Paul Cullen (cardinal)

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For other people with the same name, see Paul Cullen (disambiguation).

Pontifical Urban College
MottoPonit animam pro amicis

Paul

cardinal.[1] His Ultramontanism spearheaded the Romanisation of the Catholic Church in Ireland and ushered in the devotional revolution experienced in Ireland through the second half of the 19th century and much of the 20th century. A trained biblical theologian and scholar of ancient languages, Cullen crafted the formula for papal infallibility at the First Vatican Council
.

Early life

Cullen was born at Prospect,

Quaker Shackleton School in nearby Ballitore
.

Following the relaxation of some of the

1798 Rising.[3] His great-nieces, Mary and Elizabeth Cullen became nuns, and two great-nephews entered the priesthood.[4]

Cullen entered

Pontifical Urban College in Rome, where his name is registered on the roll of students of 29 November 1820. At the close of a distinguished course of studies, he was selected to hold a public disputation in the halls of the Propaganda on 11 September 1828, in 224 theses from all theology and ecclesiastical history. The theological tournament was privileged in many ways, for Pope Leo XII, attended by his court, presided on the occasion, while no fewer than ten cardinals assisted at it, together with all the élite of ecclesiastical Rome. Vincenzo Pecci, the future Pope Leo XIII, was present at the disputation.[6]
Cullen graduated a doctor of divinity.

He was ordained in 1829.

Rector of the Pontifical Irish College in Rome, but during the short term of his administration, he published a standard edition of the Greek and Latin Lexicon of Benjamin Hedericus, which still holds its place in the Italian colleges; he also edited the Acts of the congregation in seven quarto volumes, as well as other important works.[6]

Rector of Pontifical Irish College

In late 1831, Cullen was appointed rector of a fledgling and struggling Irish College. He successfully secured the future of the college by increasing the student population and thereby strengthening the finances of the college. He astutely fostered relationships with the Irish hierarchy, on whom he relied for students, often becoming their official Roman agent. This role yielded income and influence and was to remain a key function of future rectors. He endeavoured to chart a middle ground between conflicting parties of Irish bishops. He was active in his opposition to the establishment of the secular Queen's Colleges.[7]

During the revolution that saw the authority of the Papal States violently displaced for the short lived

Roman Republic, he accepted the position of rector of the College of Propaganda while retaining charge of the Irish College. As all the rectors of Colleges in Rome, who were not foreigners, had to leave the city, Cullen was left in charge, temporally, of their interests. Soon after his appointment the Revolutionary Trimuvirate issued orders that the College of Propaganda was to be dissolved and the buildings appropriated. The rector appealed to Lewis Cass Jr., the chargé d'affaires of the United States diplomatic mission, to protect the citizens of the United States who were students of the college. Within an hour, the American flag was floating over the Propaganda College. The order of confiscation was withdrawn.[6] Cass was subsequently criticised for his actions.[8]

Armagh and Dublin

Cullen was appointed

Apostolic Delegate. His first major act as Archbishop of Armagh was to convene the Synod of Thurles (1850),[7] the first Roman Catholic national synod held in Ireland since the Reformation. It occurred during the period of the debilitating Irish Famine which reduced the population of the country by over 2 million people through starvation, disease and emigration. The purpose of the synod was to establish a new ecclesiastical discipline in Ireland. This included rules relating to the celebration of Mass, the administration of the sacraments and the maintenance of registers and archives.[9]

Cullen was transferred to the

Cardinal Priest of San Pietro in Montorio, the first Irish cardinal.[10]

Cullen was sent to Ireland to bring the Irish church into conformity with Roman canon law and usage

Roman collars and being called "Father" (instead of "Mister") by their parishioners.[11]

Cullen was particularly intent on promoting Roman Catholic

Archbishop Hughes of New York preaching on the occasion.[8] John Henry Newman, whom he had invited to be Rector of the Catholic University, complained that the Archbishop treated him and the laity not as equals but as his subjects.[7]

Cullen paid frequent visits to Rome. He took part in the definition of the dogma of the

Paul
in 1867, when he stayed at the Irish College.

He attended all the sessions of

Vatican I, taking an active part in its deliberations. Towards the close of the council, at the express wish of the Central Commission, he proposed a formula for the definition of papal infallibility. It was a matter of great delicacy, as promoters of the definition were split in various factions, some anxious to assign a wide range to the pope's decisions, and others would set forth in a somewhat indefinite way the papal prerogative. In 1864, he founded the Irish Ecclesiastical Record. He arrived late to the conclave of 1878 that elected Pope Leo XIII
.

Politics

He was the most important Irish political figure in the 30 years between

Fenians. He supported redress by constitutional means.[9] The Gladstone government disestablished the Church of Ireland
during his episcopacy.

Cullen was a frequent visitor at the

revolutionaries. The orders of execution from London were peremptory. The scaffold was already erected, and the next morning Burke was to be hanged. Through mediation from Archbishop Hughes of New York and others, Cullen became convinced of the character of the accused and was able to obtain a grant of reprieve for Burke.[citation needed
]

Death

He died at the Archiepiscopal Residence (59 Eccles Street, Dublin) of heart failure on October 24, 1878. He was buried at Holy Cross College (Clonliffe College) in Drumcondra beneath the High Altar. On June 25, 2021, his remains were transferred to St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral, Dublin 1. The sale of Holy Cross College required that his body be reinterred.

