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The Mass Rock
Father Thaddeus (Tadhg) Moriarty
BORN at Castledrum, Parish of Castlemaine, about 1603. His younger brother, Thomas, also became a Dominican. These two boys, and many others, were greatly influenced by Father Dominic O'Daly, who, during his years at home as a young priest, held school in secret.
Tadhg went overseas to prepare for the priesthood, studying in Toledo and later at the Dominican College in Lisbon, founded by Father O'Daly, to supply priests for the Irish mission. Indeed so many of its priests died for the Faith in Ireland that the college became known as 'the seminary of martyrs'. The founder was to recall Tadhg as a student remarkable for humility and patience, one who never seemed to lose his temper.
After ordination, Tadhg returned to his native Kerry. In 1636 he is numbered among the Dominicans ministering in the diocese, and became one of the four professors in the short-lived seminary founded in Tralee by Bishop Rickard O'Connell. This was during the halcyon days of the Confederation of Kilkenny when Ireland was assured of civil and religious liberty.
Disunity, defeat and the arrival of Cromwell put an end to the dream. In July 1652, Ross Castle and island, the last stronghold of the Irish in Kerry, surrendered to the Cromwellians. Ireland was now divided into fourteen 'precincts', each under a military commander. Brigadier John Nelson was in command of the 'counties of Kerry and Desmond'. From 1652 to 1658 he wielded absolute power with ruthless cruelty.
On 6 January 1653, the four parliamentary commissioners for the affairs of Ireland issued from Dublin a decree banishing Catholic priests. Within twenty days of this date all priests were to present themselves to the authorities to express their willingness to be transported beyond seas at the earliest opportunity. Failure to comply rendered the priest guilty of high treason. The penalty was death.
Many old and sick priests obeyed and were transported, others ignored the decree and went into hiding, others still were taken and executed. Deaf to all pleas, the commissioners reaffirmed the decree on June 10 of the same year. By this time, the remaining Dominicans with their prior, Father Moriarty, had left Tralee and withdrawn to Castlemaine, Moriarty country. There they posed as merchants. The only safe place to celebrate Mass, and it was not that safe, was at 'Poll an Aifrinn' in Kilclohane Wood. It has been finely said that at this time the Mass Rock there became the parish church of Milltown.
At dawn on 15 August 1653, while celebrating Mass there, Father Tadhg Moriarty was taken by soldiers who probably came from Castlemaine Castle. They walked him all the way to Killarney, to Ross Castle, where Nelson had his headquarters. For two months he was held there and grossly illtreated. When stripped and flogged, the prisoner did not complain. His replies, when interrogated, were so unfailingly truthful, simple and direct, that his opponents concluded he was a man who knew not how to lie. When asked by Nelson why he did not obey the law of the country, Tadhg replied he was bound rather to obey the law of God and those who for him represented God and commanded him to exercise his priesthood.
He welcomed sincerely the news that he was condemned to death, and gave to the messenger and the jailers the few coins he possessed. Availing of the condemned man's privilege, he held a discourse on the scaffold at Martyrs' Hill in Killarney. He spoke briefly of the true Faith, of the Roman Catholic Church, of the brevity and uncertainty of life, and of martyrdom as the surest way to heaven.
In death, his face emaciated as a result of weeks of semi-starvation and bearing the signs of violence, seemed to change and be transfigured. This greatly consoled the Catholics. Even the Cromwellians were forced into admiration. One of them remarked: "If ever a papist were a martyr, he certainly should be accounted one." It was the 15 October 1653.
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