Banished Clergy(c.1690s)
Limerick’s treaty promised Catholic residents protection in the exercise of their religion, but worship depended upon clergy who could celebrate Mass, administer sacraments and organise parish life. In 1697 Parliament enacted a law banishing Catholic archbishops, bishops, vicars-general, deans, Jesuits, monks, friars and other regular clergy from Ireland. They were ordered to leave before May 1698 through designated ports. For Catholics in Limerick city and county, this threatened the practical survival of the faith whose security had influenced surrender. A legal promise concerning religion meant little if the people authorised to sustain that religion were imprisoned, transported or driven underground.
The statute accused senior and regular clergy of promoting rebellion, disturbing obedience and impoverishing subjects required to support them. Bishops and religious orders were instructed to report at named seaports, register their names with local authorities and await transportation. Anyone remaining after the deadline could be imprisoned until removed from the king’s dominions. A transported cleric who returned faced the law of high treason. The legislation therefore converted ecclesiastical status into an offence. Men were not prosecuted for a particular sermon or proven conspiracy; their office, religious order or jurisdiction was treated as sufficient evidence of danger to the state.
Lay Catholics were placed under pressure as well. Anyone knowingly harbouring a proscribed clergyman faced escalating penalties: a fine for the first offence, a doubled fine for the second, and forfeiture of lands, goods and chattels after a third conviction. Informers could receive part of the forfeited value, turning religious concealment into a profitable discovery. Homes, barns and remote meeting places could become temporary refuges, but every refuge exposed householders to danger. The law sought to separate priests from communities by making assistance costly. It transformed hospitality, loyalty and participation in worship into acts carrying serious financial and legal consequences.
The authorities later distinguished between regular clergy and secular parish priests. Under the 1704 registration law, priests already resident in Ireland had to appear at quarter sessions, provide their names, ages, parishes, ordination details and ordaining bishops, and produce financial sureties for peaceful behaviour. Registered priests were restricted to assigned areas and could not move freely. Those failing to register faced imprisonment and transportation. Registration allowed some parish ministry to continue, but only under surveillance. The priest became a documented and geographically controlled figure whose legal presence depended upon compliance with procedures designed by a government hostile to his church.
Despite banishment, registration and rewards for discovery, Catholic religious life survived through cooperation between clergy and laity. Priests travelled discreetly, worship moved into private or isolated places, and communities accepted risks to maintain sacraments and instruction. The legislation nevertheless damaged church organisation by excluding bishops, restricting recruitment and making clerical succession uncertain. In Limerick, the contrast with the treaty was unmistakable. Catholics had surrendered after receiving assurances against religious disturbance, yet the state soon removed or monitored those essential to worship. The story of the banished clergy reveals how persecution operated through transportation, surveillance, informers and pressure upon ordinary households.
Primary Sources
- An Act for Banishing All Papists Exercising Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction and All Regulars of the Popish Clergy, 9 William III, chapter 1, 1697.
- An Act to Prevent Popish Priests from Coming into This Kingdom, 2 Anne, chapter 3, 1703.
- An Act for Registering the Popish Clergy, 2 Anne, chapter 7, 1704.
- An Act to Explain and Amend the Act for Registering the Popish Clergy, 4 Anne, chapter 2, 1705.
- An Act for Explaining and Amending the Act to Prevent the Further Growth of Popery, 8 Anne, chapter 3, 1709.
