“Cornelius Laonensis Episcopus”.
This is the last letter we have met with from the illustrious Bishop of Killaloe, Dr. O'Melrian. His episcopate continued till 1617; yet the only event recorded concerning him during this long interval is his having examined the work of Stanihurst, De Moribus et Rebus Hiberniae, and on the margin opposite each error his solemn condemnation was found marked with the simple formula: mentitur (Hist. Cath., pag. 121).
As regards the bishops of the Establishment, that of James Curyn, or Corrin, seems to have been the first appointment made by King Henry VIII. Some call him Bishop of Killaloe as early as 1529, during the episcopate of Dr. Hogan; others date his appointment from 1539/40. At all events it is probable he is the bishop that is referred to in the letter of Dr. Browne to Lord Cromwell on 16th February, 1539/40, when he complains that the Lord Deputy in O'Brien's country “deposed a bishop who was promoted by the king's highness, ... and he that the Lord Deputy hath now promoted to the same is a Gray Friar (Dr. O'Kirwan), one of the holy confessors of the late Garrantys, even as rank a traitor as ever they were” (State Papers, iii. 123). Dr. Corrin resigned the see in 1546, and Cornelius O'Dea was appointed by the king in July, the same year, and, [pg 477] as Ware tells us, he held the see about nine years. The next crown nominee was Moriertach O'Brien. Though appointed by Queen Elizabeth in 1570, he was for a long time content with the enjoyment of the temporalities of the see, and it was only in 1577 that he received episcopal consecration. John Rider, the next Protestant bishop, was appointed in 1612: he is chiefly remarkable for a Latin dictionary which he compiled, and in which he was accused of taking both the substance and words from the Lexicon of Thomas Thomatius.
The Sacrament Of Penance In The Early Irish Church.
The name Soul's-friend (in Irish,) was a characteristic title used in the old Irish language to designate those who are now called confessors, whose mission it is to receive the confessions of the faithful and to heal by the sacrament of penance, the spiritual wounds inflicted on the soul after baptism. “Sure we are”, writes Usher, “that it was the custom of the faithful in our ancient Church, to confess their sins to the priests, that they might be made partakers of the benefit of the keys for the quieting of their troubled consciences”—Discourse on the Religion, etc., p. 46.
Our old commentator, Claudius, more than once repeats this doctrine, and teaches that the power of forgiving sins was granted by the divine Redeemer to His apostles and their successors in the priesthood: “The power of loosing and binding”, he says, “was granted to all the apostles by our Saviour, when, appearing to them after His resurrection, He breathed upon them, and said: Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven, and whose sins you shall retain, they are retained. Even to the present day this duty devolves upon the Church in its bishops and priests, and having examined each sinner's cause, they absolve those whom they find humble and truly penitent, from the fear of eternal death, but such as they find to persist in their sins, these are bound down unto never-ending torments”—In Matth. Codex Vatican., fol. 149, b.
Elsewhere, expounding the history of the man who was sick with the palsy, he remarks: “The scribes say truly that none can forgive sins save God alone, who also it is that forgives through those to whom he has given the power of forgiving”. And again, “St. John teaches us, in regard to the remission of sins, that our Saviour after His resurrection promised to His disciples [pg 478] that those shall be bound whom they shall bind, and those shall be loosened whom they shall loosen”—In Matth. ibid., fol. 81, and Usher, loc. cit., pag. 48.
The old penitential canons of our Church will serve as a practical commentary on these texts of Claudius. Thus, in the synod held by our apostle, together with Auxilius and Isernimus, about the year 450, we find the canon:
“A Christian who has committed murder, or fornication, or gone to a soothsayer after the manner of the gentiles, for every such crime shall do a year of penance: when his year of penance is accomplished he shall come with witnesses, and afterwards he shall be absolved by the priest”.[16]