St Mochamoi of Kilcathclyde - Little Mocha

WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO READ IS:

IRRELIGIOUS, IRREVERENT, AND IRRELEVANT.

THE PEOPLE, PLACES, AND EVENTS CONTAINED IN ST MUCKYMUCK ARE COMPLETELY FICTIONAL.  ANY AND ALL RESEMBLANCES TO REAL PEOPLE, REAL PLACES, AND/OR REAL EVENTS PAST, PRESENT, OR FUTURE IS PURELY COINCIDENTAL.  

IN FACT, ANY RESEMBLANCE TO ANYTHING AT ALL WILL BE REMARKABLY COINCIDENTAL.

St Mochaoi’s RC Church is the sister church of St Mochaomoc’s Metropolitan Cathedral.  It is situated three miles to the north of the Cathedral and was built on the site of the first Catholic church in Kilcathclyde, St Hawmaw’s, originally thought to have been constructed in 1552.

St Hawmaw’s was destroyed in 1688 in the great fire of Kilcathclyde in what was assumed to have been an arson attack by some disaffected pilgrims who had flocked to pray at his relics for relief from a serious infestation of earwigs.

When their prayers went unanswered, they threw lighted candles and an unidentified accelerant, purchased at the souvenir shop, into the church which quickly was razed to the ground, together with 28 local dwellings, 5 shops, 2 ale houses and the village memorial bench.

It was only due the speedy actions of the parish priest, Father Neil McNeill that the relics were saved and preserved, later to have pride of place in the church which replaced St Hawmaw’s, St Mochamoi’s.

St Mochamoi was the saint chosen to replace the church of St Hawmaw owing to the fact that she was the 4^th cousin, 33 times removed of St Mochaomoc, who was also Hawmaw’s 2^nd cousin, and although no-one could actually work out what the connection was, the parish council agreed the link was strong enough to proceed with the new building.

Additionally, given that the local Hungarian community had a special affinity to St Mochamoi and had agreed to fund the re-building of the church, the deal was quickly clinched without objection.

St Mochamoc is believed to have lived from 1614 until 1653.  She was born in a tiny hamlet on the north side of Kilcathclyde called Trochmatrool. Her parents, Molacamalot, a Hungarian campanologist and his wife, Bessie McGuigan emigrated to Trochmatrool from the Cottles in Warwickshire in 1611.  Her mother, Bessie McGuigan was a noted contortionist and was the inspiration for the famous Scottish music hall song of the 19^th century, lyrics below:

Bessie McGuigan got flung oot the jiggin’

For lifting her leg too high.

When all of a sudden, a great big black puddin’

Came flying through the sky

It landed here, it landed there, it landed everywhere,

Oh! Bessie McGuigan got flung oot .........

Mochamoi was fondly known as Little Mocha but was a sickly child, who spent much of her childhood in Ochmaheid Infirmary, suffering from uncontrollable black-outs, possibly due to being hit on the head by a bypassing dung cart.

During one of her frequent hospital stays, Little Mocha had a dream in which she was visited by St Crepe, patron saint of bandages, who told her to dig a hole in piece of ground in the centre of Kilcathclyde, and plant foundations thereon on which to build a teaching hospital, which was to be run by an order of nuns called the Sisters of Perpertual Sniffles.

This hospital, which was to be called Kilmahaddy Infirmary, was specifically to treat sufferers of hypotension. St Crepe instructed Little Mocha to build the hospital single-handedly.

Because of her problems with black-outs and prolonged periods of unconsciousness, it took Little Mocha 18 years to build and fit out the hospital.

During this time, an outbreak the black plague wiped out almost the entire population of Kilcathclyde, including Little Mocha’s parents.  Unfortunately, due to her unswerving devotion to St Crepe and her sole efforts to build Kilmahaddy Infirmary, Little Mocha was unable to treat the sufferers and ultimately only 7 villagers survived.

In the autumn of 1651, The Lord Provost of Kilcathclyde, Henry McGrovel, who avoided the black plague by spending the summer at his country retreat in St Tropez, was invited to perform the opening ceremony of the hospital.

It was whilst conducting the ceremonial stonelaying, he accidentally dropped the concrete block on Little Mocha’s head as she knelt praying, rendering her unconscious for a further two years, ironically making her the hospital’s first patient.

She was kept alive by a primitive and experimental system of life-support which was created by the local inventor, Jimmy McChancer. His system involved a paper fan blowing oxygen into Mocha’s lungs which was connected to his nearby hand-operated windmill.  Unfortunately this failed when Jimmy had to attend a call of nature, leaving the windwill briefly non-operational and Mochamoi suddenly died during his short absence.

Her body lay in the hospital mortuary, forgotten for three years until she was found in a laundry basket by a hospital porter, who was surprised to see that her body was uncorrupted with a serene smile on her face.

Although no miracles were ever attributed to her, she was immediately beatified as a saint. She became St Mochamoi of Kilcathclyde, the Little Mocha, and known the patron saint of stethoscopes.

Her remains were stolen in 1765 and to this day their whereabouts remain a mystery.

However, her relics are in the possession of the Sisters of Serious Sicknesses at the St Sprocket Sanctuary in Southern Spain.  They consist of her perfectly preserved pinkie, her left eyebrow and 3 skin tags.

The remains of the hospital she built and founded still stand, but is now used as a rest home for over-qualified musicians.  It’s called The Shug Grant Sanctuary.

©2010 Steven Gorman.  All rights reserved.