(From Hartyr’s Triumphalia, p.253)

GELASIUS O’CULLENAN[1] was born in Connaught. He was the oldest of 6 brothers, 5 joined the clergy. 

He went to Louvain and Rome. Having completed his studies, he returned to Ireland. 

He entered the Cistercian Order. 

His great virtue pointed him out as a fit person to be appointed Abbot of Boyle. 

One of the gentry had taken possession of the monastery and lands, by the edict of Elizabeth. The Abbot went to the usurper, admonished him of the guilt he was incurring and of the curse he would bring down on his whole family. 

The nobleman gave him up the monastery and lands; and sometime after, he too renounced the world and embraced the religions institute.

 In 1580, Gelasius was arrested by order of the Government, and together with Hugh Mulkeeran, abbot of the monastery of the Holy Trinity,[2 imprisoned in the public gaol.

John O’Garwin’[3] Protestant Dean of Christ Church, was among those who assisted at his first interrogatory. 

Many inducements were held out to him to abandon the Catholic faith if he would renounce the Catholic creed and the authority of the Supreme Pontiff. 

His answer was: 

The benefices you offer me are very valuable in truth; but how long will you allow me to enjoy them?’ ‘As long as you live,’ they answered. ‘And what length of life will you give me,’ he asked. ‘We can not determine the end of your life or prolong it, nor do we know the day of your death.’ 

‘Well then,’ he replied, ‘is it not much wiser for me to obey Him and to keep his law who can, if he pleases, prolong my life, and give me a life of eternal happiness in the world to come, than to obey you who cannot lengthen my life by one instant, and are striving by your deceitful and perishable gifts to lead me away from the laws of heaven?‘[4]

The English were angered by this answer and ordered his fingers, arms, and legs to be crushed with blows of a hammer. 

And when they could not break down his courage, they ordered him and Hugh Mulkeeran to be hanged.

The Abbot asked that Hugh should suffer death first, as he wept. 

He was hanged first. 

The Abbot was then put to death, and while he was on his way to scaffold, 500 heretics were converted by the sight of his constancy. 

At the request of his friends, his body was not cut in pieces. However it was set on the top of the Castle. The English used it as a mark to fire at. 

Many took away his clothes as relics. They suffered, November 21st, 1584. 

Henriquez[5] styles O’Cullenan in his Menologium Cisterciense, ... the ornament of the Cistercian Order, the light of our century, the glory of all Ireland.

Rothe says Eugene Cronius, a secular priest, was martyred with him.

See also Rothe, Copinger, O’Sullevan, Annus CistercienSiS, Molanus, Henriquez, Hartry, Porter, and Bruodin.

[1] He is called O’Boyle by Bruodin and others.
The mistake arose, no doubt, from his having been Abbot of the monastery near Boyle.
[2] In one of the islands of Lough Ce, near Boyle. It was founded by Clarus M’Mailin, Archdeacon of Elphin, in 1213 for Premonstratensians.
    See Mon. Hib., 0.615
[3] John Garvey, who became Protestant Archbishop of Armagh in 1584
[4] ‘Just such a colloquy is said to have taken place between Sir Thomas More and his wile.
    See his Life, by Roper, p.89
[5] 2 The learned Historiographer of the Order, in his Menologium Cisterciense, p. 389

Please pray for final perseverance for all of us!
May the martyrs of old inspire us all.