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The Celtic Church in Scotland

For many centuries, the Dal Riada Irish in Scotland were known by other nations as the Irish. The Romans called the Irish Scotti, and over time the Dal Riada Irish adopted the name Scots, the name we will now use for the Irish immigrants to Scotland.  The Scots introduced the rites and practices of the Celtic Christian Church, previously limited to Ireland, Wales, Cornwall, and northern Britain to what becomes Scotland. The native Picts followed traditional religious practices, believed by some historians to be similar to the Druid religion practices by the Celtic peoples of Roman Britain prior to the introduction of Christianity in the Roman era.

Celtic Christianity was introduced to Scotland by St. Columba through the great monastery of Iona, c. 563 AD.  The Celtic Church expanded with the Scottish expansion of Dal Riada which was well underway by the sixth century AD.  After the collapse of Roman rule in Britain and its replacement by pagan Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the fifth and sixth centuries, the Celtic Church of Ireland was isolated from mainstream Roman Christianity. As a result, it evolved in its own directions, loosely recognizing Papal rule from Rome, but developing its own religious rites and traditions.  

The Roman Church was organized into dioceses, under the rule of a superior official called a bishop.  The diocese organizational model, introduced in the 4^th Century AD, was based on the third Century AD organization of the Roman Empire under the Emperor Diocletian.  Diocletian created groups of provinces called dioceses.  When the Emperor Constantine designated Christianity the state religion of the empire in the 4^th Century AD, the Roman Church adopted the Roman diocesan organization, and the capital of the diocese became the seat of the bishop who presided over the churches of the diocese.

The reverse was true in Ireland.  The Romans never conquered Ireland, and Christianity was introduced by missionaries from Britain who sought to convert the heathen Irish.  Most notable was St Patrick.  Because Ireland was a hostile environment composed of competing kingdoms, monastic organization was the rule.  The monastery served as a fortress as well as a center of Christianity and for awhile coexisted with the pagan religion of the Irish.  Once Christianity was adopted by the Irish kings (and their subjects), monasteries performed the function of cathedrals in the Roman Church, and monastic priests sent by the monastery provided religious services to the secular community. 

The monastery was ruled by an abbot, who was a priest, who ranked above a bishop in the Celtic Church.  One of the priestly monks was appointed Bishop, because canon (church) law required some religious rites and ceremonies to be accomplished by a bishop.  In the Celtic Church, the bishop was a minor official subordinate to the Abbott, unlike in the Roman Church, where the bishop ruled the diocese. 

In addition to the structural differences, there was a raging controversy between the Celtic rite and the Roman rite over the church calendar, and in particular, the date of Easter.  Similar differences existed then and now between the Roman and Orthodox rites of Christianity.  Other differences included the order of service of the Mass, the Roman mass being much more ceremonial and ornate, while the Celtic rite was very simple and straightforward. 

And then there was the tonsure – the visible sign of a Church cleric.  In the Roman rite, the tonsure consisted of shaving the crown of the head of all men who had taken higher holy orders.  In the Celtic rite, the front part of head was shaved, essentially along a line from ear to ear.  While some of these issued might seem trivial today, they were taken seriously at the time.

After the monastery at Iona was firmly established, missionary monks began the work of converting the Picts of the several neighboring kingdoms.  They were largely successful in this…but as the monks of Iona spread Christianity in all directions from Dal Riada (essentially the islands and mainland of Argyll and west central Scotland), Roman rite Christianity was adopted by the Anglo-Saxon invaders of Britain. 

Thus, Roman Christianity spread north into the lowlands of Scotland with Anglo-Saxon invaders.  By this means the Pictish kingdoms were introduced to a second version of Christianity.  Keeping in mind that the Scottish kingdom of Dal Riata was expanding at the expense of the Picts, and the close identification of the Celtic Church with the Scots, it is easy to see how the introduction of Roman Christianity to Pictland would be welcomed by the Pictish kings.  At a time when the Scots and Picts were battling for control of Scotland, the Roman Church offered an alternative to the Scottish controlled Celtic Church.  As a result, by the early 8^th Century, the Picts expelled the Celtic missionaries from Iona.

In the 9^th Century, Kenneth MacAlpin, King of the Scots of Dal Riada, succeeded in uniting both the Scots and the Picts into the Scottish dominated Kingdom of Alba, later called Scotland.  With the triumph of the Scots, the Celtic rite, tied to Dal Riada, was once more ascendant.  The Celtic monks who reestablished the Celtic rite came to be known as the Ceile De, the servants of God, more widely known as the Culdees.

Historians disagree as to the origin of the Culdees, but the prevalent view is that they were sent from the great monastery of Iona to minister to the Picts and lead them back to the Celtic rite after the country was unified under Scottish rule.  The Culdees practiced a very austere form of Christianity in the beginning. Although they generally lived in monastic communities, some were known to live on isolated islands inaccessible regions so that they would be free to devote themselves to the contemplation of the divine.  Even those who lived in monasteries were known to spend a portion of the year in solitude to rejuvenate themselves spiritually.  Nonetheless, in a time when clerics were allowed to marry even in the Roman Church, the Culdee monks often had wives and families.

By the ninth Century AD, the Culdees, through their control of the monasteries, dominated Christian life in Scotland.  At the same time, Anglo-Saxon expansion and conquest of much of lowland Scotland continued, and contacts between the Roman and Celtic rite churches increased, to the point of eventual conflict between the two. 

Please continue to the companion article, The Abbey of Dunkeld and the Robertsons, for the rest of the story…

Sources:

1.      William Skene, Celtic Scotland:  A History of Ancient Alban, Volume II, Church and Culture.

2.     History of the Scottish Nation.