Yes Mary, I think they are drawn to the Penances like moths to a light. The fruits of the pence must be applied to them for them to queue up like that. 'Historically, the cave at St Patrick’s Purgatory was considered a turnstile to the Gates of Hell, where St Patrick is said to have witnessed the tortures of eternal damnation in the fifth century, and in 1148 Knight Owein is said to have been dragged into the Underworld by demons with iron hooks. During the Celtic Tiger boom years, from 1995 to 2000, numbers fell, as they did in the century when a Dutch monk complained to the Pope that no demons had attacked him during his visit, but the pilgrimage – which comes to an end on Friday, 15 August with the feast of the Assumption of Mary – is thriving again.' http://www.theguardian.com/world/shortcuts/2014/aug/15/-sp-toughest-pilgrimage-st-patrick-purgatory
I'm still set to travel there Friday July 24th with approx 4 other people. We are traveling from the Naas Co. Kildare area and haven't arranged transport yet. Anyone want to join us?
Some bright spark took it upon themselves to open all the doors just after the top pic was taken and let in the cold and the midges!!
I mentioned to a senior chap that I had been there and about the midges and he responded, "ah sure it's an island and they wouldn't be used to people!"
Your Midges, I'm guessing, are probably the same critters that used to "dine" on me while I was stationed in Northern Maine. The Maineiacs called them Black Flies and they were nasty little varmints. Down South we have Big Bugs that eat the little bugs. Up North they have little bugs that eat People ;-) I used to hang-out at the Local Rotary Club with Steve the Lutheran Pastor .. I called him Parson ;-) ... anyway he told me, and I believe it, that the reason for nasty critters down here is to remind us of what Hell will be like! GOD SAVE ALL HERE FROM HELL ..... and ALL the Nasty Varmints ... no matter how many legs they got!!!
Well they have a scary reputation in Lough Derg alright, some people say they are some local mutant not unrelated to the mosquito!lol Actually they even sell special hats on the island like bee keepers have to keep them away if they get too bad. But we had good weather, it was really too hot for the bad midges, at least they didn't go after me too much. Actually it was gloriously good weather which makes a difference because it warms you up after the cold night.
The little things had buzz saws for teeth. It is a mystery because they seem to like some people more than others, some they avoid altogether. I went round telling people that they should cover themselves in bear fat.
Yes it is a mystery how they like some people more than others, I had to leave the "beds" at one stage to get some supposedly lethal repellent. I ended up buying some local stuff that did actually work!
Lough Derg, especially the Basillica gave me the strangest feeling. It is one of those outstanding places on the face of the Earth were the veil between Heaven and Earth thins. In the Basillica I felt as though I stood at the gateway between two Worlds, this and Purgatory itself. It was as if the island was some kind of mysterious, mystical gateway. http://www.philipcoppens.com/purgatory.html View attachment 3136
It doesn't take much to obscure my view between the worlds but i must admit that at the beds and the basilica my thoughts often went to the people that had walked barefoot there in the past. People like my deceased mother, unknown by the world really, and other people, famous perhaps but still barefoot - now that's what i call equality!
The Pilgrim, by W. B. Yeats. I fasted for some forty days on bread and buttermilk, For passing round the bottle with girls in rags or silk, In country shawl or Paris cloak, had put my wits astray, And what's the good of women, for all that they can say Is fol de rol de rolly O. Round Lough Derg's holy island I went upon the stones, I prayed at all the Stations upon my marrow bones, And there I found an old man, and though, I prayed all day And that old man beside me, nothing would he say But fol de rol de rolly O. All know that all the dead in the world about that place are stuck, And that should mother seek her son she'd have but little luck Because the fires of purgatory have ate their shapes away; I swear to God I questioned them, and all they had to say Was fol de rol de rolly O. A great black ragged bird appeared when I was in the boat; Some twenty feet from tip to tip had it stretched rightly out, With flopping and with flapping it made a great display, But I never stopped to question, what could the boatman say But fol de rol de rolly O. Now I am in the public-house and lean upon the wall, So come in rags or come in silk, in cloak or country shawl, And come with learned lovers or with what men you may, For I can put the whole lot down, and all I have to say Is fol de rol de rolly O.
An interesting description of what one goes through : http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/i-fought-the-lord-and-the-lord-won-26476632.html
http://legacy.owensboro.kctcs.edu/crunyon/E102/LitCrit/3second_coming.htm William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) THE SECOND COMING Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand; A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
Well, I'm still alive and have completed the Lough Derg as hoped. Saw Border collie, bless him. It was his second pilgrimage this year.
