Nano Nagle was born at Ballygriffin in the parish of Killavullen , between Mallow and Fermoy in Co. Cork. The Nagles once owned much of the valley of the Blackwater River, but in the protracted struggle for the possession of Ireland their loyalty to the Catholic faith cost them extensive lands. However, when Garret Nagle married Ann Matthew the family still owned a goodly farm. In 1718 their first child, a daughter, was born. She was given the name Honora at baptism but this name was soon replaced by the affectionate diminutive 'Nano' by which she was known all her life.

Nano Nagle's birth occurred at a time of dark sorrow for Ireland. English military force had successfully subdued the Irish people and now English laws were used to destroy their very identity. A lord chief justice said at the time: 'The laws of Ireland did not presume a Roman Catholic to exist, nor could one breathe there without the connivance of the Government.'

Bishops, priests and religious were exiled, leaving the Church without leadership. Without the legal right to worship, to teach or even to exist, it was a Church seemingly without hope for the future.

The economy was controlled for the benefit of the powerful and the poor sank into sub-human conditions and consequent despair.

At Ballygriffin the Nagle family was one of the fortunate few who escaped the harshest realities of Irish life. It is likely that Nano received her early education at the hedge school in the ruins of Monanimy Castle and attended Masses celebrated furtively at the Mass rock in the Nagle Mountains near her home. She certainly learned at home that love of God comes first, and that education is a precious gift to be valued and shared.

Nano was sent to France, where she had cousins, to be educated. Her first contact with nuns was at the Benedictine school in Saumur. She spent long periods in Paris and grew to womanhood largely unaware of the distressful conditions in Ireland.

Returning home on the death of her father in 1746, Nano saw with painful clarity how thoroughly the penal laws had done their work, particularly in the material and spiritual degradation of the poor.

She returned to France and spent a brief period as a novice in a convent, but came home again and went to live with her brother Joseph and his wife in Cork. There, in defiance of the laws which forbade a Catholic to teach, she devoted herself to the education of poor girls. At first alone, later with the support of her family, particularly her uncle Joseph Nagle, she established a network of schools in the city.

When classes finished she walked the lanes of Cork to visit the sick and needy. It was said of her that there was not a garret in Cork that she did not know.

Nano Nagle introduced the Ursuline Order into Cork to perpetuate the work she had started, but their rule of enclosure was an obstacle to doing all that was needed. Encouraged by her parish priest, Fr. Moylan, she and three companions formed a little Society which became the nucleus of the Presentation Congregation.This was on Christmas Eve 1775.

Nano Nagle died on Monday April 26, 1784. She was 66 years old.

Her name is known, through the Presentation Sisters, not only throughout Ireland but in England, Newfoundland, USA, Australia, New Zealand, India, Pakistan, the Phillipines, Zimbabwe, Zambia, New Guinea, Mexico, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Chile, Ecuador and Peru.

A quarter of a century after Nano Nagle and her companions founded the congregation, Presentation Sisters became an inspiration, an example and a guiding light to Edmund Rice when he formed a similar society of religious Brothers in Waterford.

Reference:
Heart Aflame (Ledwith and Kyne) - Introduction by Sr. Raphael Consedine PBVM

 

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