{"id":57126,"date":"2021-07-21T15:17:01","date_gmt":"2021-07-21T20:17:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/?p=57126"},"modified":"2021-08-02T00:54:06","modified_gmt":"2021-08-02T05:54:06","slug":"mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/","title":{"rendered":"Mass Rocks as a Possible Future"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Over the past few weeks, we have looked at the setting for the church to gather in a number of posts. Anthony has commented on the <a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/09\/short-commentary-lay-led-house-churches-in-the-church-of-england\/\">Lay-led house churches in the Church of England <\/a>and I posted on the Fr. Len Black\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/09\/shed-of-the-year\/\">Shed of the Year<\/a> as an alternative setting for the Church to gather.<\/p>\n<p>I think that the future will see a variety of settings for liturgical gatherings, as unsurprisingly there have been a similar variety over the last two millennia. One particular setting for the Eucharist that has recently been making something of a comeback in Ireland is the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Mass_rock\">Mass Rock<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>During the time of the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Penal_Laws\">Penal Laws<\/a> in Ireland, Roman Catholic worship was prohibited and all the churches passed to state ownership and were either secularized, destroyed or continued in religious use as under the auspices of the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Church_of_Ireland\">Church of Ireland<\/a>. Catholic worship continued in private and often outside with the Eucharist being celebrated on a rock or large stone. As these assemblies were illegal and sometimes led to arrest and even <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Irish_Catholic_Martyrs\">martyrdom<\/a> of those attending, it is not surprising that Mass Rocks tended to be located in out of the way places.<\/p>\n<p>After Catholic Emancipation (1829) gradually Roman Catholic churches were allowed to be built again. Mass Rocks fell from the common consciousness and were often forgotten about. In recent years people began to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.findamassrock.com\/\">mark their locations<\/a> from both a religious and folkloric concern.<\/p>\n<p>Recently <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.acnireland.org\/\">Aid to the Church in Need Ireland<\/a><\/em> decided to organize a Mass Rock campaign. As they explain on their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.acnireland.org\/mass-rocks\">website<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>There is perhaps no tradition as unique to the Irish Catholic Church as Mass Rocks. Aid to the Church in Need Ireland has organised for a Holy Mass to be celebrated at a Mass Rock in each of Ireland\u2019s 26 dioceses in the lead-up to the Feast of the Irish Martyrs on 20 June [2021]. These Holy Masses were offered for the renewal of the Faith in Ireland through the intercession of the Irish Martyrs.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>While not explicitly mentioned, this happened during a stage in the lockdown where Catholic worship was again illegal and no public Masses (other than very limited funeral Masses) were allowed to be celebrated in the Republic. In the popular imagination the penal times were equated with the COVID-19 governmental criminalization of Catholic worship.\u00a0 Here is not the place to enter in polemics regarding the Irish government and their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rte.ie\/news\/coronavirus\/2021\/0418\/1210583-mass-coronavirus\/\">lack of respect<\/a> for those who publicly practice their faith. Neither is it about the liturgical mannerisms of the priests who participated. I provide photographs as an illustration many more (and a video) are available on the <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.acnireland.org\/mass-rocks\">Aid to the Church in Need<\/a><\/em> website. Please note that the photographs do not have many lay people in them, as at this stage it was illegal for anybody to be present when the Eucharist was being celebrated.<\/p>\n<p>The main point I am trying to make in this post is that our future will probably see different assemblies celebrating in very different places and that the Catholic Church will not necessarily meet in a parish complex with a purpose-built church. And this decreased physical footprint could be due to a decrease in regularly practicing parishioners as much as any persecution. But the answer to this has to be creativity and a willingness to share the joy of the Gospel and not simply resignation and condemnation of the evils of the present world.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/mass-rock-6\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-57128\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-57128\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-6-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-6-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-6-600x400.jpg 600w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-6-420x280.jpg 420w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-6.jpg 622w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/mass-rock-5\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-57129\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-57129\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-5-300x197.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"197\" srcset=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-5-300x197.jpg 300w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-5-600x394.jpg 600w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-5-768x504.jpg 768w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-5.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/mass-rock-4\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-57130\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-57130\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-4-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" srcset=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-4-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-4-600x338.jpg 600w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-4-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-4.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/mass-rock-3\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-57131\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-57131\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-3-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" srcset=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-3-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-3-600x338.jpg 600w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-3-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-3.