PRESS RELEASE FEB-1999

TERMONEENY COMMUNITY GROUP, LAVEY

St. Brigid’s Cross Night

The group was formed in March 1998 with the aim of bringing together all in the parish to seek facilities for different interest groups and to promote the history, culture and traditions in the area.

Among the projects under consideration are a walk to the Marian cross on Scullion Hill, collecting of poems, stories and place names in the area, creating parish walks and undertaking environmental and heritage work.

Anyone wishing to join the group should come along to Mayogall Hall on the first Thursday of each month.

The group thank all those from outside the parish who came to instruct on the making of St. Brigid’s Crosses and to the Bannvale Credit Union for their kind donation of £300.

St. Brigid

St. Brigid was born in a quiet named “Faughart” set upon a hill over looking Dundalk Bay. She was born about the year 454AD She spent most of her childhood in Faughart attending to a dairy farm It was to be an important event in her life.

Her father was an Irish chieftain and her mother was a bondswoman (slave) named Brocca. As a child, Brigid, demonstrated a strong will, but also a charitable nature, although her calling to help the poor often got her into trouble.

Brigid was known as the symbol of Eternal Light she also known as Mary of the Gael. She was called this as the nuns celebrated as guardians of the “Fire of St. Brigid” by starting and sustaining a perpetual fire. Nineteen nuns each took a turn tending the fire and on the 20^th day, St. Brigid tended it herself. After her death, the fire burned continuously, and although, this required a great deal of wood, the ashes never increased.

St. Brigid founded 4 monasteries and ruled over thirty religious houses. She is most noted for having established a double monastery in Kildare with Bishop Conlaeth.

St. Brigid once said, “I should like to be a rent-prayer to the lord; that should I suffer misfortune, he would bestow upon me a good blessing.”

The date of her death is now that of her feastday, February 1^st .Which is still celebrated with the traditional creation of the St. Brigid cross. It is believed that she died at Kildare on February 1^st in the year 525 and was buried at Downpatrick with St. Columba and St. Patrick.

Prayer to St. Brigid

Brigid

You were a woman of peace.

You brought harmony where there was conflict.

You brought light to the darkness.

You brought hope to the downcast.

May the mantle of your peace cover those who are troubled and anxious,

And may peace be firmly rooted in our hearts and in our world.

Inspire us to act justly and to the reverence all god has made.

Brigid you were a voice for the wounded and the weary.

Strengthen what is weak within us.

Calm us into a quietness that heals and listens.

May we grow each day into greater wholeness in mind, body and spirit.

Amen