With "The Sanctuary Lamp" the author takes a hallowed institution and populates it with social misfits who desecrate every convention in both thought and action.

"The most important and controversial work to be mounted by the National Theatre for many a year" (Irish Times) The Sanctuary Lamp is set in a church. "Murphy, in the best traditions of Bunuel, takes a hallowed institution and populates it with social misfits who desecrate every convention in both thought and action...Murphy's savage indignation is unbearably true..." (Irish Times)