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/mass-rock-2\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-57132\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-57132\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-2-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-2-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-2-533x400.jpg 533w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-2-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-2-100x75.jpg 100w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-Rock-2.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/mass-rock-1\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-57133\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-57133\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-rock-1-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-rock-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-rock-1-600x400.jpg 600w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-rock-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-rock-1-420x280.jpg 420w, https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Mass-rock-1.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>All photographs used by permission of <em>Aid to the Church in Need Ireland.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over the past few weeks, we have looked at the setting for the church to gather in a number of posts. Anthony has commented on the Lay-led house churches in the Church of England and I posted on the Fr. Len Black\u2019s Shed of the Year as an alternative setting for the Church to gather. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":57127,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[3119,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-plaza-new-ws","category-art-and-architecture"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Mass Rocks as a Possible Future - Home<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mass Rocks as a Possible Future - Home\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Over the past few weeks, we have looked at the setting for the church to gather in a number of posts. Anthony has commented on the Lay-led house churches in the Church of England and I posted on the Fr. Len Black\u2019s Shed of the Year as an alternative setting for the Church to gather. [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Home\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-07-21T20:17:01+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-08-02T05:54:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/MassRockMap.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1754\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Fr. 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Since 2020 he has also served as the Executive Secretary for Liturgy to the Irish Catholic Bishops Conference. He has studied at Seton Hall University (BA, MDiv), the University of Notre Dame (MA), and St Vladimir\u2019s Orthodox Theological Seminary (MTh). He holds a Doctorate in Theology (Ph.D.) from St Patrick\u2019s College, Maynooth and is in the process of completing a second doctorate (D.D) in the Pontifical Facultad de Teolog\u00eda Redemptoris Mater in Callao, Peru. Neil has published a translation of the Confessio of St. Patrick: St. Patrick: His Confession and Other Works (Totowa, NJ, 2009), as well editing the third edition of Fredrick Edward Warren\u2019s The Liturgy and Ritual of the Celtic Church (Piscataway, NJ, 2010). In 2011 the University of Notre Dame Press published The Eucharist in Pre-Norman Ireland an adaptation of his doctoral thesis and in 2017 the Alcuin Club published his Liturgical Orientation: The Position of the President at the Eucharist. His articles have appeared in The Irish Theological Quarterly, New Blackfriars, The Furrow and Antiphon. He writes a monthly article on some aspect of the theology of Pope Francis in the Messenger of St. Anthony and blogs regularly at PrayTell.\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/praytellblog.com\\\/index.php\\\/author\\\/nxodonoghue\\\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Mass Rocks as a Possible Future - Home","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Mass Rocks as a Possible Future - Home","og_description":"Over the past few weeks, we have looked at the setting for the church to gather in a number of posts. Anthony has commented on the Lay-led house churches in the Church of England and I posted on the Fr. Len Black\u2019s Shed of the Year as an alternative setting for the Church to gather. [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2021\/07\/21\/mass-rocks-as-a-possible-future\/","og_site_name":"Home","article_published_time":"2021-07-21T20:17:01+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-08-02T05:54:06+00:00","og_image":[{"width":2480,"height":1754,"url":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/MassRockMap.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Fr. Neil Xavier O'Donoghue","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Fr. 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Neil Xavier O'Donoghue","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/2024_09_NeiL_Portrait-96x96.jpeg?crop=1","url":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/2024_09_NeiL_Portrait-96x96.jpeg?crop=1","contentUrl":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/2024_09_NeiL_Portrait-96x96.jpeg?crop=1","caption":"Fr. Neil Xavier O'Donoghue"},"description":"Neil Xavier O\u2019Donoghue is originally from Cork, Ireland. He is a presbyter of the Archdiocese of Newark, NJ who has ministered in parishes on both sides of the Atlantic. He has spent many years as an academic mentor to seminarians. Neil currently serves as Programme Director for Liturgical Programmes at the Pontifical University and as Acting Director of the National Centre for Liturgy. Since 2020 he has also served as the Executive Secretary for Liturgy to the Irish Catholic Bishops Conference. He has studied at Seton Hall University (BA, MDiv), the University of Notre Dame (MA), and St Vladimir\u2019s Orthodox Theological Seminary (MTh). He holds a Doctorate in Theology (Ph.D.) from St Patrick\u2019s College, Maynooth and is in the process of completing a second doctorate (D.D) in the Pontifical Facultad de Teolog\u00eda Redemptoris Mater in Callao, Peru. Neil has published a translation of the Confessio of St. Patrick: St. Patrick: His Confession and Other Works (Totowa, NJ, 2009), as well editing the third edition of Fredrick Edward Warren\u2019s The Liturgy and Ritual of the Celtic Church (Piscataway, NJ, 2010). In 2011 the University of Notre Dame Press published The Eucharist in Pre-Norman Ireland an adaptation of his doctoral thesis and in 2017 the Alcuin Club published his Liturgical Orientation: The Position of the President at the Eucharist. His articles have appeared in The Irish Theological Quarterly, New Blackfriars, The Furrow and Antiphon. He writes a monthly article on some aspect of the theology of Pope Francis in the Messenger of St. Anthony and blogs regularly at PrayTell.","url":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/author\/nxodonoghue\/"}]}},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/MassRockMap.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57126"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57136,"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57126\/revisions\/57136"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}