St Mary's Pro-Cathedral - Origins of "the Pro"

Origins of "the Pro"

The Pro, as it is sometimes called, owes its origins to the anti-Catholic Penal Laws which restricted Catholicism (and other non-Church of Ireland faiths) until the early nineteenth century. For centuries, Roman Catholics could not celebrate Mass or the sacraments in public and were subject to severe penalties (hence the word penal). While these laws ebbed and flowed in terms of the severity with which they were applied, Catholic churches if they were built at all, were built down narrow, difficult to find roadways. By the early nineteenth century, many of the Penal Laws had either been repealed or were no longer enforced; an unsuccessful attempt had already been made to grant Catholic Emancipation. As a result, Catholicism began to abandon its previous status as an "underground" religion. In 1803, a committee formed by then Archbishop John Thomas Troy bought Lord Annesley's townhouse on the corner of Marlborough Street and Elephant Lane (now called Cathedral Street), within sight of the city's premier thoroughfare, Sackville Street (now O'Connell Street) as the location for the planned new pro-cathedral, pending the erection, when funds and the law allowed, of a full Roman Catholic cathedral. The architect chosen to execute the design was George Papworth. In June 1814 the demolition of the house took place. It was followed by the erection of a new pro-cathedral which combined a number of styles but which externally is closest to Greek revival. Internally, it is more Roman than Grecian. The new Archbishop of Dublin, Daniel Murray, celebrated the new pro-cathedral's completion on 14 November 1825. It thus became the first Catholic episcopal seat established anywhere in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland since the Protestant Reformation.

Though not a full cathedral, the new building became a symbol of the Irish nationalist spirit in the era following the ending of the Penal Laws. Daniel O'Connell, the leader of Irish nationalism and the first Roman Catholic MP elected to the British House of Commons, was present at a special thanksgiving High Mass in the Pro-Cathedral in 1829 following the granting of Catholic Emancipation, which among other things had allowed Catholics to be elected to parliament. In 1841, as the first Catholic Lord Mayor of Dublin in centuries, O'Connell formally celebrated his election by travelling in state to "the Pro" for High Mass. After he died in 1847, his remains were laid in state on a great catafalque in the Pro-Cathedral.