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Phelan, Michael, 1854-1932, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/358
  • Person
  • 27 December 1854-28 February 1932

Born: 27 December 1854, Johnstown, County Kilkenny
Entered: 30 December 1893, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 23 May 1880, St Patrick’s College, Carlow
Final Vows: 15 August 1906, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 28 February 1932, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Older Brother of Bishop Patrick Phelan of Sale, Australia (02/01/1856-05/01/1925)

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Michael Phelan was ordained in Ireland for the Australian church in 1880, and worked in Goulburn, 1880-93. Phelan joined the Society in December 1893, and later worked in Ireland. He never served in Australia as a Jesuit.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 7th Year No 3 1932
Obituary :

Fr Michael Phelan

Father Phelan's very sudden but not unexpected death took place at Gardiner Street on Sunday, 28th February. For some time previously he had been suffering from a bad form of heart trouble, and there was always grave danger that the final call might come at any moment. On Sunday morning he had just finished Mass and was resting himself. With startling suddenness he fell off the chair on which he sat, and lay motionless on the ground, Extreme Unction was at once administered, but from the moment of the fall he never gave the least sign that he was still in life.
Father Phelan was born at Johnstown, Co, Kilkenny, 7th December, 1854. He studied for the priesthood at the Thurles and Carlow Seminaries, and was ordained for the Australian
Mission in 1880. For thirteen years he worked in Australia where. for a short time, he was President of the Goulbourne Diocesan Seminary, He returned to Ireland in 1893, and on
the both December, in that same year, began his noviceship in Tullabeg.
Noviceship over, some time was spent in Milltown Park repeating theology, and 1896 saw him attached to the missionary staff. Galway was his residence for one year, the Crescent for six years.
In 1903 he began a year's teaching in Belvedere, followed by another in Clongowes, at the end of which the missionary staff again claimed him. Once more he lived for a year in Galway, for nine years at the Crescent, and for four in Gardiner Street. In 1919 he joined the staff in Gardiner Street, and remained there until his death in 1932.
As will be seen from the above, Father Phelan spent nearly all his time as a Jesuit in Ireland at missionary work - 21 years on the mission staff, 13 as operarius at Gardiner Street, and
during that time justly won for himself the reputation of a great preacher. Critics, to be sure, will always abound, and these people found fault with his language as being a little too florid and with his metaphors as not being always correct. These are comparatively small matters, and the outstanding fact remains that wherever Father Phelan went, in the days of his prime, he drew immense congregations, and made a deep and lasting impression. On every one of them by the soundness of his doctrine and his very earnest action in the pulpit.
His sermons, full of excellent theological matter, were prepared with extraordinary care. One famous series “The Marks of the True Church” was a brilliant and accurate summary of the treatise on “The True Church,” by the famous Maynooth Professor, Dr. Patrick Murray. Father Phelan was so often asked to give the Lenten Lectures in Gardiner Street, and that his reputation as a preacher went as far as Canada and New York, whither he was invited to preach and give lectures.
A number of pious booklets, too, as well as many articles, are due to his untiring energy - “Straight Path”, “Dust to Glory”, “The Young Priest's Keepsake”.
In spite of his success as an orator, and the praise showered on him in his best days, Father Phelan remained a simple, and even child-like religious to the day of his death. To say there was a scintilla of that ugly thing called “side” about him would be, to those that knew him, ludicrous and grotesque. He was just as approachable and as easy to get on with, as a good matured and lively school-boy. An excellent religious, there was nothing visible about his holiness of that stern asceticism that sometimes frightens, and may even repel, He was ever simple, natural full of good nature, friendly to all with whom he came in contact whether they were members of the Society or the many friends whom he made outside it.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Michael Phelan SJ 1854-1932
Fr Michael Phelan was one of our most famous pulpit orators.

Born in Johnstown County Kilkenny on December 7th 1854, he studied for the priesthood at Thurles and Carlow Seminaries. He then laboured as a priest for thirteen years in Australia, where he was for a time, President of Golbourn Diocesan Seminary, and where his brother was Bishop of Sale. Returning to Ireland in 1893, he entered the noviceship at Tullabeg.

His life as a Jesuit was devoted to missionary work, and he was 21 years on the Mission staff, and 13 as Operarius at Gardiner Street. He was often called on to give the Lenten Lectures, a genre he specialised in. His reputation was so widespread that he was invited to lecture in Canada and the United States.

His publications include “Dust to Glory”, “The Straight Path” and “The Young Priest’s Keepsake”.

He died with startling suddenness after celebrating Mass, on Sunday February 28th 1932. With him ended the line of great oratorical preachers and formal elaborate and ornate orators.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Michael Phelan (1854-1932)

Was born at Johnstown, Co Kilkenny and studied at St Patrick's, Thurles, and St Patrick's, Carlow, where he was ordained in 1880 for the Australian mission. He remained on the mission thirteen years and had been sometime President of the Goulbourne diocesan seminary. He entered the Society in 1893. Most of his life in the Society was devoted to mission work. He first joined the Crescent community in 1897 and remained in Limerick until 1903. He was again stationed at the Crescent from 1906 until 1915. His later years were spent in the Gardiner St community. Father Phelan enjoyed a well deserved reputation as a preacher and lecturer not only in Ireland but in places so far away as Canada and the USA, where he had been invited to conduct missions and courses of lectures. He was also the author of some spiritual books that had a wide popularity in their time.

Mac Gréil, Micheál, 1931-2023, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/550
  • Person
  • 23 March 1931-23 January 2023

Born: 23 March 1931, Clonaslee, County Laois
Raised: Loughloon and Drummindoo, Westport, County Mayo
Entered: 07 September 1959, St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1969, St Mary’s, Westport, Co Mayo
Final Vows: 11 June 1980, Gonzaga College SJ, Dublin
Died: 23 January 2023, Mayo University Hospital, Castlebar, County Mayo

Part of the St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street Community at the time of death

FSS
Born : 23rd March 1931 Clonaslee, Co Laois
Raised : Loughloon and Drummindoo, Westport, Co Mayo
Early Education at Portumna NS, County Galway; Brackloon NS, Westport,County Mayo; CBS NS Westport, County Mayo; CBS Secondary School, Westport, County Mayo; Cadet School, Curragh, County Kildare; Commissioned officer in Defence Forces, 3rd Curragh Batallion
7th September 1959 Entered Society at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
8th September 1961 First Vows at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
1961-1962 Tullabeg - Studying Philosophy
1962-1965 Leuven, Belgium - Studying Philosophy at Heverlee
1964 Leuven, Belgium - Studying Social & Political Science at Katholieke Universiteit
1965-1966 Kent, OH, USA - Studying Sociology at Newman Centre, Kent State University
1966-1970 Milltown Park - Studying Theology; Lecturing in Sociology at Milltown Institute and CIR;
National Chaplain to Pax Christi
31st July 1969 Ordained at St Mary’s, Westport, Co Mayo
1970-1998 Sandford Lodge, CIR - Lecturing at UCD; Consult in Research & Development at CCI
1971 Lecturer in Sociology at St Patrick’s College (NUI), Maynooth; Visiting Lecturer at UCD, Milltown Park, & CIR
1974 Research Fellow Ford Foundation: University of Michigan and UCD
1978 Tertianship in Tullabeg
1979 Guardian Máméan Pilgrim Shrine; Secretary Inter County Railway Committee
11th June 1980 Final Vows at Gonzaga College SJ, Dublin
1988 Editing ‘Memoirs of Monsignor Horan (1911-1986) published in 1992
1992 Chair Pioneer Total Abstinence Association Board
1994 President of Aontas
1996 Pastoral Research in Archdiocese of Tuam (‘Quo Vadimus’ Report; Academic Associate NUI Maynooth
1998-2023 Gardiner St - Pastoral research Diocese of Meath (Report ‘Our Living Church’ 2005) – Residing partly at Loughloon, Westport, Co Mayo
2007 Director of National Survey of Intergroup Attitudes (NUI Maynooth)
2010 Research for Memoir “The Ongoing Project”
2012 Survey of Attitudes and Practices in relation to Tourism in Westport
2014 Guardian of Máméan Pilgrimage Shrine; Survey Research Director NUI Maynooth College; Pastoral Supply work
2015 Research for PTAA Book “Abstaining for Love”
2016 Researching own publications and sermons
2017 Guardian Máméan Pilgrim Shrine; Survey Research NUI; Pastoral Supply Work
2018 + Séiplínach do Ghaelscoil, Cill Dara
2021 + Pastoral Assistant in Aughagower & Cushlough Parish, Tuam Diocese

Jesuit whose influential research spanned decades of social change
“There is only one race, the human race” was one of the many memorable apho- risms of Micheál Mac Gréil: Jesuit priest, long time lecturer in sociology at NUI Maynooth (now Maynooth University), pacifist, defender of prisoners’ rights, friend of Irish Travellers and promoter of the Irish language.

Born in Co Laois but reared in Co Mayo, Mac Gréil – who has died at the age of 91 – is best known for his ground-breaking sociological research, which led to three books – Prejudice and Tolerance in Ireland (1977), Prejudice in Ireland Revisited (1996) and Pluralism and Diversity in Ireland (2011).
His research, based on interviews spanning four decades, recorded the transforma- tion of Ireland from a deeply religious socially conservative community-focused society to a more inclusive yet more individualistic and materialistic country.

In his memoir and social critique of Irish and world affairs, The Ongoing Present (2014), Mac Gréil commented on the impact of his early research. “It made Irish people aware of their prejudices and encouraged them to be more tolerant. This self-awareness would, I believed, do much to undermine some of our more destruc- tive prejudices and result in a better life for our minorities.” But, he added, “we should not be under any illusion with regard to the persistence of racism, sexism, homophobia, ethnocentrism, anti-Semitism, class or religious prejudice.”

Mac Gréil was involved in many causes throughout his long life. He was a member and national chaplain for Pax Christi Ireland – the Irish branch of the international Catholic peace movement. He was chairman of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Asso- ciation, whose members abstain from drinking alcohol. He was also a long time campaigner for the reinstatement of the Western Rail Corridor from Limerick to Sli- go and a passionate advocate for the restoration of the Mám Éan (Maumeen) shrine in the Maamturk mountains in Co Galway.

Award
Following the publication of his first book in 1977, Mac Gréil was invited to the British-Irish conference at the University of Oxford. Later that year, he was the joint awardee of the first Christopher Ewart-Biggs Memorial Peace Prize (British ambassador Ewart-Biggs had been assassinated on his way to work at the embassy in Dublin on July 6th, 1976). In his memoir, he writes about how following that award, he was asked to give up his membership of the Irish language and culture organisation Conradh na Gaeilge. And while this request was later rescinded, Mac Gréil bemoaned the extreme politicisation of that organisation following the out- break of violence in Northern Ireland.

Micheál, born in a log cabin in a forest in Clonaslee, Co Laois, was second of six children of Austin McGreal from Loughloon, Co Mayo, and Máire Ní Chadhain from An Cabhar, An Mám, Co Galway. His father was a forester working for a Scottish timber company and his mother was a nurse who had worked in St Ultan’s Children’s Hospital in Dublin before marriage. Although brought up in a republican household, he later said that his family was never strongly anti-British nor anti- Protestant.

When his father was given responsibility to manage woods throughout Munster, parts of Leinster and Connacht, the family moved first to Portumna, Co Galway for four years and then to his father’s family home in Loughloon, Westport, Co Mayo.

Following his secondary school education with the Christian Brothers in Westport, Micheál trained as a shop manager in Dublin and returned to work in Hastings Garage in Westport. In 1950 he joined his older brother Sean as a cadet in the De- fence Forces. He served as an officer in the Third Battalion at the Curragh Camp from 1952-1959, after which he resigned to become a priest.

Mac Gréil joined the Jesuit Noviceship in Emo Park, Co Laois, and was sent to Tul- labeg (Rahen) outside Tullamore, Co Offaly, to study philosophy. In 1962 he was sent to the Jesuit Philosophate at Heverlee, Leuven, in Belgium to continue his studies (through Flemish) to licentiate level.

He went on to study social and political science at the Catholic University of Leuven, where he met Prof Larry Kaplan, professor of American political history at Kent State University in Ohio. Prof Kaplan invited him to that university, where he completed his master’s in sociology and began his study of intergroup relations (that is, social prejudice and tolerance).
Back in Dublin, he completed a four-year course in theology at Milltown Park, during which time he lectured at the Jesuit-run College of Industrial Relations (CIR, later the National College of Ireland) and at the Holy Ghost Fathers missionary college in Kimmage Manor. He was ordained a priest in St Mary’s Church, Westport, in 1969. The following year he started his PhD in sociology at University College Dublin, the thesis for which would later be published as his first book, Prejudice and Tolerance in Ireland.

In 1971, Mac Gréil began working as a junior lecturer in sociology at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth, while continuing to lecture part time at UCD, the Milltown In- stitute and the CIR for the next 10 years. In his memoir, The Ongoing Present, he writes at length about the academic struggles within NUI Maynooth and his own personal tussles with authority during his 25-year career up to his retirement as a senior lecturer there in 1996. A strong advocate of workers’ rights, he was shop steward for the University Teachers Union for nine years during that time.

Mac Gréil’s lifelong dedication to social justice brought him into some ex- traordinary situations. For two consecutive Septembers in 1968 and 1969, he lived on the roadside as a Traveller in disguise to learn about the social, personal and cultural mores of Irish Travellers.

March
Following the Bloody Sunday shooting and killing of civil rights marchers in Derry in January 1972, Mac Gréil joined the Dublin march organised by Irish trade unions that ended up in the burning of the British embassy on Merrion Square, Dublin. In his memoir, he recalls saying, “we came to protest but not to burn”.

As a member of the prisoner’s group in Pax Cristi, he was invited to visit the notori- ous republican prisoner Dominic McGlinchy in Long Kesh prison. He later worked with the Prisoners’ Rights Organisation alongside academics, politicians and barris- ters including Mary McAleese, Michael D Higgins, Gemma Hussey, Una Higgins- O’Malley and Paddy McEntee.
In 1983, Mac Gréil was called as a witness in Senator David Norris’s constitutional case against the criminalisation of homosexuality, given that his research in 1972- 1973 had found that 45 per cent of people in Dublin would favour decriminalisa- tion. He denounced homophobia as one of the most invidious prejudices and be- lieved the Catholic Church should review its pastoral relationship with gay people.

From 1970 to 1998, Mac Gréil lived in the CIR residence in Ranelagh and then moved to the Jesuit community on Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin 1. After his retire- ment he divided his time between academic research in Dublin and pastoral work in Westport.

In his latter years, he spent more time in Mayo, serving as a priest in the Aughagower and Cush Lough parishes in Westport and bringing pilgrims to his beloved Maumeen shrine in north Connemara. In 2021 he published a book, Westport: When Visitors Feel at Home, based on the views of visitors to the town.

At the launch of that book, he called for the democratisation of tourism and the right to annual leave for all, including the unemployed, the poorly paid, people with a disability and those under the poverty line. “In a truly democratic society,” he said, “social tourism, funded by the state primarily, should be the norm.”

Micheál Mac Gréil is survived by his brother Austin, (Fr) Owen and Padraig and members of the Jesuit Community. He was predeceased by his brother Sean and his sister Mary.

Activist was ‘colossus in mind, body and spirit’

Tom Shiel

Well-known Jesuit, sociologist, and social justice activist Micheál Mac Gréil, who died on Saturday at Mayo University Hospital aged 92, was laid to rest yesterday at Aughavale Cemetery in Co Mayo.

Large crowds attended the earlier Requiem Mass in St Mary’s Church, Westport. One of Fr Mac Gréil’s brothers, Fr Owen Mac Gréil was the main celebrant.
Dr Michael Neary, former Archbishop of Tuam, a colleague of Fr Mac Gréil at Maynooth College, delivered the sermon. Journalist and publisher Liamy McNally gave a eulogy.
In his sermon, Dr Neary recalled Fr Mac Gréil’s life as a university lecturer, trade unionist, campaigner for various causes including the revival of the Irish language, the rights of minorities, promotion of the Irish language and the reopening of closed railway lines.

“But he was always primarily a priest,” Dr Neary noted.

Dr Neary went on to describe his late friend’s life as “radical yet profoundly traditional”.

It was radical, he maintained, in the true sense of the word, a life of forging back to the roots of where we came from, back to St Ignatius Loyola, St Patrick and Jesus Christ.
Delivering the funeral eulogy, Liamy McNally described his late friend as “a colos- sus in mind, body and spirit”.

Mission of justice
He continued: “Regardless of opposition, church or State, justice was his mission. He was central to the legal case seeking the decriminalisation of homosexuality.”
“Fr Micheál was ahead of his time”, he remarked.

Mr McNally went on to describe his late friend as a great ecumenist and supporter of women in the church, always wanting women to have more responsibility rather than “little jobeens”.
Éamon Ó Cuív TD delivered the first reading while the second reading was given by Geraldine Delaney, a former student at Maynooth College.

The final prayers were recited by the present Archbishop of Tuam, Dr Francis Duffy.

President Michael D Higgins was represented at the funeral by aide de camp Col Stephen Howard.

https://jesuit.ie/blog/guest-blogger/my-year-with-micheal-mac-greil-sj/

My year with Micheál Mac Gréil SJ

Eoin Garrett

I first met Micheál Mac Gréil SJ (1931-2023) when I was a pupil at Gonzaga College and he was a student of theology in neighbouring Milltown Park. An early sign of his energy and capacity for organizing major projects was evident when he was asked to assist Fr Michael Hurley in promoting Milltown Park’s series of weekly public lectures. The outcome was an overflow of attendances every week! I attended Mícheál’s ordination in Westport in 1969 (by which time I was a Jesuit novice) – “a most memorable event” to quote his own description in his memoir The Ongoing Present (2014).

The main focus of this brief essay, however, is the year I spent working full-time as Micheál’s assistant (1972/73). How this came about need not detain us here. Suffice to say that the year was a more valuable education than the studies I was mismanaging both before and after it. In that year, Micheál was doing the work of several people. He remarks in his memoir that around this time a friend “detected the makings of a ‘workaholic’ in me. So be it. It did not worry me … I used to work night and day with great satisfaction”.

That academic year, he was acting head of the Department of Social Studies in St Patrick’s College, Maynooth (having joined the Department just a year previously). He was also directing research for the Survey of Intergroup Attitudes, the results of which would be the material for his Ph.D. thesis, and would eventually be published as Prejudice and Tolerance in Ireland in 1977.

My role in this was to be an “administrative assistant”, a suitably vague title, which involved among other tasks, driving some of the fourteen interviewers to their interviewees in outlying areas (e.g., Tallaght, where the first new residents had recently arrived), helping to code the information from completed questionnaires, and eventually proof-reading the thesis and the book (I was also to proof-read the follow-up publication, Prejudice in Ireland Revisited, 1996). Micheál was also acting as editor of the Social Studies journal that year, several issues of which I also proof-read.

Some years later, after I left the Jesuits, I was being interviewed for a position in a national institution. A member of the interview board spotted Micheál’s name on my CV and asked what had struck me most about his research findings. I said something about the clear signs of latent racial prejudice, at which another member of the board angrily denied there was any such prejudice in Ireland. The question had little relevance to the job I was seeking. My interview was unsuccessful!

My close contact with Micheál and with his research broadened my mind considerably. His sharp observations in our many conversations, and his clear exposition in his writings of the nature of prejudice have, I hope, helped me to be tolerant of difference and open to listen to opinions I disagree with without dismissing those who hold such opinions.

Once he asked me why my parents had sent me to Gonzaga College. This was a loaded question, as I well knew his views on Jesuits running private fee-paying schools. Fortunately my answer was the only one he could not object to: “it was the local school”!

An unintended consequence of the amount of proof-reading I did that year and subsequently is that I cannot read anything since then without seeing misspellings and typos!

Micheál was National Chaplain of Pax Christi. 1972 was Ireland’s turn to host the annual Pax Christi International Route. This involved groups of young adults of many nationalities and their leaders walking from various starting points for a week and converging on Kilkenny. Each evening they would be hosted by families in the various towns and villages in which they stopped.

Micheál organized this hospitality with military thoroughness, as befitted his pre-Jesuit career as an army officer. We sent letters to each parish priest in the stopover places. Based in the Capuchin Friary in Kilkenny, I then followed up, visiting the parish priests, travelling by-roads within a hundred-mile radius of Kilkenny on my motor-bike. I got to see many parts of the country for the first time, and to meet some great characters among the clergy. The whole operation was, of course, a great success.

These were the main activities I was involved with that year. Micheál himself had countless other commitments, lecturing in UCD and the College of Industrial Relations as well as in Maynooth, involvement in various civic campaigns, and fulfilling frequent speaking engagements. He showed great trust in me to do whatever he asked, mostly without supervision. He was an inspiration to work with and any person who reads his memoir, The Ongoing Present, can only be similarly inspired.

Gaffney, Maurice P, 1916-2016, former Jesuit scholastic and barrister

  • IE IJA ADMN/7/81
  • Person
  • 11 October 1916-03 November 2016

Born: 11 October 1916, Robinstown, County Meath / Aughrim Sreet, Dublin / Upper Gardiner Street / Finglas, County Dublin
Entered: 07 December 1934, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Died: 03 November 2016, St Vincent’s Hospital Dublin (Monkstown, County Dublin)

Left Society of Jesus: 12 January 1942

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Gaffney

Maurice Gaffney

Maurice Gaffney, S.C. (11 October 1916 – 3 November 2016)[1] was an Irish barrister, who at his death at 100, was the oldest practicing barrister in Ireland.[2][3]

Gaffney was born in County Meath to a Royal Irish Constabulary member. He moved to Dublin with his family following events after the 1916 Easter Rising.[2] He initially found employment as a teacher, before becoming a practising member of the Law Library.[1] He was called to the bar in 1954, and promoted to Senior Counsel in 1970. During the 1980s, he was involved in DPP v O'Shea, a landmark case in Irish jurisprudence in which Gaffney successfully argued that a jury's decision can be overturned. In 1996, he was involved in Fianna Fáil's Des Hanafin's attempt to overturn the historic divorce laws that came into force the previous year.[2] He considered himself an expert on railway law.[3]

He continued to practise law into the 21st century. In 2014, he was awarded a lifetime achievement award at the Irish Law Awards.[4] He continued appearing before the High Court and Supreme Court in 2015. The following year, he said he had no plans to retire and would continue working for as long as possible, saying "it keeps me alive".[3]

Gaffney, who lived in Monkstown, Dublin, was admitted to St. Vincent's Hospital and died aged 100 on 3 November 2016. The chairman of the Bar Council of Ireland, Paul McGarry, praised Gaffney's work and his track record of constitutional and criminal law.[1] He was married to Leonie Gaffney and had two children.[5]

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/maurice-gaffney-sc-a-life-in-law-1.2521359

Maurice Gaffney SC: A life in law

At almost 100 years old, Maurice Gaffney SC still works at the Bar and says he would be ‘lost without it’

Colm Keena
Fri Feb 5 2016 - 03:30

When he was called to the Irish Bar, back in 1954, there were about 250 barristers in the Republic, of whom about one-fifth were senior counsel, and the same number again did not practise at all.

"It was a small community and it was easy to know everybody," says Maurice Gaffney SC, who was born in October 1916 and is, not surprisingly, Ireland's oldest practising barrister. (There is, he was told recently, a wheelchair-bound practitioner in London who is 105 years old.)

He appeared before both the High Court and the Supreme Court last year, and was involved in a contract law case when he agreed to meet in the Four Courts recently to discuss his career. "I enjoy it and would be lost without it," he says of his work. "I know I will have to give it up some day but as long as I can do it . . . It keeps me alive."

Among the huge changes in the profession over the years, he says, is the growth in the numbers involved. Barrister numbers began to increase in the 1960s, and did so steadily over the following decades.

These days there are more than 2,000 barristers on the rolls; he says it is obvious that some of them will not make a living from the profession. “The number leaving is growing. It is hard to know how many barristers there should be.” He knows of some people who, after more than a decade in the profession, are still finding it a struggle.

His work companions range in age from their 20s to their 80s and this is partly why he finds the courts a “marvellous environment” in which to work. “Age doesn’t come into it and so I don’t age.”

As far as he is concerned, he will continue to work as long as he is in a capacity to give a service. If he thought for a moment that his clients were not happy with his work, or if his solicitors thought they could do better elsewhere, then he would have a duty to stop. But he does not think that point has been arrived at yet.

The pleasure he gets from his work comes from the pleasure he gets from solving problems, he says. At its core, the work involves “disentangling the often unnecessary problems of my clients”.

Sometimes the people who need help have difficulty paying for the service but he feels barristers have a public duty to help where they can. That is a view he believes is shared by most of his colleagues.

He believes that while most professions have a culture of collegiality, few if any can match that of the Bar. However, he also believes that this culture of solidarity was somewhat damaged by what he calls the Celtic Tiger years when, because some people were making so much money, it became a measure of capability and of success and caused both those who were making the money, and those who were watching others make so much money, to change.

They were becoming more interested in money and less interested in their fellow barristers, than had hitherto been the case. This, in turn, he says, affected standards.

However, having delivered this observation, he appears anxious to balance it with more words of praise for his fellow barristers. “I owe a lot to my colleagues. They have made me happy and have always been reliable.”

He was born in Co Meath, but his father, who was a member of the Royal Irish Constabulary, moved the family to Dublin the year after the Easter Rising, to a house on Aughrim Street, in Stoneybatter. Later they moved to Upper Gardiner Street, where they had "a fine house".

Later still, in the 1940s, they moved to Finglas, then at the edge of the city. He studied for an arts degree, joined the Jesuits, left after he got ill, and became a teacher.

After a five-year stint in Glenstal, he returned to Dublin to be with his father, who was ill, and a job with a school on James Street. He also began studying law and was eventually called to the Bar. In his early years he did work on the eastern circuit, taking prosecution cases in Co Kildare and elsewhere. He became a senior counsel in 1970. “I loved it then and I love it still.”

As well as prosecution work, he also worked in property cases. It was an area that a lot of colleagues tried to avoid because it could be tedious, but he was happy to get the work.

"I think it is marvellously attractive. It concerns everyone and it is, fundamentally, as simple as A,B,C." He also did some tax work, and some negligence cases, and in more recent times has done contract and employment work. (For seven years he was chairman of the Employment Appeals Tribunal. )

He also knows a lot about railway law, having worked over the years for CIÉ in relation to property and other issues relating to the railway network.

In the early 1980s he was involved in an important Supreme Court case, the DPP vs O’Shea, which considered whether a jury’s verdict could be appealed. The court came down in favour of Gaffney’s argument that it could in the case concerned. The law, he adds, was later changed in response to the ruling. He was also involved in the 1996 case where Des Hanafin unsuccessfully challenged the result of the divorce referendum.

One of the great changes that has occurred over the years is the increased involvement of women in the law, now just as solicitors and barristers, but as judges too. When he was called to the Bar there were five women on the rolls, one of whom had been there since the 1920s.

One of these female colleagues later left and went to the US, to study to be a librarian, but when she returned to Ireland on holiday, Gaffney met her and they began to go out. They married and now have two grown children.

During term, he comes into the Four Courts most days. Out of term he used to play golf but these days he reads a bit and walks as much as he can. “Otherwise I waste time looking at TV, like so many others.” It is not hard to imagine him doing so while waiting restlessly for the chance to return to work.

O'Keefe, Fergus, 1933-2022, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/542
  • Person
  • 27 May 1933-17 December 2022

Born: 27 May 1933, Arklow, County Wicklow
Entered: 07 September 1950, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 24 May 1964, Clongowes Wood College SJ, Naas, County Kildare
Final Vows: 02 February 1977, Loyola House, Eglinton Road, Dublin
Died: 17 December 2022, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street Community at the time of death

FSS
Born : 27th May 1933, Dublin City
Raised : Arklow, Co Wicklow
Early Education at CBS Callan, Co Kilkenny; Clongowes Wood College SJ
7th September 1950 Entered Society at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
8th September 1952 First Vows at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
1952-1955 Rathfarnham - Studying Arts at UCD
1955-1958 Tullabeg - Studying Philosophy
1958-1960 Clongowes Wood College SJ - Regency : Teacher; Studying for CWC Cert in Education
1960-1961 Crescent College SJ - Regency : Teacher
1961-1965 Milltown Park - Studying Theology
24th May 1964 Ordained at Clongowes Wood College SJ, Naas, Co Kildare
1965-1966 Rathfarnham - Tertianship
1966-1968 St Mary’s, Emo - Socius to Novice Master; Minister; Teacher
1968-1972 Coláiste Iognáid, Galway - Rector; Teacher; BVM & S Ignatius Sodalities
1972-1974 Loyola House - Socius to Provincial; Province Consultor
1974-1986 Gonzaga College SJ - Minister; Bursar (House & College)
2nd February 1977 Final Vows at Loyola House, Eglinton Road, Dublin
1980 Assistant Provincial Treasurer; Curator Rocky Valley - Villa house
1981 Revisor Irish Province; Treasurer Gonzaga
1986 Sabbatical - half year (from 01/02/86)
1986-1995 Arrupe - Parish Curate in Church of the Virgin Mary, Ballymun
1989 Superior
1992 Socius to Novice Master
1995-2003 Iona, Portadown - Community Development; Reconciliation Ministry; Librarian
1996 Superior
2003-2005 Clongowes Wood College SJ - Minister; Treasurer; Guestmaster; Ministers in People’s Church
2004 Vice-Rector
2005-2013 John Sullivan, Mulvey - Superior; Directs Spiritual Exercises
2006 Director of Lay Retreat Association; Socius to Formation Director
2007 Formation Commission
2011 Minister
2013-20 Gardiner St - Assists in Church; Director of Lay Retreat Association
2014 + Superior’s Admonitor
2016 + Prefect of Health; off Director of Lay Retyreat Association
2018 Assists in Church; Superior’s Admonitor
2021 Superior’s Admonitor
2021 October - Prays for the Church and Society at Cherryfield Lodge

https://jesuit.ie/news/fergus-okeefe-sj-a-gentle-and-humble-presence/

Fergus O’Keefe SJ – A ‘gentle and humble presence’

Fr Fergus O’Keefe SJ died peacefully, aged 89, in Cherryfield Lodge nursing home, Ranelagh, Dublin on 17 December 2022. His Funeral Mass took place in St Francis Xavier’s Church, Gardiner Street, Dublin on 21 December 2022, followed by burial in Glasnevin Cemetery. At the end of this article you can read the homily at the Funeral Mass by Fr Gerry Clarke SJ.

Fergus was born on 27 May 1933 in Dublin City. Raised in Arklow, Co Wicklow, his early education was at CBS Callan, Co Kilkenny, followed by Clongowes Wood College SJ, Co Kildare.

He entered the Jesuit novitiate at St Mary’s, Emo, Co Laois in 1950 and took his First Vows there on 8 September 1952. His Jesuit formation included studying arts at UCD; philosophy at Tullabeg; regency in Clongowes Wood College SJ and Crescent College SJ; and theology at Milltown Park, Dublin.

Upon ordination at Clongowes Wood College SJ on 24 May 1964, Fergus served in a number of roles including Socius to the Novice Master; Rector and teacher at Coláiste Iognáid SJ in Galway; Socius to the Provincial; and minister and bursar at Gonzaga College SJ, Dublin. He took his Final Vows in the Society of Jesus on 2 February 1977.

He continued to experience variety in his Jesuit life from 1977 to 2003 including acting as assistant provincial treasurer; revisor of the Irish Province; Parish curate in Church of the Virgin Mary, Ballymun, Dublin; and working in community development and reconciliation ministry in Portadown, Northern Ireland.

From 2003 onwards, Fergus lived in three other Jesuit communities at Clongowes Wood College SJ; Mulvey Park in Dundrum, Dublin; and Gardiner Street Parish in Dublin. He assisted in church and ministered the sacraments, guided people in the Spiritual Exercises, and was Director of the Lay Retreat Association.

Fergus moved to Cherryfield Lodge nursing home in 2021 where he prayed for the Church and the Society of Jesus. He accepted the situation with his usual serenity and calm, never complaining as his health declined. He died peacefully surrounded by his family on 17 December 2022.

Homily at Funeral Mass by Gerry Clarke SJ

There are, I know, many Jesuits who stand in the queue to make the homily at Fr Fergus’s Funeral Mass. And speaking to them over the last few days has brought back to mind the many and various ministries and communities where Fergus has lived and where he has graced people with his gentle and humble presence.

I had the privilege of sharing community life with Fergus in three locations:

Iona Community in Portadown
John Sullivan House in Mulvey Park, Dundrum
St Francis Xavier’s Gardiner Street

I am consoled by the fact that no words can ever capture the richness of a person or of a person’s whole life. So this is my attempt to capture something of Fergus’s grace and gift as we gather to lay his mortal remains to rest.

