THE CHURCH AND THE GRAVE

TWO CHURCHES AND A PUBLIC PARK

November 22, 2022 by infomatique

ST AUDOEN’S

St Audoen’s park was closed to the public for a number of years but it was reopened in March 2019.

I was surprised to learn that the park is fairly recent as it first opened in the 1980s and it also surprised me to learn that the nearby church is still active.

The main set of steps leads to a new forecourt area in front of the West Door of St Audoen’s Church. A number of archaeological features, uncovered by the works, have been incorporated into the paths through the park including stone setts of a former laneway that ran through the area called Keysers Lane, medieval cobbles and some Georgian-era paving tiles.

The park now includes a series of interactive sound-based installations for children, as well as a new memorial water feature, recalling the children who lost their lives during the Easter Rising 1916.

St. Audoen’s Park is significant in historical terms. Located adjacent to St. Audoen’s Church (1300 A.D.), it incorporates the first stone city wall dating from about 1100 A.D.; St. Audoen’s Arch, the last surviving entrance to the old city; and Fagan’s Gate.

The City Wall was restored in 1976 as part of Architectural Heritage Year and the park development of 1982 won a prestigious civic award. Audoen was a 7th – century Bishop of Rouen (France) and the nearby church named after him is reputedly one of the oldest still used for regular religious services.

St Audoen’s Church (Church Of Ireland) is the church of the parish of Saint Audoen in the Church of Ireland, located south of the River Liffey at Cornmarket in Dublin, Ireland. This was close to the centre of the medieval city. The parish is in the Diocese of Dublin and Glendalough. St Audoen’s is the oldest parish church in Dublin and is still used as such. There is a Roman Catholic church of the same name adjacent to it.

The architect Thomas Drew was the first to draw serious attention to the importance of the church, architecturally and historically, in 1866. He produced detailed plans of the church for which he won an award from the Royal Institute of Architects of Ireland, carried out excavations and drew up a paper on the church and its history. In a booklet published in 1873, the rector Alexander Leeper urged reroofing and restoration of the church.

In the 1980s an extensive restoration of the tower and bells was carried out. A few years later St Anne’s chapel, which had lost its roof and many monuments, was re-roofed and converted to a visitor reception centre, which included an exhibition on the history of the church.

During conservation works starting in 1996 an extensive excavation of a small section of the church was carried out, which cast new light on the early days of the church. This contributed greatly to an understanding of the building history of the church. The detailed results of this study were published in book form in 2006.

St Audoen’s (Catholic) is the church of the parish of St Audoen that is located south of the River Liffey at Cornmarket in Dublin, Ireland. The parish is in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Dublin. The church is now home to the Polish chaplaincy in Ireland. There is an Anglican church of the same name adjacent to it. The church was built between 1841 and 1847 to the neoclassical design of Patrick Byrne who also designed nearby St. Paul’s Church on Arran Quay and Church of the Immaculate Conception (Adam and Eve’s) on Merchants Quay. The cornerstone was laid in July 1841. A founding member donor being Daniel O’Connell.

St. Audoen’s houses the National Shrine of St. Anne. The site on which the church is built formerly housed a college to accommodate the chaplains to the Guild of St Anne’s, originally known as Blakeney Inns and later St. Anne’s Inns. The statue of St. Anne was made by Deghini’s of Fishamble Street, Dublin, and was donated by a Mrs. Kelly in 1919.

A central dome positioned over the crossing of the nave was the main external feature of the church until it collapsed in 1880 and was replaced with a flat roof. It has a double-level crypt to compensate for the steeply sloping site. In 1898 the portico including the piazza to the front and railings was added by George Ashlin. The pediment over portico has a granite frieze supported on granite Corinthian columns. Like the earlier St. Paul’s, above the pediment are carved statues at each end and at the apex.

The walls are constructed of Black calp and are best appreciated from Cook Street from where their sheer bulk dominates the area and the Medieval Dublin City Walls. Because of its steeply sloping site, the church has a double level crypt to the rear.

The interior, which has a coffered barrel-vaulted ceiling, is lit by lunette windows high above the walls. The statue of Our Lady’s Altar is by Peter Bonanni of Rome, which won a gold medal at the Dublin Exhibition in 1853.

The holy water stoups on either side of the main doors are giant clam shells that were donated in 1917 by a Pacific Ocean sea captain as a gift to his brother, the parish priest at the time.

Until December 2007 the church hosted a regular Tridentine (Latin) Mass. The church has experienced a resurgence of attendance due to the influx of Polish immigrants who regularly celebrate mass in the church in their native language. St Audoen’s Church is now home to the Polish chaplaincy in Ireland.

ABBEY PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH STILL A WORK IN PROGRESS

November 18, 2022 by infomatique

AS SEEN FROM THE GARDEN OF REMEMBRANCE

I refer to it as a work in progress because I do not remember ever seeing it without scaffolding around the spire.

Abbey Presbyterian Church is a church located at Parnell Square, Dublin. Designed by architect Andrew Heiton of Perth, Scotland, it is a decorated Gothic building, with a spire 180 feet (54.9 m) high. The church was erected in 1864.

Over a century and a half this church gone through several name changes: Rutland Square Presbyterian, Abbey Presbyterian, and colloquially as ‘Findlater’s Church’ (after the Dublin merchant who paid for the construction of the building); and through seismic shifts culturally, historically, socially and economically. Indeed the reconstituting and renaming of the congregation came as a direct result of the 1916 Easter Rising and its aftermath.

