espérer, tant que Dieu les laisse sur la terre. Peut-être n'aura-t-il
pas toujours l'occasion d'exhorter ; peut-être même la prudence le
forcera-t-elle de dissimuler le mal pour un temps. Qu'il se prosterne alors
devant le Père des miséricordes, et qu'il demande la conversion des âmes
rachetées par le sang de Jésus-Christ.
SOURCE : Alban Butler : Vie des Pères,
Martyrs et autres principaux Saints… – Traduction :
Jean-François Godescard.SOURCE : http://nouvl.evangelisation.free.fr/laurent_otoole.htm
Les tribulations de saint Laurent O’Toole
Rachel
Molinatti - published on 13/11/18 - updated on 03/11/21
Saint Laurent O'Toole, fêté le 14 novembre, est le
saint patron de Dublin. Sa vie n'a pas été de tout repos.
Issu d’une grande famille, Laurent O’Toole est de sang
royal. On le fête le 14 novembre. Grand modèle de sainteté, il met tout son
cœur à tenter de faire régner la concorde entre les puissants de ce monde. Un
vaste programme. Archevêque de Dublin dès l’âge de 33 ans et jusqu’à sa mort en
1180, il est le saint patron de la capitale irlandaise.
En 1179, lors du concile général du Latran, le pape
Alexandre III le crée légat pour toute l’Irlande. Alors qu’il se rend au-devant
du roi Henri II Plantagenêt pour prendre la défense de la nation irlandaise, il
ne peut finalement rentrer dans son pays et trouve refuge en France. Là-bas, il
est accueilli par les chanoines de l’abbaye de Saint-Victor à Eu
(Seine-Maritime), où il meurt en odeur de sainteté le 14 novembre 1180. Une vie
décidément bien remplie.
Un reliquaire bien convoité
Les miracles se multiplient sur son tombeau et le
saint est canonisé en 1225 par le pape Honorius III. Son gisant est toujours
présent dans la crypte de la collégiale Notre-Dame et Saint-Laurent de Eu. Son
cœur, conservé depuis le XIIe siècle dans un reliquaire dans la
cathédrale Christ Church de Dublin, est dérobé en mars 2012… avant d’être
retrouvé en avril 2018. Il sera exposé auprès du public dans la journée du 14
novembre.
Lire aussi :Irlande : à Boho, l’église du Sacré Cœur propose des
antibiotiques (sur)naturels
Wexford Church of the Immaculate Conception : Stained glass window in the south aisle, depicting Saint Laurentius O Toole and Saint Margarita.
14 novembre
Saint Laurent (Lorcan) O'Toole est le fils d'un chef de clan résidant à Castledermot, au comté de Kildare, en Irlande. Victime des guerres de clans, il est envoyé à l’âge de 10 ans comme otage. D’abord hébergé au château, il est ensuite transféré dans un endroit très isolé où ses conditions de vie sont particulièrement pénibles. Rendu à sa famille deux ans plus tard, il fait part de son désir de consacrer sa vie à Dieu. Il entre alors comme novice chez les Augustiniens du monastère de Glendalough et y demeure plus de vingt ans, d’abord comme moine puis comme abbé. En 1161, il succède à Grégoire, l’archevêque de Dublin, puis entreprend des réformes importantes de son clergé, s’astreignant à une discipline sévère tout en offrant l’hospitalité aux pauvres. Il intervient également comme arbitre dans plusieurs conflits de nature politique et agit comme missionnaire de la paix. En 1171, il échappe miraculeusement à la mort après avoir été victime d'une tentative d'assassinat survenue au moment où il s'apprêtait à célébrer la messe lors d’un séjour à Canterbury (Angleterre). Finalement, il tombe gravement malade durant une traversée de la Manche, alors qu’il accompagne le roi Henry II en Normandie. Il décède peu de temps après que le bateau ait accosté dans une petite crique des environs du Tréport et son corps est transporté à l’Abbaye Saint-Victor d’Eu (1128-1180).
Dublin St. Mary's Pro-Cathedral Ambulatory, Stained
glass window in the ambulatory, depicting Saint Laurence O'Toole. Created
by Mayer & Co. in 1886.
Also known as
Laurence O’Toole
Lorcan Ua Tuathail
Profile
Son of the chief of Hy Murray. Taken as a hostage
by King Dermot
McMurrogh Leinster in 1138 when
he was ten years old; Dermot later married Lawrence’s
sister Mor. He was released in 1140 at
age twelve to the Bishop of Glendalough, Ireland.
and raised and educated at
the monastic school there. Monk at Glendalough,
and then abbot in 1153.
Declined the bishopric of Glendalough in 1160,
citing his unworthiness. Ordered to accept the archbishopric of Dublin, Ireland in 1161,
he became the first native-born Irishman to
hold the see.
Reformed much of the administration and clerical life
in his diocese.
Worked to restore and rebuild Christ Church cathedral.
As archbishop he
accepted the imposition onto Ireland of
the English form
of liturgy in 1172.
Noted for his personal austerity, he wore a hair shirt under his ecclesiastical
robes, made an annual 40 day retreat in Saint Kevin‘s
cave, never ate meat, fasted every Friday, and never drank wine – though he
would color his water to make it look like wine and not bring attention to
himself at table. Acted as peacemaker and
mediator at the second seige of Dublin in 1170.
In 1171 he travelled to Canterbury, England on diocesan business.
While preparing for Mass there
he was attacked by a lunatic who wanted to make Lawrence another Saint Thomas
Beckett. Everyone in the church thought Lawrence had been killed by
the severe blow to the head. Instead he asked for water, blessed it,
and washed the wound; the bleeding stopped, and the archbishop celebrated Mass.
Negotiated the 1175 Treaty
of Windsor which made upstart Irish king Rory
O’Connor and vassal of king Henry
II of England,
but ended combat. Attended the General Lateran Council in Rome, Italy in 1179. Papal legate to Ireland. Died while travelling with King Henry
II, a trip taken as a peacemaker and
on behalf of Rory O’Conner. It resulted in his imprisonment and
ill-treatment by the king who
decided he had had his fill of meddling priests.
Born
1128 at
Castledermot, County Kildare, Ireland
14
November 1180 at
Eu, diocese of Rouen,
Normandy, France of
natural causes
buried at
the abbey church
at Eu
so many miracles were
reported at his tomb that his relics were
soon translated a place of honour before the altar
his heart was removed and returned to Christ
Church Cathedral, Dublin, Ireland
1225 by Pope Honorius
III
archdiocese of Dublin, Ireland
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MLA Citation
“Saint Lawrence O’Toole“. CatholicSaints.Info. 24
April 2021. Web. 14 November 2021. <https://catholicsaints.info/saint-lawrence-otoole/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/saint-lawrence-otoole/
Dublino, Christ Church Cathedral, interno, Reliquiario
del cuore di San Laurence O'Toole
St. Lawrence O'Toole
St. Lawrence, was born about the year 1125. When only
ten years old, his father delivered him up as a hostage to Dermod Mac Murehad,
King of Leinster, who treated the child with great inhumanity, until his father
obliged the tyrant to put him in the hands of the Bishop of Glendalough, in the
county of Wicklow.
The holy youth, by his fidelity in corresponding with
the divine grace, grew to be a model of virtues. On the death of the bishop,
who was also abbot of the monastery, St. Lawrence was chosen abbot in 1150,
though he was only twenty-five years old, and governed his numerous community
with wonderful virtue and prudence.
In 1161 St. Lawrence was unanimously chosen to fill
the new metropolitan See of Dublin. About the year 1171 he was obliged, for the
affairs of his diocese, to go over to England to see the king, Henry II, who
was then at Canterbury.
The Saint was received by the Benedictine monks of
Christ Church with the greatest honor and respect. On the following day, as the
holy archbishop was going to the altar to officiate, a maniac, who had heard
much of his sanctity, and who was led on by the idea of making so holy a man
another St. Thomas, struck him a violent blow on the head.
All present concluded that he was mortally wounded;
but the Saint came to himself, asked for some water, blessed it, and having his
wound washed with it, the blood was immediately stopped, and the Archbishop
celebrated Mass.
In 1175 Henry II of England became offended with
Roderic, the monarch of Ireland, and St. Lawrence undertook another journey to
England to negotiate a reconciliation between them. Henry was so moved by his
piety, charity, and prudence that he granted him everything he asked, and left
the whole negotiation to his discretion.
Our Saint ended his journey here below on the 14th of
November, 1180, and was buried in the church of the abbey at Eu, on the
confines of Normandy. His feast day is November 14th.
SOURCE : http://www.ucatholic.com/saints/saint-lawrence-otoole/
Cœur de Saint Laurent O'Toole (Lorcán Ua
Tuathail)
dans la Peace Chapel of Saint Laud, cathédrale Christ Church de Dublin
St. Lawrence O'Toole
LORCAN UA TUATHAIL; also spelled Laurence
O'Toole)
Confessor,
born about 1128, in the present County Kildare; died 14 November, 1180, at Eu
in Normandy; canonized in
1225 by Honorius
III.
His father was chief of Hy Murray, and his mother one
of the Clan O'Byrne. At the age of ten he was taken as a hostage by Dermot
McMurrogh, King of Leinster. In 1140 the boy obtained permission to enter
the monastic school of Glendalough;
in that valley-sanctuary he studied for thirteen years, conspicuous for
his piety and
learning. So great was his reputation in
the eyes of the community that on the death of Abbot Dunlaing, early in 1154,
he was unanimously called to preside over the Abbey of St.
Kevin. Dermot, King of Leinster, married Mor, sister of St.