Remembering Fergus brings us closer to the mystery of the Incarnation

Fergus has given us a gift as we approach Christmas because, remembering Fergus and his personality, brings us closer to the mystery of how God comes into the world: Christ’s Nativity

Always speak well of others

I never, ever heard Fr Fergus utter a bad word about another person. I’ll repeat that: “I never, ever heard Fergus utter a bad word about another person.” It was part of his character never to indulge his anger or frustration by spreading gossip about others. It was just not part of his DNA. And in not gossiping about others, he forced those who might have a tendency to gossip to refrain. Being around Fergus meant only ever speaking well of others. And if you can’t speak well of others, then don’t speak at all.

Pope Francis is a past master at this too. He simply goes silent. And this is what Jesus does before the authorities who, sitting on the throne of judgment would condemn him and sentence him to death.

Pope Francis, Fergus, Jesus refuse to condemn others.

Always place others before you

We all knew Fergus as a shy person. He shunned the limelight and stuck to the shadows, doing his duty with the utmost dedication. And duty has to be the hallmark of his life as a priest. Placing himself after others and always placing others before himself.

And this is another feature of Fergus that leads us into the mystery of the Incarnation. As we read from an early Christian hymn in St Paul’s Letter to the Philippians:

“he humbled himself and became obedient” (Philippians 2)

It was a feature of his life that Fergus took on what he was asked to take on, one thing after another. Sometimes when it involved quite a challenge to his own personality and character:

In his breviary I find on the inside page, written in Fergus’s unmistakable hand … each with a line drawn neatly through it:

Ballymun
Portadown
Clongowes
Mulvey Park
Gardiner Street (where there is no line yet drawn)

And then in his later years, Fergus was free and willing to proof-read texts for the Messenger and other Jesuit publications – dutifully, tirelessly and with great attention to detail. Sometimes he would present you with a really prickly problem in grammar, which you couldn’t solve and which he would have to slope off and solve in his own way!

One of the gifts of old age has to be a slowing down and a reflectiveness. Fergus embraced that generously. I remember him moving out of Mulvey Park, where, like the younger Jesuits in formation, he cooked and cleaned and kept house. But there was a moment when he realised that he wanted to and needed to move somewhere where there was a little more support and where he didn’t have to shop or prepare meals for 8! So, he moved to Gardiner Street. And when his sense of duty in the parish could no longer drive him strongly enough to celebrate daily Mass or hear confessions in the parish, Fergus, gracefully asked to be relieved of his responsibilities and step down from the daily rostering for masses and confessions.

This showed a freedom and knowledge of himself and a humility to accept the inevitable weakening of later life.

Conclusion

Fr Fergus, like his elder brother and Jesuit, Fr Ed O’Keefe had a great love for Blessed Fr John Sullivan. And it was Fergus who composed the prayers for the ceremony of beatification of Fr John which took place here at Gardiner Street on 13 May 2017. You’ll find those prayers on the wall display in the shrine at the back of the church. They remind us of Fergus’s own virtues and are, perhaps, his prayers for us today here:

We thank and praise God for every moment of this celebration; for everybody present here, especially those who are sick or unwell. May the Lord open our hearts to the needs of the poor that, like Fr John, we may be witnesses to the love of Christ Jesus, our Saviour and friend.

We pray for the leaders of our churches and for all those who serve the Christian community as pastors. We pray especially for Pope Francis, (for his representative here today, Cardinal Angelo Amato,) and for all the pastors leading us in prayer at this Mass. May they be strengthened in the gifts of leadership and service, humility and courage.

We pray for our young people facing decisions in life: that they may find in Blessed John the inspiration to be men and women for others, thoughtful, generous and kind.

Blessed Father John used to say “Be beginning. Be always beginning. The saints were always beginning.” We pray that the Lord will release us from the things that hold us down, the habits and ways in which our churches stifle growth and unity. May we “be always beginning”.

As we gather to pay tribute to Fergus, to thank God for his life and witness, we draw that line which he never drew through the final place on the list of his Jesuit life:

Gardiner Street

And we pray for him now, in the sure and certain hope that this humble, kind and self-effacing Christian, priest, brother, uncle and companion of Jesus is now beginning his new life with the Lord, meek and humble of heart.

May he rest in peace.

O'Driscoll, Cornelius, 1933-2015, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/844
  • Person
  • 31 July 1933-27 January 2015

Born: 31 July 1933, Wexford / Ballyhale, County Kilkenny
Entered: 07 September 1954, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 29 July 1965, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 05 November 1977, Mukasa Seminary, Zambia
Died: 27 January 2015, St Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin - Zambia-Malawi Province (ZAM)

Grew up in Ballyhale, County Kilkenny.

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.

Transcribed HIB to ZAM : 15 August 1971

by 1960 at Chivuna, Monze, N Rhodesia - studying language Regency

Early Education at St Kieran's College, Kilkenny and Defence Forces (Cadetship and Commission)

31 July 1933: Born in Wexford.
Early School years in Ballyhale National School, Kilkenny
1945 - 1951: St Kieran's College, Kilkenny
1951 - 1954: Defence Forces - Cadetship and Commission
7th September 1954: Entered the Society at Emo
8th September 1956: First Vows at Emo
1956-1959 Tullabeg – Studied Philosophy
1959-1960 Zambia – Studied the language
1960-1962 Chikuni College – teaching, prefecting, games, helping in Parish
1962-1966 Milltown Park – Studied Theology
1966-1968 Zambia – Chikuni College, teaching
1968-1969 Mukasa Minor Seminary – Teaching; Prefecting; Games; Helping in Parish
1969-1971 Chikuni College – Teaching; Prefecting; Games; Helping in Parish
1971-1972 Tertianship: Liverpool/St. Bueno’s
1972-1976 Chisekesi, Zambia – Teacher; Prefecting; Games at Canisius College, Chikuni
1976-1978 Mukasa – Teaching; Prefecting; Games; Helping in Parish
1978-1981 Namwala; Chikuni; Chivuna, Assistant Parish Priest
1981-1985 SFX, Gardiner Street – Vocations and Church/Parish Work
1985-1988 Chikuni; Namwala – Teaching; Parish Work; Marriage Encounter
1988-1991 Namwala-Superior, Assistant P.P.
1991-1992 3M Course at St. Beuno’s, Wales
1992-1994 Namwala/Mukasa – Teaching; Parish Work; Marriage Encounter
1994-1995 Milltown Park – Directing Spiritual Exercises; Pastoral Work;
1995-2005 Galway – Church/Parish/Retreats
1997 Parish Priest; Librarian
2003 Prefect of the Church
2005-2006 Sabbatical (USA); Rome C.I.S. Course on Spiritual Exercises
2006-2010 John Austin House – Assistant Director Jesuit Mission Office; Assisted in Aughrim Street Parish
2008 Superior
2010-2015 St. Francis Xavier’s Church, Gardiner St. – Assisted in Mission Office; Spiritual Director, Legion of Mary
2015 Residing in Cherryfield Lodge, praying for the Church and the Society

◆ Companions in Mission 1880- Zambia-Malawi (ZAM) Obituaries :
Note from Joseph B (Joe) Conway Entry
Two days before his death, Joe became semi-comatose and was moved to a nearby hospital run by the Sisters of St. John of God. While in this state, he spoke Tonga and also answered Fr O’Driscoll in Tonga who was with him the day before he died.

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/rip-fr-neil-odriscoll-sj/

RIP: Fr Neil O’Driscoll SJ
Fr Neil O’Driscoll died peacefully in St. Vincent’s Hospital on Tuesday 27th January, aged 81. The eldest of five children, he was born in Wexford but moved as a child to Kilkenny, the county that commanded his loyalty from then on. He was a fine figure of a man who never lost the military bearing that reflected his three years in the army, moving from cadetship to commission. Was it the example of the soldierly Ignatius Loyola that moved him to the next stage, entering the Jesuit noviciate at Emo? Or the fact that Neil, like his father, was born on St Ignatius’ feast, 31 July? As with Ignatius, what met the eye was impressive, but less important than the depth and gentleness that lit up his face when he smiled. He was a dear and delightful companion.
Of his fifty years of priesthood, he spent half in Zambia, first learning the language, then schoolmastering and parish work in Chikuni and Namwala. When Bishop James Corboy founded Mukasa Minor Seminary in Choma, Neil went there as Prefect and teacher, and had a great influence on the boys there. His ability to encourage vocations and his good-tempered approach to teaching and to discipline made him a valued member of staff. I don’t think it is just coincidence that among his pupils there were two who later became Bishops and many others who were priests in various dioceses.
Neil was 61 when he returned to Ireland for a new ministry of giving retreats and running St Ignatius’ parish in Galway – he was the last Jesuit Parish priest. It was a good time for him. He always spoke of Galway with special affection; he found a warm welcome there and made many close friends. Meeting Neil you sensed a man who was happy in his priestly vocation, right up to his last years in Cherryfield. And he was a man of strong loyalties: to his family, his county of Kilkenny, his Alma Mater St Kieran’s College, and to the Jesuits, his comrades and spiritual home for sixty years of his life. May the Lord reward him.

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 159 : Spring 2015

Obituary

Fr Cornelius (Neil) O’Driscoll (1933-2015)

Neil O'Driscoll died peacefully in St. Vincent's Hospital in Dublin on 27th January 2015, aged 81. Like his father, he was born on the feast of St. Ignatius, something that may have had a bearing on his decision to enter the Society. He was baptised as Cornelius, though his Jesuit colleagues will ever remember him as Neil. But there are more significant things they will surely remember about him; his bright reassuring smile; the twinkle in his eye; his personal concern for his fellow-Jesuits and their work; the warmth, kindness and sincerity of his friendship; his gentle manner; the patient resignation with which he bore adverse health conditions; the uncomplaining way in which time and again he readjusted the course of his life in answer to the demands of his deteriorating health; his deep spiritual life, never paraded openly, but obvious in his great devotion to the Mass, the Blessed Sacrament and the Rosary.

The human context for all of this was the characteristic that first met the eye: Neil's impressive, almost military, bearing and the measured way in which he would deal with an issue. The years he spent in the Irish Army Officer Cadet Corps before entering the Jesuit novitiate made a deep impression on him and in God's surprising ways equipped him for some of the roles he would fill in the Society. A very early one, while still a novice, was to take some of his fellow-novices for drill, marching them round in efforts to improve their carriage and bearing. This was at a time when Ireland was experiencing renascent Irish Republican Army (IRA) activity; so it is no surprise that when light aircraft were seen flying over Emo, the rumour went round that the Irish authorities were checking in case the Jesuit novitiate had become a hot-bed for training IRA recruits! Neither is it any surprise that Neil was affectionately known to so many fellow-Jesuits as “the Captain” - almost instinctively you wanted to salute him when you first met him!

Neil spent 27 years, or almost exactly one-third of his life in Zambia. He would certainly have remained longer if the problems with his health had not made it necessary for him to return permanently to Ireland in 1994. In 1959, he arrived in what was then Northern Rhodesia for his three years of regency, spent most of his first year learning Chitonga and the following two years teaching in Canisius College, the Jesuit secondary school at Chikuni, He returned to Ireland for theology and was ordained on 27th July 1965, along with two other stalwarts of the Zambia-Malawi Province, Frank Wafer and Frank Woda. Following his fourth year of Theology and then Tertianship, Neil returned to Zambia in 1967. There he found both national and church scenes greatly changed compared with the way they had been when he left in 1962: what had been Northern Rhodesia had become Zambia; the Diocese of Monze had been established, with James Corboy as its first bishop; and Mukasa, a Jesuit run minor seminary for Monze Diocese, had been opened in Choma.

Neil was always happy to be sent where there was a need. At the time of his return to Zambia the need was for dynamic teachers and exemplary role-models in the schools for which the Society was responsible. And so it was that he spent the next eleven years of his life teaching either in Canisius or Mukasa. His colleagues remember with great admiration the way he always gave himself totally to the job. Very cheerfully he would take on extra classes or deal creatively with double sized classes of 75 or more (necessitated by a shortage of teachers). And as might have been expected from such a fine figure of a man, he knew how to use his impressive presence to bring control out of what otherwise might have been bedlam.

In some ways these were Neil's best and most fulfilling years. He was totally engrossed in his work, never seemed to have a moment for himself, and clearly enjoyed almost every minute of the diverse demands of his teaching apostolate. Around this time he began to show the attractive personality trait that was to become his hallmark in later life - pausing in a reflective and somewhat ponderous manner when asked a question and then giving a characteristic "hmmm” before answering. But for Neil one great thing about these teaching years was that he was just too busy to be able to pay attention to the dark and nameless anxieties that were lurking under the surface of his personal life and that became such a heavy cross for him in later years.

As was not unusual at that time in schools in Zambia, Neil also had to provide back-up and support for his teaching colleagues and the school administration if there were any disturbances among the students. This was a challenge for him, often involving a situation where he did not feel comfortable or at ease. But invariably he provided courageous support and showed unswerving loyalty. The experience of such situations burned deeply into him, unsettling him in some ways, though in later life he could recall them with sardonic humour. Thus, in mid-March 1974, he was with Jerry O'Connell one Sunday evening in the Canisius Headmaster's office when they heard sounds of shouting and rioting that were getting ominously louder. Quickly, Jerry and Neil switched off the lights and remained low, letting the disorderly students pass by outside. All settled down that night, but ever after when he would meet Jerry, Neil would say in characteristic fashion, “Jerry, beware the ides, beware the ides of March”

The legacy that Neil brought with him into the Society as a cadet officer in the Irish Army stood him in good stead during the years of his assignment to Canisius. Under Tom McGivern, a cadet contingent, attached to the 2nd Battalion of the Zambian Army, had been established at the school in 1964 and flourished over the years. On his return to the school in 1967, Neil enthusiastically became involved with these Cadets - the records show him as “Lieutenant the Rev. N. O'Driscoll” for five years and then for a year as Contingent Commander until he withdrew gracefully from this position so that a Zambian could take charge.

In 1979 Neil moved from school to parish work, becoming assistant parish priest in Chivuna. He served in this position for two years before returning to Dublin to spend three years in Gardiner Street on vocations promotion and parish work. From there he moved back to Zambia, first to a teaching post for three years in Canisius, then to Namwala for five years as superior and assistant parish priest, and then once again back to teaching, this time in Mukasa for a year.

The background to these many adjustments and changes was Neil's uncertain health status. For a considerable period he suffered from the undetected condition of excess iron in the blood, something that necessitated regular replacement of his blood supply. It was this that eventually made it necessary for him to leave Zambia in 1994 and return permanently to Ireland, At the same time he had to withstand the almost unremitting onslaughts of what St. Ignatius called the "evil spirit”. This plagued the second half of his life with a great burden of nameless anxieties, apprehensions and uneasiness. Notwithstanding his fine presence, he disliked being in a position of responsibility as he felt it difficult to make important decisions. But for as long as he was able, he continued with his apostolic work despite the physical and psychological burdens that he was carrying. Unfailingly he also continued to show himself a warm-hearted and delightful companion.

That he never deviated from the steady paths of apostolic engagement and very agreeable companionship shows that spiritually as well as physically Neil was truly a man of God and a man of stature. This made a strong impression on his Jesuit colleagues as well as on the Zambian people. It is gratifying to be able to record that late in 2014, just some months before he died, former parishioners of his recalled with great appreciation the work that he and Frank O'Neill had done when they were running Namwala parish. Even today, more than twenty years after his departure from the country, the people of Zambia remember with affection and appreciation Neil's pastoral presence among them.

Neil was 61 when he returned to Ireland in 1994 to a new ministry of giving retreats and running the parish in Galway, This was a good time for him. He always spoke of Galway with special affection. Meeting him, you sensed a man who was happy in his priestly vocation, right up to his last years in Cherryfield. And he was a man of strong loyalties: to his family, his county of Kilkenny, his Alma Mater St Kieran's College, the people of Zambia, his fellow-Jesuits, and the Society that was spiritual home for sixty years of his life.

In his wonderful book Where To From Here? Brian Grogan envisages a person who has just died moving with Christ in a small boat into the unbelievably wonderful life that lies ahead and being welcomed on the other side at a crowded quay. Undoubtedly it was that way with Neil when, towards the end of January, he got into that boat and left us. And surely among those offering him a thunderous welcome when he arrived at the other side were the Jesuit colleagues with whom he had worked in Zambia and who had pre-deceased him in Cherryfield - John Fitzgerald, Dick Cremins, Paddy Kelly, Charlie O'Connor, John McCauley, Jim Dunne, Denis Flannery and, of course, Frank O'Neill – and the countless Zambian people to whom he was such an inspiration, guide and genuinely good person. Can't you see him characteristically raising his bushy eyebrows, smiling radiantly with his whole being, joy shining through his eyes, completely overwhelmed, unable to find a word, and a small sound coming from his lips -- "hmmm”? Neil, you were a great and wonderful companion and priest. We greatly took forward to the welcome you will have for us when the time comes for us also to get into the boat and cross with the Lord to where you are now.

Michael J Kelly

Dunne, James, 1921-2014, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/845
  • Person
  • 22 May 1921-07 November 2014

Born: 22 May 1921, Kilbeggan, County Westmeath
Entered: 07 November 1949, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Final vows: 02 February 1960, Canisius College, Chikuni, Zambia
Died: 07 November 2014, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death

Transcribed : HIB to ZAM 03/12/1969; ZAM to HIB 1979

by 1952 at Chikuni, Chisekesi, N Rhodesia (POL Mi) working - fourth wave of Zambian Missioners

◆ Companions in Mission1880- Zambia-Malawi (ZAM) Obituaries :
Note from Bernard (Barney) Collins Entry
In 1951 he accompanied the first two scholastics, Bob Kelly and Joe Conway, and Br. Jim Dunne, on their way to the then Northern Rhodesia.

Note from Joe McCarthy Entry
In the late 50s, Joe pioneered the Chivuna Mission where he built the community house, church and Trade School with the co-operation of Br Jim Dunne and won the esteem and affection of the people in the locality

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 158 : Winter 2014

Obituary

Br James (Jim) Dunne (1921-2014)

22 May 1921: Born in Kilbeggan, Co. Westmeath.
Early education at Rahugh National School and CBS Tullamore.
Worked in the family business
7 November 1949: Entered the Society at Emo
8 November 1951: First Vows in Zambia
1951 - 1959: Chivunia Mission, Zambia – Teacher in technical and building skills
1959 - 1960: Manresa, Roehampton - Tertianship
1960 - 1974: Bishop's House, Monze - Builder
2 February 1960: Final Vows at Chikuni
1974 - 1981: Belvedere College - Minister
1981 - 1983: CIR - Secretary to the College
1983 - 1985: St. Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street - Minister; Supervisor of staff
1985 - 1987: Tullabeg - Minister
1987 - 1988: Tullabeg - Sabbatical; studying Theology at Milltown Institute
1988 - 1995: Milltown Park - Treasurer
1995 - 1999: St. Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street - Assisted in the church
1999 - 2007: Milltown Park - Assisted in the Community
2007 - 2014: Cherryfield Lodge – Prayed for the Church and the Society

Brother Jim Dunne was admitted to Cherryfield Lodge on 13th July 2007. He was a happy resident and enjoyed fairly good health over the years. His condition deteriorated over time and he died peacefully in Cherryfield Lodge. May he rest in the Peace of Christ.

On Friday, 7th November 2014, Brother Jim Dunne, a member of the Milltown Park community, died at Cherryfield Lodge, at the age of 93 years and several months - a monumental age for a man of many monuments. Always a man of few words, Jim became more quiet-spoken as the years advanced. But underneath this quiet exterior lay a deeply spiritual man whose longings and desires were always for the Lord and how he could use his talents to make the love and service of Christ our Lord a reality in his own life, as well as in the lives of his fellow-Jesuits and the many individuals whom he encountered during his many years with us.

From the very beginning of his religious life, Jim was a rock-solid man of God. Very early witness to this was the trust that the Irish Provincial, Fr. Tommy Byrne, placed in him by sending him in his second year as a novice to Northern Rhodesia, to what was then a newly developing world for Irish Jesuits. Jim was just over 30 at the time, mature in years but still grappling with the beginnings of the religious life. However, there was no need for any fear about the depth of his commitment. His solid spirituality stood by him through the long sea and rail journey from London (via Cape Town) to Chisekesi and on to Chikuni, where he arrived early in September 1951, and during the months of learning Chitonga in the somewhat spartan conditions that then prevailed. And it never deserted him after he took vows in Chikuni on the feast of St. Stanislaus Kostka later that year. This gave Jim the remarkable distinction of being the only Irish Jesuit ever to take his First Vows in what today is Zambia. He reaffirmed his Jesuit commitment on 2nd February 1960 when he took his Final Vows, again at Chikuni.

Endowed with great practical intelligence, Jim brought into the Society a wide range of skills developed and exercised in the family's workshop not far from Tullamore. Construction, artistic brick-laying, carpentry, joinery, plumbing, electrical work – he took all of these in his stride, almost as if they were second nature to him, and yet he was always prepared to learn more from those who were more qualified than he was. Jim was also a gifted manager, with a flair for organising and getting the right people, with the right tools and equipment, into the right place at the right time. His ability to give directions simply and effectively, and his own manifest skills, helped greatly in building up confident teams of proficient and well-motivated building workers. Working with and through these, Jim became key to building-development in what was to become the Diocese of Monze. But in addition to the buildings that bear his stamp even today, Jim also left a great monument in the skills that he passed on to the local people with whom he worked. He was very particular that anything he turned his hand to should be of the highest quality and he always tried to make sure that his trainees and workers would also be concerned not just with getting a job done but with getting it done to the highest possible standards.

One of Jim's earliest assignments was to develop and run with Father Joe McCarthy the Civuna Trades Training Institute (TTI). In time, the TTI gave way to a secondary school for girls, but not before, under Jim, it had qualified several hundred first-rate carpenters and brick-layers who fanned out to bring building development across much of the southern part of Zambia. Later, when the Diocese of Monze was established, Jim became in effect its building manager, working closely with Fr. Fred Moriarty and others in the development of Kizito Catechetical Centre, churches, parish houses, schools, and houses for teachers and catechists.

In the strangely coincidental ways in which God's providence works, another Jesuit Brother from the Irish Province came to Zambia (then Northern Rhodesia) in 1952, one year after Jim's arrival in Chikuni. This was Pat McElduff who in his younger years had done some of his apprenticeship as a tradesman in Rahugh on the borders of Westmeath and Offaly where, in the years before he joined the Jesuits, Jim himself had been trained. The two knew each other from these early years and now they found themselves working together again, this time on a larger canvas. And almost after the manner of the Apostles Peter and Paul, building responsibilities were assigned to them in different ways: Jim became responsible for all projects that belonged to Monze Diocese, while Pat took on those that belonged to the Jesuits (or Chikuni Mission). As a result of this arrangement, for the last period of his life in Zambia, from 1960 to the time of his return to Ireland in 1974, Jim lived in what was to become the Bishop's house in Monze. While he was happy there and got on very well with Bishop Corboy and the rest of the community, at times he felt almost out of his depth and yearned for more interaction with the fellow-Jesuits he had lived with in earlier days. In the way of many quiet people, things sometimes got through to Jim, making him feel that bit down in himself. However, as a solid religious man, he would not let this interfere with his commitment as a hard working Jesuit but would eventually regain his equilibrium through his prayer, work, community involvement and, sometimes, rest and better physical health.

Jim was a very agreeable companion, one who was easy and enjoyable to live with. He was quiet in his manner but this did not stop him enjoying a game of cards, a good movie or the comradeship of a walk in the evening with one of the community. He was greatly loved by the Batonga people among whom he worked and is particularly remembered for the concern he showed that their marriages be happy and stable and that their children attend school. He showed special kindness and understanding towards Jesuit scholastics newly arrived in the country and was particularly attentive to their health needs; many a young Jesuit received gentle but firm admonitions from him about taking their anti-malaria medicines or wearing a hat until acclimatised to the sun.

Ironically, it was malaria that brought Jim's years in Zambia to a close. He contracted fever in days long before Artemesin or other drugs could provide powerful protection. Though frequently quite unwell, he continued with his work as best he could, but in time developed a recurrent form of malaria that was intractable to treatment. In the circumstances, the Holy Rosary Doctor-Sisters (Lucy O'Brien, Maureen O'Keeffe, Eileen Kane) advised that he return permanently to Ireland, because remaining in Zambia would always mean serious health problems for him.

So it was that after 23 years in Zambia, from 1951 to 1974, Jim returned to Ireland and was re-incorporated into the Irish Province. Until his mid-80s he was busy, a wonderful man to have on your side, practical and resourceful, moving where he was needed, always concerned about those around him; ever seeking perfection in anything undertaken by him or any of those for whom he was responsible; and always, simply always, a solid man of God, devoted and faithful to his religious duties, serving the God he loved through what he could still do, building up others through his sympathetic and understanding nature. Jim, sparing of speech, gentle and perceptive, contributed massively to the smooth running of the five Irish houses in which he served. These were not always the havens of peace one would like to imagine. Belvedere, where he was Minister for seven years, was a settled (I nearly wrote entrenched) community, hard-working but not easy to administer. If Jim was quiet, he was also alert, and concerned about everyone around him. From his sick bed in Cherryfield he would admire and appraise the craft of workmen in the building opposite. His regular greeting of How are you? was no formality. He wanted to know. No wonder he is missed. May God be good to this deeply spiritual Jesuit.

Michael J Kelly

Murphy, Martin, 1934-2015, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/843
  • Person
  • 07 August 1934-12 March 2015

Born: 07 August 1934, Ringsend, Dublin
Entered: 10 August 1966, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Professed: 15 August 1985, Luwisha House, Lusaka, Zambia
Died: 12 March 2015, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.

by 1974 at Canisius Chikuni, Zambia (ZAM) working
by 1979 at Babati, Tanzania (AOR) working for “Concern”
by 1995 at JRS Malawi (MOZ) working

Early Education at National School; Ringsend Vocational School

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/br-martin-murphy-sj-may-he-rest-in-peace/

Br Martin Murphy SJ: may he rest in peace
Death has finally got the better of Martin Murphy, but after a mighty struggle. Born in Ringsend, he learned his building skills and qualifications (a Diploma from the Catholic Workers College) before he entered the Jesuits at the age of 32. Over the next 50-odd years he practised or taught motor mechanics, building maintenance, construction, irrigation and pastoral care of refugees. Nearly thirty of those years were given to Africa, especially Zambia and Malawi.

Martin was strong as an ox, but he suffered enough sicknesses to fill a text book. His multiple health problems, touching all his senses and most parts of his sturdy body, involved treatment in four hospitals. He made full use of medical help, and carried his oxygen supply with care as he walked the pavements round Gardiner Street. He would not let medical problems absorb his energy.
At the age of 73 he embarked on a 5-year course in theology with the Tallaght Dominicans. He worked his way right up to the last assignment, on “The Just Society”, at which he balked. Why? they asked. “Because I never lived in a just society, and do not know what it is like.” Dear Martin was a strong and distinctive presence in the Irish Jesuits, a model for anyone who with God’s help has to fight sickness. “Death, be not proud.”

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 160 : Summer 2015

Obituary

Br Martin Murphy (1934-2015)

7 August 1934: Born in Dublin.
Early Education at National School; Ringsend Vocational School
1961 - 1965: NCIR. Socio-Economics Study (Diploma)
10 August 1966: Entered Society at St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
15 August 1968: First Vows at St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
1968 - 1969: St Mary's, Emo - Mechanic; Maintenance
1969-1975: Chisekesi, Zambia - Construction; Irrigation; Teaching at Canisius College, Chikuni
1975 - 1978: Milltown Park - Maintenance
1978 - 1983: Tanzania, East Africa - Working for “Concern” at Babati, Tanzania
1983 - 1984: Tullabeg - Tertianship
1984 - 1986: Lusaka, Zambia - Minister at Luwisha House
15 August 1985: Final Vows at Luwisha House, Lusaka, Zambia
1986 - 1992: Mazabuka, Zambia - Concern Development Project
1987: Youth Development Project at St Paul's, Nakambala
1992 - 1993: Santry - Pastoral Care of Refugees
1993 - 1994: Limbe, Malawi - Working for JRS
1994 - 1995: Mozambique - Working for JRS
1995 - 1996: Clongowes - House and College Maintenance
1996 - 2015: Gardiner St - Assists Director of Arrupe Society
2009 - 2014: Hospital visitation; Studying at Priory Institute, Tallaght
2014 - 2015: Residing at Cherryfield Lodge

In October 2014, Martin was admitted to hospital after a fall. He had many health problems, which meant treatment in four hospitals. He moved to Cherryfield Lodge on 25th February 2015. He was happy to be in Cherryfield again, where he died peacefully on 12th March. May he rest in the peace of Christ.

After a mighty struggle, death finally got the better of Martin Murphy on March 12, 2015. His sisters had prayed to St Francis Xavier that the Lord would spare him further suffering, and in response he died on the final day of the Novena. His funeral was delayed because an autopsy was required, and so he was finally laid to rest on March 19, the Feast of St Joseph. Martin had had a strong devotion to Joseph the Worker, so things fitted in nicely at the end of his life.

Like Joseph, Martin was a great worker: before he joined the Jesuits, he worked for Cramptons, the builders. His grandfather had been in the same trade, and had helped to build the Titanic! This came to light only when Martin showed up in Youghal in 2012 for the launch of Eddie O'Donnell's book on Fr Browne and the Titanic! Sadly, Martin's building work, so helpful to many people, carried the seeds of his own death, because as we now know, he died of asbestos poisoning.

His early education was in the National and Vocational Schools in Ringsend, where he was born. He then began his building career, From 1961-65 he did a Diploma in Socio-Economics at the Jesuit-run NCIR. It appears that he was so impressed by the Jesuit teachers there that he decided to join them in 1966, at age 32. He waited till his mother died to do this, as he was one of her carers.

Martin was a perfectionist, took pride in his work, and always did a great job. He could turn his hand to anything, including leatherwork. He was also a great teacher of his crafts and skills. I had the good fortune to discover him early on, and we became lifelong friends, even if not without some awkward moments! In 1967 I wanted to build a back wall to the handball alley in Milltown and got his help, though he was a novice at the time. It was very definitely his wall, not mine, but he never emphasised the fact. We worked in the early mornings before my classes began, and he would then continue through the day, while I dug academic furrows. One dull morning Martin looked up with an innocent smile at the Milltown buildings and asked, 'Why is it that the scholastics mostly pray in the dark'? Later Martin built the bindery which still stands at the back of the Library. And when a Le Brocquy mosaic of the Madonna and Child came our way mysteriously in the late seventies, he put it up single handed, though it weighed three quarters of a ton. It is now in the Milltown Community foyer. He was, as one of the Brothers said admiringly, “a mighty man”.

He liked philosophy, and especially the ideas of Bernard Lonergan. He could get so animated about these that when driving in Zambia he would slow down to get his point across, which lengthened journeys considerably. At the age of 73 he embarked on a 5-year course in theology in the Priory Institute in Tallaght. He worked his way right up to the last assignment, on “The Just Society”, at which he balked. Why? they asked. “Because I never lived in a just society, and I don't know what it's like”. He enjoyed the phrase “the hermeneutic of suspicion” because it gave him the leeway he needed to be devastatingly honest.

Africa
He went to Zambia in 1969, and worked there and in Tanzania, Malawi, and Mozambique, with occasional breaks, for 25 years. He built churches and schools, dug wells and cultivated a huge garden. He practised or taught motor mechanics, building maintenance, construction, irrigation. He also engaged in pastoral care of refugees. He was well loved by those who worked with him. He delighted in planning and carrying projects through. He loved the moment when he could hand over a set of keys of a new building and say: 'The job is done’. But he had time for soccer also. I have it on reliable authority that when he was playing in Dublin for Transport FC, he was considered to be of international standard. And the Zambians used watch him admiringly: Kalango mulilo! they'd shout - “Look at his fire!”

The Acting Provincial of Zambia, Jim McGloin, said in his message of condolence: “The hidden nature of the work is often the case for the Jesuit Brother. Although Brother Martin did the actual building of the Church in Chikuni Mission in the 1970's, it was the parish priest who received the credit. The serving tables in Luwisha House are still used today, thirty years later, but no one remembers that it was Brother Martin who built them.... While the workmanship was appreciated, the worker often went unnoticed. Yet the professional workmanship of Br Martin itself stands as its own monument. And those who saw his effort and dedication were grateful.'

Martin had used his many talents 'to help others' in simple ways, as Ignatius would have wished. But by 1995, the outer job was done: he had to retire because for the remaining twenty years of his life, ill health dogged him -- glaucoma, diabetes, arthritis, lung problems. But even when exiled from Zambia he always kept in contact and retained a deep love for his 'first mission'.

The inner side
Martin had his own unique relationship with God - his secret scripture. He prayed. He loved his time in the Holy Land. He lived simply. But like the rest of us, he had his own fixed attitudes, his weaker points, his awkwardness. A mature man by the time he joined the Jesuits, he had, not surprisingly, something of a Trade Union perspective on things. This included a keen sense of what he perceived as injustice, foot dragging, and so on. The Jesuit way of proceeding, he felt, was not always the most efficient. With his critical mind, he found it hard to be asked to do things by people who, he felt, didn't know what they were talking about. He had little time for eloquence that was not matched by action. “They can talk the talk” he'd say “but can they walk the walk?”

