STRANGE OCCURRENCES

As soon as I saw the two co-producers, Rachel Lysaght and Lindsay Campbell, doing their own postering I knew we were in for an intimate hands on experience.

Cinema 2 in the Lighthouse complex

I had never been to the Lighthouse cinema in Smithfield before and I was pleasantly surprised at how spacious and modernistic the complex turned out to be. I'm obviously way behind the times and was thinking in terms of some pokey arty place.

The occasion was a pre-screening of the film documentary Strange Occurrences in an Irish Village. This is the story of Knock as it is and as told by those most closely associated with it. These included descendants of those who claimed to have seen the apparition, the Parish Priest, pilgrims and handmaidens.

It started with the descendants reading from the witness statements of their forebears. This gave the story a great sense of intimacy and conviction from the word go.

You could immediately imagine the scene as reported by the witnesses, free of modern interpretation, but still subject to the intermediation of the church authorities of their day.

The only thing that remained the same as it had been when I used to frequent Knock in the 1950s was the blessing of the holy water in its water tank. Then it was a relatively small operation but it is now on an industrial scale feeding many outlets in the grounds.

One of the participants referred to a rumour that Knock water was not blessed and assured us it was. The thought would never have occurred to me. But for the avoidance of doubt we were shown the Parish Priest doing the needful in the attic of the Basilica (above).

The current PP, Father Richard Gibbons, has only been there since 2012, but to listen to him you'd think he'd been there all his life. By all accounts he is a doer and has done loads since his appointment, including a major revamp of the Basilica and attracting two USA pilgrimages complete with their Cardinals, Timothy Dolan from New York and Seán Patrick O'Malley from Boston.

Whatever about O'Malley, who is a Capuchin Friar, Timothy Dolan has all the false bonhomie of a sleazeball. That said, if he brings business to Knock who am I to poop the party.

The film shows him as Grand Marshall of New York's St. Patrick's day parade where he pitches himself somewhere between pope and emperor.

Apart from the massive built complex, which almost reduces the original church to insignificance, the big change from my day is the onset of large scale theatre and pageantry. This struck me very much in the sequence showing the recent unveiling of the huge apparition mosaic in the basilica - a mix of religious ceremony with a flock of bishops in top gear and a very theatrical procession of those representing the lay people who actually saw the apparition.

A High Mass was the pinnacle of clerical theatre in my day.

But it is in the more personal and intimate moments that this film excels. It does not interpose commentary but lets those concerned speak for themselves. Of course that only works with the help of some skillful editing and this is evident throughout the film. Production, direction and editing are unobtrusive and very effective and you come away with the feeling that you have shared moments of intimacy with the participants.

Some of the descendants have a range of shops which compete with one another in selling religious goods. The man in the picture above gave us a bit of the old time religion which reminded me of the more outrageous pamphlets in the Veritas range of old - The Devil at Dances and What is Hell and the like. In the case above it was Purgatory which was being threatened on us but there was also a place for Hell in the learned theological discourse.

Each Hail Mary bead on the rosary around his neck had a mini reproduction embryo inside. This was not only to counter repeal of the eighth amendment but also seemed to have a particular role in promoting fertility. Amazing stuff.

As against that Pio Flatley, above, was a rock of sense and realised that people, and that included Knock, had to move with the times.

I enjoyed this film immensely, for the memories of Knock it brought back, for its revealing of today's Knock in all its complexity and for its excellent production values.

I said all that to Rachel Lysaght, above, after the showing and I think she was pleased at the general audience reaction.

If you get the chance do go and see this well crafted film. It will provoke, entertain and inform you. And, who knows, it might even get you down to Knock at some stage.

VBVM

Knock Shrine c.1885
from Schofield/Sexton

This is a useful time to look at Knock, Co. Mayo, where the Blessed Virgin Mary is reputed to have appeared on 21 August 1879, so we are fast approaching the 134th anniversary of the apparition.

I have a particular interest in Knock, having been on many pilgrimages there in my youth. My father was born in Ballyhaunis, just down the road (7 miles) and visits to the old homestead, then still inhabited by my Granny and Aunt Mollie, always included a trip to the church at Knock.

This was not the Knock of today. There was no basilica only a church with a gable end. Mind you it was a very important and controversial gable end, but a gable end no less.

There was no church of reconciliation with as many confessionals as there are weeks in the year.

