MacHale, John

John MacHale (1791–1881), Catholic archbishop of Tuam (1834–1881), was born in Tyrawley, County Mayo, on 6 March. He was educated for the priesthood at Maynooth, and he taught there from 1820 until he became a bishop in 1825. While on the Maynooth staff, he wrote the "Hierophilos" letters criticizing the activities of Bible societies and the tithe system. The British government tried unsuccessfully to prevent him from becoming archbishop of Tuam in 1834.

MacHale condemned the national school system in 1838 against the wishes of both his fellow archbishop, Daniel Murray, who sat on the National Board of Education, and a majority of the hierarchy. In the 1840s he strongly supported Daniel O'Connell's campaign for repeal of the union of Great Britain and Ireland. MacHale was caustic in his criticisms of British government policy during the Great Famine, but he did not have any influence on that policy. MacHale opposed the third-level Queen's Colleges, which Murray favored, and he went to Rome to secure papal condemnation of the colleges.

Even though he supported the appointment of Paul Cullen as archbishop of Armagh in 1850, MacHale subsequently had a very poor relationship with Cullen, who controlled the Irish church in line with Roman policy. MacHale voted against papal infallibility at the First Vatican Council.

MacHale was interested in the Irish language and heritage; he translated classics into Irish and he preached in Irish. He is not, however, known as a great pastoral bishop. Toward the end of his lengthy episcopacy his diocese was neglected, and his relatives held the best clerical appointments. When a coadjutor was appointed to the 88-year-old MacHale, he refused to recognize him. A forceful and persistent critic of government policy in Ireland, he is regarded in Irish historiography as a powerful nationalist bishop and recalled as the "Lion of the West."

MacHale, John

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