Roche MacGeoghegan

Roche MacGeoghegan (1580 – 26 May 1644), also known as Roque de la Cruz, was a seventeenth-century Irish Dominican prelate and Tridentine reformist. A member of an aristocratic family from County Westmeath, he obtained a mostly Roman Catholic childhood education before, in his twenties, moving to Iberia and entering the Dominican Order. After many years promoting the revitalisation of the Order in Ireland, from Ireland and Continental Europe, he was considered unsuccessfully for the archbishopric of Armagh in 1625 and then successfully for the bishopric of Kildare in 1629, gaining himself the title of Ross, al Roche, D.D., Bishop of Kildare. After a dozen years as bishop, his health slowly declined and he died in 1644. His nephew was historian and translator Conall MacGeoghegan.

Origins and background Born in 1580, Roche was the sixth son of Giles (Giles) "Sheila" O'Dempsey (1561-1619) and Ross MacGeoghegan (1549-1580), chief of the MacGeoghegan kindred of Moycashel, County Westmeath. His family had a background of involvement in the Irish Counter-Reformation.

Despite being educated in a Protestant school for 6 months, the bulk of MacGeoghegan's early education was in the hands of Catholics, men such as the Westmeath priest John Power, as well as Catholic laymen in Westmeath and County Tipperary. This provision was repeated on 12 February 1629, this time successfully, and MacGeoghegan returned to Ireland as bishop. The new Bishop of Kildare was highly active during his early years and was known for his piety and discipline, wearing chains and a hair-shirt under his clothes. He actively carried out visitations and other episcopal duties, held diocesan synods and attended a provincial synod in 1640.

Death Two traditions exist about his death exist. A traditional story is that while preaching a sermon in praise of Francis of Assisi, he was overcome with paralysis and died immediately. Contemporary official records however reveal that in the 1640s Bishop MacGeoghegan's health declined and that he became paralysed, remaining is such a condition for an extended period before his death. In the event, he died on 26 May 1644, perhaps in County Westmeath. His place of burial is not known for certain, but it was likely at either Multyfarnham Franciscan friary, the traditional burial place for his family, or at the Catholic Church of Kildare. He left an extensive library which, after his death, was divided between his diocese and the Dominican Order.