Addressing a small gathering in the Crypt of the Pro-Cathedral at the reinterment, Archbishop Dermot Farrell prayed: “We come together to bring the body of Cardinal Paul Cullen, my predecessor, to its new resting place. Together let us pray some Psalms that here, his body - together with all those interred in this crypt - will rest in God’s safety”.

Legacy

Saint Mary's Pro-Cathedral
, Dublin

Cullen is most notable today for being the first Irish cardinal. With his experience and friendships in Rome he was able to influence the choice of appointments to episcopal sees in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Canada. His relatives, friends, and students, referred to as "

Patrick Francis Moran, archbishop of Sydney, one notable example.[13] The term also refers to a style of leadership resembling that of Cullen, characterised as "authoritative"[14] and "intransigent".[15]

Father Thomas N. Burke, O.P., in a sermon at a solemn Requiem mass, the "Month's Mind" of 27 November 1878, said: "The guiding spirit animating, encouraging and directing the wonderful work of the Irish Catholic Church for the last twenty eight years was Paul, Cardinal Cullen."[16]

Cullen has been credited with the revival of regular Catholic devotion in Ireland. An extreme

Ultramontanist, he vigorously opposed secret societies with revolutionary aims, as well as the system of mixed education then in force. His opposition was largely responsible for the failure of Gladstone's Irish Universities Bill in 1873. [17]

In James Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, the protagonist's father mentions Cullen: "Mr Dedalus uttered a guffaw of coarse scorn. O, by God, he cried, I forgot little old Paul Cullen! Another apple of God's eye!"[18]

Although a devout Catholic herself, Mary Jane, wife of Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa, wrote a blistering response in her poem, "Tis for the Glory of the Faith", to what she saw as Cullen's suggestion that Irish emigrants had the role of spreading Catholicism abroad.

Who said 'twas willed our race should be
Live monuments of misery?
To spread the faith throughout the world?
Who spoke such blasphemy, and why?
Who dared the generous God belie?
And yet thy bishops-Cullen-saith,
'Tis for the glory of Thy Faith.
And yet the Lord Chief Bishop Cullen saith
'Tis for the glory of our holy faith![19]

See also

  • St. Vincent's Industrial School, Goldenbridge

References

  1. ^ Miranda, Salvador. "Paul Cullen". The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church. Retrieved 23 June 2009.
  2. ^ a b c John N. Molony, 'Cullen, Paul (1803–1878)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published in hardcopy 1969, accessed online 7 November 2014
  3. ^
    ISBN 9780889201361
  4. ^ Earner-Byrne, Lindsey; Geoghegan, Patrick M. (2009). "Cullen, Mary Teresa". In McGuire, James; Quinn, James (eds.). Dictionary of Irish Biography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  5. ISBN 1870963008
    .
  6. ^ a b c Moran, Patrick Francis Cardinal. "Paul Cullen." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 4. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. 6 Nov. 2014
  7. ^ a b c Review of Cardinal Cullen & his World at Pontificio Collegio Irlandese, 2 December 2011
  8. ^ a b Chadman, Charles E., "Cullen, Cardinal Paul", Cyclopedia of Law, Charles Erehart
  9. ^ a b c "Paul Cullen (1852–1878)", Archdiocese of Dublin
  10. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/6872. Retrieved 9 February 2011. (Subscription or UK public library membership
    required.)
  11. ^ Essay by David Kennedy The Catholic Church in Ulster since 1800, BBC publications, 1958, p. 178
  12. ^ Miller, David W.(2013). Cardinal Paul Cullen and His World ed. by Dáire Keogh and Albert McDonnell (review). The Catholic Historical Review, Vol.99, No.1, p.168. The Catholic University of America Press, 2013
  13. ISBN 9781444337327
    .
  14. ISBN 9781903688052
    .
  15. ISBN 9780773560055
    .
  16. ^ ""The Life and Times of Cardinal Cullen", The Tablet, 7 December 1878". Archived from the original on 19 September 2015. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  17. ^ J. L. Hammond, Gladstone and the Irish Nation (1938) pp 124-25.
  18. ^ "James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man". Archived from the original on 2 April 2012. Retrieved 17 May 2012.
  19. ^ Irish Lyrical Poems, Mrs. O'Donovan Rossa, New York, 1868. pp. 18-20

Further reading

  • Bowen, Desmond. Paul Cardinal Cullen and the Shaping of Modern Irish Catholicism (1983) excerpt
  • O'Connor, Anne. "Translating the Vatican: Paul Cullen, power and language in nineteenth-century Ireland." Irish Studies Review 22.4 (2014): 450-465.
  • Rafferty, Oliver P. "Cardinal Cullen, early fenianism, and the Macmanus funeral affair." British Catholic History 22.4 (1995): 549-563.

External links

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article "Cullen, Paul".

Media related to Paul Cullen (bishop) at Wikimedia Commons

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Wood, James, ed. (1907). "Cullen, Paul". The Nuttall Encyclopædia. London and New York: Frederick Warne.

Catholic Church titles
Preceded by Archbishop of Armagh
1849–1852 		Succeeded by
Preceded by
Archbishop of Dublin

1852–1878 		Succeeded by
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