Dating to roughly 1220 and dedicated to the Virgin Mary, it is part of Youghal Union of Parishes, in the United Dioceses of Cork, Cloyne and Ross.

[citation needed] According to local tradition, an early monastic church was founded by Declán of Ardmore in the mid 5th-century.

[citation needed] There was an early-13th-century re-building and this was under the direction and hand of the Masters of four local guilds of operative masons, whose marks are still to be found on the pillars of the gothic arches.

The majority Roman Catholic population was obliged to quit the church and to conduct their services elsewhere on private premises.

The last Catholic warden was Thomas Allen (1533); Roger Skiddy was appointed by King Edward VI of England.

In 1597, the college house was plundered and laid in ruins by the insurgent forces of Gerald FitzGerald, 15th Earl of Desmond, who, among other acts of desecration, unroofed the beautiful High Chancel.

In the civil war or 1641, Richard Boyle added two large towers to the house, built five circular turrets to around the park and cast a platform of earth on which he placed ordnance to command the town and harbour.

In 1649, during the Commonwealth, Oliver Cromwell conducted his campaign from Youghal and delivered a funeral oration from the top of a chest which is still preserved in the church.

George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne and philosopher, took up residency as Warden of the College in 1734 and conducted services in the church.

From 2005, music was provided by "The Clerks Choral", which sang traditional Anglican repertoire throughout the Irish academic year.

[13] Due to a decision in the 1970s to remove the lime plaster from the rubble walls, the acoustics of the building are less than ideal for choral music.

It was moved from the deconsecrated church of St Michael on the Mount Without in Bristol, England, by an Irish firm of organ builders who then restored it.