And the holy water was freely available in unlimited quantities from a common tap in the corner.

Then there were the huxters stalls along the street, selling all sorts of religious artefacts and holy sounvenirs.

A decade of the rosary, a trimming or two, some momentos, and that was it. Private and no fuss.

So the picture above, is nearer to what I experienced than is the one below. It is a very interesting picture, taken within a few years of the apparition, and it testifies to a huge well of faith among those who visited in those early years. The crutches on the wall represent cures of one sort or another. Whether through divine intervention, the power of faith, or sheer mind over matter, an amazing number of cripples appear to have walked away.

For that reason, it is a very powerful picture. All the more powerful when you know the background of the times.

Irish faith was local and built around the monasteries, parishes and old practices.

There were patterns (mini-pilgrimages/visits), holy wells and other pisreogaí (superstitions). Rome, with the active connivance of Cardinal Cullen, was attempting to stamp out all this stuff and impose Rome rule (homogeneous and done by the book). Bishop McHale was the people's champion but he lost out in the long run.

In parallel with this conflict the land war was hotting up in this very area. Evictions were rife as was land agitation, and the church was divided, some priests opting for the old and others going with the new. This was the part of the country that gave us the boycott the following year. And, of course, 1879 was the year of the Gorta Beag (mini famine).

So it is not stretching it too much to say that Knock had a collective nervous breakdown around the time of the apparition. Eugene Hynes is great reading on all of this.

The narrative of the apparition, as it hit the wider public consciousness, was filtered by the church to ensure theological orthodoxy and the result has a bit of the camel about it.

The picture below of the gable as it is today, shows the Blessed Virgin, St. Joseph, St. John the Evangelist and the Lamb of God. As motley crew as ever there was. That's what I mean about the camel - a compromise creature designed by a Committee (for which read church).

The modern decor, and holy complex, was instituted by that great dancehall promoter from Toureen, Monsignor Horan. A holy entrepreneur extraordinary. He ran rings around Charlie Haughey (Taoiseach/Prime Minister) by challenging him to validate his Mayo credentials and support the construction of a nearby airport. He even got Pope John Paul II to visit the shrine on the 100th anniversary of the apparition. Some operator.

Anyway, I just thought I'd give the BVM a mention seeing as how she is tending to slip from view in this modern materialistic world.

The Gable End today

More Virgins

At this stage we should be used to divine apparitions and moving statues and the like. We have had our fill of them over the years.

But they're off again. This time it's the Unnoticed Virgin of the Blackstairs (above). I'll let the Kilkenny People describe it for you.

Situated just two kilometres outside Graignamanagh near St Mullin’s, rising high above the picturesque Carrigleade golf course are the Blackstairs Mountains. A bizarre formation in the rock, gravel and the heather, with a scale in the hundreds of metres, is striking at a glance – and even more so when gazed upon for longer. It appears to depict the Madonna and Child.

Damn the bit of Virgin I can see, but then I'm an unbeliever and She may be a bit selective in the company She keeps. I'm sure the local Parish Priest, the Bishop, and all the local non-RC denominations will have their hands full making sense of this one. Not to mention Fáilte Ireland in the year of The Gathering.

Unbeliever and all that I may be, that didn't spare me a recent encounter with a Virgin of my own (after a manner of speaking).

I answered the front door recently only to find that the Sumac tree in the front garden had been blown over, and uprooted beyond repair, by the storm of the previous night. The only thing left was to cut it up and burn the logs during the next cold spell.

I may, however, have to draw the line at interfering any further with the trunk of the tree (below). No doubting what you're looking at there.


So, what, I ask myself, is she trying to tell me?

Should I

• stop Knocking Knock? I think I'll await my RIC great-grandfather's report on that apparition before I take it seriously (pace Canon Horan and Pope John Paul II).
• put it up on eBay? But then there is the trade descriptions act and all that sort of legal stuff to contend with.
• burn it? It might be the other lad trying to tempt me, but then again it might not.

or

• just keep trying to improve on my Photoshopping? Yes, that sounds just about right!

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Update 23/8/2013

Well, I thought I should report progress.

The virgin is gone and the tree stump is ageing like the picture of Dorian Gray in Oscar's attic. In fact, I'm beginning to think there is something obscene about it but I can't quite put my finger on it.

The 134th anniversary of Knock has come and gone and the Pope has not restored the silenced to ministry.

So, who knows what next?