A High Court case over the closure of a historic Franciscan-owned church in Tipperary has been struck out after a "devastated" local prayer group ended its illegal sit-in.
Last month, the group's representative promised the High Court that it would end its sit-in, which was today confirmed to have finished.
Mr Justice Brian Cregan had sought the undertaking from Patrick O’Gorman, chairman of the Abbey House Prayer Group, which had been occupying the Friary Church in Clonmel since New Year's Eve in protest over the Franciscan Order’s decision to close the building.
The prayer group took over the church after what was supposed to be the final mass on 31 December before they returned the keys to the Franciscans.
The members had been allowed to use the building on a temporary basis under a May 2023 agreement.
The High Court heard that the SF Trust CLG, which owns the property on behalf of the Franciscans, decided to close the 13th century church due to the order's diminishing numbers, the age of their members and the "unrealistic" cost of maintaining the building and keeping it open.
At the High Court Matthew Jolley BL, for the SF Trust, said the matter could be struck out without any order and that the group had vacated the church.
Mr Justice Cregan had been asked by the trust to grant an injunction forcing the prayer group to vacate the building.
Last month, Mr O'Gorman told the court that the group would leave by midnight of 23 January.
Mr O’Gorman told the judge that the group had accepted they had been conducting an "illegal sit-in" as a protest to the Franciscans’ decision to close the venue.
He said the occupants were "not religious zealots" but mostly "retired, elderly people who have been coming to the church for generations".
Mr O'Gorman said the people of Clonmel were "very upset" at the closure and said the members began their around-the-clock protest as a "last resort" but wanted to be "reasonable".
After accepting an undertaking from Mr O’Gorman that the occupants would leave, the judge said he understood the church's imminent closure was a "devastating loss" to the prayer group.
In an affidavit, Fr Aidan McGrath, minister provincial of the Franciscan Province of Ireland and a director of the SF Trust, said the cost of maintaining the physical fabric of the historic property had rendered the ongoing opening and maintenance of the building "simply unrealistic".
Fr McGrath said the planned closure was widely communicated in January 2023 and that since then some €160,000 has been spent on the church's upkeep.
Last October, following a review, the order decided it could not sustain keeping the church open without significant maintenance into the future, including the fixing of leaks, roof tiles, windows and the repair of the entire roof in the friary area.
Fr McGrath said the group had also posted a sign at the church saying the Province was "seeking to bully the people to accept the decision as fait accompli, which they will not accept".
At the High Court, Mr Justice Cregan struck out the matter and made no further orders.
