By Ann Marie Foley - 22 October, 2019
Get out your rosary beads, go to the adoration chapel and make reparation, the Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother have urged Irish people as the Púca festival gets underway in Co Meath.
When people are celebrating Halloween, the Servant Sisters will be praying before the Blessed Sacrament throughout the night.
The new Púca festival, which takes place in three venues in Co Meath, is being promoted by Fáilte Ireland and is described as an alternative to the Americanised Halloween of pumpkins and ‘Trick or Treat’.
Instead, the Co Meath festival organisers say they aim to tell the story of Halloween’s origins in Irish and Celtic traditions.
Events include everything from traditional music sessions to retelling the Táin Bó Cuailgne in Drogheda.
Another event the ‘Arrival of the Spirits’ at Trim Castle involves is a parade of “the original spirits of Halloween” which include Púca himself leading the way, followed by Morrigan the dark, Boann the light, the Fear Dearg and Fionn Mac Chumaill.
However, the Servant Sisters suggest that people should consecrate all those who attend (Púca), and all those behind it, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary who is the “bearer of the True Light, which is Jesus Christ.”
“A lot of people will go, but they are not even aware of the history of it, they just see it as cultural, but there is something more,” Sr Ruth told Catholicireland.net
“It (Púca) is invoking all the old pagan gods that were here in Ireland,” she said. “Why would we have a festival like that after St Patrick brought the Catholic faith?”
Sr Ruth added, “Here in Ireland Halloween was something very innocent, there was nothing about witches or witchcraft or invoking these old demons of the pagan feast – in exactly the places where St Patrick turned pagan feasts into Catholic ones.”
In a video highlighting these issues, the Sisters pose the question, “Why turn back now to invoke pagan gods?”
They urge people to celebrate the victory of those who have gone before and show a series of pictures of saints including Saints Patrick, Padre Pio, Mother Teresa and Pope John Paul II.
They urge people to celebrate the light that never fades and to do adoration, pray the rosary for all the evil committed and for the conversion of sinners and “the salvation of Ireland”.
The Sisters are a young religious community which was founded in 1982, the year a group of Sisters made their first commitments. They later became the co-founders of the Servant Sisters. Young men made the same commitment the following year. They received its ‘Definitive Decree of Approval’ as an International Public Association of the Faithful in 2016. Their group involves women religious, brothers, priests and lay people.
Their connections with Ireland go back to Sr Clare Crockett (33) from Derry who died in an earthquake in Ecuador in 2016. Another Irish nun was injured in the earthquake, Sr Thérèse Ryan from Co Limerick.
The Servant Sisters, who have strong links with Spain, arrived in Ireland two years ago (see: CINews 13 May 2017). They now have nine committed people involved including four Sisters and houses in Roscommon and Mitchelstown.
Last year they urged Irish people to vote No in the blasphemy referendum. (see CInews 26 October 2018)
One of the areas that they work in is the media and many of their videos are available on http://www.eukmamie.org, they are also involved with HMtelevision.
See: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-2ExPhT59SvEb-O1wejS7oRGEVIdXk_v/view
