The Fertile Rock of Co. Clare

‘And some time make the time to drive out west
Into County Clare, along the Flaggy Shore…’

If you can, it is well worth making the time, as Seamus Heaney suggests in his poem Postscript, to ‘drive out west into County Clare’. You will be enriched by what you find. The north-west part of the county is known as the Burren, the ancient Barony of the O’Lochlainns. It is bounded by Galway Bay to the north, the Atlantic to the west, mountains stretching from Abbey Hill to Mullaghmore and from Corofin to the Cliffs of Moher to the east and south. The area is aptly named, as Burren comes from the Irish word ‘boireann’, meaning ‘rocky place’. I spent some wonderful time there on my own this Easter week retracing some of the pilgrim paths we trod on a very special guided retreat two years ago.
All 250 square kilometres of this carboniferous limestone plateau, which was created by great movements of the earth’s crust along the rim of Europe almost three hundred million years ago, was surely ‘charged with the grandeur of God’ - alive with new growth on bush, on stony wayside, on peaty hummock and in hidden crevice – basking in glorious sunshine. The famous Spring Gentian, signature flower of the Burren, seemed to reflect the joy of Resurrection-time as it turned its unique, blue smile heavenward. An early, warm Spring has meant that the Gentian too, is early this year. I heard the cuckoo and remembered lines from John O’Donohue’s The Voyage of Gentians:
‘…what do
these tribes of blue gentians come up here for?
Is it enough for them to climb onto
this April day above in Caherbeanna
into light confused with yellow and grey
and whorled by the song of a cuckoo?

In the Burren you will be rewarded with sights to delight the eye, move the heart and raise mind and spirit to God. About 4000 years ago the first farmers were attracted to the Burren because of its dry lightly wooded uplands. By degrees overgrazing and soil erosion led to to-day’s stark horizons. Job might have been in the Burren when, in his misery, he said ‘water wears away the stone, the cloudburst erodes the soil’ (14:19). While the surface of this karst landform is dry, water in the Burren is alive everywhere in its underground springs, swallow holes, turloughs and drainage systems. Cromwell’s General Ludlow is reputed to have said that in the Burren there was ‘not water enough to drown a man, wood enough to hang one, nor earth enough to bury him’. Of course there was plenty of stone for cairns. In fairness, he was there in November 1651 and probably did not appreciate the rich growth in the grykes in the limestone pavement on which animals still live happily outdoors even in winter.

There were gentians aplenty along Boithrín an Ghorta – a Famine Road. It is hard to imagine why starving, dying people of famine times were made to break stones to build this crescent of road going nowhere, in return for very meagre and inadequate food. On the radio earlier I had heard Minister for Social Protection, Joan Burton, express concern about the thousands of people in Ireland to-day living on Social Welfare Payments and wonder about removing it from anyone who refused an offer of work. Her words hit me in a new way. For a raw interpretation of the cruelty of this dark period of our history of a mere 150 years ago, Eavan Boland’s poem, The Famine Road, is worth reading:
‘…might it be safe
Colonel, to give them roads, roads to force
from nowhere, going nowhere of course? …
Sick, directionless they worked…’
What is it about breaking stones that makes it a universally practised punishment – Nelson Mandela on Robben Island comes to mind. The stone survives, the beauty around is magnificent and I move on.

In county Clare alone there are 170 ecclesiastical or monastic sites. The Burren, with its megalithic tombs and ivy-clad ruins is rich in reminders of another age. Ireland was the first country outside the Roman Empire to have been Christianised and it evolved its own structure and organisation that was reformed into the diocesan structure more or less as we know it to-day at the Synod of Rathbreasail almost a thousand years ago in 1111. Kilfenora succeeded in its ambition for diocesan status at the Synod of Kells in 1152. The remains of its Cathedral still stands and seven fine, carved, stone crosses – the Bibles or interactive white boards of their day, for the scriptures were intricately illustrated on their surface. From being one of the most important dioceses in the country, by 1750, within a year of the death of James O’Daly, the last Catholic bishop, it was united with Kilmacduagh; both were united with Galway in 1883. However, the bishop of Galway is only the Apostolic Administrator of Kilfenora which means that technically, the Pope is the bishop of Kilfenora. It made me reflect on the ever-changing nature of society and of Church; there is so much change, anxiety about change, and questioning of where the future is leading us at this time in our history. It will all look much clearer in another millennium! How short and transitory is one life, how long the human story. There was a certain reassurance in gazing at and touching the limestone all around me. It has been here for thousands of years – and so have human beings. With David I prayed: Yahweh…
Be a sheltering rock for me,
a walled fortress to save me;
For you are my rock, my fortress;
for the sake of your name, guide me, lead me! (Ps.31:3)

