churches historical ireland

On the north-east corner of Parnell Square is the Abbey Presbyterian Church (1864), usually known as Findlater's Church after the wealthy merchant who paid for the building. Its graceful neo-Gothic spire is one of Dublin's landmarks....

Not the usual - Mass rock - this altar has been venerated in the area for a very long time. Originally a flagged path led to it.
According to local tradition and folklore studies, there was long ago a - college - near the site and the students most likely monks, were killed during Cromwellian times, and their heads thrown into a nearby chasm....

Our Lady's Church: Regarded by some as being the earliest church erected in the lower valley, Our Lady's Church stands somewhat isolated from the main group of ruins. For this reason it is thought, as was common in most Irish monastic cities, to have been specially for the use of women or nuns. St. Kevin himself is buried within the walls of this church and he was venerated here on his feast day (June 3rd) until the eighteenth century when religious persecution under the Penal Code forced the...

This church, which was altered in 1960, has kept its fifteenth century tower and octagonal spire dated 1693. Memorials inside include a marble statue and cameo busts of John Hamilton (died 1693) and his wife, Sophia Mordaunt, made in 1760 by Scheemaker....

The name Ballycastle derives from two Gaelic Words. 'baile' which means town or village, and 'Caisleain', which means a castle. The Castle from which the town got its name stood alongside the church in the Diamond....

This church is also known as the church of Repatriation. It was built byb the Bellew's after one of the family members was killed in a duel, and therefore could not be buried in consecrated grounds. The church was built incorporating a burial vault for members of the Bellew family....

Banagher is said to have been founded by Muiredagh O'Heney, a saint of unknown date associated with a well-known local family. The church is scarcely any earlier then 12th century, with inclining jambs, a massive lintel on the exterior doorway and an arch within. The date 474 was carved on the doorway in the 18th century!

In the earlier 13th century, a chancel was added to the east end, and the east wall fo the original church was replaced by a chancel arch.

To the south-eas...

This was the medival seat of the Bishops of Meath where an 18th century mansion designed by James Wyatt was erected by Church of Ireland Bishop Arthur Price. It was the site of a famous eary christian Monastery linked with St. Ultan after whom the holy well on the grounds of the church is named....

Excavations in 1959 showed that the church had a predecessor in wood at the same location. The site, which, unusually, is not associated by tradition with the name of any particular saint, is best known for the curious set of stone figures with grimacing faces which are now attached to the interior north wall of the church.

The figures were found built into the stone church. They are made up of one set of two small figures and another group of four larger figures, along with a rough-ou...

At upper Ballinderry is a barn church with bull's eye glass in the windows, built in 1666 for Jeremy Taylor, the famous Bishop of Down and Connor, a descendant of Dr Rowland Taylor and one of the great prose writers of the seventeenth century.

Theological tussles with local Presbyterians apparently made his bishopric 'a place of torment'. He died, aged fifty four, the year before the Ballinderry church was consecrated and is buried in Dromore cathedral....