hullo all

Some of you know already that i was currious about the state of Catholism in the highlands durring the 18th cen....and I fiany was given interesting post from a Alex Anderson...

To summarise briefly there were a number of Scots institutions on the Continent, Seminaries in Rome, Douai, Paris and Vallidolid (the last still exists but in Salamanca) and various monasteries in Germany (Ratisbon etc) which largely contributed to the survival of Catholicism in Scotland.  In the early seventeenth century there was very little active Catholic worship actually in Scotland but two areas in particular - some of the Southern Hebredian Islands & West Coast and the mountainous North-East of Scotland (Aberdeenshire & Banff) - remained largely loyal to the Catholic Church and were very receptive to missions from the Continent in the later seventeenth century.  Catholicism in the eighteenth century was largely to be found in these two areas and where the landowners were Catholic themselves.  

Priests were not able to travel openly as such and would give the appearance of gentlemen (to be a Priest required a university level education) and often lived as a member of the household of a local landowner.  Later in the century there were chapels in some houses, but earlier on I suspect they would have used a large room or even the open air. Certainly in Deeside during the latter part of the century the priests said mass outside with congregations of hundreds, and would pretend to be fiddlers thus providing an explanation for such a crowd should they be discovered - in the Lochaber area many natural or man-hewn rocks that were used as altars during this time are still known today.  As to liturgical practices there are some remaining chalices, pattens etc. and the continental education of the priests would indicate that they followed the liturgical norms of the Church at the time, apart from the open-air setting.  Until 1780 they prayed for the Stuarts but after that time the prayers for the king were said for George III.  

Many priests remained in one community for some time (Lachlan Macintosh of Glengairn was priest there for over 60 years and was buried in the Presbyterian kirkyard around 1810 - an indication that locally Catholicism was tolerated, even respected by the established Church) but most were members of Orders such as the Society of Jesus and in general there was a lot of travelling back and forth to the continent, not least in order to evade capture, so priests travelling from one known Catholic family to another were common

Snippet of info...one of the Priests at Salamanca was a leading light in Wellington's Intelligence network during the Peninsula War..think he was Irish,but would have to check..features in one of the "Sharpe" stories.
Steve

yea he was Irish...and that was Sharpes Sword...