OSSORY, Diocese of. - Diocese of Ireland, in the province of Leinster, suffragan of the diocese of Dublin. It has an area of 2,400 sq km with a population of 76,038 inhabitants, of whom 73,234 are Catholics; it has 41 parishes served by 130 diocesan priests and 47 regulars; 6 male religious communities and 26 female ones (Ann. Pont., 1952, p. 304).
In 1118, at the Synod of Rathbreasail, the boundaries of the diocese were fixed. After the 12th century the seat of the diocese was Kilkenny; there, in 1317, Richard of Ledrede, a Franciscan, held a Synod for the diocesan clergy. During the Reformation, the people of O. remained faithful to Catholicism and drove away John Bale, whom however Edward VI of England attempted to impose on them as bishop. In the years 1602-18 and 1650-69 O. was without a bishop, but between 1618 and 1650 it was governed by David Rothe, one of the most renowned bishops in the history of the diocese. In 1621 he was the only bishop in Ireland and played a very notable part in the formation of the Catholic Confederation at Kilkenny in 1642. Other bishops to be remembered subsequently were the Dominicans Thomas de Burgo (1759-76) and J. Th. Troy (1776-86). In 1838 a diocesan college was opened at O.
Among the religious monuments, mention is made of the cathedral of St. Mary, begun in 1843 and finished in 1857. The patron of the diocese is St. Kieran, who lived around the year 500 and whose feast is celebrated on 5 March; until 1773 this observance was considered in the diocese a day of obligation.
Bibliography5 works
Cataldo Giblin