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Do Protestants even do Lent?” That’s the question I’m asked when I tell a friend where I’m headed on my next faith adventure.
People identifying as Protestant or Presbyterian make up just 4.2% of the population. In Ireland religion has been less about faith for some people and more about identity.
The church is beautiful and hard to miss
Rector Liz Beasley, who hails from Hawaii, tells me she was advised to be sensitive around the subject, but says she still finds it strange that people will tell her they’ve lived their entire lives in Adare but have never visited St Nicholas’.
This is a great pity because the church is beautiful and hard to miss. A collection of ornate grey buildings, it is a former monastery with stout stone walls sitting on the banks of the river Maigue just outside Adare, Co Limerick.
The church is narrow and high with bright white walls, as you enter there is a large carving with the names of the dead from WWI and WWII.
Thousands of young men, from both denominations died in those wars, my own great-grandfather was a Catholic engineer in the British army and survived a Japanese prisoner of war camp, but this is the only church where I have seen them so formally remembered.
From my Catholic background, I’m delighted by the novelty of a female, married priest
I walk up the aisle and try to remember not to genuflect. I’m greeted with bright “good mornings”from the congregation and a helpful parishioner who spots the obvious strange face and shows me how to navigate the three books I’ve been given for the service.
As I take my seat, I notice the bright kneelers on the floor. Some depict scenes from the bible but the one that catches my eye is a St Brigid’s Cross, cross-stitched with care by a child from the adjoining primary school.
From my Catholic background, I’m delighted by the novelty of a female, married priest.
Apart from that, the service would probably disappoint many by its similarity to mass. Even the words of the Nicene Creed retain the phrase: “We believe in one Holy Catholic and apostolic church.”
He is a huge blessing to me
There is also a lot more singing, led for the most part by Liz’s husband Kirk, whose booming voice carries the congregation into song with a confidence that fills the heart as well as the church.
Liz tells me afterwards he goes with her to all three services on a Sunday. “He is a huge blessing to me,” she smiles.
Spring sunshine is streaming through the windows of the rectory while Liz gives me a brief history of her life. Born in the US, with a Methodist upbringing she came to Ireland after college and worked for WB Yeats’s daughter Anne, publishing books in Dalkey where she was baptised a Catholic.
I have a nagging feeling of my own around religion and the themes of temptation and blame.
She returned to the US and continued to publish books but says there was always a “nagging feeling” that she should go into the church.
I have a nagging feeling of my own around religion and the themes of temptation and blame.
The first reading during the service recounted the story of Adam and Eve. It’s a reading I’ve always disliked as I feel it’s a tale that has been used by countless church figures to claim women are frail-minded, untrustworthy and less than men for the last 2,000 years of Christianity.
Eve and Adam stretch the truth, they lie to themselves, to each other and to God
But one of the first things Liz tells the congregation is that she doesn’t mind if we don’t take the reading literally, instead she focuses on the very human element of the story – lying to ourselves. Eve and Adam stretch the truth, they lie to themselves, to each other and to God. She asks everyone to think about the excuse we use, “the devil made me do it”.
Arriving home I reflect on what excuses I’ve been feeding myself and text my friend to confirm that, yes, Protestants do Lent.
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