Lawrence, and, though his character has been painted in
dark colours by the native annalists,
he was a great friend to the Church.
He founded an Austin nunnery,
of the reform of Aroaise, in Dublin,
with two dependent cells at Kilculliheen (County Kilkenny) and at Aghade
(County Carlow), in 1151. He also founded an abbey for Cistercian monks at
Baltinglass, and an abbey for Austin
canons at Ferns.
St. Lawrence, through humility,
declined the See of Glendalough in 1160, but on the death of Gregory, Archbishop of Dublin (8
October, 1161), he was chosen to the vacant see, and was consecrated in
Christ Church cathedral by
Gilla Isu (Gelasius), Primate of
Armagh, early in the following year. This appointment of a native-born Irishman
and his consecration by
the successor of St.
Patrick marks the passing of Scandinavian supremacy in the Irish capital,
and the emancipation from canonical obedience to Canterbury which had obtained
under the Danish bishops of Dublin. St.
Lawrence soon set himself to effect numerous reforms, commencing by
converting the secular canons of Christ Church cathedral into
Aroasian canons (1163). Three years later he subscribed to the foundation
charter of All Hallows priory,
Dublin (founded by King Dermot), for the same order of Austin
canons. Not content with the strictest observance of rules, he wore a hair
shirt underneath his episcopal dress, and practised the greatest
austerity, retiring for an annual retreat of forty days to St.
Kevin's cave, near Glendalough. At the second siege of Dublin (1170) St.
Lawrence was active in ministration, and he showed his political
foresight by paying due deference to Henry
II of England,
during that monarch's stay in Dublin.
In April, 1178, he entertained the papal
legate, Cardinal Vivian, who presided at the Synod of Dublin.
He successfully negotiated the Treaty of Windsor, and secured good terms for
Roderic, King of Connacht. He attended the Lateran Council in 1179, and
returned as legate for Ireland.
The holy prelate was
not long in Dublin till he deemed it necessary again
to visit King
Henry II (impelled by a burning charity in the cause of King Roderic),
and he crossed to England in
September of that year. After three weeks of detention at Abingdon
Abbey, St.
Lawrence followed the English King to Normandy. Taken ill at the
Augustinian Abbey of Eu, he was tended by Abbot Osbert and the canons of St.
Victor; before he breathed his last he had the consolation of learning
that King
Henry had acceded to his request.
Grattan-Flood, William. "St. Lawrence O'Toole." The
Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 9. New York: Robert Appleton
Company,1910. 14 Nov.
2015 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09091b.htm>.
Transcription. Dedicated to the Parish of St. Laurence O'Toole in Laramie,
Wyoming.
Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. October
1, 1910. Remy Lafort, Censor. Imprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop
of New York.
Copyright © 2020 by Kevin
Knight. Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
SOURCE : http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09091b.htm
Trefoil-headed tomb niche in the south wall of
Laurence O'Toole's Chapel. Christ Church Cathedral, High Street, Dublin, County
Dublin, Ireland. The tomb is assumed to belong to Archbishop John Cumin who
died in 1212.
Laurence O'Toole, OSA B (RM)
(also known as Lorcan O'Tuathail)
Born at Castledermot, Kildare, Ireland, 1128; died at Eu, Normandy, France, on
November 14, 1180; canonized 1225 by Pope Honorius III. Born Lorcan O'Tuathail
(or ua Tuathail), his mother was an O'Byrne and his father Murtagh O'Tuathail,
a Leinster chieftain of the Murrays--both sides were of princely stock. In the
2nd century, the Celt Tuathail was one of the great Irish kings. Another of the
line reigned in 533. One of the seven churches of Glendalough served as the burial
site for many generations of O'Tuathails.
When Lorcan was born his family had been ousted from
their ancient throne and Dermot MacMurrough was the representative of the
usurping line. Dermot was a large, violent, war-loving, vocal man hated by
strangers and feared by his own people. (It was he who invited King Henry of
England to come and take possession of Ireland.) Nevertheless, Lorcan's father
had many soldiers, servants, land, and cattle.
At age 10 Lorcan was sent to Dermot as a hostage to
guarantee his father's fidelity to the new order. For a time Lorcan lived in
Dermot's castle, until the day his father refused to obey an order. Lorcan was
taken to a stony, barren region, to be punished for his father's sin. At the
end of the journey was a miserable, dilapidated hut with a leaky roof. There he
forced to practice austerity because he was given only enough bread and greens
and water to keep him alive, no clothes, and no companionship except a guard.
For two years he lived in this desolate manner until threats restored him to
his father.
The bishop of Glendalough was the mediator between
Dermot and O'Tuathail and young Lorcan was sent across the hills to him. The
bishop first introduced Lorcan in Saint Kevin's sanctuary to the quiet
recollectedness of Christian life and studies. His father arrived a few days
later and, in thanksgiving for the safe return of his son, proposed dedicating
one of his sons--to be chosen by casting lots--to the service of God and Saint
Kevin. Lorcan laughed for the only time in his dolorous life, telling his
father that he would most willingly choose God as his inheritance.
So, he became a student at the school for novices in
Glendalough, where he stayed for 22 years as novice, monk, then abbot. Lorcan's
character was annealed in the ascetic training of the early Irish Church whose
austerities would seem fabulous if they were not well authenticated. He stood
in the direct descent of Saint Kevin and the early anchorites of Glendalough,
spending each Lent throughout his life in lonely, but joyful, contemplation on
the rocky shelf beneath Saint Kevin's monastery, and practicing austerities as
a normal part of his life.
The tall, extremely thin Lorcan was elected abbot in
1153 at the age of 25. His tenure of office gave him the widest exercise of
ruling men (abbots in Ireland even overruled bishops). Within the household he
had to reckon with the envy and malice provided by his early elevation; outside
the enclosure he had distress to alleviate in the mountainous lands that gave
precarious support to the population, and he had to ensure peace and order
along roads harassed by robbers.
Lorcan's unbounded charity first became evident during
a famine that marked the beginning of his office. He used the resources of the
monastery and also his father's fortune to minister to the poor as a servant,
rather than a prelate. He spent freely on church building, and from this period
dates the beautiful priory of Saint Saviour's at the eastern end of the valley.
After four years of service as abbot, his spiritual
stature was so plainly evident that men sought to make him bishop of
Glendalough. He refused stating that he was not of canonical age. For 10 years
the administration of the monastery engaged his full zeal and charity; he was
in touch with the great reform synod of Kells in 1152. His name is inscribed on
the 1161 charter of the new Augustinian foundation at Ferns, where years later
the fugitive King Dermot, its founder, sought a monk's disguise when he was
deserted by his kinsmen and friends.
In 1161 Gregory, archbishop of Dublin, died and Lorcan
was unanimously elected to succeed him by Danish and native clergy and laity, including
the High King O'Loughlin and even his former captor, Dermot McMurrough, who was
now married to Lorcan's sister Mor.
Momentously for the Irish Church, Lorcan was
consecrated the following year in the Danish Christ Church, Dublin, founded by
Sitric, which had never seen a native prelate. And the sacrament was conferred
by Gelasius of Armagh, the primate, in the presence of his suffragan bishops.
Dublin had been a Norse town for 300 years, and, because the Norse were
evangelized by Anglo-Saxons, the Irish Church had always looked to Canterbury
rather than Armagh. The vicissitudes of his immediate predecessor are evidence
of the racial and ecclesiastical jealousies that his election allayed and the
manner of his consecration (at the hands of the Irish primate, rather than the
English one) is signal testimony to the new consolidation of the Irish
hierarchy, which was a principal object of the Irish Reform movement in the
12th century.
Reform was necessary because the monastic system had
been corrupted under the Norse rule during which the abbot or comarba who ruled
the monastery as heir of the saintly founder was commonly a layman. The vices
of laicisation were rampant, even in the primatial see of Armagh which was in
lay hands for generations. There was a collateral necessity to organize
according to the hierarchy of the Catholic Church; the authority of the bishop,
archbishop, and primate had to be defined and established upon a territorial
basis.
Behind every reform movement there is a saint. In Ireland
that person was Saint Malachy, having as precursors Cellach of Armagh and
Gilbert of Limerick. Their movement carried on from synod to synod beginning
with Rath Bresail in 1111, achieved its main purpose in the synod of Kells in
1152, when among other decisions the sees of Dublin and Tuam were erected to
archbishoprics and the number and limits of the present dioceses were
substantially fixed. Minor outstanding disciplinary reforms were completed in
synods held in 1162, 1167, and 1172--all of which were attended by Lorcan.
After his consecration Lorcan had to move from being
an 'other worldly' man to a man of the world. He might have lamented like Saint
Bernard: "I am become the chimaera of my century, neither cleric nor
layman." Nevertheless, Lorcan managed with saintly charm to integrate his
inner and outer life. Tall, graceful Lorcan wore the bishop's vestments with
dignity, and a hairshirt underneath, for example.
He dispensed discreetly liberal hospitality to rich
and poor in his home beside his cathedral; among rich foods choosing for
himself the plainest and coloring water with wine for courtesy and company's
sake. Each day at his table 30 to 60 of the poor dined among his other guests
that the rich may be encouraged to do the same. From the day he donned the
white Augustinian robes he never ate meat, and on Fridays he fasted on bread
and water.
Three times daily he used the discipline
(self-flagellation); his nights were lonely vigils or spent in the choir.
Assiduous in attendance at Divine Office, when at dawn the canons left the
choir for their cells, he remained in solitary prayer. Twice during his long
periods of adoration, the Corpus on the Crucifix before the kneeling prelate
spoke. When day came he regularly went out to the cemetery to chant the office
of the dead. His life was what the old Irish homily calls the "white
martyrdom" of abnegation and labor.
