Mochua of Balla

Saint Mochua of Balla (Mo Chua, Crónán mac Bécáin), a holy monk, was an Irish hermit and abbot, the founder of the monastery of Balla in County Mayo, who died on 30 March 637. The tradition about him is largely legendary.

He was the youngest of the three sons of Becan and Cumne. His hair had fallen out in patches and he worked as a shepherd; Saint Comgall of Bangor, passing by their house and seeing him neglected by his family, took him to Bangor to be taught. Later he left Bangor and founded the monastery of Feara-⁠rois in Monaghan. In 616, at the age of thirty-⁠five, he went to Connacht and lived as a hermit in a stone cell. The chieftain Eochaidh Minnech found him there and gave him land for a monastery, calling him "Mochua of the narrow prison". The ruins of the monastery and the Round Tower of Balla can still be seen. He is said to have lived at Balla for twenty-⁠one or thirty-⁠one years.

The accounts ascribe many miracles to him, among them a spring that guided him from Bangor to Balla, and the granting of a woman's request for a child after she drank the tears of his prayer. He is commemorated on 30 March, by the Western calendar (new style), as a saint of the undivided Church.