Martin would tell it like he thought it was, and his craggy style disconcerted more than a few, and left people feeling uncomfortable. He was, one might say, of the warrior class. Critical of many in authority, at the same time he was a great defender of the small and the poor. He volunteered for Tanzania because it was one of the twenty poorest countries in the world. He was both admirer and critic of Julius Nyerere, founder of the state of Tanzania. But his mischievous humour carried him a long way. He would say outrageous things just to get a reaction: often he didn't want to be taken too seriously. And he could get caught out himself on occasion, as when he had an appointment with a consultant about his glaucoma: the great man was late and eventually came into the waiting room to apologise, only to find Martin reading the Irish Times. And he would smile and laugh at himself. A stern commentator on the foibles of humankind, he also had a great and welcoming smile.

Stay Clear! God at Work
God was steadily at work in him, as in us all. That work is to make us grow in love', to bring out the best in us. In the final phase of his life, a deep mellowing took place while he endured enormous discomfort, especially in his breathing. He carried his oxygen supply as he walked the pavements round Gardiner Street. He did not complain. His time and energy were taken up with coping with his own illnesses. He made the rounds of many hospitals and consultants, and his reports of medical encounters were never dull. To one man who wasn't measuring up, Martin said: “Take a good look at my face!” “Why?” said the consultant. “Because”, said Martin, “you won't see it again!” His humour never deserted him, and he would get great joy out of recounting such incidents. He told me how grateful he was to his family for all their care and love; and to the Cherryfield staff for looking after him so well. In turn, they enjoyed his company; he had a word - often funny - to say about everything. They loved him. And he became a grateful man.

So when the moment of death came, and Martin met the Lord face to face, the “inner job” was substantially done. Like Peter in the Gospel, he jumped out of the safety of his life's boat and struggled to the shore where Jesus was waiting, watching. Surely like Peter, Martin heard Jesus say, “Bring the fish you've caught, and come, let's have breakfast!”

Then, we may surmise, came the one-to-one chat with Jesus, who now could safely ask him: Martin, do you love me more than these others do? There would have been no digging-up of the failures of the past. No comparisons and contrasts with others. The present state of his heart was all that mattered. He would have answered like Peter: Lord, “You know everything, you know I love you”. That would be enough. Because in the evening of life we will be examined in love.

It so happened that when the news came to me that Martin had died, I was reading a book titled Love is Stronger than Death, by Cynthia Bourgeault. It tells of a Trappist monk in Colorado who had a turbulent personality and was awkward in his relationships. Community life fell short for him, and so he moved out and became a hermit. He wrestled much of his life with God and others. But at the end he became liberated and happy. I felt this man's life and Martin's had parallels! In our final conversation a week before he died, he had told me he had been struggling, not with the problem that others were not measuring up, but that he wasn't measuring up. He found it consoling to hear Pope Francis' remark from The Joy of the Gospel, “When everything is said and done, we are infinitely loved”. Perhaps, then, he felt, all would be well at the end, because God's love is stronger than our failings or our death.

And so, off he went, happily, into eternal glory. He is now fully alive, radiant with his best self, supporting us on our pilgrim way, looking forward to the great reunion when all will be made well.

Brian Grogan

Browne, Henry Martyn, 1853-1941, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/72
  • Person
  • 07 August 1853-14 March 1941

Born: 07 August 1853, Birkenhead, Liverpool, Cheshire, England
Entered: 31 October 1877, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 22 September 1889, St Beuno's, Wales
Final Vows: 02 February 1897, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 14 March 1941, St Beuno's, Wales

Part of the Heythrop, Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, England community at the time of death

by 1888 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) studying
by 1895 at Roehampton London (ANG) making Tertianship
by 1923 at Campion House, Osterley, London (ANG) teaching
by 1927 at Mount St London (ANG) writing
by 1938 at Roehampton, London (ANG) writing
by 1941 at Heythrop, Oxfordshire, England (ANG) writing

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online :
Browne, Henry Martyn
by Christina Souyoudzoglou-Haywood

Browne, Henry Martyn (1853–1941), classicist and Jesuit priest, was born 7 August 1853 in Claughton, Woodchurch, Cheshire, England, the second of four sons and one daughter of John Wilson Browne, hardware merchant, born in Portugal (1824), and Jane Susan Browne (née McKnight), one of eight children of Robert McKnight, farmer, and Jane McKnight (née McLean) from Kelton, Castle Douglas, Kirkcudbrightshire. Henry grew up in Birmingham, where his father set up in business. He lost his mother (d. 14 May 1859) when he was almost six; in 1862 his father married Agnes Bowstead and had another two children.

Brown was educated at King Edward's school, Birmingham, and in 1872 entered New College, Oxford, as a commoner. He took moderations in 1873, obtaining second-class honours in Greek and Latin literature, but left the university the following year, without taking his second public examination – he was granted a BA in 1891 (MA 1895) upon embarking on his academic career – having converted to the catholic faith and joined the Society of Jesus. He later gave an account of his conversion in The city of peace (1903). In 1877 he joined the Irish province and entered the novitiate at Milltown Park. He took his vows in 1879, remained for a year at Milltown Park as a junior, and taught at Tullabeg, Tullamore, Co. Offaly (1880–84). He was ordained in 1889 at St Beuno's, north Wales. Five years earlier he had begun a degree in theology at Milltown Park, which he completed in 1890. He was then appointed to teach classics at UCD, then run by the Jesuits, filling the post formerly held by Gerard Manley Hopkins (qv). During this period he published the Handbook of Greek composition (1885; 8th ed. 1921) and Handbook of Latin composition (1901; 2nd ed. 1907). At the founding of the NUI in 1908 he was appointed professor of Greek at UCD, a position he held until his retirement in 1922.

What characterised Browne's approach to classical scholarship was his interest in the ‘reality’ of the ancient world, which he tried to convey to students through visual and tactile materials (maps, lantern slides, photographs, artefacts, and replicas). He became an enthusiastic advocate of archaeology, and particularly of prehistoric archaeology. He gave public lectures on Minoan and Mycenaean archaeology and – a first for Ireland – he introduced these subjects into the university's syllabus. In his popular Handbook of Homeric study (1905; 2nd ed., 1908) he debated extensively the implications for Homeric studies of the recent archaeological discoveries in the eastern Mediterranean. His greatest legacy to UCD was the Museum of Ancient History (afterwards renamed the Classical Museum), inaugurated at Earlsfort Terrace in 1910. Browne built up his teaching collection of more than 5,000 Greek, Roman, and Egyptian antiquities, replicas, and coins through his personal contacts with archaeologists and museums in England, through purchases on the antiquities market – an important purchase being that of Greek vases at the Christie's sale of the Thomas Hope collection in 1917 – and through loans from the National Museum of Ireland. He became a member of the committee of the British Association for Museums, and chairman of the archaeological aids committee of the Association for the Reform of Latin Teaching. In this capacity he visited the USA in 1916 to inquire into the educational role of American museums, and included his observations in Our renaissance: essays on the reform and revival of classical studies (1917). His practical approach to the classics led him to experiment with Greek choral rhythms; he gave demonstrations at American universities, and regularly chanted Greek choral odes to his students. He had many extra-curricular interests. For several years he was in charge of the University Sodality. He played a major role in the foundation of the Classical Association of Ireland (he was its chairman in 1913) and served on the Council of Hellenic Studies. He was involved with the St Joseph's Young Priests Society and supported the work of the Mungret Apostolic School.

After his retirement from UCD Browne left Ireland, where he had resided at the Jesuit residence, 35 Lower Leeson Street, Dublin, and was transferred to London, first to Osterley, then Farm Street in Mayfair, and in 1939 to Manresa House, Roehampton. During this period of his life he channelled his energy to the study of the English martyrs, and to catechism and conversion. He wrote The catholic evidence movement (1924) and Darkness or light? An essay in the theory of divine contemplation (1925), and tried to improve the fate of the under-privileged youth of Hoxton by organising and running a boys’ club there. He returned to Dublin a few times, and he wrote with Father Lambert McKenna (qv) a history of UCD, A page of Irish history (1930). His last publication was A tragedy of Queen Elizabeth (1937).

Browne died 14 March 1941 at Heythrop College, near Oxford, where he was evacuated because of the air raids on London. His brothers, all heirless, continued the merchant tradition of the family. His sister, Lucy Jane, died in a Birmingham asylum in 1917. His half-brother Arthur Edward Wilson died in South Africa in 1941 where he lived with his wife and five children. Browne's correspondence relating to the UCD museum is in the British Museum, the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, Winchester College, and the NMI. Some papers are in the archives of the British Province, Mount Street, London. The whereabouts of a known portrait are uncertain; it was reproduced in his obituary in the magazine of the British Province with the caption ‘from a Dublin portrait’.

Browne family wills, inc. John Wilson Browne (1886) and Charles Knightly Browne (1926); census returns, United Kingdom, 1851 (Woodchurch, Birkkenhead), 1881 and 1891 (Solihull, Birmingham); ‘Browne, Henry Martyn’, New College, Oxford, Register for 1872; Oxford University Calendar, 1873, 1892, 1893; ‘The Cretan discoveries’, Freeman's Journal, 11 Feb., 17 Feb. 1905; National Museum of Ireland: letter books, 1910, 1912, 1914, 1915, 1917, 1918, 1921; University College Dublin: Calendar for . . . 1911–1912, 457–8; H. Browne, Museum of Ancient History: report, 1913 (1913); H. Browne, Museum of Ancient History: Report, 1914 (1915); H. Browne, Introduction to numismatics (1915); University College Dublin: Report of the President, 1922–1923, 3–4; Fathers of the Society of Jesus, A page of Irish history: story of University College Dublin, 1883–1909 (1930); ‘Obituary’, University College Dublin: Report of the President, 1940–1941, 16–17; ‘Obituary’, Irish Province News, iv (1941), 566–9; WWW; M. Tierney, Struggle with fortune: a miscellany for the centenary of the Catholic University of Ireland, 1854–1954 (1954), 37–8, 90; W. B. Stanford, Ireland and the classical tradition (1976), 65–6, 68–9, 168–9, 240; C. Haywood, The making of the classical museum: antiquarians, collectors and archaeologists. An exhibition of the Classical museum, 2003 [exhibition catalogue]

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 3rd Year No 1 1927
Jubilee : Fr Henry Browne
Fr Henry Browne was fêted at Leeson Street on November 1st. He had his share of College work in Tullabeg. But as far back as 1891 he was sent to University College, Dublin, where he played a full man's part in making that Jesuit establishment the first College in Ireland of the old “Royal”. Even “Queen’s” Belfast notwithstanding its enormous advantages, had eventually to acknowledge the superiority of the Dublin College, and the men who worked it.
Fr. Browne's Oxford training was a valuable asset in bringing University College so well to the front. He remained Professor in the Royal, and then in the National University to the year 1922, and is now engaged, amongst other things, in doing a work dear to the heart of men like Francis Regis, looking after the poor, especially children, in the worst slums of London.

Irish Province News 9th Year No 1 1934

Leeson St :
Monday, November 20th, was a red-letter day in the history of Leeson street, for it witnessed the celebration of the Golden Jubilee of the House's foundation. In November, 1833. the Community came into being at 86 St Stephen's Green, where it remained until 1909, when the building was handed over to the newly constituted National University. The Community, however, survived intact and migrated to a nearby house in Lesson Street, where it renewed its youth in intimate relationship with the Dublin College of the University.
Its history falls this into two almost equal periods, different, indeed, in many ways, yet essentially one, since the energies of the Community during each period have been devoted to the same purpose, the furtherance of Catholic University Education in Ireland.
A precious link between the two eras is Father Tom Finlay, who was a member of the Community in 1883, and ever since has maintained his connection with it. His presence on Monday evening, restored to his old health after a severe illness was a source of particular pleasure to the whole gathering. It was also gratifying to see among the visitors Father Henry Browne, who had crossed from England at much personal inconvenience to take part in the celebration. Not only was Father Browne a valued member of the Community for over thirty years, but he acquired additional merit by putting on record, in collaboration with Father McKenna, in that bulky volume with the modest title " A Page of Irish History," the work achieved by the House during the first heroic age of its existence. It was a pleasure, too, to see hale and well among those present Father Joseph Darlington, guide, philosopher and friend to so many students during the two periods. Father George O'Neill, who for many years was a distinguished member of the Community, could not, alas. be expected to make the long journey from his newer field of fruitful labor in Werribee, Australia.
Father Superior, in an exceptionally happy speech, described the part played by the Community, especially in its earlier days of struggle, in the intellectual life of the country. The venerable Fathers who toiled so unselfishly in the old house in St. Stephens Green had exalted the prestige of the Society throughout Ireland. Father Finlay, in reply, recalled the names of the giants of those early days, Father Delany, Father Gerald Hopkins, Mr. Curtis and others. Father Darlington stressed the abiding influence of Newman, felt not merely in the schools of art and science, but in the famous Cecilia Street Medial School. Father Henry Browne spoke movingly of the faith, courage and vision displayed by the leaders of the Province in 1883, when they took on their shoulders such a heavy burden. It was a far cry from that day in 1883, when the Province had next to no resources, to our own day, when some sixty of our juniors are to be found, as a matter of course preparing for degrees in a National University. The progress of the Province during these fifty years excited feelings of
admiration and of profound gratitude , and much of that progress was perhaps due to the decision, valiantly taken in 1883 1883, which had raised the work of the Province to a higher plane.

Irish Province News 16th Year No 4 1941

Obituary :
Father Henry Browne
Father Henry Browne died at Heythrop College on March 14 1941. He had been in failing health for the past two or three years, and had recently been evacuated from Roehampton to Heythrop owing to the air-raids over London. To quote the words of an English Father who knew him well in these last years “here he occupied himself mostly in prayer, and on March 14th brought to a serene close eighty-eight years of arduous, enthusiastic, joyful, supernatural work for the Master”.

Father Henry Browne was born at Birkenhead on August 7, 1853 but his father, Mr. J. Wilson Browne, was a Birmingham man, his mother was Joan McKnight. Who's Who contains a notice of his grandfather, Captain J. Murray Browne, who “fought at Albuera and throughout the Peninsular War, and joined the Portuguese army where he became Assistant Quartennaster-General under Marshal Beresford.” Father Browne was educated at King Edward's High School, Birmingham, and went to New College, Oxford. He was received into the Church in 1874, when his undergraduate course was not yet completed, and was advised by Cardinal Manning to interrupt his studies. Je joined the Irish Province in 1877, and entered the novitiate at Milltown Park on October 31st. After his first vows he spent a year as a Junior at Milltown Park. In 1880 he went to Tullabeg, where he spent four years as master under two Rectors, Fr Sturzo and Fr. George Kelly. The Intermediate System was then in its early stages, and Mr. Browne taught Rhetoric and Mathematics (1880-81),
Humanities (1881-2) , 1 Grammar (1882-3), Syntax, Classics and English (1883-4).
From 1884-6 Father Browne studied Philosophy at Milltown Park, where he had Fathers Peter Finlay and William Hayden as his Professors. In 1886 he went to St. Beuno's, where he was ordained in the summer of 1889. He returned to Milltown for his fourth year of theology. and was then sent to University College to teach Latin and Greek, replacing Father Richard Clarke of the English Province.
From 1890 to 1909 (with the exception of one year, 1894-95, which he spent as a Tertian Father at Roehampton), Father Browne was kept busy in Dublin as Professor of Classics and Fellow of the Royal University of Ireland. His energy was simply amazing. Two early Handbooks of Latin and Greek Composition went through various editions, though they have since lost their vogue. His Handbook of Homeric Study was for many years counted the best popular introduction in English to the famous controversy, on which Father Browne
was never weary of lecturing his own students at U.C.D. He took a leading part in the foundation of the Classical Association of Ireland and was elected President of this body in 1913. He was also a member of the Council of the Society for Hellenic Studies, Chairman (for a time) of the Archaeologica Aids Committee of the Association for the Reform of Latin Teaching, and member of the Committee of the British Association for Museums. In this connection he visited the U.S.A. in 1916 as a member of a special Committee to report on the American museum system, and his volume of essays (Our Renaissance : Essays on the Reform and Revival of Classical Studies), published in 1917 reflects his interests in these strenuous years. Father Browne's old students will not need to be reminded of his immense zest for all forms of archaeological research. He counted several of the leading English
archaeologists as among his personal friends. There had been an earlier stage when Greek music had attracted his attention - though it must be confessed that Father Browne's aptitude for musical theory was disputed by some of his colleagues. But who could resist so great a vital force? Father Browne would strum a piano for hours on end, convincing himself (and some others) that Greek music was most closely connected (through Gregorian music) with ancient Irish music as represented in Moore's Melodies. Who's Who contains the following condensed statement of this phase of Father Browne's activities “He has experimented in the melodic rendering of Greek choral rhythms giving demonstrations before the British Association at the Dublin meeting (1908) and at Columbia and Chicago Universities.
It seems a far cry from these external activities to the inner motive which explains the dual character of Father Henry Browne's life. But those who lived with him knew that he had other interests. For many years he was' exceptionally successful as Director of the Students Sodality in the old University College, giving monthly talks to large numbers. As early as 1896 he had been drawn into the work of Saint Joseph's Young Priests' Society by his lifelong friend and fellow-convert, Father Joseph Darlington. Father Darlington had to leave Ireland for a year to make his tertianship, and he succeeded (with some difficulty) in persuading Father Browne to take his place for one year. Those first hesitations were soon forgotten, and Father Browne continued to edit Saint Joseph’s Sheaf, and to be the life and soul of the Society for the next twenty-five years. He was particularly keen on the work of the Mungret Apostolic School, and deserves to be reckoned as one of the chief benefactors of that important work for the missionary priesthood. He was also a pioneer propagandist for the Chinese Mission here in Ireland. In 1915 he helped to re-organise Saint Joseph's Young Priests' Society as a national work, approved and commended by the Irish Hierarchy.
The last twenty years of Father Browne's life were spent outside of Ireland. Although he came back to Dublin more than once, and was always eager to keep in touch with the Leeson Street community.
A brief record of his activities during these years will help to complete the picture of this strenuous worker for Christ’s Kingdom. For the first two years Father Browne was stationed at Osterley, where he helped Father Lester up his work for late vocations (Our Lady's Young Priests), and taught Latin to some of the students. In a recent issue of Stella Maris Father Clement Tigar, who has succeeded Father Lester at Osterley, pays warm tribute to Father Browne's work for this good cause. He also wrote a pamphlet on the K.B.S. movement, and a very pleasant book on the recent work of the Catholic Evidence Guild (1924). This latter work made a special appeal to Father Browne - zeal for the conversion of Protestant England - and he soon threw himself heart and soul into the work of open-air lecturing and catechising. His older friends in Dublin, who knew him for the most part as the very type of an academic Professor of Greek were first startled, then amused to hear that Father Browne was exceptionally successful in this new role. He had a knack of answering casual hecklers in their own style - his answer was often so completely unexpected (and occasionally so irrelevant) that the heckler was left speechless with surprise, and unable to cause any further trouble. From Osterley, Father Browne was soon transferred to Farm Street, where he added a new field to his labours. This was a Newsboys' Club which he himself organised and directed at Horton one of the most difficult of London's slum areas. It was open to boys of every religious denomination. The mere labour of going down to Horton from Farm Street on several nights a week would have been sufficient to flaunt a younger and more vigorous man. But Father Browne now well on in his seventies, was indomitable.
In 1927 Father Browne came back for a visit to Dublin, to celebrate his Golden Jubilee with the Fathers of the Lesson Street community. In 1930 and 1931 he was here again, and was busily engaged on compiling a short history of the old University College, with the collaboration of Father Lambert McKenna. The book appeared in 1930 under the title “A Page of Irish History”. In the next year Father Browne took part in the Congress of the Irish Province which was held in University Hall, Hatch Street. for the purpose of studying the Exercises. He chose for his share in the discussion the subject of Ignatian Prayer - always a favourite topic with him in private conversation - and his comments will be found in “Our Colloquium”, pp. 129-131. He had already published a book on the theory of mystical contemplation under the title “Darkness or Light? : An Essay in the Theory of Divine Contemplation” (Herder, 1925). Many years earlier (1903) he had edited a volume entitled “The City of Peace”, in which he gathered together various autobiographical accounts of recent conversions to the Catholic Church. His own account of his conversion to the true Faith at Oxford is well worth reading for the light it throws on his own strong direct and outspoken character.
Hoxton Club and these many other activities filled Father Browne's life until 1984, when he was in his eighty-second year. He had already made plans for the transference of the Club to other hands, and it was finally passed over to the management of a joint committee of past students of Stonyhurst and the Sacred Heart Convent Roehampton. He himself felt that the end was near, but his energy was not yet spent. For the next few years he threw himself with all his old fire and enthusiasm into one last campaign for the conversion of England
through the intercession of Teresa. Higginson, in whom he had implicit faith. An adverse decision came from Rome some three years ago and Father Browne found this set-bask one of the severest trials in his long life. But he never hesitated in his obedience and submission to authority, and his faith in the ultimate conversion of his fellow countrymen never wavered for an instant. The present writer visited him frequently in the last years of his life, and it was impossible to resist the impression of a life that was more and more absorbed in the work of prayer for his fellow-Christians. Old memories of Dublin days would come back to him, but the conversion of England was his main preoccupation. He had asked to be moved from Farm Street to Roehampton, so that he might prepare himself for death in the company of the novices. But it was not to be. The air-raids on Roehampton made evacuation a duty, and Father Browne was transferred some months before his death to Heythrop near Oxford. Old memories of Oxford days. and of his own conversion, must have come back to him with double force. Those who knew him say that his last months were spent mainly in prayer. He was in his eighty-eighth year, but still unwearied in his zeal, when the end came at last, and he has been laid to rest at Heythrop College, which is now one of the most active centres of that campaign for the conversion of England which lay nearer to his heart than any other human cause. May he rest in peace. (A.G.)

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Henry Browne SJ 1853-1941
Fr Henry Browne was born of Anglican parents at Birkenhead, England, on August 7th 1853. He was educated at King Edward’s High School, Birmingham and New College Oxford, and entered the Catholic Church in 1874. Three years later he joined the Irish Province of the Society at Milltown Park. He pursued his higher studies at Milltown Park and at St Beuno’s, North Wales, and was ordained priest in 1889.

In the following year he began his long association with University College Dublin as Professor of Ancient Classics and Fellow of the Royal University of Ireland. During these fruitful years, 1890-1922, Fr Browne’s talent as lecturer, writer, organiser found its full scope. In addition to a very useful volume dealing with Greek and Latin composition, he was the author of “A Handbook of Homeric Studies”, which held its own as the best secular introduction to a famous controversy. He took a leading part in the foundation of the Classical Association of Ireland, and was a member of the Council of the Society for Hellenic Studies and of the Committee of the Irish Association of Museums.

Another side of Fr Browne’s activities in Dublin during these years was the zeal he displayed in promoting vocations to the missionary priesthood. As early as 1896 he had been drawn into the work of St Joseph’s Young Priests Society, which he served for a quarter of a century.

The last twenty years of Fr Browne's life were spent outside Ireland, and marked what we might call its Second Spring. He helped Fr Lester in his work for late vocations at Osterley, London, and in open-air lecturing and catechising. In these years date his very pleasant book on the work of the Catholic Evidence Guild. On his transfer to Farm Street, he added a new field to his labours, a newsboys club in Hoxton in the East End of London.

He remained in touch with the Irish province during this period of his life, and wrote an account of the old University College in “A Page of Irish History”. The story about his own conversion to the faith is told in “The City of Peace” (1903), and also in a chapter of a book “Roads to Rome” by Rev John O’Brien. Deserving also of special mention is Fr Browne’s work on the theory of mystical contemplation entitled “Darkness or Light” (1925).

Fr Browne closed his strenuous apostolic life on March 14th 1941 at St Beuno’s, North Wales, where he had been evacuated during the air-raids of World War II, interested to the end in the work for the conversion of Protestant England.

◆ Mungret Annual, 1941

Obituary

Father Henry Browne SJ

The death of Father Browne on the 14th March, 1941– St. Joseph's month - at the Jesuit House of Studies, Heythrop, Oxford, brought to a close a long and fruitful life.

Born in Birkenhead in 1853 and educated at New College, Oxford, he was received into the Church in 1874. Three years later he entered the Novitiate of the Irish Province and from that date till his retirement in 1922 he was engaged in educational work in Ireland. As a scholastic he taught in Belvedere and Tullabeg. He was ordained in 1890 at St Beuno's, Wales, and when his studies were completed we find him back once more in Ireland.

There is no need to chronicle here the scholastic attainments of Father Browne or his part in the great work for university education in Ireland. These are matters of history. But it is well to recall his close association with the early days of the Apostolic School. Brought into contact with Mrs Taaffe and her great work, Father Browne, at first very doubtful about the success of the venture, became one of the pillars of St Joseph's Young Priests Society. Realising the need of missionary priests and the possibilities of the work, he threw himself into the enterprise with all his characteristic thoroughness. His lantern lectures were utilised to make the work known and by these he was instrumental in having the Moloney Burse completed and handed over to the Apostolic School.

Shortly after his retirement in 1922 from the University, he returned to England and worked mainly in London.

The later years of his life were spent in the peace and quiet of Manreso and Heythrop College.

Nolan, Thomas V, 1867-1941, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/307
  • Person
  • 23 September 1867-24 June 1941

Born: 23 September 1867, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 09 October 1887, Loyola House, Dromore, County Down
Ordained: 27 July 1902, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1905
Died: 24 June 1941, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner St, Dublin

Early education at St Stanislaus College SJ, Tullabeg

Father Provincial of the Irish Province of the Society of Jesus, 22 October 1912-21 February 1922

2nd year Novitiate at Tullabeg;
by 1897 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1904 at Linz Austria (ASR) making Tertianship
PROVINCIAL 22/10/1912

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/jesuitica-answering-back-2/

JESUITICA: Answering back
Do Jesuits ever answer back? Our archives hold an exchange between Fr Bernard Page SJ, an army chaplain, and his Provincial, T.V.Nolan, who had passed on a complaint from an Irish officer that Fr Page was neglecting the care of his troops. Bernard replied: “Frankly, your note has greatly pained me. It appears to me hasty, unjust and unkind: hasty because you did not obtain full knowledge of the facts; unjust because you apparently condemn me unheard; unkind because you do not give me credit for doing my best.” After an emollient reply from the Provincial, Bernard softens: “You don’t know what long horseback rides, days and nights in rain and snow, little or no sleep and continual ‘iron rations’ can do to make one tired and not too good-tempered.”

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 16th Year No 4 1941

Obituary :

Father Thomas V Nolan

Fr. Nolan died at Gardiner Street in the early hours of the morning of the 24th June, 1941, as a, result of an attack of cardiac asthma.

Born on 23rd September, 1867, of a well-known Dublin family, the son of Edward Nolan and Mary Crosbie, he was educated at Tullabeg College, and, after a short period of University studies, entered the novitiate at Dromore, Co. Down, on 9th October, 1887. He pronounced his first Vows on Xmas Day two years later, at St. Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, whither the novitiate had in the meantime been transferred. Owing to a tired head, he was sent to the Colleges before beginning his philosophy, and spent 6 very successful years at Clongowes as classical master. He did his three years philosophy at Louvain and four of theology at Milltown Park. where he was ordained priest by the late Archbishop Dr. William Walsh, on 28th July, 1902. Third Probation he spent at Linz in Austria in company with the late Fr. Jerome O'Mahony and 18 other fellow-tertians, who included names like the later famous Innsbruck theologians Fathers Lercher and Stufler. Fr. Francis X. Widmann, the Rector and Instructor, gave them apparently the value of their money! Fr. Nolan often recalled the strenuous time he had there, and the feats of human endurance which the hospital experiment involved. On the completion of his training he was sent to Mungret, where he spent 4 years as Prefect of studies, during two of which he was Rector (1906-'8). In 1908 he became Rector of Clongowes and remained in that post till he was appointed Provincial in 1912. He continued to rule the destinies of the Province for the next 10 years amid the varied responsibilities consequent on the world-war and the post-war period. He found time as Provincial to act as President of the Classical Association of Ireland for 1917 and delivered his presidential address before that body oh Friday 26th January, 1917, in the Lecture Theatre of the Royal Dublin Society, taking' as his theme, “Aristotle and theSchoolmen” (cf Proceedings of the Cless. Assoc., 1916-17, pp. 17-46). During his Provincialate the purchase of Rathfarnham Castle was negotiated, and more adequate provision thus made for the scholastics of the Province to attend University lectures.
On the appointment of the tertian Instructor, Fr. Joseph Welsby to the office of English Assistant in Rome, Fr. Nolan was suddenly called upon to step into the breach after the Long Retreat in 1923 and carried the Tullabeg Tertians to the end of their year with conspicuous success and bon-homie. For the next 6 years he was operarius at Gardiner Street. It was during this period, in the autumn of 1920, that he was commissioned by the Holy See to enquire into the status of the Irish Franciscan Brothers of the Third Order Regular. He spent a full month (24th September-25th October) visiting their 14 houses in the dioceses of Meath, Achonry, and Tuam, without a break - a very strenuous work which included inspection of their schools and the meeting with clerical managers. Then there remained the task of revising their constitutions and drawing up his recommendations for the Sacred Congregation. As a result of his labours (to quote a prefactory notice in the Irish Catholic Directory, on the page dealing with the Franciscan Brothers ) : “Pius XI. graciously deigned to praise and recommend the Institute and confirm its constitutions by a Decree dated 12th May, 1930, thereby raising the Order to Pontifical Status.” The Brothers seem to have been extremely gratified by the results of their visitation. They certainly never lost an opportunity of extolling the charity and competence of their visitator, whose call at each of their houses they still hold in treasured remembrance. On hearing of his death this year they assured Fr. Provincial of the genuine sympathy they felt on the loss of their patron and had several Masses offered for repose of his soul. In 1930 Fr. Nolan was appointed Rector of Rathfarnham Castle and guided the destinies of the scholasticate and of the retreat house for six years.
The years of life still remaining to him were spent at Gardiner Street where in spite of failing health he continued to devote himself zealously to the works of the sacred ministry. The last months of his earthly sojourn were frequently punctuated with heart attacks of ever increasing violence, notably on St. Patrick's Day, which he bore with great courage and patience.
Fr. Nolan kept in touch with old Mungret and Clongowes boys for decades. He was always most ready to assist by counsel, influence and even material charity. where possible, those who had fallen from luck or become failures in life. His lifelong interests in the Kildare Archaeological Society, with which he made his first contacts as a young man in Clongowes, are well known, though apparently he never made any contribution to its journal nor claimed any particular competence in things archaeological. He attended regularly the meetings
of the society and was a very popular associate in the various outings undertaken by the members. On an historic occasion in the Protestant Church at Coolbanagher (near Emo) before a large gathering of archaeological enthusiasts who were viewing an ancient baptismal font, he was able to assure the audience in his suavest of manners that this relic of bygone days had only recently been filched from the grapery of St. Mary's shortly before the Jesuits acquired that property!
He was an assiduous retreat-giver. Among his papers appears an accurate list of retreats (5-8 day) given by him between 1904 and 1938. They number 90, The first on the list was given to the Patrician Brothers, Tullow, and the last to the Sisters of the Holy Child, Stamullen, 2-6 January, 1938. R.1.P.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Thomas V Nolan 1867-1941
“Thank God, now” was a phrase ever on the lips of Fr TV Nolan. He guided the destinies of the Province for ten years during the very critical period 1912-1922, taking in the First World War and the Struggle for Independence at home.

He was a classical scholar, being President of the Classical Association of Ireland for 1917, and he found time as Provincial to read his Presidential address on “Aristotle and the Schoolmen”. It was during his period as Provincial that Rathfarnham Castle was acquired and the retreat Movement started.

In 1928 he was appointed Apostolic Visitor to the Irish Franciscan Brothers of the Third Order regular. Their grateful memories of his are an eloquent tribute to the kindness and greatness of the man.

He died in Gardiner Street on June 24th 1941, an outstanding man who had left his imprint on the Province he ruled.

◆ The Clongownian, 1942

Obituary

Father Thomas V Nolan SJ

The Late Fr T V Nolan was for many years one of the most prominent members of: the Irish Province of the Society of Jesus - in fact, his personality was such that he could not help being prominent in whatever circumstances he might find himself. As a schoolboy in Tullabeg, whether it was in the classroom or on the playground, he was outstanding. Very soon, within less than a month, in fact, after leaving the noviceship, as constant headaches prevented him from following the usual course of studies, he was sent to Clongowes to teach, taking the Second Arts Class of the Royal University. Later, however, his work was chiefly confined to the Junior Grade Honours classes, which he taught with conspicuous success for many years. On leaving Clongowes he studied Philosophy in Louvain and Theology in Milltown Park. After ordination he went to Mungret - first as Prefect of Studies, and then as Rector.