The bull of his canonization recites his constancy in
prayer and his austere mortification. These were the secret springs of his energy
and profuse charity. This white-robed figure of whose speech hardly four
sentences remain is seen always in the gracious gesture of giving and with the
gravity of silence about him.
Crowds depend upon him, recognizing in him a source of
supernatural power. The records of his canonization attest to his miracles. He
lived through two famines and two sieges and saw the city of his adoption
sacked. He moves through hardships with the equilibrium of the saint and a
saint's equal mind. But also with the saint's energy.
He had hardly taken his episcopal seat when his zeal
turned to the reform of his clergy. His predecessors had been trained in a
milder climate and under laxer monastic rules. The service of the cathedral had
suffered. Looking abroad for a model he persuaded his secular canons to join
him in community life as Augustinian regulars of the Arroasian Rule and
converted the Cathedral Church of the Holy Trinity into a priory. His community
became a school for bishops: Albin of Ferns, Marianus of Cork, and Malachy of
Louth who were subsequent witnesses to his sanctity.
In the Irish monasteries psalmody occupied a central
place in the monk's life. Lorcan raised the Gregorian chant, still so little
heard in Irish churches, to its proper place about the altar and restored its
appropriate splendor to the Divine Office. He commended the rebuilding of the
cathedral and added to the number of parish churches.
During a famine which afflicted the city that
destitute flocked to his doors. He exerted himself in the public relief, not
merely by prodigally multiplying his personal charities but by organized
assistance, quartering the city poor upon the abbey lands of his
cathedral--Swords, Lusk, and Finglas. When these were filled and the famine
still continued, he sent others farther afield throughout Ireland, recommending
them to the popular charity and chartering a vessel at great cost to convey
others to England.
King Dermot McMurrough is often associated with Lorcan
in these charities, but Dermot's later actions invited the Anglo-Normans into
Ireland. Dermot abducted Dervorgilla, wife of Prince Tiernan O'Rourke of
Brefni. In 1166, O'Rourke and his allies reduced Dermot to ruin. He sailed to
England for help, taking with him his daughter Eva, Bishop O'Toole's niece,
whose beauty and nobility made her a desirable as a potential spouse. Although
King Henry II of England was still engaged in his conflict against Saint Thomas
Becket and Aquitaine, he saw the revolt and Dermot's arrival as an opportunity
to realize his designs to possess Ireland.
Then came the scourge of war in 1170, King Henry
promised Richard de Clare, Earl of Pembroke ("Strongbow"), the hand
of the beautiful Eva and succession to the throne of Leinster. He dispatched
Strongbow at the head of an army of nobles and his Anglo-Norman adventurers
landed in Ireland and took Waterford. Richard de Clare married Lorcan's niece
Eva in Waterford Cathedral before marching on to Dublin.
The rest of Lorcan's episcopate was conditioned by the
events that followed. He was in the very act of negotiating terms with Dermot,
when the city was seized by Strongbow's sudden, treacherous irruption, and the
peacemaker turned to save the wounded, to bury his dead, to guard
ecclesiastical property from spoliation, and to recover the looted Church
vessels and books.
Thoroughly aroused for his country, the saint urged a
united front under King Roderick (Rory, Ruaidri) O'Connor. Henceforth he had to
double as both a Mercier soldier and a Saint Vincent de Paul. The princes of
Ireland were moved to action by the patriotic zeal of the archbishop, who
joined with Ruaidri in rallying the country and its allies, sending missives
abroad to Gottred of Man and to the other lords of the Isles.
When Dermot died suddenly, the Earl of Pembroke
declared himself king of Leinster, but was recalled to England by Henry. Before
Pembroke could return, the Irish united behind O'Connor, and the earl barricaded
himself in Dublin as the Irish forces attacked. While Lorcan was trying to
effect a settlement, Pembroke suddenly attacked and won an unexpected victory.
The rest of Lorcan's political life was busied with
embassies of peace. When Henry II came to Dublin in October 1171. Although his
real purpose was to receive the submission of the Irish princes, he publicly
denounced the misconduct of the English in Ireland, portraying a benevolent
king on a mission of welfare. His overture was rejected by Bishop Gelasius, the
high king, and the northern princes, but the princes of the south took King
Henry at face value. The patriot Lorcan journeyed to Connaught to call forth
the dissident nobility.
Henry arranged with the papal legate, Christian of
Lismore, for the convocation of a synod at Cashel. The English king's decrees
presented nothing not already observed in Ireland, except the celebration of
the Divine Office according to the English usage. At this time, Armagh was
recognized as the primatial see of Ireland under the submission of no see but
that of Rome. This was the beginning of the Irish "troubles" with
England that were to endure for another eight centuries. On the strength of
such fair assurances the leaders of both Church and State accepted Henry.
Then Henry began to distribute Crown lands, until he
was forced to leave Ireland in April 1172 in the face of threatened
excommunication for the murder of Thomas Becket. In the meantime, Henry's
envoys reached Rome with the news of his success in Ireland. Henry was pardoned
by Pope Alexander III after walking through the streets barefoot in penance.
In 1175 the situation is reversed; Lorcan is Ruaidri's
(Rory O'Connor) envoy to King Henry II, sent to negotiate the Treaty of
Windsor, a mission that required the high qualities of skill and statesmanship,
where the contracting parties represented the feudal system opposed to Irish
law and custom.
The task was not made easier by a mischance that
occurred. While saying Mass at the shrine of Saint Thomas at Canterbury, a
madman who had heard of Lorcan's reputation for sanctity, thought that he would
meritoriously make another martyr and felled the saint to the ground with a
club before the high altar. The traces of this blow on the head were verified by
the Cardinal Archbishop of Rouen in 1876 on examining the body. Unlike the
martyred Becket, Lorcan was able to finish the Mass.
Meanwhile synods had been held at Armagh, Cashel, and
Dublin, which Lorcan attended in his subordinate place. None of them shows any
trace of his leadership or statesmanship.
In 1178, Henry II provided his son John with the title
"Dominus Hiberiae," which was not as exalted as the royal title
allowed by Rome in order to ensure Ireland's subordinate position. That same
year, the papal legate to Scotland and Ireland, Cardinal Vivian, arrived in
Ireland. He was indignant at the incursions and slaughter of the invading de
Courcy, whom he admonished to withdraw. When his command was unheeded, the
cardinal exhorted King MacDunlevy of Ulster to defend his country.
In 1179, Lorcan left for Rome to attend the Third
General Lateran Council with five other Irish bishops, more than attended from
Scotland and England combined. On their passage through England, Henry
compelled them to promise not to seek anything at the council that was
prejudicial to the king or his kingdom.
Some 300 bishops attended the council, and from that
great assembly Lorcan passed into the closest confidence of the Holy See. He
obtained from Alexander III a bull confirming the rights and privileges of the
see of Dublin. Jurisdiction was conferred over five suffragan sees and the pope
took the archbishop's church in Dublin and all its possessions under Saint
Peter's protection and his own, defining and confirming its possessions and
ensuring it and the property of his suffragans by strictest penalties against
any lay or ecclessial interference. Finally, on his return home Alexander gave
him the supreme mark of his confidence in naming Lorcan as papal legate.
In the brief space of life that was left to him,
Lorcan exercised his new powers with exemplary decision. With the invaders new
abuses had crept amongst his clergy. Some abuses he refused to forgive and
dispatched at least 140 clerics to Rome.
Henry was not pleased with the steps Lorcan had taken
in Rome. A new Thomas Becket had touched his authority. And, therefore, on a
final peace mission for Ruaidri, when Lorcan crossed the Irish Sea to take the
king's son as a hostage to Henry, he found the Channel ports closed against his
return by royal edict. After three weeks of virtual imprisonment in the
monastery of Abingdon, Lorcan followed the king to Normandy. He landed near
Treport at a cove which still bears his name, Saint-Laurent. There the saint
fell ill and was taken to Saint Victor's abbey at Eu, where he was received by
the monks and where his bones still rest.
A priest companion was sent to find Henry. He brought
back word that Henry would again meet with King Rory. Saint Lorcan had done all
that he could.
Only two sentences are recorded of his last hours.
Asked by the abbot to make his will: "God knows, I have not a penny under
the sun." A little later a farewell in his native tongue, thinking of his
own people.
A good and just man, Giraldus calls him; he died in
exile--an exile and a fugitive, the Abbot Hugues wrote to Innocent III, pro
libertate ecclesiae--an exile as well, he might have written, of charity and
patriotism.
So many miracles were reported at his tomb that less
than five years after his death, his remains were enclosed in a crystal case
and translated to a place of special honor before the high altar of the church
at Eu. The canons and faithful of that city forwarded his formal canonization.
His life was written and rewritten at Eu from information eagerly gathered by the canons from the saint's disciples and other pilgrims from Ireland who journeyed to his shrine; from his nephew Thomas, Abbot of Glendalough; his intimates Albin, bishop of Ferns, Marianus of Cork, and Malachy of Louth; and from Jean Comyn, who succeeded him in the see of Dublin. In 1225, 45 years after his death, he was canonized by Honorius III and thereupon became patron of the archdiocese of Dublin (Attwater, Curran, Curtayne, Curtis, D'Arcy, Delaney, Healy, Kenney, Legris, Messingham, O'Hanlon, Plummer, Sullivan).
SOURCE : http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/1114.shtml
Gisant de Saint Laurent O'Toole.
