05.02.2025
‘No Homes to Go To’ – Cathedral Lectures Focus on Charities’ Response Over 250 Years
Christ Church Cathedral’s February lunchtime lecture series focusing on homelessness got underway yesterday (Tuesday February 4). The series began with an insight into the work of Dublin’s oldest charity, The Sick & Indigent Roomkeepers Society.
Homelessness is one of the greatest challenges of our time but, having been in existence since 1790, the Roomkeepers Society’s long history reminds us that it is a problem which has existed for centuries. Today, the “sheer scale of misery” as shown by the applications received by the society can be daunting, but historian and trustee Felix Larkin said that the flip side was that the charity can help people get back on their feet after a financial set back.
Entitled ‘No Homes To Go To: Dublin Charities and Homelessness 1790–2025’, the lunchtime lecture series takes place in the Henry Roe Room of the cathedral’s Chapter House on Tuesdays in February starting at 1.10pm. Next Tuesday a talk titled ‘The poor you will always have with you? A brief history of Dublin’s Mendicity Institution’ will be given by the historian, Eimhin Walsh.
The third lecture in the series will be given on Tuesday February 18 by Focus Ireland CEO, Pat Dennigan, entitled ‘Challenging homeless, changing lives: Focus Ireland and 40 years of homelessness’. The series will conclude with a talk on ‘Ireland’s housing crisis: What now? What next?’ on Tuesday 25 February given by Ronan Lyons, an internationally recognised expert on housing markets and housing price indices, and both director of Trinity Research in Social Sciences and associate professor in Economics at Trinity College, Dublin.
Mr Larkin explained that the Sick & Indigent Roomkeepers Society started in the Parish of St Michan in 1790 to provide relief at local level. Some years later itexpanded to include two areas north of the river and two to the south. It now covers Dublin city and county. From the outset the society was non–denominational with both Anglican and Catholic clergy associated with it. It served people of all creeds and none and continues to do so.
In 1855 the society bought No 2 Pallas Street, close to Dublin Castle. The building still stands and while no longer in its ownership, it remains closely associated with the society. They sold the property in 1992 and are now based on Fitzwilliam Square.
Mr Larkin described the “rampant poverty” of Dublin in the mid 1800s. He said that the aims of the Roomkeepers Society then remain their mission today: to help people experiencing temporary hardship due to illness, unemployment or other unforeseen circumstances and who need assistance to get their lives back on track.
Today Roomkeepers makes cash grants in response to applications from social workers from recognised agencies. They provide once off assistance to help people back towards self–sufficiency.
“The housing crisis is the greatest concern for society. It is evidenced by the large number of applications made,” Mr Larkin said. Such was the demand, Roomkeepers reluctantly took the decision that, as a small charity, they could no longer assist with rent arrears or providing funds for cash deposits. “The rational for [not providing funds for deposits] is that we are only funding an anomaly in policy – State rent payments are made in arrears whereas landlords seek rent up front. This is an anomaly which should be fixed,” he said adding that the society has written to government about this.
The society pays out €100,000 per year and finds that awards of smaller amounts are more efficacious. “It is extraordinary how a modest assistance can help people out and get them over the hump of their financial difficulties,” he commented adding that they aim to bridge the gap when the unforeseen happens. This assistance may take the form of clearing an unpaid bill or helping a person out of debt. They also support students and, where a number of bodies are collaborating, Roomkeepers may make up a shortfall.
Mr Larkin noted that it was more difficult than ever to raise funds and returns on investments were low. A number of Dublin’s Catholic parishes donate annual collections and they receive some bequests. The society raises some funds through the sale of prints and cards of a painting of No 2 Pallas Street by the artist Peter Pearson, who owned the building after the Roomkeepers. These are available from their website www.roomkeepers.com.
“I am honoured to have served as a trustee of the Sick & Indigent Roomkeepers Society since 2008 and as its chairman from 2012 to 2016… There is great satisfaction to be had from the work that we do. I often feel overwhelmed by the problems that we come across, the sheer scale of human misery that we encounter in applications for assistance. But the flip side is knowing that we can do some good and in some way relieve some of that misery,” he concluded.
You can read more about the forthcoming lectures in the series here.