Happy anniversary, CPC
When the first Cross & Passion sisters arrived in Kilcullen in 1878, they were welcomed by the whole town and parish priest Canon Langan, writes Brian Byrne, and escorted in procession to their new home after a celebratory Mass in the town's new church, apparently attended by everyone in the Parish.
The sisters had been invited in by Canon Langan to work in the primary school built a couple of decades before, and he had managed to secure the donation of a house for them from one Thomas Quinn, who later provided extra land so that a more substantial Convent could be built.
An Open House will be held in Cross & Passion College tonight, Friday, to mark the 125th anniversary of the sisters' arrival. The school will be open from 7pm with celebratory refreshments for all.
The evening will be a special one for former students and teachers of the Class of 1986/1987 First Year, for whom it is a particular Gathering with a chance to chat and and wander around to relive old memories. But anybody who has had a connection with the College down the years is very welcome also, and an open invitation has been extended.
The Cross & Passion Sisters order was originally founded in Manchester in 1851 by Elizabeth Prout and a Passionist priest from Italy, Fr Rossi. Under their original name of Institute of the Sisters of the Holy Family their work was primarily about opening and operating schools, visiting the sick and encouraging a return to Catholicism in the Lancashire cotton towns.
The order grew fairly quickly, helped by a revival in Catholicism in England, and after cementing their association with the Passionists and changing their name accordingly they expanded their activities to Ireland, Scotland, Europe and the Americas.
The initial community in Kilcullen consisted of only three sisters but their work began immediately in the Girls National School, and with visitations to the poor. There was a population in Kilcullen at the time of around 900, and times were tough. They very quickly gained a reputation for quietly helping people in distress or incapable of looking after themselves.
A private second level for girls was set up in the original house, starting with just three pupils. Lessons available were wide ranging, and included Irish, English, French, German, Italian, Hungarian, Dancing, Embroidery, and Music. The latter included lessons in pianoforte, the harmonium, the harp, and the violin.
Thomas Quinn had also given a loan of money for the building of a proper Convent, and the chapel in this construction was blessed in 1883.
In 1924 the school was recognised as a Secondary School under the new Department of Education and in 1928 a novitiate was opened which lasted in Kilcullen until it was moved to Maryfield, Dublin, in 1953. The school was extended further in 1958 and again in 1971.
In 1986, boys were admitted and the boarders were phased out. A major new extension was constructed. In 2004, with the retirement from teaching of Sr Maire O'Sullivan, the last of the Cross & Passion Sisters left the school.
Today the school accommodates some 800 students from a hinterland around Kilcullen and other parts of mid-Kildare.
This article originally appeared on the Kilcullen Page of the Kildare Nationalist.
