Richard Luke Concanen, O.P., was an Irish prelate of the Roman Catholic Church, who served as the first bishop of the Diocese of New York (1808–1810).
Luke Wadding, O.F.M., was an Irish Franciscan friar and historian.
Irish Colleges is the collective name used for approximately 34 centres of education for Irish Catholic clergy and lay people opened on continental Europe in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.
The Dominican Order has been present in Ireland since 1224 when the first foundation was established in Dublin, a monastic settlement north of the River Liffey, where the Four Courts is located today. This was quickly followed by Drogheda, Kilkenny (1225), Waterford (1226), Limerick (1227) and Cork (city) (1229). The order was reestablished in the 19th century after having been driven out in the 17th century by laws against Catholic religious orders. During the Penal Laws, as other Irish Colleges were established on the continent, in 1633 the Irish Dominicans established, the College of Corpo Santo, Lisbon and College of the Holy Cross, Louvain (1624-1797) to train clergy for ministering in Ireland. San Clemente al Laterano in Rome, was entrusted to the Irish Dominicans in 1677. In 1855, St. Mary's Priory, Tallaght, was established to train members of the order, who would complete their clerical studies in Rome and be ordained in the Basilica San Clemente.
Brendan Kelly is an Irish former Roman Catholic prelate who served as Bishop of Galway and Kilmacduagh and Apostolic Administrator of Kilfenora between 2018 and 2022.
Thomas Messingham was an Irish hagiologist, born in the Diocese of Meath. He studied at the Irish College, Douai before going to the Irish College, Paris, proceeding to the degree of S.T.D. Among the Franciscan Manuscripts in Dublin is an interesting tract sent by David Rothe, Vice-Primate of All Ireland, addressed to my "loving friend Mr. Thomas Messingham at his chambers in Paris", dated 1615. It is evident that at this date Messingham was one of the staff of the Irish College in that city, and was commencing his studies on Irish saints.
The Scots College at Douai was a seminary founded in Douai, France, for the training of Scottish Roman Catholic exiles for the priesthood. It was modelled on the similar English College there, founded for the same purpose. It has an unfortunate notoriety in consequence of the long dispute between the Jesuits and the secular clergy which centred around it in later times.
The Pontifical Irish College is a Catholic seminary in Rome for the training and education of priests. The College is located at #1, Via dei Santi Quattro, and serves as a residence for clerical students from all over the world. Designated a pontifical college in 1948, it is the last Irish College in continental Europe.
Patrick Fleming was an Irish Franciscan scholar, who was murdered near Prague in the course of the Thirty Years' War.
The Irish College in Paris was for three centuries a major Roman Catholic educational establishment for Irish students. It was founded in the late 16th century, and closed down by the French government in the early 20th century. From 1945 to 1997, the Polish seminary in Paris was housed in the building. It is now an Irish cultural centre, the Centre Culturel Irlandais.
Edward Dillon (1739–1809) was an Irish clergyman who served as a Roman Catholic prelate in Ireland during the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
James Dillon (1738–1806) was an Irish Roman Catholic Bishop of Kilmore from 1800 to 1806.
Irish College at Lisbon or St Patrick's College, Lisbon was set up during the Penal Times, by a group of Irish Jesuits, supported by a number of Portuguese Nobles, in Lisbon.
The Irish College at Salamanca,, it was endowed by the King of Spain and dedicated as the St Patrick’s Royal College for Irish Noblemen. It was founded by Rev. Thomas White SJ, formerly of Clonmel, Ireland, in 1592 to house the students of that country who came to Salamanca due to the English persecution of the Catholics. The students resided at the college while attending lectures at the University of Salamanca.
The Irish College of St Anthony, in Leuven, Belgium, known in Irish: Coláiste na nGael i Lobháin, Latin: Hibernorum Collegii S. Antonii de Padua Lovanii, French: Collège des Irlandais à Louvain and Dutch: Iers College Leuven, has been a centre of Irish learning on the European Continent since the early 17th century. The college was dedicated to St. Anthony of Padua.
College of the Immaculate Conception, Prague, was a Franciscan College, founded in 1629 by Irish Franciscan priests from Louvain. Instrumental in its foundation was its first Rector Patrick Fleming from Leuven, also involved was Fr Malachy Fallon, the Professor of Theology in Louvain, who persuaded the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II to permit foundation of an Irish College in Prague. The establishment was seen as being part of a re-catholicisation of Bohemia, by the Habsburgs, but also to provide clergy for Ireland. Shortly after its foundation, Bohemia was invaded during the thirty-years war, Rector of the college Fleming and another Irish friar Mathew Hoare were captured and murdered by Calvinists.
Irish College, Antwerp, was an Irish Pastoral College, dedicated to St. Patrick for Irish Secular Priests, which opened circa 1600 during the Penal Laws in Antwerp, in what is now Belgium. It was a satellite college of the Irish College, Douai. The College was redeveloped in 1629 by Lawrence Sedgrave a Leinster priest who bought the premises. Students attended lectures at the Jesuit college at Antwerp, where Irish Jesuit was a professor Fr. Richard Archdeacon (Arsdekin), S.J. taught, later from 1716 students studied at the Antwerp Diocesean Seminary in Schoenmarkt.
The Irish College of San Jorge at Alcalá de Henares, was founded about 1648, from the estate of Baron George Sylveira, a Portuguese nobleman, related to the McDonnells of Ulster through his mother. After the baron died, his widow Beatriz Silveira implemented his wishes and the College came into existence. Alcalá de Henares is a town to the northeast of Madrid, where the Complutense University was situated. The college and its chapel were dedicated to St. George, and were formally known as the Royal Irish College of St. George the Martyr, Alcala. Students would study for seven years, Theology and Arts with the college was affiliated to the Complutense University of Madrid, aimed at training clerics for Ireland, Belgium(Flanders) and The Netherlands. The Irish Franciscan Luke Wadding, O.F.M. wrote the statutes for the college.