Little
Lives of the Great Saints – Saint Lawrence O’Toole, Archbishop of Dublin
Article
Died A.D. 1180.
Saint Lawrence was the youngest son of Maurice
O’Toole, a rich and powerful prince of Hy-Murray, in Leinster, Ireland. He was
but ten years of age when his father delivered him as a hostage to Dermot, King
of Leinster. The cruel king treated the boy with great inhumanity.
O’Toole, however, being informed of the ill-treatment
and poor health of his son, obliged Dermot to place him in charge of the Bishop
of Glendalough. The good prelate carefully grounded him in the principles of
religion, and, at twelve years of age, the little Saint was sent back to his
father.
Soon afterwards Prince O’Toole and his sons visited
Glendalough. He told the bishop that it was his intention to devote one of his
sons to the Church, and proposed casting lots in order to find out which. The
young Lawrence was startled at such a foolish thought, and more than glad to
find so favorable an opportunity for the accomplishment of his desires.
“There is no need to cast lots,” he exclaimed. “It is
the wish of my heart to have no other portion than God in the service of the
Church.”
On hearing this his father placed him once more under
the care of the venerable bishop, who rejoiced in having charge of one so
young, and noble, and promising.
The soul of Lawrence expanded in the holy cloistered
shades and amid the romantic beauties of Glendalough. His mind was stored with
knowledge, and he grew in age, and grace, and wisdom.
At the age of twenty-five he was chosen Abbot of the
monastery of Glendalough. The Saint governed his large community with rare
virtue and prudence. When a great famine desolated the country, his charity was
boundless. Nor did he cease to aid the poor and the unhappy when the resources
of the abbey were exhausted. He even distributed a treasure which his father,
Prince O’Toole, had left with him as a deposit.
But other trials were not wanting to test his
goodness. Some false monks, whose eyes could not bear the brightness of his
virtue, the holiness of his conduct, and the manly zeal with which he opposed
their disorders, slandered his reputation. The young Abbot remembered that
Christ had His calumniators, and that the disciple is not better than his Master.
He looked up to Heaven, and fought his enemies with silence and patience.
On the death of Gregory, first Archbishop of Dublin,
our Saint was unanimously chosen his successor. He was then about thirty years
of age; and, much against his own wishes he was consecrated in 1162 by
Gelasius, Archbishop of Armagh.
In this exalted position he carefully watched over
himself and the large flock committed to his charge. He was an unwearied toiler
in winning souls to Christ. Before all shone the light of his example. His
words were powerful, because they were enforced by sweetness and lofty virtue.
The Saint’s spirit of prayer and penance was
admirable. He always assisted at the midnight office with the Regular Canons of
his cathedral; and often when the world was buried in slumber he might be seen
for hours whispering aspirations to heaven before some lonely crucifix.
He never ate flesh-meat. He fasted on all Fridays. He
wore a rough hair-shirt, and often used the discipline. Every day he
entertained thirty poor persons at table; and countless others partook of his
charity at home. In him all found a tender father ever ready to aid them in
their temporal and spiritual necessities.
For the renewal of his interior spirit, this great
Irish Archbishop made frequent retreats at Glendalough – that holy and
picturesque spot in which he had first learned the beauty of the narrow way
that leads to heaven. On such occasions he usually retired to a famous cave at
some distance from the monastery. This wild abode overhung the south side of
the lake. It was hewn out of a solid rock three hundred feet above the water.
Six hundred years before the days of Saint Lawrence it had listened to the
sighs and prayers of Saint Kevin, the religious founder of Glendalough.
But the quiet, holy career of Lawrence was about to be
disturbed by an unhappy event that fills many a dark page in history. The land
was rent by discord. A band of English freebooters invaded Ireland. The tocsin
of strife sounded louder than ever, and the rage of contending hosts marked the
beginning of a long, gloomy period of appalling misfortunes for the “Isle of
Saints and Sages.” Our own age has not seen its termination!
When Dublin was besieged by the faithless Dermot and
his English allies, the city soon felt its weakness, and Saint Lawrence O’Toole
was sent at the head of a deputation to make terms with the enemy. But while
the venerable Archbishop was engaged in negotiations with the leaders at their
headquarters, a number of treacherous officers were secretly examining the city
walls. A weak point was discovered. One thousand picked soldiers entered with
fury, sword in hand; and no pen can picture the scenes of carnage that
followed. Old and young were butchered without mercy, and crimes the most
revolting were committed.
The Saint did everything that man could do to save his
unhappy people. Fearless of danger, he passed from quarter to quarter; but,
alas! often the most he could achieve was to procure a decent burial for the
slain.
About seven months after this dreadful disaster, the
death of Dermot, and other favorable circumstances, induced the noble-hearted
Archbishop – who was none the less a patriot because he was a Saint – to urge a
grand union of the Irish princes for the utter extermination of the fierce and
lawless invaders. With this object he flew from province to province. He
implored them to forget their foolish animosities and combine against the
foreign foe. But in vain were the pleadings of sanctity and eloquent patriotism
A few years passed, and history records that Roderick O’Connor, the last king
of Ireland, signed a treaty with Henry II by which he promised to hold his
title from the English monarch. The Saint himself was one of the witnesses to
this document, which bears the date of 1175.
In the same year Lawrence was obliged to go over to
England, to see Henry II in relation to some affair relating to his diocese. He
was nearly killed while at Canterbury. As he was ascending the steps of the
cathedral altar to say Mass, a sacrilegious ruffian conceived the scheme of
making the Saint another Saint Thomas; and, rushing at him, he struck him on
the head with a heavy club. The Archbishop fell to the floor. The people were
horror-struck, and thought he was murdered. But he soon recovered and called
for water, which he blessed. No sooner was the ghastly wound washed with the
holy water than the blood ceased flowing, and the Saint celebrated Mass.
In 1179 the Third General Council of Lateran was held
at Rome. Saint Lawrence and six Irish bishops assisted at that august assembly.
Pope Alexander III. greatly admired the wisdom and learning of the Archbishop
of Dublin, and appointed him Legate of the Holy See in Ireland.
Meanwhile a misunderstanding had arisen between
Roderick O’Connor and Henry II. Between the bickering rulers, Saint Lawrence
undertook to negotiate, and with that object he made another journey to
England. “Blessed are the peacemakers,” says Christ. But the English monarch
would not hear of peace, and immediately after the Saint’s arrival, he sailed
for Normandy. Lawrence followed the rude, ill-tempered king into France. In a
second interview his charity and prudence triumphed over Henry’s wild passion
and brutal selfishness. He granted everything, and left the whole negotiations
to the discretion of the great Archbishop.
But the earthly pilgrimage of the Saint was drawing to
its termination. On the way home he was seized by a fever. He retired to the
monastery of Eu, on the borders of Normandy. “This is my resting-place,” he
said as he reached the entrance. He prepared for death and received the
last Sacraments.
When the abbot suggested that he should make a will,
Lawrence answered with a smile: “Of what do you speak? I thank God I have not a
penny left in the world.”
A little before the light of this world faded from his
eyes, the thought of dear, unhappy Ireland made him exclaim: “O foolish and
senseless people! what are you now to do? Who will cure your misfortunes? Who
will heal you?” He died on the 14th of November, 1180, and was canonized in 1226.
Saint Lawrence O’Toole is the last canonized saint of Ireland.
MLA Citation
John O’Kane Murray, M.A., M.D. “Saint Lawrence
O’Toole, Archbishop of Dublin”. Little Lives of
the Great Saints, 1879. CatholicSaints.Info.
25 September 2018. Web. 14 November 2020.
<https://catholicsaints.info/little-lives-of-the-great-saints-saint-lawrence-otoole-archbishop-of-dublin/>
Détail du gisant de Saint Laurent O'Toole.
Pictorial
Lives of the Saints – Saint Laurence O’Tool, Archbishop of Dublin
Saint Laurence, it appears, was born about the year
1125. When only ten years old, his father delivered him up as a hostage to
Dermod Mac Murchad, King of Leinster, who treated the child with great
inhumanity, until his father obliged the tyrant to put him in the hands of the
Bishop of Glendalough, in the county of Wicklow. The holy youth, by his
fidelity in corresponding with the divine grace, grew to be a model of virtues.
On the death of the bishop, who was also abbot of the monastery, Saint Laurence
was chosen abbot in 1150, though but twenty-five years old, and governed his
numerous community with wonderful virtue and prudence. In 1161, Saint Laurence
was unanimously chosen to fill the new metropolitan See of Dublin. About the
year 1171, he was obliged, for the affairs of his diocese, to go over to
England to see the king, Henry II, who was then at Canterbury. The Saint was
received by the Benedictine monks of Christ Church with the greatest honor and
respect. On the following day, as the holy archbishop was advancing to the
altar to officiate, a maniac, who had heard much of his sanctity, and who was
led on by the idea of making so holy a man another Saint Thomas, struck him a
violent blow on the head. All present concluded that he was mortally wounded;
but the Saint coming to himself, asked for some water, blessed it, and having
his wound washed with it, the blood was immediately stanched, and the
archbishop celebrated Mass. In 1175, Henry II of England became offended with
Roderic, the monarch of Ireland, and Saint Laurence undertook another journey
to England to negotiate a reconciliation between them. Henry was so moved by
his piety, charity, and prudence, that he granted him every thing he asked, and
left the whole negotiation to his discretion. Our Saint ended his journey here
below on the 14th of November, 1180, and was buried in the church of the abbey
at Eu, on the confines of Normandy.