In 1908 he was appointed Rector of Clongowes, and held the post until November, 1911, when he became Provincial. His long term of office (ten years) saw him engaged in many activities. He was prominently identified with the settlement in various parts of Ireland of the Belgian refugees, who came to Ireland in considerable numbers during the last war. He was a member of the Classical Society of Ireland, acting as its President during 1917, when he read a paper to the Society, entitled : “Aristotle and the School men”. He was also closely identified with the Kildare Archeological Society, of which he was Vice-President. He was also, when ever his duties did not call him away from Dublin, a very popular Confessor, especially with poorer boys who came to his confessional from all parts of Dublin.

Shortly after his term of office as Provincial was completed, he was appointed by the Holy See as Visitor to the Irish Franciscan Brothers of the Third Order. This entailed visiting all their houses, inspecting their schools, revising their constitution, and drawing up a recommendation for the Sacred Congregation. This he did to the complete satisfaction of the Brothers and of the Holy See.

Father Nolan's last position of authority was Rector of Rathfarnham College, which he himself had founded when Provincial. He held this position for six years (1930-6). When his term of office had expired, he returned to Gardiner Street and continued to devote himself zealously, as far as his failing health allowed, to the sacred ministry until death claimed him last June.

The following is an appreciation from the pen of one of his most distinguished Clongowes pupils :

The death of Father “Tom” Nolan, which came as a great personal loss to so many old Clongownians, was a particular grief for those who had studied under him as Master at Clongowes in those golden far off years from 1890 to 1896, when he taught First Preparatory and First Junior classes.

In all the fullness and variety of his manifold talents there were surely none greater than his gifts as a teacher of boys in those formative years of youth before the real taste for learning and scholarship had been developed, and when everything for success depended on the personal influence and inspiration of the teacher.

Father Tom Nolan had every gift and every grace that could attract and hold the affection, as well as the attention, of his pupils.

His splendid figure, easy dignity, and manly lucidity of thought and expression made the task of learning seem almost easy and pleasant for his class.

He had above all the teachers at Clongowes of his day the secret of making his class feel that he was one with themselves in the task to be accomplished; he was no passenger holding the rudder lines, but always a stout oar in the boat, at one with his crew.

Not one of those lucky ones who studied under him can ever forget the charm and easy firmness with which he steered their sometimes lagging steps along the rugged path of scholarship; he knew the secret of learning without labour, teaching without tears.

It was inevitable that a man of such gifts as his could not be allowed to remain long confined to the routine of class teaching, and unfortunately for the Clongownians of succeeding years Father Tom never returned to Clongowes again as a teacher after his ordination as a Priest in July, 1902, at Milltown Park,

It was fitting that his last year as a teacher should have produced the great First Junior Class of 1895-1896, which gained twelve exhibitions in a class of twenty boys ; those who were students in that class must still feel proud of having given the beloved master such a fine farewell. For Father Tom Nolan, however, was reserved a great career in the Society in which his early triumphs as a teacher may well have been obscured.

The wider sphere of direction and ad ministration, for which he had, if possible, even greater talents, took him to Mungret as Rector from 1905 to 1908, and from there back to Clongowes as Rector from 1908 to 1911, where his precious and inspiring presence as head of the College more than compensated for his loss as a teacher.

The final recognition of his powers came with his appointment as Provincial of the Society for that long and fateful period from 1911 to 1920, when the fullness and versatility of his gifts were more than ever displayed under the most critical conditions.

He had then reached the summit of his efforts for the Society, and could well look back on a splendid record of achievement, when, after six years as Rector in the serene atmosphere of Rathfarnham Castle, he joined the Community at Gardiner Street, where he died on the 24th June, 1941, at the ripe age of seventy-four years, mourned by the generation of Clongownians who had known and loved him for his great human qualities and infinite charm, but by none more deeply mourned than by those who had known his unforgettable comradeship as teacher and as a friend.

J M Fitzgerald.

◆ The Mungret Annual, 1942

Obituary

Father Thomas V Nolan SJ

Although not a past student of the College, Father Thomas V Nolan, whose death took place last summer, was intimately associated with Mungret, where he was Rector and Prefect of Studies in the years 1905-1908. Mungret boys of those days will remember Father Nolan as a vigorous classical master, a fine cricketer, and a redoubtable opponent on the football field. During his period of Rectorship the National University of Ireland was established; and Father Nolan strongly urged the claim of Mungret, which had such a brilliant record of success in the Royal University examinations, to be made an affiliated College of the new University. To accommodate the growing number students, Father Nolan built the present Refectories, and added an additional storey to the original Agricultural College buildings. He became Rector of Clongowes Wood College in 1908, and in 1912 was appointed Provincial of the Irish Province of the Jesuits. Father Nolan was always keenly interested in the progress and wellbeing of Mungret; and to the end of his life despite his infirmities, he never lost his hearty good humour and, cordiality. He died peacefully at the residence of St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St., Dublin, on June 24th, 1941. RIP

Woda, Francis, 1926-2016, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/525
  • Person
  • 28 February 1926 - 19 December 2016

Born: 28 February 1926 in Mokrzyska, Poland
Entered: 4 February 1950 in Santuaria di Galloro, Arricia, Rome, Italy (Pol Mi)
Ordained: 29 July 1965 in Milltown Park, Dublin, Ireland
Final Vows: 5 November 1977 in Chikuni, Zambia
Died: 19 December 2016 at John Chula House, Lusaka, Zambia

Apostolic Life
1956-1957, Katondwe, Kasisi, teaching, regency
1960-1962, Dublin, Belvedere, teaching
1966-1967, Karenda/Mumbwa, pastoral work
1967- Chelston, pastoral work
1968-1974, Kabwe, Mpima Minor Seminary, teaching sciences
1974-2001, Chikuni, Canisius, teaching sciences
1988-2000, school bursar
2002-2004, Choma, Mukasa, teaching, translating archive documents
2004-2005, Dublin, Poland, recovering health.
2005-2009. Choma, Mukasa, teaching science
2009-2010, Dublin, taking care of health, sabbatical
2010-2013, Chikuni, Canisius, teaching science
2013-2014, Dublin, Gardiner St., taking care of health, sabbatical
2014-2016, Lusaka, Chula House, assisting in archives, praying for Church and Society

by 1958 came to Rathfarnham (HIB) studying 1957-1961
by 1962 came to Belvedere (HIB) for Regency 1961-1963
by 1964 came to Milltown (HIB) studying 1963-1966

Father Francis Woda (Lesser Polish Province) was born on February 28th. 1926, in Mokrzyska, Krakow, Poland. He is a son of Mr and Mrs Francis Woda. In 1950 he entered the Society and after noviceship and philosophy he spent two years on the Polish Mission in Zambia. Later he came to Ireland where he graduated in Science in UCD. Before coming to Milltown Park for his theology he taught for two years at Belvedere College.

Monahan, John, 1920-1993, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/676
  • Person
  • 08 May 1920-08 December 1993

Born: 08 May 1920, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1939, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 04 January 1956, Sydney, Australia
Final Vows: 03 December 1977
Died: 08 December 1993, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin - Australiae Province (ASL)

Part of the St Joseph’s, Hawthorn, Melbourne, Australia community at the time of death

Transcribed HIB to ASL : 05 April 1951

by 1948 at Australia (ASL) - Regency

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Seán Monahan's family attended St Francis Xavier's Church, Gardiner Street, and he received his secondary education at Belvedere College nearby. On 7 September 1939 he entered the Irish noviciate at St Mary's, Portarlington, and then did juniorate studies in arts, studying English, French, Latin and Irish, at the Irish National University, while living at Rathfarnham. He developed tuberculosis during this time and never completed the course. For the next three years he was an invalid, and the decision was made for him to go to Australia.
At the beginning of 1948 Monahan arrived in Australia and began the three year philosophy course at Loyola College, Watsonia. He was a wonderful companion with his sense of humour, his gift for mimicry and his talent for friendship. He enjoyed participating in the scholastic dramatic performances, particularly the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. He produced Iolanthe.
For regency he spent some time at St Louis School, Perth, teaching and working in the boarding house, but he found the heat did not benefit his health, so in 1953 he began theology
studies at Canisius College, Pymble. After ordination in 1956, Monahan became a member of the Australian province. Tertianship followed in 1957 at Sevenhill, SA, under Henry Johnston, his theology rector.
His first priestly appointment was to Corpus Christi College, Werribee, where he was minister, bursar, prefect of liturgy and librarian. In 1958, there were 189 diocesan students; 42 in the first year. Monahan was a good administrator, shrewd, diplomatic, and with a care for detail. His special eye for individuals was much appreciated. He soon became involved in spiritual direction and the students found him a most warm and understanding confessor. He kept contact with many of these men in later years, either as priests or laymen. He was probably one of the best known Jesuits among the Melbourne diocesan priests.
Monahan's special talent for spiritual direction became well known, so he was sent to Loyola College, Watsonia, in 1960, first as socius to the master of novices and later as master of novices. In his first year as master there were 36 novices. Monahan was a most successful and highly acclaimed novice master. Despite his obvious garishness, he understood Australian young people and the contemporary needs of the Church and Society, and initiated many sensible changes into the life of the Jesuit novice. In many ways, he was a significant turning point in the formation of Jesuits in the Australian province, and the last of the Irish novice masters. At the time of his death, 42 of his novices were still members of the Society.
Monahan spent 1971 as spiritual father to Jesuit University scholastics at the Dominican house of studies in Canberra. In 1972 he was recalled to Victoria to become rector of Corpus Christi College, Werribee. It was the last year of the college at that place, the Society handing over its administration to the diocesan clergy.
For the next two years Monahan was spiritual director to the ]suit scholastics at Campion College, and in 1976 he was appointed socius to the provincial and lived at the provincial residence, Hawthorn. Having made his mark as socius, he was given the job, in 1977, of secretary to the South East Asian assistant in Rome, Robert Rush. However, the Roman climate affected his health, and he had difficulty learning Italian, so Paul Gardiner replaced him. He returned to Australia in 1978. At this time the archbishop of Melbourne, Frank Little, asked for him as vicar for religious in the archdiocese.
On his return he took up residence at the provincial house, and was superior from 1979-85, secretary of the province, giving wise advice to the provincial, while continuing his work as spiritual director to many in Melbourne. He was a most hospitable man, and Jesuits enjoyed being invited to Power Street for some Jesuit celebration. During this time his health continued to deteriorate.
In 1993 his health improved a little and Monahan was keen to revisit Ireland. He went and stayed at Cherryfield Lodge, Milltown Park, Dublin, where he received many visitors. He related by mail that he was very happy to be in Dublin. However, his health further declined, his return to Australia was postponed, and he finally died there in December.
Monahan was much loved in the Australian province for his personal humanity and charm, his loving care of others, his encouragement and cheeriness, his sense of fun and wit. He was one of the great storytellers and was a good companion. He loved news, enjoyed being consulted and gave wise advice. Above all he engendered love of, and confidence in, the Society.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 23rd Year No 1 1948

Fr. Peyton left for Australia on the “Mauretania” on 31st October in company with Fr. Conway, a member of the Viceprovince. Fr. Kevin Carroll, also a member of the Viceprovince, left Shannon Airport on 3rd November for New York, bound for San Francisco and Sydney. Mr. Monahan left Southampton on the “Queen Mary” on 20th November for New York; he took boat at San Francisco on 12th December for Sydney which he reached on 4th January. He will be doing his first year's philosophy at Loyola, Watsonia in the coming year.

Irish Province News 48th Year No 1 1973

A recent letter from Fr Seán Monahan, Corpus Christi College, Werribee, conveys the new that the Seminary is being replaced; “After just 50 years in Jesuit hands; the diocesan authorities have to find a buyer for a property a bit like Emo. A new Seminary is a building and though scheduled to be ready for the opening of this year on February 26th it will not in fact be ready in time. We have handed over the administration to the diocese but there will be Jesuits on the staff of the new establishment as academic and spiritual directors. It is in this latter capacity that I go there together with the present spiritual director here, Fr Paul Keenan. Altogether there will be five of us working with the same number of diocesan priests for 161 students following an 8 year course”.

◆ Interfuse No 77 : Summer 1994 & Interfuse No 82 : September 1995 & ◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1995

Obituary
John (Seán) Monahan (1920-1993)

During the six decades of my life, an unbelievable number of people have crossed my path, some friends, others mere acquaintances.

Out of this vast galaxy of people, some have shone like stars to light my way, a select few have been guiding lights that have helped me to believe in myself and to keep on course when I was in danger of losing my way or of being overwhelmed by what confronted me. These latter luminaries have exerted a colossal impact on my life, and I am ever conscious of my debt to them.

On this occasion I want to talk about one that I treasure very specially, one who died on the 8th of December last year after a life of extraordinary dedication to God and to people who needed him. He was John (Seán) Monahan, and I met him first in my last year in the seminary 1958. He had been born in Dublin, Ireland, on 8th May 1920, and had entered the Society of Jesus just prior to the outbreak of the Second World War, on 7th September 1939.

Interestingly enough, he had been ordained a priest only two years before our own group, on 6th January 1956. Because of health reasons he was sent to work in Australia where he spent over thirty years; ironically enough, for the latter part of this period he was contending quietly and courageously with a debilitating illness.

I was thinking back, as I was putting these thoughts together, about how we first met, and I can't quite recollect exactly how that meeting took place. What I do recall, however, is the fact that during the space of a few short months we established a bond that was to link us in friendship every since that time.

As I indicated earlier, I saw him as one of those luminaries who exerted a colossal impact on my life. Whether our contacts were frequent or separated by long intervals, those points at which our lives touched each other, either by letter or in person, exerted a considerable influence on me, both as a man and as a priest. All this was so profound and leaves me so indebted to him that I would like to tell you about at least a few of the riches that I derived from my friendship with Father John Monahan.

My first comment might well sound extraordinary, but I believe it to be the truth; in John Monahan I met Jesus. He was a person in whom I perceived, particularly at a time I needed it, that he really cared about me. He was unhurried as he walked with me on my journey.

There was an extraordinary warmth in him. He had a graciousness, a charm that was not artificial but from the heart. It wasn't a performance designed to impress, it was a natural outflow from his personality. Quite obviously, I wasn't the only one to have experienced this Monahan touch. From the testimonies of others ! know that he endeared himself to an incredible number of people, who were, like myself, influenced and enriched by his part in their life.

As I said, he really embodied Jesus for me, and I mean that if I were to meet Jesus, he would act towards me as John did. Related to this Christlikeness, he breathed an extraordinary inner peace. Any contact that transpired between us was characterised by this quality. There was this relaxing, disarming approach that he adopted, and it said to you in unmistakable terms, “Just be at home while you're with me”.

Had I been aware that he was going home to Ireland for a final farewell to his relatives, friends and fellow religious, I would have grasped the opportunity of saying my own good byes. Therefore, regret that I failed to say goodbye to him and to thank him for everything.

In a way, this tribute to him is a public goodbye and thanks to John for all he was for me and did to me. That is not to suggest that I have finished what I want to say about him, because there is one other comment that completes the picture, and it is this.

The most indelible and most lasting impression that I will always carry with me is that he was a great affirmer. How often, when important events occurred in my life and I let him know about them, and sometimes when I omitted to do so, through the mail would come, written in his neat and thorough way, a letter that complimented me on what I had achieved, or encouraged and supported me in what I was about to undertake.

So often in regard to this very programme he was a source of endorsement and positive comment which encouraged me to give of my best. He wouldn't hesitate to provide a suggestion, too, of how this or that might be improved, but there was always a sensitivity and enthusiasm that urged me on.

His was a caring ministry and I know from comments of other priests and people how widespread and powerful was the influence for good in their lives. Which means that the greatest kindness would be for us to emulate him and his Christlike behaviour in our daily lives. That is no easy prospect, to absorb all these great qualities of a genuine loving priest, but it would be worth the effort.

I already miss John very much; I was always aware that he was there, selflessly supporting me in the background through his suffering and by his prayer.

I thank our heavenly Father that in his providence our lives did touch each other and that I am so much the richer for that as I share these thoughts with you now.

So, to fittingly conclude these thoughts about the man who was for me my Christlike Character for 1993, I share with you a text of Scripture that John referred to often and which presumably affected his personal and priestly ministry and sustained it.

It was found highlighted in his Bible, following his death. It comes from Paul's Letter to the Colossians, chapter one, verses twenty-six to twenty-nine. As I read it, I can perceive John really reaching into the very depths of his being, and opening himself to the power of the Spirit, seeking to be a true priest - a bridge between us and the Father, in and with our Brother, Jesus.

These are the words that animated and challenged John Monahan, Priest and Member of the Society of Jesus, to be Christlike in character:
“...the mystery is Christ among you, your hope of glory. This is the Christ we proclaim, this is the wisdom in which we thoroughly train everyone and instruct everyone to make them all perfect in Christ. It is for this I struggle wearily on, helped only by his power driving me irresistibly”.

Christopher Gleeson, Riverview Australia

Duffy, Patrick J, 1814-1901, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/130
  • Person
  • 22 May 1814-27 July 1901

Born: 22 May 1814, Booterstown, Dublin
Entered: 15 August 1834, Hodder, Stonyhurst, England - Angliae Province (ANG)
Ordained: 26 March 1848, Rome, Italy
Final Vows: 15 August 1867
Died: 27 July 1901, St Vincent’s Hospital, Melbourne, Australia

part of the Xavier College, Kew, Melbourne, Australia community at the time of death

by 1847 in Rome studying
by 1853 at Vals France (TOLO) studying to 1854
by 1856 in Crimea to 1857
Came to Australia 1888

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
After First Vows he was sent to Rome and France for studied, being Ordained in Rome 26 March 1848.
1851 He was Minister at Clongowes under Michael A Kavanagh.
1854 He was sent as Chaplain to the Forces in Crimea, a mission he really liked, and where he had full scope for his zeal and charity.
After he returned from Crimea he was sent teaching at Clongowes for some years, and then sent to Gardiner St, where he worked for 29 years.
At Gardiner St, sinners were converted. Many who were caught up in the world saw a different path, and the sick and destitute were visited with great care. Those who hear him Preach, especially at a “Reception” or “Profession” of a nun were hugely impressed by his sincerity. It was said that when he recited the “Hail Holy Queen” after Mass, it was as though he were speaking directly to the Blessed Virgin.
1879 He got a serious illness, and was ordered by doctors to complete change and rest. So, he was sent abroad for six months. he was a great letter writer, and his letters home during this six months contained glowing accounts of his experiences and vivid descriptions of the places he visited. On visiting Lourdes he spoke of his own delight at saying Mass there and was completely captivated by the Basilica : “Nor could you look at it, and walk through it leisurely, as I did on yesterday, without feeling that it was a work of lover - a work, I mean, of persons who had both the will to do it, the money and the skill, and who, prompted by an irresistible feeling of faith and love, and gratitude, were determined to stop at nothing!” During this six months, he visited Paray-le-Monial, Annecy and Switzerland as well, and eventually returned to Gardiner St, with an immense sense of gratitude for having been given the opportunity. He always communicate gratitude easily, and made good friends. Though some timed thought of as somewhat “rough and ready” he was an immensely sympathetic man, and he was clearly a diamond, who cared for anyone in trouble especially.
Following his experience of illness and the sense of gratitude, he was invited to consider going to Australia. He would have declined at an earlier time, so wrapped in his work and relationships. His response at this relatively late stage in life was “Come soldier! here’s a crowning grace for you - up and at it! Away from your country and friends, away off to the far off battlefield of Australia - a land you won’t like naturally, but in which I wish you to finish the fight! Fear not, I’ll give you the necessary strength, and only be a plucky soldier you, and show me what stuff is in you!”
1888 he arrived in Australia and straight away to St Ignatius, Richmond, and gave a series of Missions from there. He was then sent to St Mary’s North Shore. And so it was until his death, Retreats and Missions were his works.
He was a great enemy to self, and when advising on how to be happy he would say “Forget yourself, this is the secret. Think of Christ and His Cause only and leave the rest to Him!” He had great common sense too. He was entirely military in his ideas, and plenty of military references in his ordinary writing and publications, as seen in “The Eleven-Gun Battery, for the Defence of the Castle of the Soul”.
He had just concluded his own retreat and was conducting one for the Sisters of Mercy at Fitzroy, when he turned on his ankle coming downstairs and fractured his hip. He had an operation, but got up too quickly and had a recurrence, and pneumonia having also set in he declined rapidly. He suffered a lot of pain, but bore it with patience, and his end was calm and peaceful on 27 July 1901 aged 88. His funeral took place at St Ignatius, Richmond with a huge crowd in attendance. His desired epitaph was “Here lies one that did a soldier’s part”.

Note from William Ronan Entry :
A Few years after his Novitiate he went with Fr Patrick J Duffy as a Chaplain in the Crimean War, where he worked for more than a year in the hospitals of Scutari Hospital (of Florence Nightingale Fame in the Istanbul Region) and other Military stations.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Patrick Duffy 1814-1901
In Australia on July 27th 1901 died Fr Patrick Duffy in the 88th year of his life and the 67th of his life in the Society. He was born in Dublin on May 22nd 1814 and entered the Society in 1834 at Stonyhurst.

After his ordination he was sent as a chaplain to the British Forces in the Crimean War in 1854, an event which was destined to colour his spiritual life and writings for the rest of his life.

After his return from the War, he spent upwards of 29 years of fruitful and zealous work as Operarius at Gardiner Street. As a preacher he was renowned for his earnestness and sincerity, and it is related of him that he recited the “Hail Holy Queen” after Mass, as if he spoke to the Blessed Virgin there present, so earnest was the tone of his voice.

In 1879 after a severe illness, he was sent by Superiors on a tour of the continent for six months. He had a facile pen and left us lengthy and vivid impressions of the various places he visited.

At the advance age of 74, when most men would be thinking of retiring and preparing fore the end, Fr Duffy volunteered for the Australian Mission. What was it that induced him to take this up. He himself reveals the reason in a letter written to a friend some years later :
“Oh, dear me! Had I hesitated when I got the invitation years ago, to break the remaining ties and quit all, what an unhappy man, comparatively speaking, I should be today! I saw then what I see now, the mercy which said ‘Come Soldier, here’s a crowning grace for you, up and at it. Away from your country and your friends. Away to the battlefield of Australia - a land you won’t like naturally, but in which I wish you to finish the fight”.

For about fourteen years he worked unceaselessly on missions and retreats throughout Australia. He always regarded these as “campaigns” and conducted them as “pitched battles”, due to his experiences as a chaplain.

In 1887 he embodied his ideas of the spiritual life in a booklet entitled “The Eleven Gun Battery for the Defence of the Castle of the Soul”, to which is added “A Day-book for Religious of the Art of leading in Religion a holy and happy life, and dying as a certain consequence a holy and happy death”.

◆ The Clongownian, 1902

Obituary

Father Patrick Duffy SJ and Father Charles Walshe SJ

We regret to announce the deaths of two Jesuits long connected with Clongowes both as boys and masters-Father Patrick Duffy and Father Charles Walshe.

Father Duffy died at the ripe old age of 88 in Melbourne, Australia. He entered Clongowes as a boy in 1829 and having passed with distinction through the various classes, he joined the Novitate of the Society of Jesus in 1834. Early in his priestly career he was sent out as chaplain to the forces during the Crimean war, a mission which was peculiarly agreeable to him, and to which in after years he often referred with pleasure. He was beloved by the soldiers an Irish regiment - and on one occasion it is said that they refused to march unless their chaplain were allowed to accompany them. He had a fine, manly, soldierly spirit, a most guileless nature, and he was full of ardour. He was for many years on the staff at Clongowes, and later at St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, Dublin. As late in life as his 70th year he volunteered to give his Services to the Australian Mission, where he worked till the end with the zeal and zest of a
youthful beginner.

Smyth, James, 1928-2023, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/2368
  • Person
  • 13 August 1928-02 August 2023

Born: 13 August 1928, Lauragh, Tuosist, County Kerry
Entered: 07 September 1946, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 28 July 1960, Milltown Park Chapel, Dublin
Final Vows: 07 October 1976, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin
Died: 02 August 2023, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street Community Community at the time of death

Son of Thomas Smyth and Frances Lyne.

Born : 13th August 1928 Lauragh, Tuocist, Co Kerry
Raised : Lauragh, Tuocist, Co Kerry
Early Education at Lauragh NS, Co Kerry; Mungret College SJ, Limerick
7th September 1946 Entered Society at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
8th September 1948 First Vows at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
1948-1951 Rathfarnham - Studying Arts at UCD
1951-1954 Tullabeg - Studying Philosophy
1954-1956 Cheung Chau, Hong Kong - Regency : Studying Cantonese and Teaching Catechetics at Xavier House
1956-1957 Kowloon, Hong Kong - Regency : Teacher
1957-1961 Milltown Park - Studying Theology
28th July 1960 Ordained at Milltown Park Chapel, Dublin
1961-1962 Rathfarnham - Tertianship
1962-1963 Cheung Chau, Hong Kong - Minister; Socius to Novice Master; Church Prefect at Xavier House
1963-1966 Kowloon, Hong Kong - Teacher at at Wah Yan College
1965 Prefect of Studies; President of Academic Alumni; President of Past Pupils Union
1966-1971 Belvedere College SJ - Teacher; Assistant Prefect of Studies; Studying H Dip in Education at UCD
1968 Newsboys Club
1970 Spiritual Father 3rd & 4th years; Assistant Career Guidance
1971-1979 Gardiner St - Assists in Church; BVM & SFX Sodalities; Newsboys Club
1976 Parish Chaplain; Chaplain in Hill St Primary School
7th October 1976 Final Vows at St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin
1979-1982 Claver House - Curate in Gardiner St; living in Hardwicke St., Dublin; Spiritual Director Belvedere Youth Club
1982-1985 Luís Espinal - Curate in Gardiner St; living in Hardwicke St., Dublin; Spiritual Director Belvedere Youth Club
1985-1990 Gardiner St - Curate in Gardiner St; living in Hardwicke St., Dublin; Spiritual Director Belvedere Youth Club
1988 Resides in Gardiner St Community
1990-1991 Croftwood, Cherry Orchard - Chaplain in Cherry Orchard Parish of Most Holy Sacrament; Assists in Gardiner St
1991-1992 Milltown Park - Sabbatical
1992-2000 Belvedere - Assistant Pastoral Care Co-ordinator; Ministers in Inner City; Assistant Librarian & Sacristan; College Confessor; Chaplain to Social Integration Scheme
1994 Chaplain in Junior School;
1996 Pastoral work in Gardiner St; Spiritual Director
2000-2023 Gardiner St - Assists in Church; Church Team; Spiritual Director
2015 Prays for the Church and Society at Cherryfield Lodge

https://jesuit.ie/news/featured-news/death-of-fr-james-smyth/

James Smyth SJ RIP: Friend of the poor

Fr James (Jim) Smyth, at 95 the oldest Jesuit in the Irish Province, has died in Cherryfield Nursing Home, Milltown. He passed away peacefully on the morning of Thursday, 31 August. His funeral took place on Tuesday 5 September.

He had a remarkable lifelong involvement with those on the margins in north inner city Dublin, living alongside them in a small one-bedroomed flat in Hardwicke Street. He was a friend to the travelling community, prisoners and anyone in need.

He was a member of the Gardiner Street Community for many years. Richard Dwyer SJ, Superior of that community offers the following reflection on his life.

Renowned for compassion and kindness

Fr James Smyth SJ was born on 13 August 1928 in Lauragh, Tuosist, Co Kerry. He went to Lauragh National School and received his secondary education at Mungret College SJ, Limerick.

On 7th September 1946 he entered the Society of Jesus at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois and took his first vows on 8 September 1948.

After taking an arts degree at UCD, followed by 3 years of philosophy at Tullabeg, he went to Hong Kong in 1954 to study Cantonese and teach catechetics. He returned to Dublin to study theology at Milltown Park and was ordained to the priesthood on 28 July 1960.

He returned to Hong Kong for 4 years after his tertianship (1962) working as Socius (assistant) to the Master of Novices there and later as a teacher in Wah Yan College, Kowloon.

James returned to Dublin and from 1966 to 1971, he worked in Belvedere College SJ. Through a chance encounter on a bus from Rathnew in Wicklow to Dublin, he was invited into the Newsboys Club not far from Belvedere. He attended the club for a number of weeks and was told to sit in the corner and say nothing. According to himself, he felt awkward and embarrassed and spoke to no one. He missed one session and when he returned, the boys asked him where he had been and that they had missed him. This was the beginning of a remarkable lifelong involvement that James developed with the people of north inner city of Dublin.

He went on to live in Hardwicke Street flats in small one bedroom for a 12-year period and became part of the social fabric of people there. He became close friends with the parents and grandparents and became a trusted and beloved pastor, confessor and counsellor to them. He married their sons and daughters, baptized the children of those unions, and became a priestly grandfather to the numerous children.

He visited the sick and elderly. He was a frequent visitor to Mountjoy and St. Patrick’s prison and was renowned for his compassion and kindness. He highlighted the poor condition of the flats and the lack of any play and recreational facilities. James himself lived on a basic income of £20 per week and had to go without meat to buy a shirt or a pair of shoes. All of this time he worked as a curate in Gardiner Street Church and spent long hours in the confession box. He was loved by all who came to him and he was noted for his compassion and understanding.

Over his years in Hardwicke Street and the Church in Gardiner Street, he also was involved with the Travelling Community and again presided over many weddings and baptisms. In a nutshell, James discovered and developed in his heart a tremendous love of the poor and marginalized and the people of the North inner city and the Travelling Community took Fr James to their hearts and loved and revered him.

In the late 1980s and into the 1990s a heroin epidemic was devastating the lives of young people in the North Inner City. Along with the local residents, Fr James and Dublin City Councillor Christy Burke,set up a committee to rid Hardwicke Street of drug dealers and pushers who were making a lot of money from enticing friends and neighbours to take heroin. It was a wonderful example of a community coming together with great courage and determination to eradicate the scourge of hard drugs from their area and to prevent the death and utter destruction of young lives. Fr James and Christy received death threats as a result of their actions.

Fr James continued to live and work with the poor and marginalized in Gardiner Street Church up to his 85th year when ill health saw him transferred to Cherryfield Nursing Home. He settled in well to life in Cherryfield and was cherished by the staff as one of the oldest residents. The constant stream of visitors from the inner city, the Travelling Community and fellow Jesuits bore strong testimony to the love and affection he was held in, to the very end of his long life.

May he rest in peace and receive the fitting reward of all his good deeds in long priestly ministry.

Ar dheis Dé go raibh a ainm dílis.

Richard Dwyer SJ

September 2023

Drennan, Mike, 1942-2023, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J718
  • Person
  • 21 April 1942-19 April 2023

Born: 21 April 1942, Piltown, Co Kilkenny
Entered: 27 September 1977, Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin
Ordained: 06 June 1965, St Mary’s Cathedral, Kilkenny (pre Entry)
Final vows: 22 April 1990, St Francis Xavier’s, Gardiner St, Dublin
Died: 19 April 2023, Cherryfield Lodge, Milltown Park, Dublin

Part of the Manresa Community at the time of death

Older brother of Bishop Martin Drennan

FSS

    Born :  21st April 1942     Piltown, Co Kilkenny
Raised : Piltown, Co Kilkenny
Early Education at Kilkenny NS; CBS Carrick-on-Suir, Co Tipperary; St Kieran’s, Kilkenny; San Diego Diocese; Gregorian University, Rome, Italy

6th June 1965 Ordained at St Mary’s Cathedral, Kilkenny
27th September 1977 Entered Society at Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin
27th September 1979 First Vows at Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin
1978-1979 John Austin House - Second Year Noviciate; Vocational Counselling at John’s Lane; Assistant Retreat Director in Rathfarnham
1979-1988 Campion House - Vocational Counselling
1988-1989 Tertianship at St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg and Campion House, Osterley, London
1989-1993 Gardiner St - Superior; Vocational Counselling; Director of Works
22nd April 1990 Final Vows at St Francis Xavier’s, Gardiner St, Dublin
1993-2000 Manresa House - Director of Ignatian Centre and Retreat House; Directs Spiritual Exercises
1994 Rector; Bursar
1999 Spiritual Direction at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth, Co Kildare
2000-2003 Clongowes Wood College SJ- Spiritual Director at St Patrick’s College National Seminary & Pontifical University
2003-2010 Milltown Park - General Secretary CORI (to 2007)
2005 Vice-Rector
2007 Child Protection Delegate; Spirituality Delegate
2010-2012 Loyola House - Child Protection Delegate; Spirituality Delegate
2012-2023 Manresa House - Rector; Child Protection Delegate; Spirituality Delegate; Directs Spiritual Exercises
2021 Directs Spiritual Exercises; Building Programme; Healthcare

https://jesuit.ie/news/mike-drennan-sj-his-legacy-lives-on/

Mike Drennan SJ: His legacy lives on

Fr Mike Drennan SJ died peacefully, surrounded by his family, at Cherryfield Lodge nursing home, Milltown Park, Dublin on 19 April 2023.

