UHI Thesis - pdf download summary Financing the Faith Scottish Catholicism 1772- c.1890 Tierney, Darren DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (AWARDED BY OU/ABERDEEN) Award date: 2014 Awarding institution: The University of Edinburgh Link URL to thesis in UHI Research Database General rights and useage policy Copyright,IP and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the UHI Research Database are retained by the author, users must recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. This copy has been supplied on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement, or without prior permission from the author. 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Darren Tierney LL.b (Hons), M.Litt A thesis presented for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen 2014 Declaration I hereby declare that this dissertation has been composed by myself, and that it has not been accepted in any previous application for a degree, diploma or similar award. Also I declare that all sources of information have been specifically acknowledged and all quotations are distinguished by quotation marks. Name: Darren Tierney Signature: Date: Abstract This thesis considers the financial development of the Catholic Church in Scotland between 1772 and circa 1890. In 1772, the Church was heavily reliant on external, normally insufficient sources of income. The dangers of this over-reliance became clear when the progress of the French Revolution destroyed the Church’s foreign financial bases and saw the loss of its continental colleges. Consequently, and for the first time, the Church turned to the Catholic laity for financial support. This represented a significant cultural shift for a community which was unaccustomed to providing such support. But recognising the Church’s financial needs, the laity responded generously to this appeal and in many places raised additional funds to support their priests. Very quickly this financial necessity was subsumed into a larger narrative of religious duty and idealism, so that to financially support the Church was now also crucial to an individual’s spiritual and temporal well-being. By the early decades of the nineteenth century, financial voluntarism was well embedded in the Catholic community and ordinary Catholics had assumed responsibility for financing many of the Church’s activities. As the century progressed, and as the Church responded to new pressures caused by famine migration, the bishops began to exert greater control over the Church’s financial life. The rise of ultramontanism within the Church, with its focus on the parish church, ensured that the local church also became the locus for many of these new fundraising efforts. A sign of the Church’s increasing maturation came in 1878 when Rome restored the episcopal hierarchy, which had a number of financial implications as the bishops sought to come to terms with ordinary ecclesiastical government - something that had been lacking for nearly three centuries. By c. 1890, most of the difficulties of these years had been resolved and the Church had put in place financial infrastructures that, in many ways, remain in place even today. Acknowledgements Over the last three or so years I have incurred a number of debts. Naturally, my first and most grateful thank-you goes to my supervisors, Dr. S. Karly Kehoe and Professor Daniel Szechi. Both have been unfailingly kind and generous throughout the whole process and have, I believe, helped me mature as a historian. I extend my gratitude to Dr. Jim MacPherson, who joined my supervisory team during the second year, for his advice and assistance. I would also like to thank my examiners, Dr. Mary Heimann and Professor Marjory Harper for their feedback and comments. A number of fellow historians have generously shared their work and ideas with me. I am especially grateful to the late Bernard Aspinwall, Alasdair Roberts, Elizabeth Ritchie and Michael Turnbull. Thanks are due also to the University of the Highlands and Islands for funding this PhD and for its generous support of related activities, as they are to the Centre for History in Dornoch for all the support and assistance given me over the last few years. I would be remiss in not giving special mention to the Centre’s Administrative Officer, Alison MacWilliam, without whose help I most likely would have found myself destitute in various European towns and cities. I should also like to thank North Lanarkshire Council and the Fondation Catholique Eccosaise for providing financial support in 2011. In terms of the latter, I owe particular thanks to Monsignor Michael Regan of the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, to say nothing of his unfailing generosity and decency on my countless trips to Edinburgh. Two historical organisations are also due thanks for providing friendly forums, not to mention financial support, in which to disseminate my work: the Scottish Catholic Historical Association and the Catholic Record Society. It has been a particular honour and pleasure to be involved in the work and activities of the former. I owe thanks to a number of archivists and librarians, particularly Mr. Andrew R. Nicoll, former Keeper of the Scottish Catholic Archives, without whose help and unequalled knowledge of the sources of Scottish Catholic history this thesis would be all the poorer, if it would exist at all. His loss to the archives is, I believe, a loss to all of us interested in telling the story of the Catholic community in this land, and many pages remain to be written. I should also like to thank Anna Edwards, archivist of the Provincial Archives for the Jesuits in Great Britain; Jenny Smith, archivist of the Union of the Sisters of Mercy; and the Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. My thanks are also due to the staff of the following libraries and repositories: The National Library of Scotland, National Records of Scotland, the Mitchell Library, Glasgow University Library, the Archives Nationales, Paris, Archivo Storico of Propaganda Fide in Rome, the Vatican Library and the Vatican Secret Archives. I extend a particular word of thanks to Father John Hughes, Rector of the Scots College, Rome and the seminarians and staff for their very gracious welcome and generosity during my trips there in 2011 and 2013. I would also like to thank Mgr. Charles Burns for his hospitality and assistance during our 2013 trip to Rome. And to the many others, too many to name, friends and family amongst them, I extend my sincere gratitude for every kindness and decency shown me no matter how small. It has been a privilege and a pleasure to have had the opportunity to study in such depth, across so many places and with the help of so many people, the history of a Church and community to which I, for good or ill, belong. Tables of Contents List of Tables, Figures and Charts i Abbreviations and Special Notes iii Introduction 1 1. Literature Review 10 2. Primary Sources 17 3. Chapter Overview 18 Chapter 1 - Background to Church Finance, 1603-1772 1. Introduction 22 2. Administrators and Procurators, 1700-1772 25 3. Conclusion 35 Chapter 2 - From Political Revolution to Financial Evolution, 1772-1827 1. Introduction 36 2. Towards Scotland as a Financial Centre 36 3. The French Revolution and Aftermath 52 4. Towards Scottish Catholic Financial Voluntarism 60 5. Conclusion 83 Chapter 3 - From Reorganisation to Revival, 1827-1840s 1. Introduction 86 2. The Problems of Reorganisation 86 3. Financial Voluntarism Confirmed 95 4. Catholic Friendly Societies 104 5. Conclusion 116 Chapter 4 - Financing a Revival, c.1840s-1878 1. Introduction 118 2. Demographic Changes 119 3. Financing the Secular Mission: New Fiscal Strategies 122 4. Financing the Religious Orders, Congregations and Communities 147 5. Financing Schools 161 6. Conclusion 176 Chapter 5 - Post-Restoration Settlements, 1878-c.1890 1. Introduction 179 2. The Restoration of the Hierarchy 179 3. The Mitchell Trust 185 4. The Menzies Trust 193 5. Inter-diocesan Disputes 198 6. Conclusion 208 Conclusion 210 Appendices 218 Bibliography 239 List of Tables, Charts and Figures Tables 2.1. Church income, 1772-9 38 2.2. Church business acquaintances 49 2.3. Church income, 1789-98 55 2.4. Clerical quotas, 1799-1807 59 2.5. Aberdeen Catholics’ augmentation proposal 63 2.6. St Mary’s, Edinburgh: seat rent rates 65 2.7. Congregational collections for the clerical friendly society 80 3.1. Church funds, 1837 92 3.2. Clerical stipends, 1830s 97 3.3. Catholic friendly societies 108 4.1. Sample churches 140 4.2. Sample churches: income from door money 143 4.3. Benefactors of the Convent of Mercy, Glasgow, 1859-62 149 Figures 2.1. George Hay, vicar apostolic of the Lowland District 44 2.2. Andrew Scott, vicar apostolic of the Western District 70 2.3.