Lovestruck couples visit shrine to St Valentine in Dublin

Engaged couples had their wedding rings blessed at the Carmelite Church in Whitefriar Street by Bishop Denis Nulty.

Bishop Denis Nulty blessing engaged couples (left to right) Ilona Catharine Dorrepaal and Patrick Michael Lennon, and Orla Gavin and Patrick Corcoran, at the shrine of the holy relics of St Valentine in the Carmelite Church in Dublin city (Niall Carson/PA) (PA Wire)

Couples hoping to be lucky in love have been visiting a shrine in Dublin which contains the partial remains of St Valentine.

Engaged couples had their wedding rings blessed at the Carmelite Church in Whitefriar Street on Monday by Bishop Denis Nulty at the shrine of St Valentine.

The historic city centre church is a traditional place of pilgrimage at this time of the year.

Among those at the church were engaged couples Gavin and Patrick Corcoran, and Ilona Catharine Dorrepaal and Patrick Michael Lennon.

The remains of St Valentine, put to death in Rome in the third century for refusing to renounce his Christian faith, ended up in Dublin when they were gifted to an Irish preacher, Father John Spratt, by Pope Gregory XVI in 1836.