Archbishop Dermot Farrell of Dublin, four other bishops, and many priests joined the Jesuits and people from all over Ireland for Fr Mike’s funeral Mass in St Francis Xavier’s Church, Gardiner Street, Dublin on 24 April, followed by burial at Glasnevin Cemetery. Fr Mike is predeceased by his brother Martin, former Bishop of Galway, who died only five months ago.

Fr Mike was born in 1942 and raised in Piltown, County Kilkenny. He was educated at Kilkenny NS, CBS Carrick-on-Suir in County Tipperary, and St Kieran’s secondary school in Kilkenny. He trained for the diocesan priesthood in St Kieran’s diocesan college, Kilkenny, and was ordained at St Mary’s Cathedral, Kilkenny in 1965. He ministered in San Diego Diocese, USA, and studied psychology at Gregorian University, Rome.

Fr Mike entered the Jesuits at Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin in 1977, and worked in the field of vocational counselling for many years while living at John Austin House, Campion House, and Gardiner Street in Dublin.

After taking Final Vows he served in numerous roles, including as Director of Manresa Jesuit Centre of Spirituality, Dublin; Spiritual Director at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth; Secretary General of CORI (Conference of Religious in Ireland), and Child Protection Delegate for the Irish Jesuit Province. He was a skilled spiritual director and gave retreats all over Ireland for many years.

He recently published a book on the ministry of spiritual direction entitled See God Act (Messenger Publications) ». He also completed a full liturgical year of gospel inspiration points for the Sacred Space book (2024) and online prayer website – a job normally done by at least 12 people, according to John McDermott, Director of Sacred Space, who greatly appreciated the work he did and the insights he shared. “His work will help the prayer of many thousands of people down the years to come,” says John; “His inspiration still goes on.” As Fr Tim Healy SJ said in his homily at the funeral Mass, “What Mike did he did with energy and creativity. During the pandemic, for example, with the help of Piaras Jackson at Manresa, he recorded hours of video and presided over hours of Zoom meetings in online retreats for diocesan priests.”

Regarding this new online presence, Piaras Jackson noted that “The pandemic seemed likely to narrow his scope and limit his ability to minister, but he mastered Zoom and was chuffed to find himself featuring on videos where he offered material for hope and meaning at a confused time. Casual YouTube surfers looking for snappy upbeat content may have quickly slid past his presentations, but those who knew and trusted him appreciated their thoughtful and rich content and welcomed how Mike was reaching out and relating rather than waiting it out or staying silent; for him, this was “keeping in contact as best we can” – communicating, not about himself, but opening new perspectives and meaning for others. And it’s important to say that all of Mike’s activity sprung from his own prayer; having invited us Jesuits in Manresa to commit to a time of daily prayer together during the lockdowns, I value the memory of how Mike was faithfully present day after day in our community chapel.”

As he lay in repose in Cherryfield on Sunday 23 April, a steady stream of people from all over the country came to say a final farewell and offer their condolences to his family, including brothers John, Paddy, and Jim. Many shared stories of how much Fr Mike had meant to them. It was clear that all through his lifetime he had encountered many people from a variety of backgrounds and all of them held one thing in common, namely the esteem and genuine affection they felt for him.

Mary Rickard, Health Delegate for the Jesuits, noted that it was fitting that he spent his last weeks in Cherryfield when in earlier times as a board member for over fifteen years he was centrally involved in setting up both the Milltown community building and Cherryfield Lodge nursing home as a centre of excellence for older or convalescing Jesuits from home and abroad.

At a meeting of the board just after his burial Mary Rickard, as Chair, read out the prayer attributed to St Ignatius which she felt summed up Fr Mike’s life of dedicated service to God: “Teach us, good Lord, to serve you as you deserve; to give, and not to count the cost, to fight, and not to heed the wounds, to toil, and not to seek for rest, to labor, and not to ask for reward, except that of knowing that we are doing your will.”

At the end of the Mass, Fr Mike’s nephew Karol spoke warmly of the man who was his uncle and summed up well the effect Mike’s short illness and premature death had on his fellow Jesuits. “It was like an earthquake,” he said. He will be sorely missed. But his videos are available on Manresa’s YouTube » and ‘Retreats @home’ ». They will surely remain valued by the many who were blessed by Mike’s generous life; the conclusion of his first video appearance is poignant as Mike offers an Easter blessing » before walking away.

Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dílis.

Gill, Frederick, 1868-, former Jesuit priest

  • Person
  • 1868-

Born: 11 August 1868, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 08 October 1890, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 01 August 1897, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Left Society of Jesus: 19 February 1928

Older brother of Henry Gill - RIP 1945

by 1895 at Enghien Belgium (CAMP) studying

Marks, Gerard, 1932-2023, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J707
  • Person
  • 02 December 1932-25 November 2023

Born: 02 December 1932, Cabra, Dublin
Entered: 22 December 1954, St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
Final Vows: 02 February 1965, Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin
Died: 25 November 2023, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the St St Ignatius Leeson Street Community at the time of death

FSS
Born : 2nd December 1932 Dublin City
Raised : Cabra, Dublin
Early Education at St Agatha's William Street North, Dublin; St. Peters, Phibsborough, Dublin; Ringsend Tech, Dublin; Hosiery Mechanic; Cathal Brugha St College, Dublin
22nd December 1954 Entered Society at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
25th December 1956 First Vows at St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois
1957-1959 Clongowes Wood College SJ - Cook (from Jan 1957)
1959-1981 Rathfarnham - Cook
1964 Tertianship
2nd February 1965 Final Vows at Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin
1981-1983 Manresa House - Cook
1983-1985 Lahore, Pakistan - Administration at University Hall
1985-1987 Gardiner St - Cook; Social Services Centre
1987-1989 John Austin House - Social Services Centre Gardiner St; Minister
1989-2005 Belvedere College SJ - Minister; Social Services Centre
1993 Subminister; Assistant Sacristan; Pastoral Work in Inner City; Assists in School
2005-2012 Gardiner St - Pastoral Work in Innter City; Assists in Belvedere College SJ; Community Sacristan
2012-2023 Leeson St - Assistant Sacristan & Gardener; Visitor to Cherryfield Lodge Residents
2020 Prays for the Church and Society at Cherryfield Lodge

Interfuse No 44 : September 1986

Interfuse Interviews : Gerry Marks

On his career as a Jesuit Brother, ranging from the shining saucepans of Rathfarnham to the black pots of Pakistan. Gerry is now working in the Social Service Centre in Sherrard Street and he tells us what that's like.

Interfuse
How many years have you been in the Society now, Gerry?

Gerry Marks
Well, I entered in 1954 so I'm thirty-two years a Jesuit. I started off as a postulant in the old days in Milltown Park with Fr. Con Murphy. I don't know whether you'd count that as being in the Society: the Catalogus doesn't! Anyway, I was two and a half years there before going to the noviceship in Emo in 1954. I took my vows in 1956,

Interfuse
And when did you volunteer for Pakistan?

Gerry Marks
I went out there in 1983.

Interfuse
So you had been a heck of a long time in the Order before making that decision. Mainly cooking for the troops, right?

Gerry Marks
Yes, I spent most of my Jesuit life in the kitchen.

Interfuse
Did you get fed up with cooking, if that's the right way to put it, or what made you opt for the Foreign Missions?

Gerry Marks
Well, I was a long time cooking and I didn't know whether I liked it at times. It was nice in Rathfarnham Castle; I liked it there. But when I was changed from Rathfarnham to Manresa it felt like going back to the noviceship and starting all over again. So that's why I jumped at the offer of a job in Pakistan.

Interfuse
Had you thought for some years of going on the Missions or was that a spur-of-the-moment decision?

Gerry Marks
Years ago I had thought about going to a place like Zambia but it wasn't a very strong urge. I thought I was doing okay at the cooking. I felt that I was helping out and that I was making a fairly good job of it. I also felt it was the only thing I was capable of doing. I wondered what I could do to help in Zambia and felt that I would need some other talent to be able to help the people out there.

Interfuse
So what made you think you could help out in Pakistan?

Gerry Marks
It was Bill McGoldrick's example, really. When I saw how a man of his advanced age (!) could volunteer and be capable of doing the job out there, well, I said to myself, “If Bill can do it, then the bould Marks can do it!”

Interfuse
So you replaced him out there?

Gerry Marks
Actually, it just happened at the right time, I saw a notice on the board, looking for a replacement for Bill who was coming back for tertianship. I thought I might as well volunteer this time, I thought that there would be several volunteers and I wanted to get in first. In fact I was the only applicant - so the job was mine.

Interfuse
Did you know when you were going out that it was for a limited number of years?

Gerry Marks
Yes, the contract was for two years.

Interfuse
So you hadn't burnt all your boats?

Gerry Marks
No, it would certainly be different if you were going out for an indefinite period.

Interfuse
I don't have to ask you to tell us what you were doing in Pakistan because Interfuse readers have already heard all about the job from Bill McGoldrick. When it came to the end of your time out there, were you dying to come home or would you gladly have stayed on?

Gerry Marks
For me, that's a difficult question to answer. I was sorry to be leaving in one way and I was glad in another. The thing was, I had two types of work out there, I had an apostolate with people in “the villages”, as they're called, and I was working in a hostel with the students. I was sorry to be leaving the village work. But as regards the hostel work, I didn't think much of that. There wasn't a lot to do there, to tell you the truth, I wasn't cooking. I was just looking after the staff and taking in the students' fees. In the villages, on the other hand, I found that I was meeting people and getting to know a lot of them very well. I liked that part of the work and wouldn't have minded staying on doing it.

Interfuse
Would you recommend this kind of a two-year stint to the other Brothers in the province?

Gerry Marks
I would recommend it to them if they were going to be let do the pastoral work and not confined to the hostel. You don't feel it worthwhile if you're working indoors most of the time. You meet the students and talk to them (mostly in English). I am sure that many of our middle-aged Brothers would find the pastoral work in the villages very fulfilling. I'd recommend that to any Brother because he'd be really in the middle of things where there is such great work to be done.

Interfuse
Did you find the living conditions hard yourself or did you get used to them fairly quickly?

Gerry Marks
The living conditions are okay. When I got used to the heat - 110 degrees in the dining room: great if you want to lose a bit of weight - and when I got rid of the mosquitos from my room, then living conditions were grand. The food was okay, too.

Interfuse
How was it cooked?!

Gerry Marks
Oh, it was cooked alright. But I must say that the kitchen that they had was a bit primitive and the standard of hygiene was bad. I don't think it would pass the Eastern Health Board here. I went into the kitchen when I went there first and saw that the pots were jet black. You see, the type of gas they use is a very dirty natural gas and it blackens everything in sight. All the pots were covered with this thick, black stuff, inside and out. Anyway, I got going on these pots and when I finished they were practically shining. Everything was grand for a month or so. Then they began to go black again. I just said to myself, “Sure if they've survived up to now, they can survive a few years longer”. So, I left it at that. The “black stuff” must have been edible.

Interfuse
What was the general standard-of-living like?

Gerry Marks
Some Irish Jesuits talk about Ballynun being poverty stricken. They should see the conditions in the villages in Pakistan and see the so-called housing, the little bits of shacks people live in. It is a very poor nation, materially. The one thing they have out there is the sun. I think that's what keeps them happy in their poverty. They are very happy people, believe it or not.

Interfuse
What did it feel like to live in a non-Catholic country?

Gerry Marks
Strange. I thought that when I went out first. The Moslems are friendly, though, and will shake hands with you when they meet you in the street. When they see a white face coming along, some of them will come over and say, “You are welcome”. Others might ask, “What did you come out here for?” If you say, “to work”, they wonder why you came to Pakistan where there are so many unemployed. In a way I felt sad for them because they were really good people and, if they got the chance, they'd probably make better Catholics than I am. If I ever got the opportunity, of course, I used to speak to them about the Catholic faith.

Interfuse
And how did that go down?

Gerry Marks
Well, there are a lot of things about Christianity that they find peculiar. For instance, they can't understand how God could have a son. They do have a certain devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, as you know. They don't call her that; they call her the Mother of Christ the Prophet. They try to make out, through our Gospels even, that Christ promised Mohammed. They quote the text, “I am going to the Father and I will send to you a paraclete who will make all things clear”. This word, “paraclete”, in their script and in their writings, is very similar to the word for prophet. So they take this as pointing towards Mohammed. They don't realise that it was the Holy Spirit that Jesus promised the apostles and when you explain this to them, they do begin to doubt a little.
I was surprised to find that they have “Christian” mountains in the Himalayas. I was out on a trip one day and they pointed out a peak near K2 called Murray. I discovered it meant Mary. It is a big mountain and Mary is supposed to be buried beneath it. Then they point in another direction and tell you that Jesus Christ is buried over there. They say that He didn't die on the cross. His friends took him down off the cross before He died and brought Him off to the East. They can show you the mountain where He is buried.

Interfuse
Did you ever talk about religion with the students in the hostel?

Gerry Marks
Oh yes, in the hostel the students were very open. They each had different ideas on religion. Each one had his own way of thinking. We had one Shiite Moslem with a most unfortunate name. Br. McGoldrick will remember him well. If I had ever to call his name out over the yard for a phone call, I would hear a roar of laughter from the Australian Jesuits in the dining room. They used to think I was using a bad word! Anyway, he was a very nice fellow, going on to be a doctor. There was so much bribery and corruption going on in that profession that he was becoming quite disillusioned. After the doctors had performed an operation, they would go straight back to their own private clinics and leave the aftercare of a patient to the nurses. In this way they made stacks of money, thousands of rupees. That's why this student was so very disillusioned. But he was a very sincere Moslem and he would tell me all about the high moral standards he had set for himself.

Interfuse
So, eventually, the time came when you had to return to Ireland. Did you know what you'd be doing when you came home?

Gerry Marks
No. I didn't know at the time. I went and spoke to the Provincial and he told me he was looking for someone to work in the Social Service Centre, So I agreed to give it a go. Joe went on to tell me they needed someone to do the cooking on Saturdays and Sundays in Gardiner Street and wondered if I'd mind “keeping my hand in”. I didn't mind.

Interfuse
Tell us a wee bit about the Social Service Centre.

Gerry Marks
Well, I did feel a bit at sea here at first. I was always looking for a white collar job. I always had the white collar but never had the job! Anyway, I found myself coming into this job, doing office work for four days a week. As you know, there are three Sisters here and two Brothers, Eamonn Davis and myself. One of the Sisters, Sr. Mary de Porres, works in the Home Help office. The other two, Sr. Joseph and Sr. Susan, work with Eamonn Davis and myself.

Interfuse
I presume you get all sorts of problems with no two days the same? It just depends on who rambles in off the street looking for help in some shape or form?

Gerry Marks
Yes. You have to be ready for all sorts. You can get people who are very nice and polite. You can get ladies who are practically weeping looking for help because they have problems in their homes and that type of thing. Then you have tough lads coming down here straight from Mountjoy Jail. They come in here looking for money. I can tell you that Sr. Joseph is glad to have a few able-bodied men around the place at times.

Interfuse
Have you grown to like the job by now?

Gerry Marks
Well, of course, work being what it is, I sometimes get those Monday morning feelings. It's not terribly heavy work, physically speaking, even though sometimes you may have to move second-hand furniture or washing machines around. But I've got used to it. I was always used to meeting people and talking to people because I am a member of the Legion of Mary.

Interfuse
Did you find your Legion background a big help?

Gerry Marks
Yes, definitely. We visit a lot of old people. Some of them are psychiatric cases. Some of them are people who have been left alone and have no relations. They love you to stay a long time with them and talk to them. I give them as much time as possible. We each have a list of people to visit. There are about twenty-four people on my list. There are poor people and there are lonely people and they love to have you in their home for a chat, I find this very fulfilling work, visiting people who are on their own. I have to take my turn in the office as well, it's the visiting that I find most rewarding. I've discovered that the majority of these people know very little about the different grants and things that can be done for them by the Eastern Health Board or by us. There are a good few lonely old people around that we have done a lot for, Using the Eastern Health Board grants to have their houses done, helping them with their gardens and things like that: that's the type of work I like.

Interfuse
And your overall assessment of the work done by the Centre?

Gerry Marks
It's terrificly well organized and I think Fr. John Murphy is mainly responsible for that. The organizational structure of the Centre is very simple but very effective. We have a Staff Meeting every Thursday where we can discuss problem cases and help one another with advice. All in all, I can assure your readers that the Centre is a work of which the Province can be justly proud.

Interfuse No 70 : Autumn 1992

TO YOUGHAL AND BACK

Christopher Murray

“Little did I realize what was ahead for me when Eamonn Davis and Gerry Marks invited me to join them on this special occasion. I am grateful to them because it was a great day, a very pleas ant and enjoyable one. This was a surprise and delight for me, an American Jesuit on sabbatical who happened to be visiting Ireland and Belvedere College at the right time...”. So writes another participant, Brother Pat Flanagan from New York; and doubtless there will be yet more testimonies to the great day, and to the forth coming pilgrimage to Rome...

Thursday morning had us all on our feet at a rather early hour, a somewhat overcast sky and a hope of a very pleasant day. It was also the end to all discussion as to who was going and who was not and what exactly was the programme for the day.

At Gardiner St. all were ready in good time and waiting for the arrival of the bus after scoffing a plate of Bro. Loftus’ porridge and a cup of hot coffee - which he had been preparing for our comfort at 5 am. amid the sound of some musical noises and some not so musical.

The bus arrived in good time and Tom Phelan was buzzing around (rather early for him too!) making sure the “old men” were able to climb up the steps and find a comfortable seat for the long journey. All in place and then “where are the Belvedere Brothers?” In the distance Bros. Marks and Davis were seen cornering at speed and making their way up Gardiner St. to a general sigh of relief. Then came a gasp and a groan as Gerry headed in the direction of the church door as if to do his meditation, but he quickly had second thoughts and headed for the bus, to a collective sigh of relief. So on we went to collect our other passengers for the journey and found the Provincial waiting at Milltown Park to give us a send-off.

Our first stop was planned for Kilkenny with a pick-up at Naas where Bros. O'Connor and Fitzgerald were patiently awaiting our arrival. A somewhat uneventful run on to Kilkenny to the murmur of voices, which gradually grew louder as the morning blues wore off. A very pleasant breakfast awaited us and arrangement made for a meal on our evening return at 7 pm. It was a very light-heart ed and noisy crowd that boarded the bus for our Onward journey, even the bus driver became one of the excursionists!

The sun was shining brightly and the holiday spirit took over and all bother and curiosity about “what's next” was put aside, and there were some mild attempts at song and joke intermingled with comments on the places we were passing thro' and old memories evoked by some on a former journey through the same place.

Arriving finally and in good “timetable” time we found a welcoming PP, with some others, at the beautiful and ideally situat ed parish church, and were all greeted individually with great warmth. A new church in a new housing area, in very beautiful surroundings, and most pleasing to the eye.

A very restful and inspiring Mass and a reflection on Dominic Collins followed and we all felt it alone was worth the journey. A very pleasant meal, back in the town, in the welcome and warm company of the PP and then a kind of aimless ramble from here to there with Dominic Collins connections, a visit also to the SH Convent where we were graciously greeted by Mother Provincial and a quiet visit to “Exposition of the BS” which was mainly the care of the local laity. A visit to the Protestant pre-Reformation church, with visible relics and reminders of its former owners. We ourselves were the object of no little curiosity and possibly the locals had never seen such a large body of “Clericals” ambling idly around and “gawking” in at shop windows and various other places, - and wondering was this an outing for decrepit clergy! accompanied, of course, by some younger “keepers”.

I would leave it to others to describe the hilarity of the return journey, the very adequate and pleasant dinner in Kilkenny, and the hilarity and variety of real talent we enjoyed on what seemed a short journey home. The satisfaction expressed by all at the well planned day by those who had the care on their shoulders. The MC of what we might describe as the Return Concert was as good as the hidden talent that came to light in such abundance. It wasn't a very prayerful day but I think Dominic Collins would have enjoyed it very much.

Mallin, Joseph, 1913-2018, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/853
  • Person
  • 13 September 1913-01 April 2018

Born: 13 September 1913, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1932, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1946, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final vows: 08 December 1976, Hong Kong
Died: 01 April 2018, Wah Yan College, Hong Kong - Sinensis Province (CHN)

Transcribed HIB to HK : 03 December 1966

Son of Michael Mallin - executed following he 1916 Irish Rising
Brother of Seán Ó Mealláin - RIP 1977

◆ Hong Kong Catholic Archives :
Easter farewell to long-serving Jesuit

Father Joseph Mallin (連民安神父), of the Society of Jesus, returned to the Lord he served on 1 April 2018, Easter Sunday. He was 104-years-old.

Born in Ireland on 13 September 1913, he joined the Jesuits on 7 September 1932 and was ordained on 31 July 1946. He made his final vows on 8 December 1976.

He arrived in Hong Kong and proceeded to Canton (Guangzhou) in 1948, returning to the then-British colony in 1949.

Between 1950 and 1968, Father Mallin taught at Wah Yan College Hong Kong and Wah Yan College Kowloon, then served as the principal of Pun U Association Wah Yan Primary School, Stubbs Road, from 1971-1977 and subsequently as the school’s supervisor from 1977 to 2002.

He was chaplain of Pun U from 2009 to 2103, formally retiring when he reached 100-years-old.

A funeral Mass will be celebrated for Father Mallin at 10am on 14 April at St. Ignatius Chapel, Wah Yan College Kowloon.
Sunday Examiner Hong Konh - 8 April 2018

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/child-of-two-revolutions/

Child of two revolutions
When Father Joseph Mallin celebrated his 100th birthday in Hong Kong on 13 September, he was hailed in Ireland’s newspapers as the oldest Irish priest in the world. Sitting in Wah Yan College, he gave a lively interview to Fionnuala McHugh of the Irish Times, who pointed to the two revolutions that Joe has survived: the Easter Rising of 1916, which claimed his father’s life; and the coup which made Sun Yat Sen the first president of the Republic of China, the year before Joe’s birth.
Joe’s father was Michael Mallin, who left home on Easter Monday 1916 to take command of the fighting in St Stephen’s Green, and never came home; he was shot in Kilmainham along with Connolly, Pearse and the other leaders. The night before the execution, 3-year-old Joseph was taken by his mother (then pregnant with her fifth child) to visit Michael in his cell. Though Joseph has no memory of that goodbye, he heeded the plea in Michael’s last letter: “Joseph, my little man, be a priest if you can.” His brother Sean had preceded him into the Jesuits, and both brothers were assigned to the Hong Kong mission.

https://www.jesuit.ie/news/featured-news/fior-eireannach-gan-dabht/

‘Fīor Eireannach gan dabht’
President Michael D Higgins and the Lord Mayor of Dublin Mícheál MacDonnacha are among the dignitaries who will attend Fr Joe Mallins SJ’s Memorial Mass on Sat 21 April, 2018 at 11:00am in St Francis Xavier Church, Gardiner St. Fr Joe Mallin was the son of Commandant Michael Mallin, who was executed for his role in the Easter Rising. He died peacefully and fittingly, on Easter Sunday morning, 1 April 2018, in Hong Kong. He was 104 years old. The funeral Mass for Fr Joe, presided over by the Bishop of Hong Kong, took place at 10am on Saturday, 14 April, at St Ignatius Chapel, Wah Yan College Kowloon. The burial was in St. Michael’s Cemetery, Happy Valley.
In his homily at the funeral Mass, Fr Joe Russell SJ, commenting on Fr Joe’s longevity said, “It is easy to understand why the people of the Old Testament were sure that a long life was the sign of God’s blessing, and explains why extraordinary life-spans were credited to their great men.” He added, “Joe was a private person. He seldom if ever spoke about himself. Which of us knew what his likes and dislikes were? More remarkably he never spoke unkindly about others. I never remember him ever speaking disparagingly about another. He never complained. With a family background like his and proficiency in the Irish language, another might have baulked at being assigned to Hong Kong. But not Joe. This is what God was asking of him; there was nothing more to be said.”
Concluding his short homily which you can read in full below, Fr Russell commented, ”As Joe comes before his judge his good life will speak eloquently for him, not only his service to the community at large but also, as the poet puts it, that best portion of a good man’s life: his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love. These have not been forgotten, they have been indelibly recorded in the book of life. Now, there is a special difficulty in speaking on the occasion of the death of someone esteemed and admired, that in recalling their virtues we may deprive them of the prayers they need for their soul’s repose.”
He was born in 1914, just two years before his father was executed by firing squad, leaving a wife and five small children. One of Fr Joseph’s brothers, Seán, also became a Jesuit priest, and his sister Úna entered the Loreto order in 1925. She was sent to a convent in Spain, where she spent the rest of her life. Commandant Mallin would have been proud of his children. In his last letter he wrote: : “Úna, my little one, be a nun; Joseph, my little man, be a priest if you can ...” Fr Joe joined the Jesuits, and in 1948 he went to Hong Kong and China as part of the Irish Jesuit mission to China. He spent over 70 years of his life there.
Fr Joe entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1932, the same year as the Eucharistic Congress and after his ordination, he was sent on the Jesuit mission to China, where he would spend 70 years of his life. His first posting was in Canton (Guangzhou) in China in 1948. This was the era of Mao Tse Tsung’s and as his Communist Red Army advanced on the city, he and other missionaries had to move to Hong Kong.
According to Fr Alfred Deignan, another Irish Jesuit missionary there, this mission was a new challenge to the Irish Province, “and a new experience for the Jesuits who went there to work among poor people speaking a different language, the Cantonese dialect, with different food, customs and weather, often very hot and humid.” Fr Joe was mission bursar for a time there, and was Director of a social centre before working as a secondary school teacher in a Jesuit-run school. He was appointed Headmaster of their primary school and Principal of Ricci College, a kindergarten in Macau, which was a Portuguese colony until 1999. He was still holding teaching duties there when he returned to Ireland in 2006 to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the Easter Rising in 2006.
Fr. Joseph, a freeman of Dublin, received an invitation from the Taoiseach’s Office to attend the 90th commemoration, as the child of Commandant Michael Mallin, who was chief-of-staff of the Irish Citizen’s Army and commander of the St. Stephen’s Green garrison during the Easter Rising. Commdt. Mallin was executed in the Stonebreakers’ Yard, Kilmainham Gaol, along with the other leaders of the revolt, and buried in Arbour Hill.
His visit at that time attracted a great deal of media attention. The late Gerald Barry interviewed him for the Easter Sunday edition of ‘This Week’ (RTE 1, 1.00pm), and he also spoke to Joe Little for RTE News and to a Sky News correspondent. “I will attend the parade on Easter Sunday, as the Government was good enough to invite me, but what I am most looking forward to is being able to go to the grave of my father in Arbour Hill, with the other families of those executed, for a ceremony in early May,” he said.
Fr Joe was also musical and played the very flute which his father’s had played in Liberty Hall as a member of the Workers’ Orchestra on the eve of the 1916 Rising. The flute and his father’s watch are on exhibition in the National Museum of Ireland.
Coming up to Fr Joe’s 100th birthday, he was asked if he regretted anything about leaving Ireland 65 years earlier. He replied that he would have liked to have spent some more time working as a priest in his home country and that he “missed the rain”.
In a moving statement on his death, Fr Joe’s family in Ireland said, “Fr. Joseph Mallin SJ was the last direct living link with that period of our history... He served for more than 70 years as a missionary and educator in mainland China and Hong Kong... and like most teachers, he often talked with pride of the pupils educated at that college, many of whom went on to become leaders in their various walks of life.”
They also spoke of the kind of man Fr Joseph was to them, singling out his humility and spirituality. “He had a deeply held Christian faith and love for his fellow man and woman. His was a practical faith with a strong base in social justice and equality; not unlike his father who as a trade union activist fought for social justice and workers’ rights and who gave his young life for such a cause.”
Referencing his communication skills they said, “Fr. Joseph was... a prolific letter writer, just like his father, and he wrote letters to his family members on a regular basis and also to many other correspondents, never failing to respond to a letter when anyone wrote to him, be it a young school child from Donegal or an academic historian from the University, they would receive a thoughtful reply.” And they spoke of his love of the Irish language – “His command of the Irish language, written and oral, was unbelievable considering he was out of the country since 1948. He wrote to family members and others as Gaeilge – always, san sean-cló, in the old Irish script, and he was delighted to speak Irish to anybody from Ireland who visited him, Fīor Eireannach gan dabht. He had numerous friends in Ireland and around the world. He kept in contact with them all and whenever he was home in Ireland he would make sure to visit them.
Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dílis.

Homily at Funeral of Father Joseph Mallin SJ Wah Yan College, Kowloon, Hong Kong 14 April 2018
When Father Mallin was two and a half years old, his mother took him to the prison cell where his father was awaiting execution by firing squad the following day at dawn for the part he played in his country’s struggle for independence. As his father embraced his then youngest child for the last time he said to his wife: he’ll make a fine priest.
Wish and prophecy splendidly fulfilled in the life we are remembering this morning.
Father Mallin – he was always Joe to us – was born in Dublin 104 years ago. In him it is easy to understand why the people of the Old Testament were sure that a long life was the sign of God’s blessing, and explains why extraordinary life-spans were credited to their great men.
Joe became a Jesuit in 1932, was ordained priest in 1946. In 1948 he arrived in Hong Kong, where – with the exception of a stint in Macau as principal of Colegio Ricci, he spent the rest of his life.
As we gather together in this chapel to commend him to the Lord’s tender mercy, we have wanted prayers offered, God’s praises sung, the scriptures read, the Eucharist celebrated. It is our way of saying thank you to almighty God for the gift of Joe, and to thank him for sharing his life with us, to thank him too for all the good he accomplished with God’s grace in a long life of service of others. His pilgrim journey came to an end on Easter Sunday – on what better day could one choose to die? – and those who were privileged to have walked some part of that journey with him are left to mourn his loss.
Our Mass this morning then is an act of thanksgiving, it is a last public act of love, an opportunity to surrender Joe into the loving embrace of the God he so faithfully served. Our Mass is also the joyful assertion of our Christian belief that we – that all of us – are called to share Christ’s resurrection. We are asserting that we have been created, not for death but for life, that death has not the last word. Because of Christ’s resurrection death, from being final and immediately destructive has become fruitful and triumphant, has become the beginning of something magnificent rather than the end of everything. Though Joe has died he still lives on, in the thoughts of those who knew and loved him, and he lives on, we confidently believe, in our Father’s house, experiencing now the truth of those lovely words of St Augustine: You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.
Joe was a private person. He seldom if ever spoke about himself. Which of us knew what his likes and dislikes were? More remarkably he never spoke unkindly about others. I never remember him ever speaking disparagingly about another. He never complained. With a family background like his and proficiency in the Irish language, another might have baulked at being assigned to Hong Kong. But not Joe. This is what God was asking of him; there was nothing more to be said. Joe was a man of many parts. Though most of his time was given to education, he was called on to fill many and varied roles. Because of his good judgement and attention to detail he was asked to supervise the construction of both Wah Yan Colleges as well as the Adam Shall student hostel on the campus of the Chinese University. For a time he was in charge of a Caritas social service centre. He was bursar for the communities where he was stationed. And when the Jesuits took on the running of the Pun U Association primary school, it was he who was called on to be its principal and then its supervisor. The Provincial who assigned him to this new venture gave as the reason for his choice: Joe seems to succeed in whatever he undertakes.
His was a life without frills. His hobbies were few: he was a lover of nature and delighted in treks up and down the hills and dales of the New Territories. He also played the recorder. Living in the room next to his I can vouch for this. He had a phenomenal, computer-like memory which remained with him until the end. He took the trouble to remember the name of every boy in Pun U school. The boys’ names were written in a little book which he carried around with. For him to make this effort to know the names of his students was a mark of his respect for them.
This morning we are a guard of honour escorting Joe home to meet his Lord, to that presence where each of us will one day just as surely go. We are outriders accompanying him on his final journey. As Joe comes before his judge his good life will speak eloquently for him, not only his service to the community at large but also, as the poet puts it, that best portion of a good man’s life: his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love. These have not been forgotten, they have been indelibly recorded in the book of life. Now, there is a special difficulty in speaking on the occasion of the death of someone esteemed and admired, that in recalling their virtues we may deprive them of the prayers they need for their soul’s repose.
As we hand Joe over to the mercy and compassion of his Saviour and ours, we bid him a fond good-bye, conscious that we are saying au revoir and not farewell. As we salute him with pride and affection, we turn to God in prayer for ourselves who are left behind: that the Lord may support us, all the day long, till the shadows lengthen and the evening comes and the busy world is hushed and the fever of life is over and our work is done. Then in his mercy may he give us too a safe lodging, a holy rest and peace at the last.
Fr John Russell SJ

https://www.jesuit.ie/news/memorial-mass-for-joe-mallin-sj/

Memorial Mass for Joe Mallin SJ
President Michael D. Higgins was among the dignitaries at the Memorial Mass for Irish Jesuit missionary Fr Joseph Mallin SJ at Gardiner Street Church on 21 April, 2018. Fr Mallin’s funeral was previously held in Hong Kong where he had lived and worked for the last 70 years.
The service was a celebration of his remarkable life, which had both historical and spiritual significance and offered his family, friends and fellow Jesuits the opportunity to mark his passing in his home town.
The packed congregation in St Francis Xavier Church also included the Lord Mayor of Dublin, Mícheál Mac Donncha, the Taoiseach’s aide-de-camp Commandant Caroline Burke, Councillor Cormac Devlin, Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD and Senator Mark Daly, who were in attendance due to Fr Mallin’s stature as the last surviving child of an executed 1916 leader and as a Freeman of Dublin.
A book of condolence was signed by mourners as they entered the church. The book sat on a table against a backdrop of photographs of Fr Joseph’s parents. The portrait of his father Michael Mallin sits beside a photo of his mother Agnes who is captured sitting with her five small children Séamas, Seosamh, Séan, Maura, and Úna at Maura’s baptism in 1916 – the year her husband was executed.
Fr Joseph’s cousin, Fr Ray Warren OMI, was the main celebrant at the Mass and delivered a heartfelt homily in which he said that his cousin was a man who was ‘blessed indeed with understanding, wisdom, and knowledge’ and noted his ‘encyclopaedic memory’.
The Mass was a bilingual celebration in honour of Fr Joseph’s lifelong love of the Irish language and of course his heritage. It was also an event in which both his biological and Jesuit family came together. Fr Gerry Clarke SJ, the Gardiner Street parish priest welcomed the congregation and was joined on the altar by many other Jesuits including Ashley Evans SJ, James Hurley SJ and the Provincial, Leonard Moloney SJ. John Guiney SJ, Director of the Jesuit Missions Office, accompanied the President, Michael D. Higgins throughout the ceremony.
Fr Joseph’s niece, Una Ni Challanáin, did the first reading and his cousin, Fr Ray Warren OMI, read the Gospel on ‘The Beatitudes’. Other members of the Mallin-Hickey family read prayers of the faithful and sang at the event.
An offertory procession that presented symbols of Fr Joseph’s life were presented at the altar during Mass. The items chosen were a flag, a flute, and his rosary beads and also his pen and glasses. Fr Joseph didn’t return home very often from the time his mission in Hong Kong began but he was a prolific letter-writer who corresponded with many people in Ireland and around the world. A letter to his nephew arrived in Ireland five days after his death and added a poignant touch to the collection.
Seán Tapley is a nephew of Fr Mallin’s who corresponded with him right up until his death and worked closely with him on the document that revealed new evidence about his father Michael Mallin’s court martial and execution. He gave a moving eulogy which gave tribute to Fr Mallin’s legacy of education and pastoral work in Hong Kong, and his love of his adopted home. He also noted that in spite of the many letters that Fr Mallin wrote, he was essentially ‘a thoughtful man with a droll sense of humour’ who was economical with words.
The Jesuit tribute to the deceased missionary was delivered by Fr Leonard Moloney SJ, the current Provincial of the Society of Jesus. In it he emphasised Fr Mallin’s dedication to his mission in Hong Kong, and his reputation for never speaking ill of anybody over his long life (see the full speech below).
After the ceremony, the congregation stayed for refreshments and conversation in Gardiner Street Jesuit community, to celebrate the life and achievements of this remarkable man.
Photo: Accompanying the President are John K. Guiney SJ and Yanira Romero of Irish Jesuit Missions.