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/pictorial-lives-of-the-saints-saint-laurence-otool-archbishop-of-dublin/
St. Laurence, Archbishop of Dublin, Confessor
From his life authentically written by a regular canon
of Eu, not many years after his death, in Surius: Chron. Rotomag. F.
Fontenai, Contin. de l’Hist. de l’Eglise de France, l. 31, p. 46, &c.
A.D. 1180.
LAURENCE 1 was
youngest son to Maurice O’Toole, 2 a
rich and powerful prince in Leinster, whose ancestors for many ages had been
princes of the territories of Hy-Murray, and Hy-Mal, in the vicinity of Dublin.
Laurence was but ten years old when his father delivered him up a hostage to
Dermod Mac Murchad, king of Leinster. 3 The
barbarous king kept the child in a desert place, where he was treated with
great inhumanity; till his father being informed that by such usage his son had
fallen into a bad state of health, obliged the tyrant to put him into the hands
of the pious bishop of Glendaloch, 4 by
whom he was carefully instructed in the service of God, and at twelve years of
age sent back to his father. Maurice took Laurence with him, and went to thank
the good bishop. At the same time he mentioned to that prelate his design of
casting lots which of his four sons he should destine to the service of the
church. Laurence, who was present, was justly startled at such a mad
superstitious project, but glad to find so favourable an overture to his
desires, cried out with great earnestness: “There is no need of casting lots.
It is my most hearty desire to have for my inheritance no other portion than
God in the service of the church.” Hereupon the father, taking him by the hand,
offered him to God by delivering him to the bishop, in whose hands he left him,
having first recommended him to the patronage of St. Coëmgen, founder of the
great monastery there, and patron of that diocess, which has been since united
to the see of Dublin. The good prelate performed excellently the part of an
Ananias to his pupil, who, by his fidelity in corresponding with the divine
grace, deserved to find the Holy Ghost an interior master in all virtues,
especially humility and the spirit of prayer.
Upon the death of the bishop of Glendaloch, who was at
the same time abbot of the monastery, Laurence, though but twenty-five years
old, was chosen abbot, and only shunned the episcopal dignity by alleging that
the canons require in a bishop thirty years of age. The saint governed his
numerous community with admirable virtue and prudence, and in a great famine
which raged during the first four months of his administration, like another
Joseph, was the saviour of his country by his boundless charities. Trials,
however, were not wanting for the exercise of his virtue. For certain false
brethren whose eyes could not bear the refulgency of his virtue, the regularity
of his conduct, and the zeal with which he condemned their disorders, attacked
his reputation by slanders, to which he opposed no other arms than silence and
patience.
Gregory, the archbishop of Dublin, 5 happening
to die about the time that our saint was thirty years of age, he was
unanimously chosen to fill that metropolitical see, and was consecrated in
1162, by Gelasius, archbishop of Armagh, and successor of St. Malachy. In this
exalted station he watched over himself and his flock with fear, and with
unwearied application to every part of his office, having always before his
eyes the account which he was to give to the sovereign pastor of souls. His
first care was to reform the manners of his clergy, and to furnish his church
with worthy ministers. His exhortations to others were most powerful, because
enforced with sweetness and vigour, animated with an apostolic spirit, and
strongly impressed by the admirable example of his own life, which every one who
had any sparks of piety in his breast, was ashamed to see himself fall so
infinitely short of. About the year 1163, he engaged the secular canons of his
cathedral of the Holy Trinity, 6 to
receive the rule of the regular canons of Arouasia, an abbey which was founded
in the diocess of Arras about fourscore years before, with such reputation for
sanctity and discipline, that it became the head or mother house of a numerous
congregation. Our saint took himself the religious habit, which he always wore
under his pontifical attire. He usually ate with the religious in the
refectory, observed their hours of silence, and always assisted with them at
the midnight office; after which he continued a long time in the church in
private prayer before a crucifix, and towards break of day went to the
burial-place to pour forth certain prayers for the souls of the faithful
departed. He never ate flesh, and fasted all Fridays, on bread and water, and
oftentimes without taking any sustenance at all. He wore a rough hair shirt,
and used frequent disciplines. Every day he entertained at table thirty poor
persons, and often many more, besides great numbers which he maintained in
private houses. All found him a father both in their temporal and spiritual
necessities; and he was most indefatigable in the sacred functions of his
charge, especially in announcing assiduously to his flock the word of life. To
watch over, and examine more narrowly into his own heart and conduct, and to
repair his interior spirit, he used often to retire for some days into some
close solitude. When he was made bishop, King Dermod Mac Murchad preferred to
the abbey of Glendaloch, one so notoriously unworthy of that dignity, that he
was in a short time expelled, and Thomas, a nephew of the saint, by whom he had
been brought up, was canonically elected. By the care of this young, pious, and
learned abbot, discipline and piety again flourished in that house. And from
that time St. Laurence frequently made choice of Glendaloch for his retreats;
but he usually hid himself in a solitary cave at some distance from the
monastery, between a rock and a deep lake, in which St. Coëmgen had lived. When
our saint came out of those retreats he seemed like another Moses coming from
conversing with God, full of a heavenly fire and divine light.
St. Laurence found the greater part of his flock so
blinded with the love of the world, and enslaved to their passions, that the
zealous pains he took seemed lost upon them. He threatened them with the divine
judgments in case they did not speedily and effectually reform their manners by
sincere repentance: but, like Noë when he preached to a world drowned in sin,
he seemed to them to speak in jest, till they were overtaken on a sudden by
those calamities which he had foretold, which served to purify the elect, and,
doubtless, brought many who before had been deaf to the saint’s remonstrances,
to a sense of their spiritual miseries. Dermod Mac Murchad, king of Leinster,
having violated the wife of Tigernan O’Ruarc, (prince of Breffny and occasional
administrator of Meath,) Tordelvach O’Connor, then monarch of Ireland, took
cognizance of the injury, and obliged the violator to restore that princess to
her family, together with her effects. So slight a reparation of a public as
well as domestic crime, involved bad consequences. Dermod, growing daring from
impunity, became intolerable to his vassals, whom he despoiled by various acts
of tyranny, and Roderic, the son and successor of Tordelvach on the throne of
Ireland, was put under the necessity of expelling him from his government of
Leinster. To gratify his revenge, and regain his former power, Dermod solicited
the aid of Henry II. king of England, a very powerful monarch, who scrupled not
to permit some of his subjects to join their arms to the tyrant’s. The times
were favourable to that attempt, and the adventurers found but a weak
resistance from a monarch ill obeyed and from a people divided by internal
factions. Dermod’s success in this event was principally due to Richard earl of
Pembroke, commonly called Strongbow, who brought with him several noblemen,
with the best soldiers among their vassals; and, having landed at Waterford,
overran the greater part of Leinster and Ossory. Dermod dying in 1171, the earl
of Pembroke being left his heir, claimed the principality of Leinster, (in
right of his wife, Eva, who was Dermod’s daughter,) took Dublin sword in hand,
and massacred a great number of the inhabitants. In this dreadful disaster the
good pastor was employed in relieving the distressed, in imploring for them the
compassion of the conquerors, and in inducing the sufferers at least to make a
good use of their afflictions. This invasion of Ireland was begun by private noblemen,
whose success gave umbrage to the court, and King Henry II. commanded Strongbow
and his associates to return to England: but they declared they only conquered
Ireland in his name. Whereupon, he went thither, and, in 1171, received at
Dublin the homage of some of the princes and petty kings, and was acknowledged
by them lord and sovereign of Ireland. Some time after this, St. Laurence was
obliged, for the affairs of his church, to go over to England, in order to make
application to King Henry II. who happened then to be at Canterbury. St.
Laurence repaired thither, and was received by the monks at Christ Church with
the honour due to his sanctity, and desired by them to sing high mass next day.
That whole night he spent in prayer before the shrine of St. Thomas, to whose
intercession he recommended himself and the business which brought him thither.
On the day following, as he was going up to the altar to officiate, a madman
who had heard much of his sanctity, out of an extravagant notion of making so
holy a man a martyr, and another St. Thomas, gave him so violent a blow on the
head with a staff, as knocked him down. All that were present concluded that he
was mortally wounded, and expressed their concern by their tears. But the
saint, coming to himself again, called for water, which he blessed with the
sign of the cross, and then directed the wound to be washed with it. This was
no sooner done but the blood was immediately stanched, and the saint said mass.
To this miracle, the author of his life, who was then at Canterbury, was an
eye-witness, and assures us that the fracture was to be seen in the saint’s
skull after his death. The king ordered the franatic assassin to be hanged; but
the holy prelate interceded in his favour, and obtained his pardon.
The third general council of Lateran was held at Rome,
in 1179, by Pope Alexander III. with three hundred bishops, for the reformation
of manners, and the extirpation of heretical errors. St. Laurence went on from
England to Rome, and, with the archbishop of Tuam, five other Irish, and four
English bishops, assisted at this council. Our saint laid before his holiness
the state of the Irish Church, and begged that effectual remedies might be
applied to many disorders which reigned in that country, and care taken for
preserving the liberties of that national church. The pope was wonderfully
pleased with his wise and zealous proposals, and so satisfied of his virtue and
prudence, that he readily made the regulations which the saint desired, and
appointed him legate of the holy see in the kingdom of Ireland. As soon as the
saint was returned home, he began vigorously to execute his legatine power, by
reforming the manners of the clergy, and making wholesome regulations. He found
the whole country afflicted with a terrible famine which continued to rage for
three years. The saint laid himself under an obligation of feeding every day
fifty strangers, and three hundred poor persons of his own diocess, besides
many others whom he furnished with clothes, victuals, and the other necessaries
of life. Several mothers who were reduced so low as not to be able to keep
their own children, laid them at the bishop’s door, or in other places where he
would see them, and the saint took care of them all: sometimes he provided for
three hundred of them together.
