Originally published at National Catholic Register
LOUGH DERG, IRELAND — Every year, more than 10,000 pilgrims make their way to Lough Derg, to take part in an intense three-day pilgrimage, following a 1,000-year-old tradition of strict fasting, keeping vigil and barefoot prayer.
Tradition links Patrick to the island through his disciple St. Dabheog, “a young man remembered as a disciple of St. Patrick,” Father Laurence Flynn, prior of Lough Derg, told the Register.
The disciple presided over and likely established a monastery on Lough Derg in the fifth century, just a few decades after the arrival of Christianity in Ireland.
“St. Patrick, in his own writings, makes no mention of this place,” Father Flynn said, adding, “In the two texts that Patrick himself wrote — his Confession and Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus — which scholars have accepted as coming from him, Lough Derg is not mentioned.”
St. Patrick’s name only started becoming associated with the island when the medieval Tractatus de Purgatorio Sancti Patricii (“Treatise on St. Patrick’s Purgatory”) started spreading across Europe in the 12th century.
According to the medieval text, Christ revealed a pit in the ground, calling it purgatory, to St. Patrick, who had prayed for divine assistance in converting the