Reflection by Irish Jesuit Provincial Leonard Moloney SJ
In the second last letter to his wife Agnes, written literally on the back of an envelope, Commandant Mallin, Joe’s father, wrote, “All is lost, my love to all my children. No matter what my fate I have done my duty to my beloved Ireland, to you, and to my darling children.”
Joe’s father was one of those Irish men with a deep Catholic faith and a sense of sacrifice, who were prepared to give their lives for what ‘was right and just’, as Joe himself has said.
Ireland has that tradition of self-sacrifice for the good of others, and it’s also expressed in another vein – that of our missionary tradition. We have the monks of old like St Columcille, St Columbanus and St Gall who left their native land to spread the good news of Christ and his vision of justice and peace.
When Fr Joe became a Jesuit, he joined an order whose early founders, like Francis Xavier, began the European missionary journey to the East. Indeed, Francis wanted to go to China but died on the island of Shangchuan, in sight of the mainland.
So like the early Jesuit Fathers, Fr Joe become a part of the Jesuit tradition of mission, going where the need is greatest, obeying orders! And following in the sacrificial tradition of his own Father, (and Irish missionaries) he gave his life – over 70 years of it – working for and with the people of China and Hong Kong.
As he said in an interview a short while ago, the men and women of the Rising, like his father “had a vision of what was right and just, and they wanted to do what they could to build a better Ireland free from poverty and oppression.”
That too was Fr Joe’s motivation as a missionary and as a Jesuit. In the words of Pedro Arrupe, a former Fr General of the Jesuits and himself a European missionary to Asia, Jesuits are men called to live ‘a faith that does justice.’
And that was the faith that Joe lived out, teaching those he was sent to, and in the best missionary tradition, allowing them to teach him. In that same interview, he quoted a Chinese saying that summed up what life was about: “It’s not about ‘ourselves alone’, (now there’s a resonant phrase!) “it’s about what the Chinese call ‘sharing with others’.”
Joe certainly shared his long life with others, be it as teacher, construction supervisor, bursar, headmaster, or director of a social services centre. He found himself in those various roles because, “of his sound judgement and attention to detail” to quote his fellow Jesuits in China.
That word attention is key. For as 20th century mystic Simone Weil points out, “Taken to its highest degree, attention is the same thing as prayer. It presupposes faith and love”. And what else would you call it when someone takes the trouble to remember the name of every boy in his school, as Father Joe did.
The Jesuits in his community also attest to his goodness – ‘He never complained’, fellow Jesuit community member Fr Joe Russell tells us. And in fact, as Fr Ray has pointed out, Fr Joe was a great communicator, and he was very careful with words.
This is something that Pope Francis singles out for attention in his recent apostolic letter Gaudete et Exultate. He tells us that resisting the temptation to gossip or engage in back biting is a holy thing.
And Fr Russell also adds, “Remarkably, he never spoke unkindly about others. I never remember him ever speaking disparagingly about another”. 104 years and never an unkind word about another person – remarkable indeed!
In that letter on the envelope that Commandant Mallin wrote to Joe’s mother he started by saying, “All is lost”. He ended by qualifying that statement saying, “All is lost, Agnes, except honor and courage”.
Those qualities were certainly not lost in his son whom we remember today. Fr Joe Mallin, a man of courage and honour, a good and holy Jesuit.

https://www.jesuit.ie/news/jesuitica-rebel-stock/

JESUITICA: Rebel stock
A curious bond links the first scholastic of the restored Irish Mission with the oldest Jesuit in our Chinese mission: both lost their fathers to execution by the British. Bartholomew Esmonde returned from his studies in Sicily in 1814 to join the staff of the new college of Clongowes. Some ten years earlier his father, Dr John Esmonde of Sallins, Kildare, had been publicly hanged on O’Connell Bridge in Dublin for his part in the 1798 rebellion. William Aylmer of Kilcock, whose Jesuit brother founded Belvedere, was convicted of treason for the same reason, but escaped execution. Michael Mallin, a leader in the 1916 rising, called his family to Kilmainham Gaol on the eve of his execution, and prayed that his little son Joseph would be a priest. 94-year-old Joseph SJ, pictured here on the steps of Kilmainham Gaol, is still ministering in Hong Kong. Despite stereotypes, many Jesuits are of rebel stock.

◆ Irish Jesuit Missions : https://www.jesuitmissions.ie/news/242-fr-joe-mallin-sj-a-life-of-service and https://www.jesuitmissions.ie/news/587-fr-joe-mallin-sj-a-life-of-service-2

FR. JOE MALLIN SJ - A LIFE OF SERVICE
The last eighty years have seen momentous changes and Fr. Joe Mallin SJ has been a witness to many, during his years of service in China. Clearly a life of service to others was not unknown in his own family - his brother Sean entered the Society a few years before him and his father was Commandant Michael Mallin, executed by the British for his part in the Easter Rising of 1916.
Fr. Mallin was only two and a half years old and therefore has no memories of his father but was very moved by an article about him written in 1917 by an American Jesuit. Fr. Mallin remembers his mother as a wise woman, who tried to let them experience as normal a family life as possible. At the time of his execution she had four children and was expecting their fifth. In a final letter to her, her husband wrote "to pray for all the souls who fell in this fight, Irish and English".

Eucharistic Congress 1932
Shortly before he entered the Irish Jesuit Novitiate, in September 1932, Joe was an active participant in the Eucharistic Congress, remembering the huge crowds in Phoenix Park, the relief that the weather held, and the excellent marshalling by General O'Duffy, Garda Commissioner. Joe had been in contact with the Jesuits whilst at St Enda's Rathfarnham and met Fr. Ernest Mackey at Knockbeg College.

China
On the ship out to Hong Kong the Catholic cargo supervisor died and Fr. Joe was asked to conduct the burial service at sea. It was a very moving experience he remembers and the captain was most helpful. Fr. Mallin arrived in Guangzhou (Canton) in early September 1948. But in May 1949, the Jesuits had to leave the city for Hong Kong due to the advance of the Chinese Communist army. Hong Kong in the late 1940s was not in good shape due to the Japanese occupation and the Allied bombing but it recovered very quickly.
Fr. Mallin didn't have much time to explore his new home but got to work straight away. He had to take over the top floor of the Paris Foreign Mission Society house which had kindly been handed over to the Jesuits. Joe had no difficulty adapting to the new life and culture. He pitched in head first into dealing with all kinds of people – architects, builders and suppliers, cooks and cleaners. He supervised several construction or building conversion jobs and had to arrange for the temporary accommodation of many Jesuits expelled from Mainland China after the Communist takeover.
An incident he recalls clearly was when a phone call came one night, very late, from the Queen Mary Hospital asking for a priest to come to attend a dying patient. He went down to the street and stopped a taxi. The taxi driver got him to the hospital very quickly. When he thanked him, the driver replied "I am a Muslim, and my father told me that if a Catholic mission priest ever stopped me in the middle of the night to go to a hospital I should drive like the wind because it was very important."

Few words, but many loving actions
He had a very varied apostolic life, successfully doing the job of minister in the community, Mission Bursar, Director of a Social Centre, secondary teacher, Headmaster of Pun Yu Primary School in Hong Kong, Principal of Ricci College in Macao, among other things. He was known as a man of few words, but of many loving actions.

National Museum Dublin
Fr. Mallin played the flute, which had belonged to his father. Indeed his father had played it in Liberty Hall in the Workers' Orchestra on the eve of the 1916 Rising. The flute and his father's watch are now in the National Museum in Dublin.
When asked if he regretted anything about leaving Ireland, he said that he would like to have had some more time working as a priest in Ireland. He said that he also missed the rain! Fr. Joe Mallin has been a Jesuit for over 80 years and will celebrate his 100th birthday next September! He is viewed with almost incredulous amazement for all he does at his age. He is deeply respected by all those who know him.

https://www.jesuitmissions.ie/news/460-fr-joseph-mallin-sj-looking-back-2016-1916

FR JOSEPH MALLIN SJ: LOOKING BACK 2016-1916
Fr Joseph Mallin SJ received the freedom of the city (https://www.thejournal.ie/joseph- mallin-freedom-of-dublin-hong-kong-2671842-Mar2016/) award from the Lord Mayor of Dublin Críona Ní Dhálaigh who flew to Hong Kong to meet him on the 21st March. An Irish concert was enjoyed by all, including Fr Mallin's visiting niece Una, and the two conversed "as Gaeilge" all evening. The award was a tribute to his life’s service through his ministry to the people of Hong Kong and Macau and in recognition of his status as the child of Commandant Michael Mallin, one of the executed leaders of the Irish 1916 Easter Rising.

Oldest Irish Jesuit missionary priest
Joe Mallin was born in 1913. At age 102 (https://www.jesuitmissions.ie/news/416-happy- 102nd-birthday-to-fr-joe-mallin-sj), he is the oldest Irish Jesuit missionary priest, living in Hong Kong.
His father Michael Mallin commanded the fighting at St Stephen’s Green on Easter (https://jesuitmissions.ie/news/459-celebrating-easter-2016) Monday 1916 with Countess Markievicz as his deputy. The Commandant paid the ultimate price for his part in the Irish Easter Rising and was shot in Kilmainham Gaol, Dublin on May 8th, 1916.
The night before his father’s execution, Joseph was taken to Kilmainham Gaol by his mother, then pregnant with their fifth child, to say goodbye. He was only two and a half years old and does not remember the occasion. Michael Mallin wrote to his little boy in the last letter to his family: “Joseph, my little man, be a priest if you can.”
Portrait of Michael Mallin by David Rooney from 1916 Portraits and Lives(Royal Irish Academy)
Fr Mallin often played the flute that his father used in the Workers’ Orchestra, in Liberty Hall, Dublin on the eve of the 1916 Rising. The flute and his father’s watch are now in the National Museum in Dublin.

The ultimate price
In a greeting on Fr Mallin’s 100th birthday, Senator Mark Daly wrote:
“As a nation we owe a huge debt of gratitude to the sacrifice made by many men and women through the generations.
“The price paid by your father in laying down his life, the price paid by your mother who lost her husband, the price paid by you and your siblings who grew up without their father is a debt un- repayable by any nation.
“The proclamation whose ideals they tried to fulfill contains concepts that are both timeless and universal. Those aims are as relevant to people struggling for rights all over the world today as much as they were for the people of Ireland in 1916.”

https://www.jesuitmissions.ie/news/588-‘fīor-eireannach-gan-dabht

‘FĪOR EIREANNACH GAN DABHT’
Joe Mallin SJ, son of Commdt. Michael Mallin, who was executed for his role in the Easter Rising, died
peacefully and fittingly, on Easter Sunday morning, 1 April 2018, in Hong Kong. He was 104 years old.
He was born in 1914, just two years before his father was executed by firing squad, leaving a wife and five small children. One of Fr Joseph’s brothers, Seán, also became a Jesuit priest, and his sister Úna entered the Loreto order in 1925. She was sent to a convent in Spain, where she spent the rest of her life. Commdt. Mallin would have been proud of his children. In his last letter he wrote: : “Úna, my little one, be a nun; Joseph, my little man, be a priest if you can ...” Fr Joe joined the Jesuits, and in 1948 he went to Hong Kong and China (https://www.jesuitmissions.ie/news/587-fr-joe-mallin-sj-a-life-of- service-2) as part of the Irish Jesuit mission to China. He spent over 70 years of his life there.
According to Fr Alfred Deignan, another Irish Jesuit missionary there, this mission was a new challenge to the Irish Province (https://www.jesuitmissions.ie/news/543-90th-anniversary-of-the-arrival-of-the- jesuits-in-hong-kong), “and a new experience for the Jesuits who went there to work among poor people speaking a different language, the Cantonese dialect, with different food, customs and weather, often very hot and humid.” Fr Joe taught in a a Jesuit-run secondary school and was still holding teaching duties there when he returned to Ireland in 2006 to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the Easter Rising in 2006.
Fr. Joseph, a freeman of Dublin, received an invitation from the Taoiseach’s Office to attend the 90th commemoration, as the child of Commandant Michael Mallin, who was chief-of-staff of the Irish Citizen’s Army and commander of the St. Stephen’s Green garrison during the Easter Rising. Commdt. Mallin was executed in the Stonebreakers’ Yard, Kilmainham Gaol, along with the other leaders of the revolt, and buried in Arbour Hill.
His visit at that time attracted a great deal of media attention. The late Gerald Barry interviewed him for the Easter Sunday edition of ‘This Week’ (RTE 1, 1.00pm), and he also spoke to Joe Little for RTE News and to a Sky News correspondent. “I will attend the parade on Easter Sunday, as the Government was good enough to invite me, but what I am most looking forward to is being able to go to the grave of my father in Arbour Hill, with the other families of those executed, for a ceremony in early May,” he said.
In a moving statement on his death, Fr Joe’s family in Ireland said, “Fr. Joseph Mallin SJ was the last direct living link with that period of our history... He served for more than 70 years as a missionary and educator in mainland China and Hong Kong... and like most teachers, he often talked with pride of the pupils educated at that college, many of whom went on to become leaders in their various walks of life.”
They also spoke of the kind of man Fr Joseph was to them, singling out his humility and spirituality. “He had a deeply held Christian faith and love for his fellow man and woman. His was a practical faith with a strong base in social justice and equality; not unlike his father who as a trade union activist fought for social justice and workers’ rights and who gave his young life for such a cause.”
They spoke also of his communication skills – “Fr. Joseph was... a prolific letter writer, just like his father, and he wrote letters to his family members on a regular basis and also to many other correspondents, never failing to respond to a letter when anyone wrote to him, be it a young school child from Donegal or an academic historian from the University, they would receive a thoughtful reply.” And of his love of the Irish language – “His command of the Irish language, written and oral, was unbelievable considering he was out of the country since 1948. He wrote to family members and others as Gaeilge – always, san sean-cló, in the old Irish script, and he was delighted to speak Irish to anybody from Ireland who visited him, Fīor Eireannach gan dabht. He had numerous friends in Ireland and around the world. He kept in contact with them all and whenever he was home in Ireland he would make sure to visit them. (Read their full statement below).
The funeral Mass for Fr Joe will take place at 10am on Saturday, 14 April, at St Ignatius Chapel, Wah Yan College Kowloon.The burial will take place after the Mass at St. Michael’s Cemetery, Happy Valley, Hong Kong. The Mass will be presided by the Bishop of Hong Kong.
Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dílis.

Statement from the Mallin/Hickey Family on the death of Fr Joe
It is with great personal sadness that we learned from Hong Kong this Easter morning of the death of Fr. Joseph Mallin SJ, and just as we were about to commemorate the 102nd anniversary of the Easter Rising. We always knew this day was near but it came as a shock all the same to know that Fr. Joseph is gone to his heavenly reward. What a poignant day to complete his earthly life. And what a good and long life in the service of God it was and he lived it well. May he rest in peace. We will miss him. Solas na bhflaitheas dó agus ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dílis.
Joseph Michael Mallin was born in September 1913. He was the youngest son of Agnes Hickey and Michael Mallin. His mother was the daughter of Joseph Hickey, a Fenian man who was deported from Ireland for 11 years for his part in the Fenian Rising of 1867, and the granddaughter of John Francis Nugent a United Irishman, a printer & publisher from Cookstown Co. Tyrone. Agnes was born in Liverpool in 1870 during the deportation. Joseph was just a young boy when his father, Michael Mallin, Commandant and Chief-of-Staff of the Irish Citizen Army was executed at Kilmainham Gaol in 1916.
Fr. Joseph Mallin SJ was the last direct living link with that period of our history. His siblings, brothers Séamus and Fr. Seán, sisters Sr. Agnes, a Nun with the Loreto Community in Seville, Spain, and Maura Phillips have all predeceased him.
He served for more than 70 years as a missionary and educator in mainland China and Hong Kong with the Jesuit community there. He was ordained in 1946 and two years later was sent to the Jesuit Mission in China. He worked tirelessly for the people there. He loved that community and they loved him and it is there where he will be laid to rest. With others he played a significant part in the ongoing development of education and progress of Wah Yan School and college in Hong Kong and Kowloon. He managed Wah Yan College for a number of years and, like most teachers, he often talked with pride of the pupils educated at that college, many of whom went on to become leaders in their various walks of life.
Fr. Joseph was a very spiritual and humble man. He had a deeply held Christian faith and love for his fellow man and woman. His was a practical faith with a strong base in social justice and equality; not unlike his father who as a trade union activist fought for social justice and workers’ rights and who gave his young life for such a cause.
Fr. Joseph lived to be 104. He was given more time than most on this earth and he used that time wisely. His parents, Michael and Agnes Mallin would be very proud of their son’s achievements and the way he lived his life.
Fr. Joseph was a great communicator all his life, a prolific letter writer, just like his father. He was an inveterate letter-writer and he wrote letters to his family members on a regular basis and also to many other correspondents, never failing to respond to a letter when anyone wrote to him, be it a young school child from Donegal or an academic historian from the University, they would receive a thoughtful reply. His command of the Irish language, written and oral, was unbelievable considering he was out of the country since 1948. He wrote to family members and others as Gaeilge – always, san sean-cló, in the old Irish script, and he was delighted to speak Irish to anybody from Ireland who visited him, Fīor Eireannach gan dabht. He had numerous friends in Ireland and around the world. He kept in contact with them all and whenever he was home in Ireland he would make sure to visit them.
Fr. Joseph Mallin SJ was proud to be honoured with the Freedom of the City of Dublin during the 1916 Centenary Commemorations. An honour presented for his service to education and his family’s connection to the Easter 1916 Rising and the struggle for Irish Independence.
One of his last official acts was his major historical contribution to the memory of his father, Commandant Michael Mallin. This historical document was published last year and it presents new insights and facts about the record of his father’s court martial. This document is now available in the archives of Kilmainham Gaol Museum and the National Library of Ireland. It was Fr. Joseph’s wish that historians would be cognisant of this work.

◆ Biographical Notes of the Jesuits in Hong Kong 1926-2000, by Frederick Hok-ming Cheung PhD, Wonder Press Company 2013 ISBN 978 9881223814 :
His father was a martyr for Irish Independance. He was born in 1913. His father was shot in 1916 for his part in the insurrection against the British, and so his father was considered a martyr.After his father’s death his family were cared for, he was sent to a special Irish Primary School and then to a Jesuit one.

He joined the Society in 1932, was Ordained in 1946 and came to Hong Kong in 1948, going to Guangzhou for language studies until he was forced to leave in 1949.

He was highly respected among Jesuits as a holy man of charity and practical work. The Jesuits in Hong Kong owe much to him in maming the buildings on Cheung Chau typhoon proof (Typhoon Mary had killd 30 people there in 1930)
He was in charge of building Wah Yan College Hong Kong 1954-1955.
He was also in charge of the School Chapel at Wah Yan Kowloon and the extension over the avenue in 1969. He was also responsible for the construction of the Adam Schall Residence at the The Chinese University of Hong Kong.
He spent four years in Macau, one as teacher and three as Proncipal, until he was recalled to Hong Kong to be Principal of the Pun U Wah Yan Primary School when the Society took over the management of that school. He later became Supervisor there.
He was sent back to Macau to work at the Jesuit school there, and was recalled to Hong Kong as Supervisor of the Primary School again, He knew the teachers there so swell and they all loved him. He was interested in people and kind.
According to Mr Wallace Yu, and alumnus of Wah Yan Hong Kong, he is keen to point out that Joe Mallin was “Headmaster” rather than “Principal” at Pun U, and that the Wah Yan was only added later in 1971 between his two periods at Pun U he was in Macau at Collegio Ricci.

Note from Séamus Doris Entry
He was good friends with Harry Naylor, Joe Mallin and Dan Fitzpatrick.

◆ Fr Francis Finegan : Admissions 1859-1948 - St Enda’s Rathfarnham student

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 23rd Year No 3 1948
Frs. Casey G., Grogan and Sullivan leave England for Hong Kong on 2nd July on the ‘Canton’. On the following day Fr. Kevin O'Dwyer hopes to sail with Fr. Albert Cooney from San Francisco on the ‘General Gordon’ for the same destination.
The following will be going to Hong Kong in August : Frs. Joseph Mallin and Merritt, Messrs. James Kelly, McGaley, Michael McLoughlin and Geoffrey Murphy.

Tomkin, Nicholas J, 1859-1942, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/417
  • Person
  • 18 February 1859-15 November 1942

Born: 18 February 1859, Rathmines, Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1877, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 31 July 1892, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1898, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 15 November 1942, Milltown Park, Dublin

Cousin of Nicholas A Tomkin - RIP 1923; James Tomkin - RIP 1950; Joseph Tomkin (ORE) - RIP 1942

by 1897 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Cousin of Nicholas J Tomkin - RIP 1942 and James Tomkin - RIP 1950

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 18th Year No 1 1943
Obituary :
Father Nicholas J Tomkin SJ
Fr Tomkin died at Milltown Park, at 8.30 on Sunday morning, the 15th November. He had been very poorly for some weeks previous to his death, and had been anointed again before the end came.
Born at Rathmines, on 18th February, 1859, he was educated at Belvedere College, and entered the Novitiate, on 7th September, 1877, at Milltown Park, where, alter a year's Juniorate, he pursued his philosophical studies. Before beginning theology he spent six years teaching mathematics and physics at Belvedere, Clongowes and Tullabeg, and was also mathematical tutor at University College one of those years. He was ordained priest on St. Ignatius Day 1892, at Gardiner Street Church, by the late Archbishop Walsh. On the completion of his fourth year of theology he became Minister at Milltowvn, a post he held till 1896, when, in company with Frs. G. O'Neill, and Gleeson, and the late Frs. James O’Dwyer and T Murphy, he made his third year's probation at Tronchiennes. The Next three years of his life he spent at Belvedere as Minister, then in 1900 he became Rector of that College, a post he held for eight years of very fruitful activity. Belveclerians of that period will recall with affection his genial and attractive personality. Widening the scope of school life, he encouraged College societies, debates, music theatricals and athletics, brought about a closer association of the boys parents with the life, both religious and social, of the College, and was instrumental in founding the Belvedere Union of past students of which he remained a life-long friend and adviser. For the next twelve years he was Rector at Mungret (1908-1912) and Clongowes (1912-1919), and organised and carried through with great distinction the Centenary Celebrations of the latter College in June, 1914, promoting also, with outstanding success, its financial status during the difficult years of the World War.
In the summer of 1919 his long and uninterrupted. tenure of office as Rector for nineteen years in the three largest Colleges of the Province came to a close. For the next five years he was Minister and Procurator of Milltown Park, till in May, 1924, he was appointed to the office of Socius to the Provincial, Fr. John Fahy. Though then a man of sixty-five, Fr. Tomkin brought to his new responsibilities his customary buoyancy of manner, good humour and capacity for hard sustained work. In addition to the usual routine of a Socius' life he had to cope with a large volume of business as revisor of the temporal administration of the Province and the Houses, and was in this capacity of great assistance to the Provincials under whom he served, especially during the period of visitation of the Province. For some time, too he had charge of retreats, and appears to have given every satisfaction in that most delicate of tasks.
Towards the close of 1934 Fr. Tomkin's health broke down, and for the eight years of life that still remained, and which he spent at Milltown Park, he retained the varied interests of his earlier days. He even explored new avenues of activity in the domain of carpet-making and book-binding, whose intricacies he found a boyish enthusiasm in mastering. Graced with a delightful charm of manner he leaves behind him the memory of a life of unremitting toil and selfless dedication in the cause of God.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Nicholas Tomkin 1859-1942
Fr Nicholas Tomkin was born in Rathmines Dublin on February 18th 1859. He was educated at Belvedere College and in 1877 he entered the novitiate at Milltown Park. After the usual course of studies, he was ordained in Gardiner Street Church by Archbishop Walsh.

In 1900 he became Rector of Belvedere for eight years, and his reign there will be long remembered as the Golden Age of Belvedere, when through his administrative ability and charming personality, he expanded the school in all its branches, both academic, cultural and social, and founded at this time the Union of Old Belvederians.

For the next 12 years he was successively Rector of Mungret and Clongowes. In n1924 he was appointed Socius to the Provincial Fr Fahy, though a man of 65 years of age.

He had a childlike cherubic countenance which did not reflect the keeness of mind behind it. But his childlike quality did display itself in a delight in striking a good bargain. Many jokes were told of this side of his character – for example, it was said that he offered to buy coffins on a large scale at a reduced price for quantity profit. However, such stories merely exaggerated a simple fondness for a bargain, which some folks took too seriously.

He died on May 15th 1942.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1943

Obituary

Father Nicholas J Tomkin SJ
Belvedere (1873-77); Entered Society of Jesus (1877); Ordained Priest 1892; Minister, Belvedere (1897-1900;: Rector (1900-1908); Died, Milltown Park, 15th Nov., 1942.

I esteem it an honour to be allowed to pay a tribute to the memory of the late Father Nicholas Tomkin, a distinguished Rector of Belvedere, and, I believe, one of the greatest headmasters of any school of his day, I shall always remember his fine physical presence, his dominant personality, his dignity and power of command, and his rigid justice and discipline, with which his kindliness, humanity, and sense of humour were in no way incompatible.

Becoming Rector, as he did, at the turn of the century and when the world was only just emerging from the narrowness, tyranny, and stuffiness of the Victorian era, he was in many ways a quarter of a century ahead of his time. He at once envisaged clearly and put into operation principles of moral and material reform which even to-day are still being blindly sought after as the expression of a new age. Looking back, it would seem that he achieved the ideal, because he took from the past stern rules of discipline and a tendency to aspire for all standards of conduct, and on this he superimposed a conception of humanity and justice which had been lacking in that past.

His cardinal principle was that there is good in every boy and that if he is instructed with sympathy and understanding his own sense of propriety will prove a better taskmaster than any exterior rule. He did away with corporal punishment, taught that to play was legitimate but that to work was manly and honourable and not the mark of a milksop or a toady. He inculcated the idea that “Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam” could cover our games, our relaxations, and every activity of our lives, as well as a Latin exercise. He made Belvedere pre-eminent in gymnastics, introduced it to the Rugby Schools' Cup and Cricket competitions, made it the nursery of Irish Swimming, brought Theatrical productions to a pitch of intrinsic merit which has never been excelled, and even encouraged Dancing, Elocution and Manual Instruction. In study he deplored cramming or prize-hunting and aimed at encouraging the mediocre and backward, so that no boy of his time who was not a hopeless recalcitrant ever failed to realise the full potentialities that were in him. He restored and enhanced the historic beauties of Belvedere House, and into the School Buildings he introduced every modern amenity of sanitation and hygiene.. When the Old Boys' Union was. formed through the efforts of distinguished members of the Past, it was his dynamic personality and intense love of the School which made it not merely an Association of Old Boys, but a corporate union of the Past, taking a live interest in the Present, and the boys, sharing with pride in the notable achievements of the Past.

Truly there was nothing that he did not touch; there was nothing he touched that he did not adorn.

In his official capacity of Rector he could preserve a dignity and aloofness which made his authority most impressive, but outside school hours he remained a friend and charming companion, always easy of approach, always full of interesting information on a host of subjects dear to the heart of boys. He made Belvedere such an epitome of what life ought to be that, I think, most boys experienced, for years after they left, a kind of nostalgia which led them to revisit the school at frequent intervals, and in particular to seek to renew contact with Father Tomkin.

He has passed from our physical sight, but as long as boys of his time remain, his memory will linger and his spirit will continue to direct them in every problem of life.

V J O'HARE.

◆ The Clongownian, 1943

Obituary

Father Nicholas J Tomkin SJ

Rector of Clongowes (1911-1919)

Though Fr Tomkin was not at school either here or in Tullabeg, he was associated with both places. He came here from Tullabeg, where he had been on the teaching staff, at the amalgamation, and taught mathematics and physics for three years before going to Milltown Park for his theological studies. In 1911 he came here as Rector in succession to Fr T V Nolan who had been appointed Provincial. It was during the period of his Rectorship, in 1914, that Clongowes celebrated the century of its existence as a school, and very much of the success of the three days of those celebrations was due to the energy and organising powers of the Rector. Almost immediately after these celebrations came the European war which called for qualities of another order: Again Fr Tomkin rose to the occasion, and, mainly as a result of more intensive farming, the conclusion of the war and of Fr Tomkin's Rectorship found the College practically self-supporting.

◆ Mungret Annual, 1943

Obituary

Father Nicholas J Tomkin SJ

We regret we announce the death of Father Tomkin who was our Rector here from 1908-1912 and to whose energy the house owes much. He was in his prime during his period of office here and was active in every part of the life of the house - class-work, debates, plays, games, all were of interest to him and he attended and followed all appearances of the boys with great keenness. To him we owe the Communion rail in the chapel and the final decoration of the chapel. He equipped and opened the infirmary and appointed the first resident matron. As one might expect from his enquiring and scientific turn his day saw the end of oil lamps and gas plant here with his introduction of electric lighting. Old boys will remember him with affection and even very young old boys will recall his annual visit here as socius to Father Provincial.

All will pray for the happy repose of the soul of Father Tomkin.

Father Tomkin was born at Rathmines in 1859. Educated at Belvedere College, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1877, and a before pursuing his higher studies at Milltown Park, was mathematical tutor at University College, and taught physics and mathematics at Belvedere, Clongowes and Tullabeg. He was ordained priest in 1892 by the late Most Rev Dr Walsh, Archbishop of Dublin.

Father Tomkin's exceptional gifts of administration were fully tested by the posts of trust and responsibility he held for about forty years in the various Houses of the Order in Ireland, and notably at Milltown Park, and as Rector for twenty years of Belvedere, Mungret and Clongowes Wood. He was Assistant Provincial during the years 1925- 35.

Graced with a delightful charm of manner, he retained to the end the various interests of his earlier days amid the deepening affection of the many whom he helped or influenced during a long life of laborious service.