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LARGE HIGH CROSS AND SMALL PARK

November 16, 2022 by infomatique

DOLPHINS BARN IN DUBLIN

This High Cross, which is not very attractive, at Dolphins Barn dates from 1868 and it was originally located in the garden of the priest’s house at St James’s Terrace. It was moved to its present location in 1991 which could be described a a very small park across the road from Our Lady of Dolours Church.

Dolphin’s Barn is an inner city suburb of Dublin situated on the Southside of the city in the Dublin 8, and partially in the Dublin 12, postal district.

The official Jewish cemetery of Dublin is on Aughavannagh Road near Dolphin’s Barn. It was established in 1898 by Robert Bradlaw and the Dolphin’s Barn Jewish Burial Society to replace the Ballybough Cemetery which was nearing capacity. Bradlaw was one of the founders of the St. Kevin’s Parade Synagogue. The cemetery was dedicated to Sir Moses Montefiore.

Unfortunately the GPS tagging is much less precise than usual and I don’t really know why. I did update my iPhone a few days ago so that might be the cause.

MARIAN STATUE AT CEANNT FORT AT MOUNT BROWNE

November 12, 2022 by infomatique

PHOTOGRAPHED NOVEMBER

Because of all the protection it was close to impossible to photograph this religious statue.

This caught me by surprise and I cannot find any details online. I do not have any reason to believe that it is not a Marian Statue and I cannot understand why it is protected by such an ugly, and annoying, perspex case. I do not remember seeing any other Marian Statue protected in such a manner and I have never seen one that has been vandalised in anyway. Maybe it needs protection from the elements as it is in an exposed position but many others are.

In 1953 Pope Pius ordered a Marian year for 1954, the first in Church history. It was called to commemorate the centenary of the definition of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary. The Marian year, which ran from December 1953 to December 1954, was filled with Marian initiatives, in the areas of Mariology, cultural events, and charity and social gatherings.

If you are not from Ireland you may be unaware of ‘Marian Statues’ and if you are younger than 35 or 40 you may also be unaware of them and even if you pass any of them on a daily basis you may not have given them much thought.

There are about 20 or 30 in Dublin alone and most of them are located on public land in what were working class areas back in the 1950s. One or two are located on private property with the statue at Broadstone Station being one example

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MORE ABOUT FORT CEANNT

PAINT-A-BOX STREET ART NEARBY

CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION MEMORIAL 1929

November 9, 2022 by infomatique

AT THE INTERSECTION OF GRAY STREET AND REGINALD STREET

A number of memorial fountains were erected in Dublin commemorating the visit of Queen Victoria to Ireland and I must admit that my favourite is the one in Dun Laoghaire. As you may have guessed I really like these old Victorian memorial fountains

While searching, many years ago, for Marian Statues in Dublin I was informed by a local historian that there was one in the Liberties area of Dublin known as the “Holy Mary” statue. According to her it was located on Gray Street.

As soon as I located it I realised that it was not a Marian Statue and that it may have been a a Queen Victoria fountain that had been modified or converted.

Over the years since publishing a series of photographs on Flickr I discovered that it was known at various times as ‘The Fountain”, “The Sacred Heart Statue” or “The Catholic Emancipation Memorial” or “the 1929 memorial”.

I now know that the large canopied structure was originally built as a water fountain until the top was knocked off during the War of Independence. In 1929 the local community converted it into a Sacred Heart shrine [not a Marian Shrine] and then in 1979 it was rededicated for the Papal visit to Ireland.

According to some accounts much of the current structure is not original as the roof was replaced after the fountain had been demolished by a lorry. I do not know if the lorry accident and the War Of Independence incident were in fact the same event and to complicate the story even more some local historians maintain that pieces were shot off by British ‘Black And Tans’.

The inscriptions read as follows:

“Erected by the parishioners of St. Catherine’s to the glory and honour of God and in commemoration of the Centenary of the Emancipation, 1929″

“Restored to mark the visit of Pope John Paul II to the Liberties 29th Sept. 1975″

As described by the National Inventory Of Architectural Heritage: ‘Carved stone statue of Jesus Christ, erected 1929, set within structure erected over former drinking fountain c.1900 comprising of decorative cast-iron columns having bands of stylised shamrock to shafts and connecting wrought-iron railing panels, supporting copper roof with cross finial and cast-iron shields with storks. On octagonal-profile ashlar limestone base, formerly base to fountain erected c.1900. Restored 1979.’ and ‘The original fountain was made by the MacFarlane foundry of Glasgow and was erected to provide a reliable water source to the surrounding houses. The canopy suffered damage during the War of Independence and again in the late twentieth century. The statue of Jesus replaced the fountain in 1929 to commemorate the centenary of Catholic emancipation. The structure was restored to commemorate the Papal visit to Dublin in 1979. It provides a focal point to the junction of Gray Street and Reginald Street.’

I am still testing my Sony FX30 camera and today I used a Sonnar T* FE 55mm F1.8 ZA. Vario-Sonnar Zoom lens are optimised for the demands of Sony’s high quality picture cameras using Carl Zeiss’ expertise in creating both analog and digital lenses. It produces high quality, bright and sharp pictures, enabling sensitive and precise images.