Because it was one of the first places in the Burren that attracted me many years ago I love to go back to the ruins of Corcomroe Abbey. As part of the plan to reform the Irish Church European religious orders were introduced, one of which was the Cistercians who settled in Corcomroe in 1194 giving the Abbey the wonderful name of ‘Sancta Maria de Petra Fertili’ - ‘St. Mary of the Fertile Rock’. It reflects the fertile nature of the Burren land around the monastery as the monks were able to support themselves by cultivating it. The ruin is relatively well preserved and contains some interesting architectural features including arches, carved leaves, dragons’ heads, human masks and carved rib vaulting in the Romanesque style. There is a recumbent effigy of an Irish chieftain, said to be that of King Conor O’Brien, killed in battle nearby in 1227. The Cistercians were here for almost four hundred years when the English Reformation led to the dissolution of Catholic monasteries in Ireland. In 1554 Corcomroe was granted to the Earl of Thomond. The monks worked locally for a while but the political climate led to their decline. The last Abbot was Rev. John O’Dea. What is happening to religious houses in Ireland to-day? Another kind of dissolution? As I grapple with this question in the silent but still beautiful ruins of Corcomroe this Easter week, I can only repeat again and again: ‘Christ is Risen’.

Ancient burial places and Ring Forts are common in the Burren. One of the best known megalithic tombs in Ireland is the Poulnabrone portal tomb or Dolmen where the remains of 21 people were identified by archaeologists in 1985. Radiocarbon dates from the bones give a date range of c. 3,800 – 3,200 BC. Other burial places are marked by large mounds of stones, called cairns. One of the ‘new-to-me’ and fascinating places visited when I did the Burren Retreat was Poulawack. There was something in the very sound of the name that appealed to me. The Poulawack burial cairn is not as well known as Poulnabrone because it is off the beaten track. It is 21 metres in diameter and about 2.5 metres high and archaeologists tell us that it contains the remains of eighteen persons including children, in cists or stone boxes. I recalled the moving prayer service for the dead which Mary Lillis and Nóirín Long conducted with us at this site as we walked slowly round and round the cairn. I wondered anew about the mystery of death and dying and afterlife. I prayed for those buried here. People grieved for them and remembered them until they too were lost in time. I remember by name family and friends who have died and whom I will one day join. Poulawack sends me back to the chapter on resurrection in Pope Benedict’s book, Jesus of Nazareth (CTS London:2011) where he says ‘Speculation over history, looking ahead into the unknown future – these are not fitting attitudes for a disciple. Christianity is the present: it is both gift and task…bearing witness to Jesus Christ’.
Even a long day is too short in the Burrren. I must return soon to complete my retracing of that very special ‘Retreat with a Difference’ directed by Mary and Nóirín almost two years ago. And different it was. If you’re interested, banish all thought of sitting attentively, or even drowsily, in comfortable chairs in a polished chapel listening to well crafted lectures. For this retreat take your stoutest walking shoes, rain-gear, hat, scarf, gloves, walking stick (invaluable over rocky terrain), your love of nature and of the great lunar landscape that is the Burren. A few Euro in the pocket for the unexpected – like coffee and a display of flora and fauna in the Burren Perfumery when it rains – is also important!
I want to go back to the Flaggy Shore, to the ‘crochet-like’ dry-stone walls, to the Glen of Clab and Glencolumbcille; to Noughaval with its ruins of an ancient Church-sponsored monastery where monks had strong links to the land. Later local ‘chiefs’ dominated the area. A Market Stone still bears witness to trading and commerce of yore – precursor of mart, bank and stock exchange, perhaps? How is to-day’s economy serving God’s people? What trace of Market Stone will be found in cyberspace? Other places of inspiration are the ruins of the Law School at Cahermacnaghten run by the scholarly O’Davoran family; the Caherconnel Stone Fort which is close to Poulnabrone in the heart of the Burren.
Thank God for the many gifts all around us and for people like Mary and Noirin who open our eyes to see in them links to deeper meaning. Mary can be contacted at 087-7901130 087-7901130.
Canice Hanrahan rsm

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