Potter, Henry, 1866-1932, Jesuit priest and chaplain

  • IE IJA J/1998
  • Person
  • 19 April 1866-18 November 1932

Born: 19 April 1866, Kilkenny, County Kilkenny
Entered: 01 June 1885, Loyola House, Dromore, County Down
Ordained: 1901
Final vows: 15 August 1903
Died: 18 November 1932, Dublin

Part of the Clongowes Wood College, Naas, County Kildare community at the time of death.

Older brother of Laurence Potter - RIP 1934

First World War Chaplain.

◆ Fr Francis Finegan : Admissions 1859-1948 - Medical student before entry

by 1893 at Enghien Belgium (CAMP) studying
by 1898 at Stonyhurst England (ANG) studying
by 1902 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship
by 1917 Military Chaplain : 7th Yorkshire Regiment, France
by 1918 Military Chaplain : 37 London Road Chelmsford
by 1919 Military Chaplain : 21 Wellington Esplanade, Lowestoft

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 8th Year No 1 1933
Obituary :
Fr Henry Potter
Father H. Potter died in Dublin, Friday, I8th November, 1932.
He was born in Kilkenny 19th April, 1866, educated at Christian schools, Diocesan College, and Castleknock, and began his noviceship at Dromore, Is June, 1885. Two years juniorate followed, the first in Milltown Park, the second in Tullabeg (the noviceship was changed from Dromore to Tullabeg in 1888).
At the end of the two years Father Potter was sent to Clongowes, where he remained for three years as master or prefect, and then to Enghien for philosophy. His course was
interrupted when he had done two years, and in 1894 we find him in Mungret when he put in three more years as prefect before resuming philosophy at Stonyhurst. Theology at Milltown immediately followed, and then tertianship at Tronchiennes.
When the tertianship was over in 1902 he began his long career as Minister - Clongowes, Belvedere, Gardiner St., Crescent - until in 1911 he was back in Belvedere as master. He spent three years in the classroom, when once more the ministership claimed him, by way of variety, at Leeson St. This brought him to the memorable year 1914, when Father Potter donned the uniform as Military Chaplain. He saw service both in France and England, and in 1919 was back in Gardiner St. as Oper. A year in Milltown, Director of Retreats, stood between him and his special vocation, in 1923 he was minister in Galway. He held the position until 1928, and was thus minister for fifteen years, and in six different homes. For the next three years he had charge of the small study in Clongowes, a year's quiet teaching followed, and then came the end.
On the evening of Monday 14th November he was brought to Dublin in great pain. All the ordinary remedies for lumbago were tried without result, and a growth of some kind, pressing on a nerve centre, was suspected Next day he was very much distressed, and a minor operation was performed to try and give him relief, His heart was in a very bad state, and the doctors advised the Last Sacraments, which were immediately administered. That night he had two very severe haemorrhages, which left him very weak. On Thursday blood transfusion was tried, but did no good, and on Friday morning he collapsed. When asked if there was much pain his only answer was that he was “offering it all up.” He was quite conscious to the very end, and got absolution several times. He joined in the prayers for the dying, and his last act immediately before expiring was to kiss the crucifix, and whisper the Holy Name.
This very happy death was the crown of a holy life. Father Potter did not belong to the class of men whose goodness attracts attention and is freely spoken about, but the goodness was there. And, now that he is gone, stories are being told of his visits to the Blessed Sacrament, especially when few people were about, of his devout prayers, and, especially, of his devotion to the Stations of the Cross, He was charitable, the character of the neighbour was safe in his hands. And he was charitable when charity was difficult, when something was said that invited a sharp retort, that retort was never forthcoming, He was an excellent community man, and will be sadly missed. It can be said of him with truth that he was the life and soul of recreation, was full of fun, and had as keen an eye as most people for what was comical or ludicrous in his surroundings. He was very approachable, and with boys a prime favourite. As soon as he appeared a knot of them quickly gathered round him, and soon fun of some kind or other was in progress. And this was true of all classes of boys, our own College boys or the little lads that come to serve Mass in our Church. May he rest in peace.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Henry Potter 1866-1932
Henry Potter died in Dublin on November 18th 1932, He was a native of Kilkenny, being born there on April 19th 1866. Having been educated at Castleknock College he entered the Society at Dromore in 1885.

He spent most of his life as Minister in our houses. In 1914 he became a Chaplain in the Great War, and he served all through it until 1919.

He was a man of deep piety practised in secret. After his death, people spoke of his quiet nocturnal visits to the Blessed Sacrament, and his great devotion to0 the Stations of the Cross.

In his last agony, he remained conscious to the end, joining in the prayers for the dying. His last act was to kiss the crucifix and murmur the Holy Name.

◆ The Clongownian, 1933

Obituary

Father Henry Potter SJ

Though Clongowes cannot lay claim to Father Potter as one of her own Past, some of us can well remember him when he came as far back as to take over the Third Line. He had just finished his Rhetoric as a young Jesuit. So that it was in Clongowes that he began and ended his working life. In the middle of this long span he was Minister here.

He always felt very much at home here, for he was at his best with the boys: one is almost tempted to say: with the little lads. So that there was a strange fittingness in the fact that the Third Line Prefect of 1891 was the Small Study Prefect of 1931. The comic touch of incongruity, apparent only, would often make one smile when one caught sight of him in the centre of a group of Elementarians as they gathered for class at 9.30. He, seemingly grave but thoroughly enjoying the way in which they would solemnly discuss the amazing theories he would propound just to draw them out. In him a cloak of gravity covered a puckish fancy, a fact which explains his general popularity.

Though he was suffering a good deal, it was only on Monday morning, 14th November, that he failed to go down to his small boys. He left that day for a Dublin Nursing Home and died on the following Friday.

We inay be sure that he was sustained in the pains and sufferings of the last year of his life by his devotion to the Stationis of the Cross, a characteristic of his personal life. He is much missed in Clongowes. In the Community recreations his passing away has left a great blank. RIP

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Henry Potter (1866-1932)

Was born in Kilkenny and received his early education at St Kieran's and Castleknock College. He entered the Society in 1885 and pursued his higher studies at Enghien and Milltown Park where he was ordained in 1901. Father Potter spent two years at the Crescent 1909-11 when he held the position of minister of the house and prefect of the church. At the beginning of the first world war, he volunteered as chaplain and served in England and France. In the years following the war he was sometime director of retreats at Milltown Park and served some seven years as minister at Clongowes. His remaining years were spent in Clongowes.

O'Higgins, Pearse, 1916-1976, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/334
  • Person
  • 16 October 1916-30 May 1976

Born: 16 October 1916, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 14 September 1935, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 28 July 1948, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1951, Sacred Heart College SJ, Limerick
Died: 30 May 1976, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Brother of Criodán O'Higgins - LEFT 19 March 1950

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 51st Year No 3 1976

Gardiner Street
We end on a sad note. Fr Pearse O’Higgins died on the morning of Sunday, 30th May. His death was a terrible shock for the community and indeed for everyone living in the parish and in the Pioneer circle. Pearse will be a real loss to us here, not only for the wonderful work he did but above all for the extraordinary support his presence meant in the community. May the Lord be good to him!

Obituary :

Fr Pearse O’Higgins (1935-1976)

Though I spent thirteen years of formation with Pearse, we did not share the same roof since we endured tertianship together in 1949-50. In the intervening years, on those occasions on which I met him, he seemed to be unchanged and unchangeable. Large, deep-voiced, welcoming, and always, always equitable: with his unending supply of funny stories and his acute memory for situations and events in Emo, Rathfarnham and Tullabeg, he was always good company. There was a great solidity about Pearse, a great durable sanity: a blending of deep spirituality, good humour and common sense. With his political and linguistic back ground, one might have expected Pearse to hold extreme positions on all sorts of questions, but he was so open to reality and so capable of an accepting awareness of many views that his attitudes were sympathetic and moderate.
My memories of Pearse on the playing-fields of Emo and Tullabeg are comic. He wasn’t a born athlete and I think he disliked football but he togged out just to be with us and to lumber around in search of the ball which never seemed to be where Pearse was. I was quite astonished when I learned that in recent years he had become quite a good golfer. Now that I come to think of it, I remember seeing himself and the braces-wearing Dr Corboy playing havoc on the links in Balbriggan!
Golf courses and football pitches are not, to be sure, the serious arenas of life, but personalities are often revealed on them, Pearse remained as unaffected by his success in golf as by his clumsiness at football: both revealed that in-built stabilising quality which, to my mind, was Pearse's greatest human attribute. Maybe memory, like the sundial, records only the sunny hours of my friends : be that as it may, I can never recall Pearse being down or touchy or in bad form: Pearse was always ... just the large-bodied, good-natured, humorous man of God.

Here, surely, was a man in whom there was no guile. Above all his many virtues he stood out as a man of principle, and nothing could cause him to swerve from the path he thought fit to take. He never acted hastily-in word and deed he was slow-moving, but always got there'.
With his natural power of mimicry, which was always good for a laugh but which never gave offence, and his wonderful gift as a raconteur, a gift he used unsparingly, he was delightful company, At recreation, to get him going, it was sufficient to throw out a phrase like “Do you remember such-and-such?”, and he was off at once entertaining all within earshot - and his range was extensive! Some of his recollections, told always with unerring accuracy and detail, I must have heard fifty times over, but they never failed to raise a laugh,
He was a man of deep faith and fervent but never ostentatious prayer. This, united with his perennial good humour, won admiration and respect from all wherever he went or worked. His passing is a sore loss to all who had the pleasure of his companionship. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam caomh!

◆ The Clongownian, 1976

Obituary

Father Pearse O’Higgins SJ

Just as we go to Press, we learned the sad news of Fr Pearse O'Higgins's sudden death in St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, on Sunday, May 20th - Union Day. Fr Pearse had spent a number of years teaching and doing church work both in the Crescent, Limerick, and in St Ignatius College, Galway, where he had been Rector for some six years, before coming to Clongowes in 1965 to join the teaching staff. Though he spent only a year with us, in that short time he endeared himself both to his confrères and pupils. He had a genius for getting to know people, and was interested in all they did and in all belonging to them - and he never seemed to forget a name or a face. He will be sadly missed by all, but especially by the Pioneers, for whom he did so much throughout his lifetime in Limerick, Galway and in Dublin. Ar dheis láimh Dé go raibh a anam

O'Flanagan, Paul, 1898-1974, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/331
  • Person
  • 10 April 1898-23 September 1974

Born: 10 April 1898, Lahinch, County Clare
Entered: 31 August 1915, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1930, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1934, Sacred Heart College SJ, Limerick
Died: 23 September 1974, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Brother of Bishop Dermot R O'Flanagan who Entered the Irish Province in 1917 and LEFT as a priest in 1932. He then went to Alaska in 1933 and was appointed first Bishop of Juneau, Alsaka 9th July 1951

by 1922 at Valkenburg, Netherlands (GER I) studying
by 1924 in Australia - Regency
by 1933 at St Beuno’s, Wales (ANG) making Tertianship

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Already with a BSc, Paul O'Flannagan arrived in Australia as a regent at Riverview, 1923, teaching, organising cadets and directing debating. In 1926-27 he was first division prefect, and looked after rowing before returning to Ireland for theology He later returned to Australia, working with Victor Turner, 1949-50, in the Australian Mission team.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 23rd Year No 3 1948

Frs. Kennedy G., O'Flanagan and Saul leave for Australia on 9th July.

Irish Province News 49th Year No 4 1974

Obituary :
Fr Paul O'Flanagan (1898-1974)
The recollection evoked by the sad, sudden demise of Fr Paul O'Flanagan on September 23rd, of the severe heart seizure and consequent sickliness he had been visited by eight or nine years since, and before his advent to Gardiner Street, reconciled some what for his loss - his death might have been anticipated by years and yet during the years in Gardiner Street he undertook and fulfilled the chores thrust upon him with admirable regularity and efficiency. A comment, attributed to Fr P O'Mara in his latter days when age compelled him to seek Fr O’Flanagan's aid in running his Ladies' Sodality : “Don’t deprive me of my friends” was not totally whimsical ... Fr Paul did make a notable success of the succession
He was approachable, punctual, unassuming; popular with the house staff (competent critics), and among the Community and with externs a counsellor confidently consulted.
The obsequies took place on Wednesday, September 25th. Fr David Murtagh, CC, a nephew of Fr Paul’s was principal celebrant assisted by Fr Provincial and upwards of twenty others, Ours and externs, familiar friends. Fr Murtagh again later officiated at the graveside.
We offer sympathy to Mr Frank O'Flanagan and Mrs Murtagh, the surviving members of Fr Paul’s family....and their families.

We offer an appreciation by one long associate with the deceased :
I first met Fr Paul O'Flanagan a few months after his ordination; and I spoke to him for the last time about a day and a half before he died. We chatted for over an hour.
In the intervening years, time had lined his face and flecked his hair with grey. In my view, however, though greatly matured by the experiences of a very active life and a good deal of suffering in his latter years, I found him the very same Paul I had known in the far-off days. His conversation was refreshingly youthful, and he was as mentally alert as ever-optimistic, full of humour and boyish mischief. The idea that he was so soon to die never crossed my mind; I wonder, if it did his?
Paul was born in Lahinch in 1898, went to school in Belvedere College and entered the novitiate at Tullabeg in 1915. Having gained his BSc degree in University College, Dublin, and studied philosophy with the German Jesuits in Valkenburg, Holland, he was sent to Riverview College, Sydney, to teach. Returning to Milltown Park for theology, he was ordained in 1930.
Most of his life as a priest was spent on the mission-staff, and it was there I came to know him, both as a colleague and as a friend. In the work we did together, he appeared to me to have preserved his boyhood ideal of what a Jesuit should be, and I never detected any trace of - as it is now the fashion to call it! - “crisis of identity”! He was possessed of all the natural qualities that go to the making of a good Jesuit, holding the Society in high esteem and regarding it with affection. He was interested in its welfare and in that of our Province; as also in the success of his Jesuit friends. As a community man, he was unrivalled. He brought joy to all his work, and shared it with the members of the house to which he happened to be attached. His pleasures were simple a game of bridge, which he took seriously; a day's golf or a session of story-swopping. When in the mood, he was a delicious raconteur, notably about his adventures under the Southern Cross, about Archbishop Mannix of Melbourne or Archbishop Kelly of Sydney. His warmth of character won him many friends, both inside and outside the Society. Amongst the laity, he was the special friend of the men. On missions they would call him on the telephone, wishing to enjoy again his warm, human companionship. Some were past pupils, some school friends, and others, men to whom he had lent a helping, priestly hand.
Paul was an outstandingly good, even exemplary priest, and he distinguished himself over many years as an excellent missioner and retreat-master. All through his life he preserved his youthful, high ideal of the priesthood, and in his last years he edified us all by his incredible bravery, as he fought for health and life. I cannot speak for others, but I never heard a word of complaint or self pity escape his lips. Practising what he had preached so often, he took his suffering tanquam de manu Dei, as indeed he took every thing in life.
From glimpses I had of him on missions, I guess he must have helped thousands yearly, both by his advice and by example: But he never spoke of this work, his cases or of those who had come to him. In this he showed no sign of self-glorification or self seeking; certainly no trace of worldly ambition. He was always ready with prompt obedience, whatever the task or office assigned him. And, as already mentioned, in the allotted work he made himself happy, and by so doing, contributed greatly to the happiness of all concerned.
It would be an incomplete and phoney picture of Paul, if I did not refer - I hope, gently and with kindly intent?....to his likeable foible! He was pre-possessed about his BSc degree, and sometimes referred to himself as a “scientist”! However, he was open to a bit of leg-pulling on the subject, provided it came from the right quarter! He was proud of Bishop Dermot, his brother, and one might sometimes lead him on, to discourse on Dermot's successes. He was most vulnerable, however, on the subject of Australia. This was a favourite theme of his conversation, for, besides his years teaching in Riverview, he had done a two-year stint as a missioner there. Right to the end, he never lost his interest in the Aussies, more especially in their cricket. When a Test Match was in progress, he would listen assiduously to the ball-by-ball account on the radio, and was ever ready to explain the intricacies of the game and the prospects of an Australian victory to any interested party. Some of the boys who had been introduced to cricket by him, later won places on Test teams, and he could often be drawn on this subject. If I remember rightly, one of their number was the well-known and very successful player, Fingleton. It has been suggested to me that Sir Don Bradman was another; but there, I am open to correction!
Paul was ever one of Belvedere's most loyal past pupils. Even to the last days of his life, he was proud of the college and took keen interest in its successes in studies or at games; in Old Belvederians, the Newsboys' Club, as it formerly was, but more especially in the Old Belvedere Rugby Football Club. . If an acquaintance were to judge merely by Paul’s manner, he might conclude, that he never faced a crisis in his life. I am sure such a conclusion would be incorrect, since most of us do. But he never lost his cool in any circumstance that I saw, and appeared calm and unperturbed at all times - the completely unflappable man!
He showed little of his real self, either to the outside world or to his fellow Jesuits. I have, however, reason to believe, that underneath, he was possessed of a very strong, deep faith, and a great reverence for the things of God, Reserved and silent regarding his interior life with God, I strongly suspect him to have been as truly a pious man as he was a sincere and staunch friend.
As one who worked side by side with him on many occasions, I am happy to be able to bear witness, and pay tribute to his gracious charity, his kindness and thoughtfulness. He was generous in praising and encouraging others, and his memories of any mission concerned either its success, or the amusing incidents which cropped up from time to time. As we sat together thirty-six hours before his death, a smile often played about his lips, as he recounted the pleasant happenings of a mission in Mullingar Cathedral, in which he and I were engaged, just over thirty years back. That is my last memory and picture of him,
It is sometimes said, that every human life is like an Unfinished Symphony; to this statement, I am afraid, I cannot subscribe. Colleagues of mine who worked for God all the days of their lives, and aspired to union with Christ through his grace, seemed in their latter years, to be anything but the Unfinished Symphony. If I may say so, each life-work appeared perfectly rounded off, ending in a rising crescendo of faith, trust, joy, hope and expectation of life eternal. For these men we have prayed, that that crescendo would end in a paean of glory with the Risen Christ. In their number we, Paul’s friends and colleagues, would wish to include him by heartfelt and earnest prayer. I should like to think, that no one who ever met him would wish otherwise, and that without exception they would gladly join us as we pray: Solus na Soillse agus radharc na Tríonóide dá anam!

O'Dwyer, James, 1860-1925, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1896
  • Person
  • 24 September 1860-29 October 1925

Born: 24 September 1860, Barronstown, County Tipperary
Entered: 01 October 1880, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 1895, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1899, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 29 October 1925, Burke Hall, Kew, Melbourne, Australia

Older brother of Thomas (Toddy) - RIP 1942

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

by 1897 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship
Came to Australia 1901

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Early education was at Tullabeg. The distinguished William Delaney was Rector there at that time, and James proved himself distinguished while there, in the classroom and on the playground. he ended his days there as Captain of the College.

After his Novitiate he was immediately sent to Belvedere for Regency. A year later he went to Milltown for Philosophy. He returned to Regency, this time for six years at Clongowes, where he earned a reputation as a brilliant teacher.
He then went to Milltown again for Theology, was Ordained there in 1895 and then went to Drongen for Tertianship.
After Tertianship he returned to Clongowes teaching.
1901 He was sent to Australia and was immediately appointed Prefect of Studies at Riverview.
1904 He was sent to Xavier College Kew.
1906 He was sent to the Richmond Parish.
1908 He was appointed Rector of Cavier College Kew. and remained in that post until 1917. During his tenure Xavier took its place in the first rank of Australian schools.
1918 He was asked to play a leading role in the founding of Newman College.
He was then sent teaching at St Aloysius College Sydney, before becoming the first Superior at Studley Hall (later Burke Hall), a position he held until his death there 29/10/1925

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
When the Irish provincial, John Conmee, came to Australia in 1908, he was not happy with conditions at Xavier College. “It is from almost all aspects, a failure - enormous debt (£30,000), fails miserably and increasingly at exams, fails in all athletic contests ...”. He believed that the college needed an educational rector who would improve the college intellectually and spiritually and remove the debt. James O’Dwyer was appointed rector in May 1908.
He entered the Society at Milltown Park, 1 October 1880. His Jesuit training was at Milltown Park for both philosophy and theology, and tertianship was at Tronchiennes, Belgium. During regency he taught physics and mathematics at Belvedere College, 1883-86, and Latin, Greek, and mathematics at Clongowes College, 1886-92.
O’Dwyer first appointment in Australia was as prefect of studies at St Ignatius' College, Riverview, 1901-04, but it seems that, as he did not continue the policy of previous prefects
of studies, he did not win the approval of the rector, Thomas Gartlan. O’Dwyer certainly did not approve of student absenteeism for sporting functions without his approval. Both rector and prefect of studies were strong, determined men - O’Dwyer was transferred to Xavier College.
It was during his term as rector of Xavier College, 1908-18, that his best work in Australia was achieved. He became one of the few Jesuit educationalists in the history of the Australian Province. At Xavier College he improved the school numerically, financially and educationally. At a time when science was unpopular as a school subject, he elevated its status. He built the laboratory, introduced electric light, enlarged the cricket oval, improved the Rowing Club and laid down the tennis courts. He also re-introduced secular masters after an absence of fifteen years and began the St Vincent de Paul Society in 1909. He also taught English literature and history, and encouraged a professional attitude to the teaching of religious knowledge.
O’Dwyer was one of the strongest of the rectors of Xavier College with extraordinary energy and force of character. He was most outspoken on every issue, showing a wide vision of life and detailed his educational philosophy more clearly than his predecessors. He stressed that “the aim and ideal of our education is to turn out cultured Christian gentlemen”. This was the Jesuit ideal for three centuries, and it was best achieved by following centuries of tradition, while taking care to keep in touch with the improvements of the physical sciences. More than many rectors, O’Dwyer believed that Jesuit traditions and the British Public School image had much in common, and the Public Schools of Victoria were continuing this great tradition of turning out men of character much needed for the future of Australia.
In his many addresses to parents and students, O’Dwyer stressed that hard work and character formation were more important than success in examinations or gaining prizes. He wanted his students to rise above their environment. with minds trained in wisdom. True education for him involved the soul, the life of the spirit, which produced truth, reverence, modesty and holiness. Christ was presented as the moral motive for Christians, and the syllabus used in education ought to be the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount. The importance of religious education was continually stressed.
At a time when religious rituals were exactly prescribed, such as the custom of daily Mass for boarders, O'Dwyer questioned whether this enforced practice did not turn the boys against religion. It took another 50 years before compulsory Mass ceased. He was also a champion of pedagogical excellence. He constantly mentioned the poor quality teaching among Jesuits in Australia, and asked Irish superiors to send good teachers, especially in mathematics and science. Very little change occurred. He wanted Jesuit scholastics to be trained in pedagogy for teaching, but superiors held to the old belief that Jesuit formation was sufficient for all Society ministries.
Apart from his work within the colleges, O’Dwyer was also influential within the wider community In Victoria he was the Catholic representative on the Board of Registration, and was sought after for sermons and lectures. He gave the Cathedral Hall Winter Lectures in Melbourne one year, and regularly spent his holidays giving retreats.
In addition, he was not slow to comment on the education system in Victoria, all the time advocating an academic environment that would assist students to progress easily to the university.
The strong leadership that O’Dwyer exercised showed him to be a man of great zeal and enthusiasm, inspiring confidence and trust in others. He was extremely loyal to colleagues, boys and the Church. He was not given to praising people to their face, choosing rather to express his appreciation of them to others. He wasted no time on compliments. He was never familiar and not easy to know well, but was admired for his personal strength of character.
O’Dwyer was very British in outlook and spoke eloquently about the importance of the Empire and patriotism. During the Great War, he proclaimed the privilege of lighting for the
rights of King and country Vice-royalty were always welcome at Xavier College during his term of office. He strongly supported the Public School spirit at the College, a spirit that, in England he believed, had produced the best leaders in the Empire.
After his term of office as rector of Xavier College, he was given charge of preparing for the opening of Newman College at The University of Melbourne, a task he performed with
distinction. He must also be credited for the real work in founding the preparatory school to Xavier College, Burke Hall, and was appointed its first headmaster, 1921-25 . He died in office much mourned by the Melbourne Catholic community for his dedicated service to the Church and education.
It took time to know O’Dwyer as a person. He was reserved to a degree, even shy, and though he would let you know what he thought, he scarcely ever let you know what he felt. He could appear largely unemotional and lacking the finer sensibilities, keeping these emotions and feelings to himself. He was a man of action, and was impatient of delays. Yet, at the same time, he had no time for censorious criticism. If he had a complaint against anyone, that person alone heard about it. He was strong, sincere, and straight. These qualities earned the respect of his colleagues, and they seemed to treat him the same way.

Note from Toddy O’Dwyer Entry
Brother, Sir Michael, assassinated by a fanatical Indian student, Udharn Singh, 13 March 1940, in Caxton Hall, London, for the massacre at Amritsar, 13 April 1919, while he was Lieutenant Governor of the Punjab. Over 379 protesters were killed and 1,200 wounded. The “Massacre” was officially condemned, and many Indians considered Michael a tyrant.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 1st Year No 1 1925
Studley Hall (Burke Hall) : The success of this school is mainly due to the late Father James O'Dwyer, who died on October 29th R.I.P.. His death is a big loss to Dudley and to the Mission, to which he rendered invaluable assistance.

Irish Province News 1st Year No 2 1926

Obituary :
Fr James O’Dwyer
Fr James O'Dwyer died on Thursday, 29th October, 1925. His loss was severely felt, not only by the Society in Australia, but by his brother priests and by all those who are engaged in the great work of education. The crowded congregation assembled in St. Patrick's Cathedral, where the solemn office and High Mass were celebrated on the Saturday after his death gave eloquent testimony of the high opinion in which he was held by the general public. Some of the leading Protestants of Melbourne took part in this tribute to his memory.

Fr. O'Dwyer was born in Co. Tipperary in 1860. At the age of sixteen he went to Tullabeg, then a flourishing College with Fr. Wm. Delany as Rector. Young O'Dwyer was equally distinguished in the class-room and on the play-ground, and ended his school days as Captain of the College. He entered the Society in 1880, and immediately after the Noviceship was sent to Belvedere as Master. After a year he returned to Milltown for Philosophy. At the end of the third year he was appointed to Clongowes, where, during six years, he earned the very highest reputation as a brilliant master. He made his Theology at Milltown, ordained in 18957 went to Tronchiennes for Tertianship, and when the year was over he again found himself a master at Clongowes. He remained there until 1901, when he sailed for Australia. He at once became Prefect of Studies at Riverview and held that office until 1904, when he was transferred to Kew. Two years later he had his first experience of Parish work at Richmond. It did not last long, for in 1908 he was appointed Rector of Kew. During his rectorship, which lasted until 1917, Kew took its place in the very first rank of Australian schools a position it still occupies. To play a leading part in the starting of Newman College in I9I89 was Fr. O'Dwyer's next work. For the two following years he was engaged in teaching at St Aloysius' College, Sydney, and then became the first Superior of Studley Hall. Except for one year, when ill health incapacitated him for active work, he held that position until 1925 when God called him to receive the reward of his great labours.
Fr. O'Dwyer was not only a great schoolman, but as a preacher and lecturer he held a very high place. He was also much sought after by religious Communities, and by the secular
clergy to conduct their retreats.
At the High Mass and Office at St. Patrick’s, on the Saturday after Fr. O'Dwyer's death, His Lordship, the Bishop of Sandhurst, the Right Rev. Dr. MacCarthy, presided.

Irish Province News 1st Year No 3 1926

At Kew, Dr, Mannix paid the following tribute to Fr James O’Dwyer “I was very sorry to hear of the death of my dear friend Fr O’Dwyer desire to-night to sympathize with the Jesuit Fathers, and to assure them that I should like to be allowed to share the loss they feel. Fr O'Dwyer was a man in a thousand. He was one of the greatest educational experts in Australia. The debt that Victoria owes to Fr O'Dwyer will never be paid - but his work still remains.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father James O’Dwyer 1860-1925
Born in Tipperary on September 24th 1860, James O’Dwyer went to Tullabeg at the age of sixteen. It was then a flourishing College with Fr Delaney as Rector. Young O’Dwyer was equally outstanding in classroom and on playing field, and ended his schooldays as Captain of Tullabeg. He entered the Society in 1880.

He made his name as a brilliant Master in Clongowes, where he spent six years as a scholastic. After his ordination in Milltown and his Tertianship, he returned to Clongowes until 1901 when he sailed for Australia. He at once became Prefect of Studies at Riverview.

In 1908 he was appointed Rector of Kew, a post he held until 1917. During his Rectorship, Kew took its place in the very first rank of Australian schools. He played a leading part in the starting of Newman College in 1918, and he became the first Rector of Studley Hall, a position he held until his death.

Fr O’Dwyer was not only a great schoolman, but as a preacher and lecturer he held a very high place. He was much sought after by the clergy for their retreats.

He died on October 28th 1925.

◆ The Xaverian, Xavier College, Melbourne, Australia, 1925

Obituary

Father James O’Dwyer SJ

Born, 24th September, 1860: died 29th October, 1925)

The Editor asks me for some notes on the more intimate side of Father James O'Dwyer, omitting, as he suggests, all reference to the positions of trust he filled, the important works he accomplished, the brilliant and intellecu tual quialiies of his sermons and public lectures and so on. I daresay the Editor fixed on me for this task because inore than any other I was in daily and close association with Father O'Dwyer during the whole ten years of his rector at at Xavier.

Few, if any of his fellow-workers had better opportunities than myself of kriowing him; and yet, I inust confess, it took timne to know him intimately. He was reserved to a degree, even shy, and though he would let you know what he thought, he scarcely ever let you know what he felt. The impression produced on me for some time - even for some years - was that he was largely unemotional and lacked the finer sensibilities. I look back now on that impression with surprise. As intimate association with him increased I saw that earlier impressions had to be corrected. He was, in fact, a man of deep feeling and of a sensitiveness that few, I think, suspected. But he was wonderfully silent about what he felt: as a rule, you had to find it out by casual indications or rare and unguarded admissions, For instance, it came to me as a surprise to learn some years after the occurrences that matters, concerning which I had regarded him at the time as “thick-skinned” and insensible, had caused him many a sleepless night,

If I were asked to me what seemed to me to be his most striking characteristic - a dangerous, and, perhaps, illusory thing to attempt - I would select his loyalty. Whether it was really his most prominent characteristic or not, at all events it was sufficiently noteworthy to call for attention, and, to me at least, it was always touching. He was extraordinarily loyal both to his colleagues and to the boys under his charge, while his loyalty to the Catholic Church was the overmastering passion of his life.

Looking back over ten years of close collaboration with him at Xavier, I can not recall a single occasion on which he expressed to myself a word of formal approval of my own work, I am inclined to think that somewhat similar was the experience of all my co-workers. He wasted no time on compliinents. You felt his approval rather by his decisions and you appreciated it all the more. But in speaking to you of his colleagues who were not present, his appreciation of their work was most heartening. He referred to them in the most enthusiastic terms. No one could be warmer in his recognition of their work. He was utterly sincere, straightforward, and manly. In his presence you might be reminded with a certain abruptness of some omission, or something that should be “done at once” - a favourite expression of his - or of something that should have been done long ago; but though he wasted no compliments on you, you could be absolutely certain that behind your back no one ever heard of anything but appreciation of your work. You knew it because that was his invariable practice regarding every one of his community. He wanted to get things done, to see things moving, and he was certainly impatient of delays; but he had no time for censorious criticism. If he had any fault to find, he kept it to himself or reserved it for the person corcerned. He was a strong, sincere, and loyal man, and the better you knew him the more you admired him.

Equally notable was his loyalty to the boys. He was enthusiastic about thenı; keenly alive to their fine points; and scrupulously careful about their reputations. He took, I fancy, a kind of sacramental view of their faults and never discussed them. You certainly heard him.say a good deal about the fine qualities of the boys, but never a word about their misdemeanours. No doubt, in the Study Hall at assembly he came down forcibly on publicly known breaches of college law - as boys of his time will remember - and even decreed vigorous correction at times; but no one resented that - not even the culprits themselves - though they must have found it unpleasant at the time, the boys felt it was all in the game, and the public spirit of the school was solidly behind the Rector. The boys really like a good lead, and they felt they got it from Father O'Dwyer.

I was after somewhat surprised to note how completely the boys understood him. Undoubtedly he was often abrupt and impetuous, and even seemed to me at times to be a trifling harsh in his manner; but if there was any apparent harshness, the boys never seemed to notice it in the least. They never held off from him; they were frank, straightforward, and trusting in their whole attitude towards their Rector. They understood him; they appreciated the interest he took in thern; they admired his manliness and his high principles; and they were proud of him as a leader. More, they felt he was a friend and loved and trusted him as such.