Henry II. king of England, was offended at Roderic,
the Irish monarch, 7 and
our saint undertook another journey into England to negotiate a reconciliation
between them. Henry would not hear of a peace, and immediately after the
saint’s arrival, set out for Normandy. Laurence retired to the monastery of
Abingdon; and, after staying there three weeks, followed him into France. Henry
who had always repulsed him, was at length so much moved by his piety,
prudence, and charity, that he granted him every thing he asked, and left the
whole negotiation to his discretion. It was only to obtain this, that charity
had made the saint desire to remain longer upon earth. Having discharged his
commission, he was obliged, by a fever which seized him upon the road, to stop
his journey. He took up his quarters in the monastery of regular canons at Eu,
upon the confines of Normandy, an abbey depending upon that of St. Victor’s in
Paris. Going into this house he recited that verse of the psalmist: This
is my resting-place for ever: in this place will I dwell, because I have chosen
it. He made his confession to the abbot, and received the viaticum and
extreme-unction from his hands. To one who put him in mind to make a will, he
answered with a smile: “Of what do you speak? I thank God I have not a penny
left in the world to dispose of.” Indeed, whatever he possessed always became
immediately the treasure of the poor. The saint died happily on the 14th of
November in 1180, and was buried in the church of the abbey. Theobald,
archbishop of Rouen, and three other commissioners, by order of Pope Honorius
III. took juridical informations of several miracles wrought at the tomb,
through the intercession of the servant of God, and sent an authentic relation
to Rome: and Honorius published the bull of his canonization, in 1226, in which
he mentions that seven dead persons had been raised by him to life. This
archbishop, in 1227, caused his body to be taken up and enshrined, forty-two
years after his death. The abbey of our Lady at Eu still possesses the greater
part of his relics, though some churches at Paris and elsewhere have been
enriched with certain portions.
The saintly deportment, the zeal, the prayers, and the
miracles of St. Laurence were not able to awaken many of those hardened sinners
whom he laboured to convert. How few among the Jews, especially among the
Pharisees, obeyed the voice of our Redeemer himself! If a pastor’s labours were
constantly attended with easy success, he would meet with nothing for the
exercise of his patience, by which he is to purchase his own crown, and perfect
the sanctification of his soul. No degree of obstinacy, malice, or perverseness,
must either disturb or discourage him. The greater the blindness, the more
desperate the spiritual wounds of others are, the more tender ought his
compassion to be, the greater his patience, and his earnestness in praying and
labouring for their recovery and salvation. He is never to despair of any one,
so long as the divine mercy still waits for his return. If opportunities of
exhorting fail, or if charitable remonstrances only exasperate, so that
prudence makes them unseasonable for a time, he ought never to cease earnestly
importuning the Father of mercies in their behalf.
Note 1. The name given to the saint in baptism
was Lorcan, Latinized Laurentius. [back]
Note 2. His name in the Irish was Muretach
O’Tuathail. The saint’s mother was the daughter of O’Brian (now Byrne) a
chieftain of an ancient family in Leinster, who continued in power till,
through their inflexible adherence to the Catholic religion, and opposition to
the puritans in the reign of Charles I. they were stript of power and property
under Oliver Cromwell. [back]
Note 3. Not to Dermod O’Malachlin, king of Meath, as some have imagined; for this prince was killed in battle in 1130, when Laurence was scarcely six years old; and it is certain that Dermod had never exercised any authority in the province of Leinster, of which the territory of Hy-Murray (O’Toole’s hereditary district) was a part. Dermod’s government in Heath continued but three years, and he held it upon a very precarious footing, in opposition to a strong faction who adhered to the interest of Murchad, his father, deposed in 1127, and restored to his former authority over Meath, after the death of his son.
The monarchy of Ireland, which continued near six hundred years under the Hy-Nial race, was dissolved in 1022, on the decease of Malachy II. From that period to the entrance of Henry II. Ireland continued for the greater part of the time in a state of anarchy; some assuming the title of kings of Ireland, but exercising the regal power in the provinces only which acknowledged their authority. On the death of Malachy II. Donchad, the son of Brian Boroihme, took the title of King of Ireland; and some years before his departure for Rome, his son-in-law, Dermod Mac Malnambo, king of Leinster, assumed the same title. Their authority did not extend beyond a moiety of the kingdom. Donchad died in Rome in 1064, and Dermod was killed in the battle of Odba, in 1072, by Concovar O’Malachlin, king of Meath. To these princes succeeded Tordelvach O’Brian, the grandson of Brian Boroihme: his authority was acknowledged in the provinces of Leinster and the two Munsters; he was an excellent prince, and died a great penitent in 1086.
After an interregnum of eight years, Murertach O’Brian, the son of Tordelvach, took the title of king of Ireland, and at the same time Donal Mac Loghlin, prince of Tyrone, was declared king of Ireland by the northern moiety of the kingdom. During a course of twenty-five years, the nation had been involved in a state of ruinous hostility between those princes. Another interregnum succeeded for fourteen years, at the end of which Tordelvach O’Conor, king of Connaught, assumed the title of king of Ireland. He was supported by powerful factions, and the southern provinces he reduced to his obedience by force of arms. He was reluctantly submitted to, and the more as none of his ancestors reigned over Ireland for 770 years before. He died in 1156, and was interred in Clonmacnois. Tordelvach was succeeded by a very valiant prince, Murertach Mac Loghlin, king of Tyrone, and his title being acknowledged through all the provinces in 1161, he reigned with an authority as extensive as that of any former king of Ireland. Blinded, however, with his power he made a very unjust invasion on the privileges of the people of Ulad, which cost him his life in the battle of Literluin, in 1166.
Soon after that event a majority of the states had assembled in Dublin to provide a successor. In that convention Roderic, king of Connaught, was elected monarch; and no former king of Ireland was inaugurated with greater solemnity. The reluctant princes were soon brought to recognise his title. But it was a temporary submission to an authority, which, as it was obtained from the power of factious men rather than stated laws, could not be durable. Roderic reigned with splendour during the three first years of his government; till his country was invaded by Henry II. king of England, in October, 1171. The fallacious allegiance of most of his subjects was dissolved; and, through the negotiation of Laurence, archbishop of Dublin, he entered, in the year 1175, into a treaty with Henry, the best that could be obtained, but far from being honourable to himself, or, in its consequences, profitable to the nation. He died in Cong, in 1198, and was buried in his father’s tomb at Clonmacnois.
Brian, who is said in the Irish peerage to have descended from Heberius, eldest son of Milesius, prince of Spain, was monarch of Ireland in 1014, and fought valiantly against the Danes. Roderic O’Connor, the last Irish monarch of Ireland, was not of the O’Brien family, but chief of the Connaught Hy-Brune race. Some writers have been deceived by a resemblance in the family names of O’Brien and Hy-Brune. From the sixth year of Henry III. the heads of the O’Brien family were usually styled kings of Thomond, or Limerick. The Irish peerage reckons twelve kings of Thomond of that family, after Ireland became subject to England. After the extinction of the title of king, Henry VIII. created the next heir, or supposed heir, of the O’Briens, earl of Thomond, which honour Edward VI. confirmed to his heirs.
That the old Irish annalists delivered very little better than
fables in their accounts, antecedent to Nial Naoigiallach in the fifth century,
is out the bare conjecture of Sir James Ware. Tigernach and Cormac, king and
archbishop of Munster in the ninth century, could inform him better; even his
contemporary, Usher, might have undeceived him. But Ware was far from being a
good antiquarian. He affirms, truly indeed, that the elective monarchs of
Ireland died mostly by the sword: but this circumstance was owing to a capital
defect in the civil constitution, which allowed too little power to the
monarch, and too much to his inferior vassals. Some account of the ancient
inhabitants and language of this country, is given under St. Palladius, on the
6th of July; St. Alto, the 5th of September, and at note under St. Remigius,
the 1st of October. See also O’Connor’s Dissertations, Dublin, 1766; and his
Dissert. on the Origin of the Scots, prefixed to Ogygia Vindicated,
Dublin. 1775. [back]
Note 4. Glendaloch lies in the territory of
Forthuatha, in the county of Wicklow. See an account of it in the Life of St.
Coemgen, 3rd of June. [back]
Note 5. The ancient name of this city was Baile-Duibhlinne, Duibhlinne signifying black stream, from the muddy colour of the Liffey in time of flood. It has thence taken the several names of Divelin, Dyfelin, Dublinum, Dublinia, and by Ptolemy (or his interpolators) Eblana, a corruption of Dublina. It was also called Baile-atha-cliath, and is yet so called by the Irish, the words signifying the town of the Ford-hurdles, from the hurdles laid over a wooden bridge which kept the communication open between the provinces of Leinster and Meath. In ancient time the Irish made use of hurdles, with which they covered the beams and joists of wooden bridges, as the best substratum for the layers of earth and gravel, which rendered the passage very commodious. The ancient Irish annals mention several Baile-atha-cliaths distinguished by the adjunction of the territories to which they belonged: as Baile-atha-cliath Medry near Galway, Baile-atha-cliath Coran, near Baillimote in the county of Sligo, &c. From the time of the English settlement, Dublin has been the metropolis of the whole kingdom, the seat of the government and chief course of justice, and the second great city in the British empire.
