St Cathal of Taranto (7th-8th century) pilgrim for Christ and patron of the diocese
Tradition that he was bishop at Taranto
The
tradition at Taranto is that Cathal came from the monastery school at
Lismore, Co Waterford, Ireland, and arrived in this city en route to or
from the Holy Land and was chosen as its bishop.
His cult certainly goes
back to 1071 when his relics were found in a coffin at Taranto with a
pastoral staff of Irish workmanship with the inscription Cathaldus Rachau.
He is the titular of the cathedral there and the principal patron saint of the diocese
Spread to Sicily and beyond
The Benedictines of
the Norman kingdom of Sicily and south Itlay inspired devotion to him.
He appears in mosaics in Palermo and in the basilica of Monreale.
There
is even a painting of him on one of the pillars in the Church of the
Nativity at Bethlehem commissioned by the Norman archbishop Drogo of
Taranto and approved by the Norman patriarch Raoul of Jerusalem.
The
earliest account of his life was written by an Italian monk Petrus de
Natalibus in 1382.
Where in Ireland?
Efforts to identify a diocese of Rachau have suggested Shanrahan or Rachaa in Co Tipperary (See the website,
where the links between Shanrahan and Cathaldus are explored).
Another
suggestion is Rahan in Co Offaly with the hypothesis that he was a
missionary from an Irish monastic centre on the continent.
The first
interest taken in this saint in Ireland was in 1746, when he was linked
with a claim that the diocese of Cashel should take precedence over the
diocese of Armagh!
Stained glass window in Clogheen, Co Tipperary
In
1963, Fr. Frank Mackin, a Jesuit priest from Boston, came to Clogheen
to research his family history.
Following that visit, he went to Taranto
to research the life of Saint Cathaldus.
He was amazed that there was
neither a statue nor a stained glass window commemorating the Irish
Saint in the Clogheen Church even though it was obvious from the
writings of the historian Fr. Everard - Clogheen's Parish priest in the
early years of the twentieth century - and from local tradition, that
Clogheen people were aware of the historic link between Taranto and
Shanrahan.
He resolved to do something about it. In 1986 the Mackin
family of America, Ireland and Australia installed a beautiful stained
glass window in St. Mary's Catholic Church, on Clogheen's Main Street.
The window, on the west wall of the church, depicts the life of St.
Cathaldus in Shanrahan, his journey to the Holy Land and his being
shipwrecked off the coast of Southern Italy