The Famine Cemetery.🙏🏻

In known and unknown graves they rest, the young, the bravest and the best. They too loved well what life could give, and yet they died that we might live’. (Patience Strong)

Every day, for the month of November, our little church community/group visit a cemetery. We pray Holy Rosary and Chaplet of Divine Mercy for the Holy Souls, sprinkling Holy water on the graves, as we go.

Sugreine Cemetery, also known as The Famine Cemetery, extremely moving experience for me. Unmarked graves, stones sticking out of the ground, deep sadness, grief hanging heavy in the air. Not far away, the ruins of the old ‘Work House’, poignant painful history. ‘Family tombs’ built with large flat stones, mini houses without windows, many of our ancestors interred here.

The ruins of the ancient Church where Holy Eucharist was once celebrated felt warm in a strange way. When no other comfort was to be had in those terrible times, the poor people lived for Holy Mass.

As we parted company, we knew something wonderful occurred in our hearts, something unexplainable. Prayer and grief mingled together in that open bleak place settled in our bones, shifting our gaze.

In these harsh pandemic days, we may be out of our comfort zones, but we have little cause for complaint. In comparison to the extreme hardship our ancestors suffered we are beyond rich.

May God have mercy on their gentle souls.