The Irish Catholic tradition of the Station Mass, an incredible preparation from a rural farmhouse from the 1960s

The Station Mass, a deeply rooted Irish Catholic tradition, carries with it a story of resilience and faith. Born in the days of penal laws, when priests risked their lives to celebrate mass in secret, this cherished custom evolved into a rural community event held in family homes. For a family in the 1960s, hosting Station Mass meant more than fulfilling a religious duty: it was a labor of love, a source of pride, and a test of their social status.

The tradition of the “Station Mass” dates back to a time when criminal laws were in force in Ireland. A price was placed on the heads of Catholic priests if they were caught celebrating Mass. Priests and worshipers risked their lives celebrating Mass in secret wooded areas, changing locations (stations) in order to get ahead of “priest hunters.” With the repeal of the penal laws, mass was celebrated in homes. The tradition has continued through the centuries.

I remember the stations we had at home in the 1960s. Our catechism taught us that at the consecration of the Mass, Jesus was “really, truly and substantially present” at the Mass. We were in awe of the honor that this was taking place in our home. We believed that the blessings that would come from this would be many.

The social pressure to “do stations right” cannot be underestimated. For our Mass Station we would not be left out. For this, we whitewashed all the outbuildings. The farm’s manure pile was packed with many cartloads of sand. It took many cartloads of gravel spread across the barnyard to cover the potholes. Sand and gravel were laboriously brought from the nearby beach.

Meanwhile, inside the house, the women had scrubbed and cleaned every corner. The white linen tablecloths and altarpiece tablecloths, strictly reserved for the Stations, and which only saw the light of day every five years, were washed and starched.

The kitchen table, which was to become the priest’s altar, posed a problem. My father was the standard for measuring roughly the height of a priest. By unanimous vote, the table was deemed too low for a respectable altar to look down upon. The priest could not be expected to bend down to retrieve his sacred vessels. A few “sensible” neighbors were called to see if they could find a solution.

Hoisting the table onto the chairs did not solve the problem. Now the altar was too high. After much head scratching and cups of tea, one man said a few inches would saw off the table legs and when placed on the chairs the altar would be closer to regulation size. The handsaw was brought out and after much sawing and sloppy finger measuring it was declared “close enough”. It was a quick solution to a thorny problem.

Food for the Station Mass was the next important issue. Certain protocols had to be followed and might as well have been set in stone. The butter had to be made into butter balls.

The day before the Stations, a woman known to be a skilled maker of butter balls arrived at our house full of importance and took out her palettes of butter. My mother produced a pile of butter and the wife turned it into a pile of butter balls. The paddles had tiny ridges, so each butter ball had ridges. So much better than those seen at other resorts.

The sugar for the priests’ tea had to be sugar cubes in a bowl with sugar tongs. Brown sugar was a staple of the priest’s porridge (oatmeal), a food that was difficult to find in a rural village in the 1960s.

The hardest thing to get, however, was a grapefruit.something that no respectable Station table could do without. Fortunately, a woman had the opportunity to travel to a distant town and returned with the goods. We could all expire.

Now no less important task was to determine the place at the priest’s breakfast table. These were generally considered to be “those who could best speak to a priest”.

The ecclesiastical table was seated for six people. There was a lot of struggle for these positions because it consolidated everyone’s position in the village. “Bad” investments have caused a lot of resentment for a long time.

In the case of our Mass Station, some of these positions were already occupied. The woman who prepared the butterballs was rightly assured of her place at the table. For the woman who found the sugar cubes, brown sugar and perhaps the only grapefruit in the county, it was no contest. For the man of the house, it was an honorary position. This left two coveted openings at the discretion of the lady of the house.

Two women who arrived from the mountains in the morning were chosen by my mother. It wasn’t too subtle a message from him. bringing down those who thought they were the most qualified to speak to a priest. Yes, even in this poor rural village, there was a hierarchy.

Stations morning arrived and Mass was celebrated on the paved table/altar in the kitchen. Neighbors were amazed at its great height and some couldn’t help but peek under the altar cloths to see how it was achieved. Breakfast was then served to the priest accompanied by his group of diverse guests.

When the priest left, the Stations were officially finished. Neighbors came home to milk the cows and feed the chickens. The women stayed for breakfast, gossip and the “Station Mass” autopsy.

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