The Normans, called Ostmen or Easterlings, took possession of Dublin, A. D. 838, in the fifth year of the reign of Niall Calinne, king of Ireland, three hundred and thirty-four years before the town was given up to Henry II. king of England. No English monarch before him possessed a foot of ground in Ireland; and the prefatory lines to King Edgar’s diploma, in 964, are but the adulatory rant of his chancellor. The fiction is most gross, and (as Usher observes) hath no foundation whatever in the annals of England or Ireland. As Dublin had been thus occupied in the ninth century by heathen barbarians, and the Christians expelled, the succession of bishops was interrupted till the pagans were converted to the Catholic faith. The succession, therefore, until the conversion of the Normans, is not found entire in the Irish annals before Donatus, (Latinized from Dunan,) who was promoted in 1038, in the time of King Sitricus. However, (as Harris remarks,) it is not probable that St. Patrick, who established a church in Dublin, in the fifth century, would leave it without a bishop to preside over it, and thus deviate from his universal practice in other places. Moreover, we have mention made of St. Livinus in 633, who is honoured on the 12th of November; St. Wiro in 650 (or later) honoured the 8th of May; St. Rumold in 775, honoured the 1st of July; and Sedulius, styled abbot of Dublin, who died the 12th of February, 785. That these and other prelates had a fixed see at Dublin before the arrival of the Normans, we have no reason to doubt, nor have we any proof to the contrary.
Donat was probably the first bishop of this see after the
conversion of the infidels: he died in 1074. His successor, Gilla Patrick, was
drowned at sea in 1084, and was succeeded by Dongus O’Haingly, who died in 1095
of a pestilence called Teasach. His successor, Samuel O’Haingly, died
in 1121; and St. Celsus, bishop of Armagh, was appointed guardian of the
spiritualites of the see of Dublin, before the election of Gregory, who died
the 8th of October, 1161, and was succeeded by St. Laurence O’Toole. It was in
the year 1152, nine years before Gregory’s death, that Cardinal John Paparo,
legate of Pope Eugenius III. conferred on this see the archiepiscopal dignity,
having brought from Rome four palls for four metropolitans in Ireland, and
assigned respective suffragans to each. The four metropolitan sees are, Armagh
in the province of Ulster, Dublin in Leinster, Cashel in Munster, and Tuam in
Connaught. Between the two first a controversy had continued for a considerable
time concerning precedence; but, according to Harris, it was at length finally
determined both by papal and legal authority, that the archbishop of Armagh
should be entitled Primate of all Ireland, and the archbishop of Dublin,
Primate of Ireland; like Canterbury and York in England. [back]
Note 6. This church was built for secular canons
in the centre of the city by Sitricus, king of the Ostmen in Dublin, and Bishop
Donat in 1038. The change made by St. Laurence continued until Henry VIII. in
1541, converted it into a dean and chapter; from which time it hath taken the
name of Christ-Church; being before called the church of the Holy Trinity. The
principal cathedral of Dublin is dedicated under the invocation of St. Patrick,
and was built in the south suburbs of the city, by archbishop Comyn in 1190, on
the same spot where an old parochial church had long stood, which was said to
have been erected by St. Patrick. [back]
Note 7. This monarch is, by mistake, called
Deronogus in Messingham’s Florilegium, p. 386. [back]
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume
XI: November. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
SOURCE : http://www.bartleby.com/210/11/141.html
.jpg)
View of the St Laurence O'Toole Roman Catholic
church, Cobar,
New South Wales
St. Lawrence O'Toole, Benedictine Peacemaker
The saint of the day for November 14 is St. Lawrence (also spelled Laurence)
O'Toole, a Benedictine abbot and archbishop of Dublin.
St. Lawrence O'Toole was born around 1128 in County Kildare, Ireland. His
father was the chief of Hy Murray, and his mother one of the Clan O'Byrne.
At the age of 10, Lawrence was taken hostage by King Mac Murehad of Leinster,
who treated him with such cruelty that his father convinced the King to turn
him over to the Bishop of Glendalough.
In 1140, Lawrence obtained permission to enter the monastic school of
Glendalough; he studied there for thirteen years and became known for his piety
and learning. So great was his reputation in the eyes of the community that on
the death of Abbot Dunlaing, at the young age of 25, he was unanimously chosen
to supervise the Abbey of St. Kevin.
In 1161, Lawrence was chosen as Archbishop of Dublin. In his new position, he
reformed much of the administration and clerical life in his diocese, worked to
restore and rebuild Christ Church cathedral, and accepted the English form of
liturgy in 1172.
Known for his personal self-denial, he wore a hair shirt under his clerical robes,
made an annual 40 day retreat in Saint Kevin's cave, never ate meat, fasted
every Friday, and never drank wine - although he would color his water to make
it look like wine to avoid attracting attention to himself during meals.
Throughout the second siege of Dublin in 1170, he acted as a peacemaker and
mediator.
In 1171, he travelled to Canterbury, England on diocesan business. While
preparing for Mass there he was attacked by a lunatic who wanted to turn
Lawrence into another Saint Thomas Beckett. Everyone in the church thought
Lawrence had been killed by the severe blow to the head. Instead he asked for
water, blessed it, and washed the wound; the bleeding stopped, and the
archbishop celebrated Mass.
In 1175, King Henry II of England became upset with Roderic, the monarch of
Ireland, and St. Lawrence once again journeyed to England to negotiate a
compromise between them. Henry was so moved by his piety, charity, and prudence
that he cooperated totally with Lawrence.
Lawrence participated in the Lateran Council in 1179, and returned as legate
for Ireland. While on yet another mission to King Henry II of England, Lawrence
died at Eu, Normandy, France. He was canonized in 1225 by Pope Honorius III.
St. Lawrence is the patron saint of the archdiocese of Dublin, Ireland.
SOURCE : https://catholicfire.blogspot.com/2016/11/st-lawrence-otoole-benedictine.html
San Michele all'Adige (Trentino) - Chiesa di San
Michele - Scultura raffigurante san Lorenzo O'Toole
San Michele all'Adige (Trentino, Italy) - Saint
Michael church - Sculpture portraying saint Laurence O'Toole
San Lorenzo O'Toole Arcivescovo di Dublino
Castledermot, Kildare, 1128 - 14 novembre 1180
Nato a Castledermot, contea di Kildare nel 1128,
Lorenzo (Lorcan Ua Tuathail) era figlio di Murtagh, capo del clan Murray. Nel
1140 entrò nella scuola monastica di Glendalough, dove fu abate dal 1154 al
1162. Contribuí anche alla fondazione dell'abbazia di Baltinglass per i
Cistercensi e di una casa per i Canonici Agostiniani a Ferns. Eletto
arcivescovo di Dublino nel 1162, egli mise mano alla riforma di quella Chiesa.
Ebbe un ruolo da mediatore con gli invasori normanni che nel 1170 presero la
città. Quando Enrico II giunse nell'isola e convocò un sinodo a Cashel, Lorenzo
accettò la Bolla papale «Laudabiliter» con cui il papa inglese Adriano II
autorizzava Enrico II ad operare in Irlanda. Con l'arcivescovo di Tuam ed
i vescovi di Limerick, Kildare, Waterford e Lismore, partecipò al III concilio
Lateranense in Roma nel 1173. Nel 1179, Lorenzo tornò in Irlanda e convocò
un sinodo a Clonfert per le regioni settentrionali dell'isola. Nel 1180,
Lorenzo si recò in Inghilterra per incontrare Enrico II, che però era assai
incollerito con il vescovo per i privilegi papali ricevuti e costrinse Lorenzo
a vivere in esilio. Tornando dalla Normandia, dove aveva seguito il re, si
ammalò e morí il 14 novembre 1180. (Avvenire)
Emblema: Bastone pastorale
Martirologio Romano: A Eu nella Normandia, in Francia,
transito di san Lorenzo O’Toole (Lorcan Ua Tuathail), vescovo di Dublino, che,
nonostante le difficoltà del suo tempo, promosse strenuamente l’osservanza
della disciplina della Chiesa e, impegnato a riportare la concordia tra i
príncipi, passò alla gioia della pace eterna mentre si recava da Enrico re
d’Inghilterra.
Nato a Castledermot, contea di Kildare nel 1128, Lorenzo (Lorcan Ua Tuathail) era figlio di Murtagh, capo del clan Murray. Nel 1140 entrò nella scuola monastica di Glendalough e nel 1154 fu eletto abate di quel monastero all'età di venticinque o ventisei anni.
Il suo abbaziato (1154-1162) fu notevole per la devozione alla riforma; egli contribuí anche alla fondazione dell'abbazia di Baltinglass per i Cistercensi e di una casa per i Canonici Agostiniani a Ferns.
Eletto arcivescovo di Dublino nel 1162, egli mise mano alla riforma di quella Chiesa imponendo la regola c'i Arrouaise ai canonici della sua cattedrale. La sua santità personale era ravvivata ogni anno da un ritiro di quaranta giorni nella grotta di s. Kevin a Glendalough.
Quando nel 1169 i Normanni invasero l'Irlanda, Lorenzo venne a trovarsi in una posizione difficile; era stato, infatti, suo cognato, Dermot Mac Murrough, re del Leinster, a chiamare i Normanni dall'Inghilterra e sua nipote, Eva, figlia di Dermot, fu data in sposa a Strongbow, capo degli invasori. Durante il secondo assedio di Dublino nel 1170, Lorenzo fu incaricato di negoziare con i Normanni, ma la città fu presa mentre ancora procedevano le trattative. Sembra tuttavia che egli abbia fatto fronte all'occupazione anglo-normanna dell'Irlanda senza eccessivi sforzi.
