by John Healy

“ One of the first acts of William the Conqueror was to place men of his own nation in all the most important bishoprics. These foreign ecclesiastics—men of ability and energy—set themselves to reproduce in England the state of things to which they had been accustomed on the Continent. Thus, when the realm of England was brought under the sway of the Conqueror, the Church of England was brought under the sway of the Pope. ”

“ During all this time the Danes of Ireland did not forget their kinsmen beyond the Channel. Though settled in Dublin, or Waterford, or Limerick, they were not Irish. Just as in an earlier age the inhabitants of the south-west of Scotland belonged to the Irish, and not to the Pictish people, so these Danes were really Englishmen living in Ireland. In times of defeat they sent to England for help ”

“ When the Danes of England became Christian, the conversion of their brethren in Ireland followed as a matter of course. The change was very gradual, and the Christianity which they at first professed was very little removed from the paganism which they abandoned. Eventually, however, idolatry became quite extinct amongst them; they founded churches more imposing in proportions than any others to be found in Ireland, and they established a ritual and liturgy similar to that which was followed at the time by the Churches of England. ”