Flatrock is a

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

Newfoundland and Labrador Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic Canada, Atlantic region. The province comprises t ...

. The town had a population of 1,722 in the Canada 2021 Census. Most of the people in Flatrock are of Irish descent. There are some families who are descended from the few Norwegian settlers who came to Flatrock in the 19th century. Irish heritage is still strong today and can be seen in such things as religion, folkways, music, and dialect/accent.

Religion and history

Flatrock is a

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

fishing town. The first settlers were Roman Catholic Irish fishermen and also Roman Catholics of French descent. About 95 per cent is Roman Catholic, 2.0% is Anglican Church of Canada, 1%

United Church of Canada The United Church of Canada (french: link=no, Église unie du Canada) is a mainline Protestant denomination that is the largest Protestant Christian denomination in Canada and the second largest Canadian Christian denomination after the Catholi ...

, or

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's ...

who attend the United Church in Pouch Cove, and 1%

Presbyterian Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...

who attend St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church (The Kirk) in St. John's. The population of Protestants in Flatrock are from other communities in Newfoundland, having moved in from recent economic development. There is no evidence of any Protestant family settling in Flatrock other than Norwegian and some English families, who, as evidenced in the town's local history, soon converted to Catholicism. There is only one church, St Michael's Roman Catholic Church. This church as well as St Agnes' Roman Catholic Church in the neighbouring community of

Pouch Cove Pouch Cove is a town in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. The population is 2,063 according to the Canada 2021 Census. It is located on the northeast Avalon Peninsula, 27 kilometres north of St. John's, the province's capital ...

, share the same parish. The Church currently shares a parish priest with Holy Trinity in Torbay, and St. Agnes' in Pouch Cove. There is no Presbytery in Flatrock. However, they do exist in neighboring communities Torbay, Pouch Cove, and Portugal Cove.

Our Lady of Lourdes Grotto

Our Lady of Lourdes Grotto is a religious shrine located outside of the parish church in Flatrock, founded in 1954 by Fr. William Sullivan after his return to the parish from

Lourdes Lourdes (, also , ; oc, Lorda ) is a market town situated in the Pyrenees. It is part of the Hautes-Pyrénées department in the Occitanie region in southwestern France. Prior to the mid-19th century, the town was best known for the Châ ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. Fr. Sullivan saw many similarities in the terrain in Lourdes to that of his church in Flatrock, and saw that it would be a great opportunity to take advantage of this land. It is to date the largest religious grotto east of

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...

and has been visited by

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...

on September 12, 1984 where it received a special blessing from him. The grotto has been designed by Michael Curtis of the nearby city of St. John's. Since its inception, a number of additional monuments have been erected including: a lifesize statue of the

crucifix A crucifix (from Latin ''cruci fixus'' meaning "(one) fixed to a cross") is a cross with an image of Jesus on it, as distinct from a bare cross. The representation of Jesus himself on the cross is referred to in English as the ''corpus'' (Lati ...

, a statue of St. Michael, a statue of the

Blessed Mother Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of ...

that is placed in the cave portion, a statue of St. Bernadette and it contains the fourteen Stations of the Cross which are frequently venerated by parishioners. As well, there as a number of memorial plaques placed throughout the grotto. The Our Lady of Loudes Grotto has also been voted the "Most Psychedelic Spot" by the St. John's bi-weekly publication The Scope in 2007.The Scope
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Confederation

As an Irish settlement, during the confederation debate of 1949, Flatrock had voted against

confederation A confederation (also known as a confederacy or league) is a union of sovereign groups or states united for purposes of common action. Usually created by a treaty, confederations of states tend to be established for dealing with critical issu ...

. To this day, Flatrock as an

Irish Irish may refer to: Common meanings * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the isle ** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...

settlement flies the

Union Jack The Union Jack, or Union Flag, is the ''de facto'' national flag of the United Kingdom. Although no law has been passed making the Union Flag the official national flag of the United Kingdom, it has effectively become such through precedent. ...

, the Irish Flag, and the traditional pink white and green flag of Newfoundland - as well as the American flag. A number of townsfolk would move to New England States and New York before Newfoundland joined Confederation to live with relatives. Some townsfolk had U.S. military service before confederation with Canada. Beárna na Gaoithe (Wind Gap)Road the main road going through the town is known to come from settlers that came from WindGap areas of County Waterford and County Kilkenny in Ireland.(citation: NL Archives:The Rooms)

Demographics

In the

2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, which is sli ...

conducted by Statistics Canada, Flatrock had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.

References

External links

*
Flatrock - Encyclopedia of Newfoundland and Labrador, vol. 2, p. 209-212.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Flatrock, Newfoundland And Labrador Towns in Newfoundland and Labrador Fishing communities in Canada