Cathedral of Saints Patrick and Colman

Newry Cathedral or the Cathedral of Saint Patrick and Saint Colman is a Roman Catholic cathedral located in Newry, Northern Ireland. It acts as the seat of the Bishop of Dromore, and the head church of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Dromore.

History

The See of Dromore was founded in the sixth century by Colman of Dromore, and had its own independent jurisdiction ever since. The old cathedral of Dromore, which had been taken by the Protestants, was burnt down by the Irish insurgents in 1641, and rebuilt by Bishop Taylor twenty years later; the Catholic Church was erected later. In 1750 the seat of the cathedral was transferred to Newry the largest town of County Down situated at the head of Carlingford Lough.

Newry Cathedral, dedicated under the joint patronage of St Patrick & St Colman, was designed by the city's greatest native architect Thomas Duff and work began in 1825 with the basic building completed in 1829. Built of local granite, it was the first Catholic Cathedral in Ireland opened after Catholic Emancipation.

Work continued to enlarge and beautify the Cathedral at various stages in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century viz. the tower and transept were added in 1888 and the nave extended in 1904 under the supervision of Bishop Henry O'Neill.

It is a Grade A listed building.

The Cathedral replaced St Mary’s Church (the Old Chapel) which has been constructed by Bishop Lennon in 1789 and which, for forty years, doubled as both a parish Church and quasi-cathedral, two bishops having received episcopal consecration there.

Text imported from Wikipedia article "Newry Cathedral" and modified on July 23, 2019 according to the CC-BY-SA 4.0 International license.