Quando Enrico II giunse nell'isola e convocò un sinodo a Cashel, Lorenzo accettò la Bolla papale Laudabiliter con cui il papa inglese Adriano II autorizzava Enrico II ad operare in Irlanda. Quindi agí da intermediario tra Enrico e i vari re irlandesi e negoziò un trattato tra Ruaidhri O'Connor "High-King", ed Enrico.
Con l'arcivescovo di Tuam ed i vescovi di Limerick, Kildare, Waterford e Lismore, partecipò al III concilio Lateranense in Roma nel 1173. Nell'aprile o maggio di quello stesso anno fu nominato da Alessandro III legato papale in Irlanda ed ottenne dallo stesso papa due importantissimi privilegi, uno per Dublino ed uno per Glendalough. Alla fine del settembre 1179, Lorenzo era di ritorno in Irlanda ed immediatamente convocò un sinodo a Clonfert per le regioni settentrionali dell'isola (arcidiocesi di Tuam e Armagh); scopo particolare del sinodo - durante il quale furono deposti sette vescovi "ereditari" - era quello di arginare oli abusi dei laici nella Chiesa.
Agli inizi del 1180, Lorenzo si recò in Inghilterra per incontrare Enrico II, portando con sé il figlio del re del Connacht come ostaggio per suo padre. Probabilmente a causa dei privilegi papali che egli aveva ottenuto a Roma Lorenzo incontrò ad Oxford o ad Abingdon, nel marzo 1180, un Enrico assai incollerito, il quale, infatti, "costrinse il beato Lorenzo a vivere in esilio". Dopo aver seguito il re fino in Normandia, finalmente ebbe il permesso di tornare in Irlanda. Sulla via del ritorno, tuttavia, si ammalò e morí il 14 novembre 1180 nella casa dei Canonici di S. Vittore ad Eu, in Normandia, dove il suo corpo riposa ancora.
Lorenzo fu canonizzato da papa Onorio III nel 1225 e poco dopo un canonico di Eu ne compilò una Vita, pubblicata da C. Plummer.
In Irlanda la festa di Lorenzo si è sempre celebrata il 14 novembre; ad Eu, invece, vi è anche una festa della traslazione il 10 maggio.
Autore: Leonard Boyle
SOURCE : http://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/90998
St Laurence O'Toole's Church, County Dublin
Den hellige Laurentius O'Toole av Dublin (~1128-1180)
Minnedag: 14.
november
Den hellige Laurentius O'Toole (Lorcan Ua Tuathail)
ble født ca 1128, sannsynligvis ved Castledermot i grevskapet Kildare i Irland.
Han var et resultat av ekteskap mellom høvdingeslektene O'Toole og O'Byrne og
var sønn av høvdingen Murtagh. Han tilbrakte deler av barndommen som gissel i
hendene på den rivaliserende familien til kong Dermot McMurrough av Leinster.
Deretter ble han munk i den hellige Kevins kloster
Glendalough, og der ble han valgt til abbed i 1154, bare 25 år gammel. Hans
plikter inkluderte ikke bare å styre klosteret, men også å lindre hungersnød og
å slå ned på røverbander i nærheten, noen av dem besto av frafalne munker.
I 1161 døde Gregor, den første erkebiskopen av Dublin.
Laurentius ble valgt til ny erkebiskop og i 1162 ble han konsekrert i
Treenighetskatedralen (senere Christ Church) av erkebiskop Gelasius av Armagh.
Dette var et uttrykk for den nye enheten i den irske kirken siden synoden i
Kells i 1152; før det hadde biskopene av Dublin ligget under Canterbury. For å
sikre tilførselen av gode pastorale klerikere innsatte han augustinerkorherrer
fra Arrouaise i de viktigste kirkene. Dette augustinerkorherreklosteret var
grunnlagt i bispedømmet Arras i 1090, og hadde slikt ry for fromhet og disiplin
at det ble moderhus for mange grunnleggelser. Laurentius bar selv deres drakt
og levde selv i kommunitet med dem i enkelhet og strenghet. Hans nevø ble
biskop av Glendalough og erstattet en uverdig inntrenger som var støttet av den
lokale høvdingen. Hver faste vendte han tilbake til Glendalough for å leve en
periode i St. Kevins celle i ro og ensomhet. Han var fortjenstfull i sin
lindring av de fattiges nød i sitt bispedømme, og hver dag bespiste han minst
tretti fattige. Senere i livet sendte han fattige til England for
rehabilitering. Men hans reformer ble hemmet av tidens politiske omveltninger,
der han selv måtte spille en aktiv rolle.
Dermot McMurroughs uhyrligheter førte til at han ble
drevet bort fra Irland, og for å gjenvinne sin posisjon, ba han om hjelp fra
kong Henrik II av England. Han var bare glad til å tillate hvem som helst av
sine stormenn å bli med på en ekspedisjon. Lederen for disse frivillige var
Richard de Clare, jarlen av Pembroke («Strongbow»), som i 1170 invaderte Irland
med sine anglo-normanniske eventyrere. De gikk i land i Waterford, nedkjempet
deler av Leinster og marsjerte mot Dublin. Laurentius ble sendt for å forhandle
med okkupantene, men under denne diskusjonen erobret kong Dermots
anglo-normanniske allierte byen, og satte i gang massakre og voldtekter.
Laurentius vendte tilbake for å hjelpe de lidende og forsvare de overlevende.
Dermot døde i sin seierstime, og Strongbow krevde Leinster, som Dermots arving
og ektemann til hans datter Eva, som var Laurentius' niese. Deretter kalte kong
Henrik sin vasall tilbake til England, irene forente seg under sin «High-king»
Rory O'Conor av Connacht, og Strongbow befestet seg i Dublin. Igjen opptrådte
Laurentius som fredsmegler, men forhandlingene var mislykket. Men Strongbow
samlet seg plutselig i desperasjon og uventet vant han en avgjørende seier over
de irske styrkene.
Kong Henrik dro nå selv til Irland, og i 1171 mottok
han i Dublin underkastelse fra alle irske høvdinger, unntatt dem i Connaught,
Tyrconell og Tyrone. Året etter kalte han sammen en synode i Cashel, hvor
Laurentius deltok. Her ble Hadrian IVs bulle som påla sølibat for presteskapet
akseptert, og det samme ble den engelske formen av den romerske liturgien
(Sarum-ritene). Pave Alexander III ble bedt om å bekrefte avgjørelsene, noe han
med tiden gjorde. Samme år forhandlet han frem en avtale mellom Henrik II og
kong Rory O'Connor. Ved denne anledningen besøkte han den hellige Thomas Beckets
grav, og slapp så vidt unna en voldsom død av en gal drapsmanns hånd.
I 1179 reiste han sammen med fem andre irske biskoper
til det tredje Laterankonsil, hvor han ga pave Alexander III full rapport om
Kirken i Irland og ble pavelig legat. På vei til Roma hadde de blitt tvunget av
Henrik II til å sverge på å ikke skade hans rettigheter som hersker over Irland
mens de var i Roma. Men dette hindret ikke Laurentius fra å få pavelig
beskyttelse for eiendommene til bispesetet i Dublin og dets fem suffraganseter,
spesielt Glendalough. I 1179 var det også holdt et konsil i Clonfert som av
satte sju «legbiskoper», hindret presters og biskopers sønner å bli presteviet
og fremfor alt forbød alle legmenn å ha «styringen av noen kirke eller
kirkelige saker». Disse dekretene viser at suksessen til den hellige Malakias da
han kjempet de samme slagene, bare hadde vært delvis. Dublins økende makt ble
klar i 1180 da Laurentius forfremmet en biskop fra Connacht til det irske
primatsetet i Armagh.
I 1180 besøkte han igjen Henrik II på vegne av Rory
O'Connor for å forhandle om skatter og andre saker, men kongen var irritert
fordi Laurentius brukte pavelige buller i eiendomstvister med normanniske
nybyggere ved Dublin, så han nektet å treffe erkebiskopen. Laurentius ventet
tre uker i Abingdon og fulgte deretter etter kongen til Normandie. Han gikk i
land ved Le Tréport, på et sted som fortsatt heter Saint-Laurent. Han fikk
Henriks tillatelse til å vende tilbake til Dublin.
Men på veien ble han svært syk, og da de nærmet seg
augustinerkorherreklosteret Saint-Victor i Eu i Normandie ved utløpet av
Bresle, mumlet han: Haec requies mea in saeculum saeculi, «Her skal jeg
hvile i all evighet». Han var klar for døden, og her døde han fredag den 14.
november 1180. Hans minne æres fortsatt i det franske bispedømmet Rouen, hvor
Eu ligger. Der oppbevares hans relikvier og der ble hans livshistorie skrevet. Han
ble kanonisert av pave Honorius III i 1225 og hans relikvier ble skrinlagt den
10. mai 1226. Han finnes i den malte kalenderen av helgener som ble kanonisert
på 1200-tallet i basilikaen for De fire kronede martyrer i Roma, og hans navn
står i Martyrologium Romanum. Hans fest feires i hele Irland og av
regularkannikene i Lateranet.
Hans minnedag er 14. november, med en translasjonsfest
den 10. mai.
Kilder:
Attwater/John, Farmer, Schauber/Schindler, Attwater/Cumming, Butler -
Kompilasjon og oversettelse: p. Per Einar Odden
SOURCE : http://www.katolsk.no/biografier/historisk/lotoole
St Laurence's Roman Catholic church in en:Molong, New South Wales, Australia
Voir aussi : http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/ccmed_0007-9731_1994_num_37_145_2584
