Set on the slopes of Slieve Gullion, St Monnina’s Well and Old Killeavy Graveyard form one of the most evocative early Christian sites in the Archdiocese of Armagh. The place has been associated with prayer and pilgrimage for well over a thousand years and remains closely linked with St Monnina, also known locally as St Blinne, one of the important women of the early Irish Church.
Tradition holds that Monnina lived during the fifth and early sixth centuries and established her principal religious community at Cill Shléibhe, the “Church of the Mountain”, from which the name Killeavy derives. The community became one of the significant early convents of Ireland. Monastic life endured there through the centuries, despite Viking attack in 923, and in the later medieval period Killeavy became home to a community of Augustinian nuns until its suppression in 1542.
Within the old graveyard stand the remains of two ancient churches. The western church is the older and contains an impressive lintelled doorway, believed to date from the tenth or eleventh century. It is particularly significant as the only surviving pre-Norman church in County Armagh. The adjoining eastern church belongs to the later medieval period and contains a beautiful fifteenth-century east window. A round tower once stood nearby, although it had fallen by the eighteenth century.
On the northern side of the graveyard lies a large granite slab traditionally believed to mark St Monnina’s grave. In earlier times pilgrims taking part in the local Pattern began their prayers here before climbing further up the mountain to her holy well and returning again to the grave for their final prayers. The well remains a place of pilgrimage and devotion and continues to be visited, particularly around St Monnina’s feast day on 6 July.
There is a particular beauty to pilgrimage at Killeavy. The pilgrim moves physically through the landscape, from graveyard and ancient church towards the holy well on the hillside. Prayer, walking, memory and the natural beauty of Slieve Gullion become intertwined. It recalls an ancient Christian understanding of pilgrimage in which the landscape itself helps draw the heart towards God.
St Monnina’s story also gives Killeavy a distinctive place within our Christian heritage. Here we remember a woman whose life centred on prayer, community, practical charity and attentiveness to the Holy Spirit. The tradition associated with her recalls her care for the poor, widows and children, and her desire to build a community in which faith found expression in service to others.
Today, St Monnina’s Well, the ancient churches and Old Killeavy Graveyard continue to welcome pilgrims and visitors. Among these old stones and on the quiet path towards the well, we encounter more than the remains of another age. We encounter the memory of generations who prayed here before us and an invitation, in our own time, to seek God in prayer, creation, community and service.