His loyalty to the Church was inspiring. It had the breadth, the depth, and the strength which became one who was at once a scholar and an enthusiast. To him the Catholic Church could never be regarded as something about which, in any circumstances, we may be shamefaced or apologetic. To him, the Faith was the one thing that really matters in this world, not only for the individual, but also for nations, empires, and civilizations. As he was a close and deep student of history, he was conpetent to appeal on behalf of the Church to the Nineteen Great Witnesses - the Nineteen Centuries which have rolled over the shifting destinies of the nations, and which, as they look down the long avenues of history strewn with the wreckage of human institutions, pass this solemn judgment: “One institution stands through all the changes; one in stitution was built by the hands of God and will not pass away; one institution outlasts the long-drawn ravings and the futile prophecies of hostile criticisin is generation succeeds generation”. Father O'Dwyer's loyalty was founded upon the deep and profound study of history and of philosophy and theology, and he gave to his convictions a depth and breadth which could only come from religion, backed up by culture.

A French writer has said that fame is the privilege of being known to those who know you not. Another defined popularity as the esteein of men who take us for something altogether different from what we really are. Fame or popularity of that kind may be treated with indifference or contempt. Far different fron that was the genuine esteem in which Father O'Dwyer was held by those who really knew him. The more intimately people knew and understood him, the more they esteemed him. He had the love and esteem of those who came in close contact with him, and understood his aims and his work. He was not a man who invited familiarity, From his aggressive pushfulness, his initiative, his energy and his impatience with shilly-shallying, he was a man with whom it might be said no one was really familiar. Even the people who were most friendly with him felt slightly restrained by something in him. Yet, as I have said before, the boys felt that he was their true and real friend and, feeling that, loved and trusted him. In Newman College, among the students, Father O'Dwyer was quite at home. He was as much at his ease with the University students as he had been with the Xavier College boys. Laer, when he was appointed head-master of the Xavier Preparatory School, some might have wondered how he would get on with the children, many of whom were practically babies fresh froin the nursery. Well, I think that in many ways the part of his life that he would have chosen, if asked, as the happiest time of his life, was while he was in charge of Studley Hall, Here he plotted and planned and kept things moving as he had done at the College and was the happiest of men in the midst of the young life of the Preparatory School. Here, as at Xavier, he won the trust of children - that hardest of all things to capture. It seems to me that no greater tribute could be paid to Father O'Dwyer's qualities than that given by the spontaneous trust in him alike by men, boys and little children.

Furthermore, no class of men or women were more loyal, more respectful, or more affectionate to Father O'Dwyer than those who served under him in the capacity of servants. He gained their respect and affection by his ready sympathy, by his appreciation of their work, and by the tactfulness and kindly courtesy of the true Christian gentleman.

Of that last and greatest loyalty of his life-his religious obedience I would not speak for very sacredness. Yet was it, I think, the beacon light of his life. In his own handwriting he wrote on the fly leaf of the Boys' Rules of Xavier College these beautiful words:

“True guidance in return for loving obedience (did they but know it) is the prime need of man” and...
“Great souls are always loyally submissive reverent to what is set over them; only small, mean souls are other wise”."
How truly was his own life an exemplification of those words,
May he rest in peace.

Eustace Boylan SJ

A LITTLE POSTHUMOUS PUBLICATION

The Editor of the “Xaverian” has ever felt that justice should be done to the Editor of the “Xaverian” for 1918 - the year that Father O'Dwyer ceased to be Rector of Xavier and this all the more because in righting the living he is but paying tribute to the humility of the dead. In December, 1918, when the changes of Rector had been officially announced and Father Jerernialı Sullivan succeeded Father James O'Dwyer as Rector of Xavier, the Editor drew up a simple, honest, sincere, plain and unflattering account of the stewardship of Father O'Dwyer and to it added in a poor broken way, a word of appreciation of his work and worth. Out of respect for his old Superior and never dreaming the upshot, he imprudently asked Father James to read the proof sheet and give his permission for its production. He did the former willingly enough, and expressed his gratitude but to the latter gave a refusal so decisive and so earnest that compliance had to be. Accordingly the “Xaverian” went out minus the precious manuscript. Then came the storm of criticism foreseen and predicted by the poor Editor as he argued and argued - but all to no effect - With Father O’Dwyer...... of the Leaving Classes who apprecraitopn, perhaps, more than as boys — the love of literature and grasp of religious truth which his teaching instilled.
Far deeper, however, than these benefits (great as they are) will be found, in the hearts of the boys, the grateful thought and remembrance of Father O'Dwyer's personal kindness to them. The memory of this will live on when many another golden text - be it of Science or Scripture - has been forgotten, and will teach the Xavier boy both how to live and how to die. Rumour runs that Father O'Dwyer leaves Xavier for higher - if not better things - for the Rectorship of Newman College. We know not. But, whether Rector of Newman College or of no College, “the School, both old and new, will not forget” his kinduess to it, nor fail to pray that he who blessed so much may, in ......

◆ Our Alma Mater, St Ignatius Riverview, Sydney, Australia, 1925

Obituary

Father James O’Dwyer

Within the last few weeks there passed to his eternal reward a great educationalist in the person of Fr J O'Dwyer, brother of our late rector, Fr T O'Dwyer, and formerly sometime prefect of studies in this College. He had been rector of Xavier College, Melbourne, and was the first rector of Newman College, Melbourne University. He was largely in strumental in putting that institution on its firm bass, and must be credited with what has been recently described by an independent observer, as its phenomenal success. “Here, as there, Fr O'Dwyer was always : tireless worker, with complete forgetfulness of self, and unbounded zeal for the work he had in hand. At the time of his decease he filled the post of headmaster of Studley Hall, the preparatory school of Xavier College, which establishment also has attained, under his wise rule, to immediate and conspicuous success. A crowded attendance of clergy and laity on the occasion of the requiem in S Patrick's Cathedral, gave testimony of widespread appreciation for his splendid. works, and general regret at his demise.
RIP

◆ The Clongownian, 1926

Obituary

Father James O’Dwyer SJ

James O’Dwyer SJ had had the most intimate connections with Clongowes, for after a brilliant school career at Tullabeg that had been made by Father Delany he came as a scholastic to teach Rhetoric here, numbering Father Rector among his pupils. He is one of the small band whose teaching has survived to be a tradition and a model. Intensely intellectual, he was full of an almost missionary zeal for imparting knowledge, and his method was quite as much inspiration as exposition. He was that rare thing, a practical enthusiast who was fully qualified and a master of his own work. Going as a priest to Australia, he continued his educational work in a wider field, was ten years Rector of Xavier College at a time when its career was one of rapidly growing success, and then for many years the first Superior of Studley Hall, its preparatory school. His charming and original character, with its strongly-felt ideals and strongly-expressed opinions, could not fail to make many friends and perhaps a few. enemies, a per sonality to be followed and opposed. He fought with conspicuous skill, vigour and success in the battle for Catholic Education in a Protestant country.

◆ The Clongownian, 1931

Appreciation

Father James O’Dwyer SJ

(OT 1876-1880 ; Master at Clongowes 1887-1892 and 1897-1901; first Rector of Newman College in the University of Melbourne, Rector of Xavier College and of Burke Hail, Melbourne).

By Fr George O'Neill SJ

“The Clongopwnian owes a debt of commemoration to the late Fr James O'Dwyer; but it is not easy to pay that debt satisfactorily. For, though Fr O'Dwyer died as recently as 1925, he is to Clongowes of to-day a man of a past generation; and “the generations” are still as “hungry” as when the poet so described them - “ever wearying of the old and wolfing down the new”. So long ago as 1901, Fr James was led by the call of duty very far away from Tullabeg and Clongowes, and, once he reached his new world he became absorbed in the task he set before him, and cut off with, perhaps, excessive completeness his links with the old country. A student at Tullabeg from 1876 to 1880, a master at Clongowes from 1887 to 1892 and again from 1897 to 1901, he will have left vivid memories of what he was as a schoolboy and a Jesuit among a fairly “old guard” of Clongownians and a much smaller remnant of the men of St Stanislaus. By such as these, at all events, whatever their numbers, we have no doubt that an appreciation of him, however imperfect, will be welcomed; while, perhaps, a chance perusal of it will catch the attention and even appeal to the soul of some younger readers, and as for the antipodes we have no doubt that when “The Clongownian” of 1931 'arrives out there, it will gain a living and warm reception for anything it has to say in reverent commemoration of Fr O'Dwyer a man in whom hundreds of Australians have recognised and still recognise one of the most successful educators of youth that have ever appeared in their country.

Fr O'Dwyer made himself, indeed, an Australian with the Australians. He was, none the less, a true son of Irish soil. Sprung from a family settled immemorially in the “Golden Vein” country, near Tipperary, he and his brothers grew up a large and gifted circle. One, by sheer force of ability rose to a place among the highest in the difficult field of Indian Government, and, as Sir Michael O'Dwyer, confronted its problems with energy and ability; another, now Fr Thomas O'Dwyer SJ, as Vice-Rector of St Patrick's College, Melbourne, Rector of Riverview College, Sydney, and in other capacities also served well the Society to which he and his brother James gave them selves in their early days.

Provincialism or narrow nationalism of any sort was no part of Fr James's mind or character. For that he was too much of an enlightened Catholic and too much of a man of culture. These characteristics were justly dwelt upon by the preacher at his funeral service, Fr Eustace Boylan SJ, who thus spoke :

“The most prominent characteristic of Fr O'Dwyer's life was a passionate loyalty to the Catholic Church. This gave unity to all his efforts in study, in teaching, and in preaching. He regarded the Church as the only thing that really mattered in the world - the great rock, marking out the true goal of human progress. His loyalty was founded on a deep study of history, philosophy and theology, which gave his mind a depth and breadth that could result only from religion backed up by culture. In the battle for progress and improvement, his one central idea was the progress of the Church to the greater glory of God”.

It is a panegyric such as might have been spoken concerning some canonised son of St Ignatius. And, while it was true in a generous measure of Fr James, he possessed, furthermore, the strength of will and character that could make his ideals active forces in all manner of surroundings, as well as the spirit of self-sacrifice that does not count the cost to self. As teacher, preacher, Rector, and much else - especially from the time of his ordination as priest in 1895 to his last illness in 1925 - he wore himself out by hard and incessant labour. His strenuousness, combined with his ability, “made him a prince of teachers”. There was no room for slovenliness or slackness in his conception of a well-ordered life, and those he train d had to “take it or leave it” on that understanding. Utterly straightforward himself, so un relentingly expected truth from others. Here came in the inevitable touch of human imperfection. His forcefulness in the moulding of his pupils, while it had, on the whole, a desirable result, was sometimes, felt to be a little exaggerated and oppressive. So too in his judgments of character and his views on things in general, though you could not call him narrow, yet there was certainly a tendency to be one-sided, to see things too absolutely in black and white. He was not readily indulgent to views and tendencies, or sympathetic in judging characters, that were unlike his own. In his later years, however, this inborn positiveness appeared tempered and softened. It must, at all times, have given him occasion for meritorious self-repression; for never did it interfere with his obedience as a religious, never with his exercises of charity, and seldom with his capacity for team-work in any good cause. You might find it hard to draw him into a hive of action; but, once you got him in, you could count infallibly on his loyal co-operation.

He might have gained, doubtless, something in breadth of view had he been favoured with a course of studies less locally confined. His long years at Tullabeg and at Milltown Park might possibly have narrowed, not expanded, a mindless bent on self-improvement than his was; but he was a keen learner, He ranged as widely in general studies and reading as opportunity permitted, and, like Coleridge's hermit, receptive of lights from every quarter:

“He loved to talk with mariners.
That come from a far countree”.

Just before entering the Jesuit novitiate he had been given a useful glimpse of many lands in a tour which he took with a school fellow under the capable guidance of Fr Conmee, and ever after he guarded as gold the reminiscences of those weeks, especially of his Italian experiences. After his ordination in 1895 he was sent for the customary ten months of recollection to Tronchiennes in Belgium, and there he valued and utilised his opportunities of exchanging ideas with men of many nationalities and temperaments.

Thus formed, he. could not fail to make his mark, or rather a deep impression, when, in 1901 he entered upon the business of his best years - his teaching and leadership among the Catholic schools of Australia. His capacity and adaptability were proved in University; secondary and primary scholastic business; and whether his work lay in the newly (and daringly) started Newman College of Melbourne University, or in Xavier Public School, or in its preparatory school, Burke Hall, he never failed to rise to the height of his task. That task - as he conceived it - was that of an educationalist and an apostle. Ready, apparently, for any work, he changed easily from readiness into enthusiasm. One of his colleagues wrote on the occasion of his death :

“One thing especially impressed me in his life, and that was the way in which he ever thoroughly settled down in every place to which he has been sent, and joyfully and whole-heartedly carried out any and every kind of work he has been given to do”.

The Council of Public Education, the Association of Registered Teachers of Victoria, the head-masters. of public schools and the heads of the University colleges of Melbourne placed on record their sense of regret at the death of Fr O'Dwyer and their deep appreciation of his value as a thinker and worker in educational matters. “The Council”, wrote one of these bodies, “deplored the death of one who had given so freely of his ability to further the cause of education”. Regrets were widely expressed that he had shortened so valuable a career by reckless expenditure of his strength and indifference to health and rest.

These personages and committees were in the main non-Catholic. They, as well as other non-Catholics, had been deeply impressed not only by the abilities but also by the moral and priestly qualities of their deceased colleague. Nevertheless it is rather to Catholic sources we must look for evidence as to the internal spirit that underlay Fr, James's unremitting activities. When we turn to such witnesses we may particularly notice the tributes they have paid to his practice of the gentler virtues - those that were least congruous to his natural temperament. It was not, for example, his zeal or his forcefulness that Fr Lockington SJ, selected for praise in his condolences on his death. He wrote :

“He has done rare work for the Church and the Society and will be greatly missed by all of us. The outstanding feature in his character - one in which he was a model for all of us - was his invariable charity towards everyone. He had at times men under him who must have tried him sorely, yet,-always the good word!”

Mother MacRory, religious of the Sacred Heart, sister of His Eminence Cardinal MacRory and Superior of Sancta Sophia College in the University of Sydney, gave this testimony :
·
“I am sure Christ, our Lord received with a benign countenance one who had so often and so beautifully spoken about Him. Dear Father James seened to have a special gift of inspiring personal love for Our Lord. He is a great loss; but he has done a great work, and it will endure”.

It was indeed true, as the last writer's words remind us, that, quite apart from his educational activities, whereby not merely had hundreds of his pupils been formed into excellent Christians but also a numerous élite had been led into the ways of perfection. Fr O'Dwyer's labours and success as a conductor of retreats, as a preacher and a confessor, would alone have entitled him to grateful and reverent memory. But on these aspects of his life-work we cannot now further dwell.

Our final quotation concerning him shall be a tribute paid to his memory by a man of letters, Mr T J Cleary, who thus refers to Fr James's co-operation with him in various services rendered to the cause of Catholic literature in Australia :

“Your very able brother was a kind and good friend to me while I was editor of ‘The Austral Light’. We edited together Archbishop Carr's Lectures and Replies, and the manner in which he smoothed over the harsh words exchanged was almost a revelation. When he had finished; the note of controversy had departed and the Lectures as now published leave no indication that they emanated from a controversy with Dr R . By his death, too, we lose the greatest gentleman among the clerics since Dr. Carr's death”.

Fr O'Dwyer's funeral at St Patrick's Cathedral, Melbourne, on November 25th, 1925, presided over by the Bishop of Sandhurst, gave impressive testimony to the esteem in which he was held and the regret occasioned by his loss. Since then nothing has been done to perpetuate his name; but so he himself would have wished it. He had laboured for nearly forty-five years, indifferent to praises, testimonials or titles. His ambitions were fixed on successes and rewards that do not fade away with time, and much that he achieved will remain even on earth as of permanent value.

St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin, 1832-

  • IE IJA CM/GARD
  • Corporate body
  • 1832-

The Church of St Francis Xavier in Upper Gardiner Street was one of the first churches to be built in Dublin after Catholic Emancipation (Catholic Relief Act) in 1829. The Jesuits had a small church in Hardwicke St (1816), and with the building of the St Francis Xavier's, turned the Hardwicke St property into a school, later to be named Belvedere College SJ.

In 1 July 1829, the first stone was laid at Upper Gardiner Street by Fr Charles Aylmer SJ (1786-1847), and the first Mass was celebrated by Archbishop Murray on 2 May 1832. The church cost £18,000 to build and was designed by Fr Bartholomew Esmonde SJ (1789-1862) and John B Keane (died 1859).

Those associated with the church include Matt Talbot and John Henry Cardinal Newman. Gardiner Street Church is also the resting place of Blessed John Sullivan SJ.

In 1974, Gardiner Street Parish was established by Archbishop Dermot Ryan.

Other Jesuit associations in the parish include: Belvedere College SJ, Young Adult Ministry, Pioneer Total Abstinence Association of the Sacred Heart, Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice, The Peter McVerry Trust, St Joseph's Penny Dinners, Polish Ministry, Jesuit Refugee Service, and the Irish Jesuit Mission Office.

Edward Kelly
William Ronan
John Conmee, Vice-Superior
John Conmee, Superior
James Fottrell
Michael Weafer
Andrew Macardle
Francis M Browne
Fergal McGrath
Robert J Tyndall
Timothy Mulcahy
Matthew Meade
John McCarron
John Murphy

Murphy, James F, 1852-1908, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/15
  • Person
  • 18 September 1852-22 March 1908

Born: 18 September 1852, Clonmel, Co Tipperary
Entered: 27 November 1871, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 15 August 1891
Final Vows 02 February 1891, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 27 November 1908, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly

Twin brother of John Murphy - RIP 1898

Father Provincial of the Irish Province of the Society of Jesus: 13 November 1900-1905
Novice Master: 1905 - 1908

by 1871 at home for health
by 1873 at St Beuno’s, Wales (ANG) studying
by 1874 at Roehampton, London (ANG) studying
by 1875 at Laval, France (FRA) studying
by 1885 at Oña Spain (ARA) studying

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He was a twin brother of John Murphy SJ - RIP 1898. He was also a brother of Canon Henry Murphy of Arran Quay and Lieutenant Colonel William Reed Murphy DSO, who had a distinguished career in the Indian Civil Service.

After First Vows he studied Rhetoric at Roehampton and then three years Philosophy at Laval, where Fathers Bucceroni and Fredet were teaching at the time.
He was then sent as a teacher to Tullabeg and later as a Teacher and Prefect of Studies at Clongowes for Regency of seven years.
1884 he was sent to Oña to study Theology. This was at that time the largest Theologate in the Society, whose chief Theologian, Father Mendine, was of great repute. Here he read a most distinguished course in Theology and shortly after his return to Ireland he was appointed a Chair of Theology at Milltown. He was a profound and able Theologian. Whilst this work was significant, he also found the time to exercise his love of children and the poor, by gathering the local poor boys together on Saturday evenings to teach them.
1895 He was appointed Master of Novices.
1900 he was appointed Provincial, and when he finished this in 1905 he went back to Milltown which he loved, including all his former work. he was not known as a Preacher as it was not necessarily in his gift, though when speaking or talking to groups who could follow his high train of thought, he was very effective. In this regard, his Priests Retreats were highly valued, and he also earned a great reputation as a Spiritual Director, adding prudence and sanctity to his learning.
Early in 1908 his health became a concern. From the outset there was not great hope that he would recover, and he died at Tullabeg an edifying death 22 March 1908.

At his end he was said to have described his experience as being like a man travelling from Dublin to Bray Head, shut up in a dark stuffy tunnel, but expecting at every moment to dash out into the sunshine with a glorious view before and around him, the glittering sun stretched out on his left, and inland on the right, green fields, woods and fair mansions, and in the distance the beautiful mountains. “Some happy change like that of a spiritual sort is before me please God”. In his dying he didn’t seem to suffer much, never tired of thanking those around him, and they considered themselves privileged to have witnessed his dying.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father James Murphy SJ 1852-1908
Fr James Murphy was one of those men who left an indelible mark on the Province. He was one of those men to whom those who met him could not be indifferent. One might put it this way : Fr Peter Kenney was to the infant Mission what Fr Murphy was to the growing Province.

Born in Clonmel in 1852, he entered the Society in 1869, where he had the famous Fr Sturzo as Novice Master. After a brilliant course of studies, especially displaying exceptional intellectual ability in Theology an Oña Spain, he was appointed to the chair of Theology in Milltown Park. In 1895, he became Master of Novices, his favourite Office in the Society. He used to say that God had given him the “tit-bit” of the work of the Province. He had a special flair for training novices. He had immense and infectious enthusiasm for the Society. His influence on the novices was profound and lasting, the central strand of which was his spirituality, a strong and effective love of the Lord. Regnum Christi was the inspiration of his life.

He was a fluent and forceful speaker and had a special gift of expounding attractively deep spiritual truths like the varietes of grace. His way of giving the Exercises, such as the Foundation and the Kingdom, so impressed his hearers, that novices could approach it only from his direction, and when afterwards as priests, they themselves had to give the Exercises, they revealed at once the Master from whom they learned.

He aimed at making the novices men of principle. “What is right is right” he would say, “and what is wrong is wrong, and that settles the question”. He did not forget the traditional methods of training in the Society, and by public and often unconventional commands, he raised them in poverty, obedience and humility. The great majority of his novices always admitted that he was the greatest influence on their lives.

In 1900 he was appointed Provincial, and he set about moulding the Province to his own high standard of spiritual values and ascetic living. As Provincial he was a man of vision. Foreseeing the growing importance of Biblical Studies, he sent three brilliant Juniors to the University of Beirut to learn Oriental languages. One of these, Fr Edmund Power, by his distinguished career at the Biblicum and Milltown Park, more than justified Fr Murphy’s foresight. He retired from this post in 1905 to become once more Master of Novices.

Health failed him in 1908, and he died on March 22nd at St Stanislaus College, Tullamore. To the end he displayed these high principles of the spiritual life, which he had inculcated into generations of novices.

His actual death was most edifying, painless and effortless. From his deathbed he delivered his last exhortation to the novices gathered round him, gathering up the gist of his teaching, which left an indelible mark on all of them. Describing the scene that bursts on one emerging from a stuffy tunnel at Bray Head, he said “Some happy change like that if a spiritual sort is before me, please God”. The bystanders considered themselves privileged to have witnessed so holy a death.

◆ The Clongownian, 1908

Obituary

Father James Murphy SJ

On Sunday morning, March 22nd, Father James Murphy died at Tullabeg. Though not educated either at Clongowes or Tullabeg, he was so intimately connected with both Colleges that his memory deserves more than a passing notice in our columns. Born at Clonmel in 1852, he was only 17 years of age when he entered the Noviceship of the Society of Jesus at Milltown Park, Dublin. After the usual term of preparation he went to Tullabeg as Master, and in 1878 passed on to Clongowes, where he soon became Prefect of Studies, a post which he held for several years, It was during his tenure of this office that the Intermediate Act was passed, and that that system of examination came into operation. It was well that there was such a man as Father Murphy at the head of affairs at so trying a time, for it required no little skill and manipulation to graft the Intermediate system on to the old ratio studiorum. During these years at Tullabeg and Clongowes he won the esteem of all the boys, and the affection of not a few. ·All recognised his great qualities, his vast erudition, his untiring zeal, his impartiality, his self-sacrifice, and many came to realise that in him they possessed a true friend, one to whom they could safely confide their troubles and difficulties, sure of a sympathetic hearing and kindly assistance, Indeed it would be no exaggeration to say that when the notice of his death appeared in the papers, many who read it felt tbat they had lost their truest and best friend. From Cloogowes in 1884 he went to Oña, in Spain, to study Theology, acquiring the reputation of a brilliant Theologian, so much so that his opinion was always asked by his fellow-students when some especially kootty point had to be settled. After his return to Ireland he was appointed Professor of Theology in Milltown Park, where he fully upheld the reputation he had gained for himself in Spain. In 1895 he was appointed Rector and Master of Novices in Tullabeg, a post which he held until November, 1900, when he became Provincial of the Irish Province. In this position he was necessarily brought again into close touch with Clongowes, and he always evinced the keenest interest in its doings, and to no one was its success more grateful. When his term of office as Provincial had expired he returned to his old post, which he loved so much, of Master of Novices at Tullabeg, and there, after a lingering illness, borne with the most edifying patience and resignation, he passed to the reward of his services for his Master. May he rest in peace.

◆ The Mungret Annual, 1908

Obituary

Father James Murphy SJ

Two special friends of Mungret have been, during the past year, called to their reward. These were Rev Francis Daly SJ, who died at Rhyl, N Wales, 17th October, 1907; and Rev Jas Murphy SJ, who died at Tuliabeg, Ireland, March, 1908.

Although Rev James Murphy SJ, never belonged to the Mungret staff, he was very well known to very many of the Mungret pupils of both schoois, in whom he always showed a lively interest.

During his career as · Provincial of the Irish Province SJ (1900-1905), he proved himself a steadfast and powersul friend of the College, to which he rendered great and far-reaching services; and after that time, when he again resumed his old post of Master of Novices in Tullabeg, he still retained a deep interest in Mungret. The Past pupils of Mungret who knew him, and upon whom his imposing personality and extraordinary abilities did not fail to make a deep impression, will learn with regret of his untimely death. His illness was protracted, and his death, which he himself had long desired, was the death of a saint. RIP

Manning, Denis, 1848-1924, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/241
  • Person
  • 03 August 1848-14 July 1924

Born: 03 August 1848, Dingle, County Kerry
Entered: 10 September 1867, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 1885, St Beuno’s, St Asaph, Wales
Final Vows: 15 August 1888, St Francis Xavier’s, Gardiner Street
Died: 14 July 1924, Mount Saint Evin’s Hospital, Melbourne

Part of the St Patrick’s College, Melbourne, Australia community at the time of death

Brother of Thomas Manning = RIP 1893 South Africa

by 1870 out of community caring for health
by 1878 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) studying
by 1879 at Stonyhurst England (ANG) studying
by 1883 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) studying
Came to Australia 1889

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Brother of Thomas Manning - RIP 1893
He made his Philosophy and Theology studies in England and Regency at Tullabeg teaching.
1887 He was Minister of Juniors at Milltown.
1888 He was appointed Socius to the Master of Novices at Dromore whilst making his Tertianship at the same time.
He then sailed for Australia where he was stationed at St Aloysius teaching.
1896 He taught at both Xavier College Kew and St Patrick’s Melbourne.
He worked at St Patrick’s Melbourne up to the time of his death 14 July 1924
He was a very earnest Jesuit.

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Denis Manning's early education was at Clongowes Wood College, Ireland, where he was a boarder until he was nineteen years of age. He entered the Society, 10 September 1867, and his ecclesiastical studies were done in Ireland and England, 1879-86. His regency was at Tullabeg College, 1880-82, and he was minister of the scholastics, teaching rhetoric at Milltown Park, 1886-87, before his tertianship, while being socius to the master of novices, at Dromore, 1887-88.
He arrived in Australia in December 1888, and was assigned to St Aloysius' College, 1889-92, teaching for the public examinations. He taught Latin, Greek and French to senior students at Riverview, 1892-95, and at Xavier College, 1895-03. He was prefect of studies from 1897.
His final appointment was to St Patrick’s College, East Melbourne, 1904-24, where he was prefect of studies, 1904-10 and 1923-24. He was also a mission consulter, 1904-16. He was
heavily involved in pastoral work all his working life, but he rarely appeared in the pulpit. If he did, it was not enjoyed. He shunned publicity. His focus was the private chapel and the classroom.
Manning's life was busy, regular and hidden to all except his colleagues and students, and those to whom he gave retreats. He devoted his life to teaching. He taught for 44 years, 36 of them in Australia. He was extremely conservative in his tastes and could hardly be said to bristle with new ideas. He was a bright and lively person in recreation and a good listener. Although inclined to serious reading - even during vacations - he enjoyed a good joke. He was a man of iron will. If he made a plan or undertook a task, he executed it to the last detail. No flights of imagination or temptations to do other work ever deflected him from his purpose.
Although deferent to the voice of authority, he never lightly undertook a new obligation. He was a man to rely on, highly efficient, performing his duties with scrupulous exactitude. He never wavered. He rose every morning at 5.30 am, even when unwell, and was most faithful to his spiritual duties. He had great devotion to the saints. In sickness in later years, he was never heard to complain, working hard until he could physically cope no more. He was content with his approaching death that came suddenly at Mount St Evan’s Hospital.
Apart from teaching, Manning was appreciated for his retreats to nuns. He was always the student, and loved study. Intellectual life was what drew him to the Society - special interests were the ancient classics and professional studies. He thought of himself as a “labourer in the vineyard”, and that is what he was.

◆ The Xaverian, Xavier College, Melbourne, Australia, 1924

Obituary

Father Denis Manning SJ

In Melbourne, on the evening of 9th July, Father Manning died in Mount St Evin's Hospital. His death removes from the ranks of the schoolmasters a highly efficient, very interesting, and somewhat unusual personality. He may be said to have died in harness. He died within a month of his seventy-seventh year, and with the exception of the few weeks spent in hospital, he was doing his usual full work to the end.

His busy and regular, life was a hidden one. He was practically unknown - except to his colleagues and his pupils, to the fairly numerous priests who came to him for confession, and to the religious communities to which he gave retreats. Beyond these he was almost unknown.

I imagine he must have preached in his day an occasional sermon - a few words from the altar at Mass - and no doubt he gave regular instruction for over forty years to sodalists and to religious communities, but I cannot recall an instance of his appearance in a pulpit. I daresay he appeared there occasionally, long ago, but if he did I am quite sure he did not enjoy it. : He shunned publicity. His work was in the private chapel and in the classroom.

His full and useful, but uneventful life is, therefore, easily summed up. His early education was at Clongowes Wood College, Ireland, where has was a boarder till his nineteenth year. Then he entered the Society of Jesus. His training in the religious life, as well as his philosophical, theological, and other studies, mainly in England and Ireland, occupied twelve or thirteen years; in teaching he spent forty-four years, thirty-six of which were in Australia; principally in Melbourne.

Like most of his colleagues he disliked office and preferred to serve in the ranks. He was never burdened with the dignity or responsibilities of rectorship, but at Xavier for six years (ending 1903), and at St Patrick's for a much longer period, he was entrusted with the exacting duties of Prefect of Studies, Father Pidcock, so well-known to many generations of Xaverians as an original “character”, used to maintain, and some times remarked it to the present writer, who was Prefect of Studies at the time, that of all the Prefects of Studies known to him, Father Manning was the best of the lot. I suspect that Father Pidcock's admiration was not unconnected with the fact that Fr Manning; more than others, gave him a fair amount of rope for his choir practices and for his appalling concerts. Certainly Fr Manning discharged his duties as Prefect of Studies with success and with scrupulous exactitude, but he was a happy man when he was allowed to return to the ranks.

From his boyhood he was a steady student and loved study. He told me once that it was his love for study which, among other things, impelled him to seek admission into the Society of Jesus. Yet outside of the ancient classics and his professional studies his course of reading was not very varied. He read many books dealing with religious and ascetical questions but not many dealing with the lighter forms of literature, He was extremely conservative in his tastes and could hardly be said to bristle with new ideas. In time of recreation he was bright and lively, talked a good deal and was an interested listener to ordinary small talk, and moreover, though a very serious man, he had his jokes - yes, a fair number of them; but I doubt if in thirty years he added a new joke to his repertoire. Constant to an exceptional degree, he clung, even in the department of wit and humour, to old and tried friends.

Though he had a vigorous constitution, I doubt if, even as a boy, he ever played more football or cricket than he could possibly avoid. I have heard it said on good authority that as a young man he excelled at handball, That may be, but I find it hard to imagine him excelling at that or any other game, for, though firm on his feet and a strong walker in his younger days, his movements were never lively and he was awkward with his hands. At all events, his interest in sport seemed entirely limited to the school contests. Once, indeed, in a moment of inadvertent levity, he quoted from a boxing correspondent in a newspaper about some terrific wallop with which one exponent of the fistic art had put another to sleep. The exact words were, “a pile-driver to the bread basket”, and it was plain that Fr Manning, being totally inexperienced in the vivid literature of the ring, required a certain effort even to pronounce such unaccustomed language. One of his younger colleagues thereupon seized upon this incautious utterance as a pretext for assuming that Fr Manning took an intense interest in the “noble art”, and on the strength of this entirely false assumption used to retell to him the most excruciating details of the latest encounters. Fr Manning used to listen in polite but agonising silence, till one day he nearly jumped a foot off his chair when his colleague, reading something from the sporting columns of the newspaper, in formed the gathering that “Creamy” Pinkerton (or some such name) had polished off “Pinky” Tomkinson with Father Manning's favourite “punch to the bread-basket!”

Though Fr. Manning had intellectual gifts beyond the average, and as we have seen, was also exceptionally fond of books, he took little interest in novel speculations. He kept to the beaten track. Last year I dropped into his room one day in the holidays and found him reading Fabiola. I shrink from guessing how many times he must have read it since his boyhood. On another free day some years ago I called on him and found him quietly enjoying the second book of Virgil's “Aeneid”. His recreative reading was not unduly light nor ultra-modern.

In Father Manning will-power predominated over intellect. He had an iron will. If he made a plan or undertook a task, he executed it to the last detail. No flights of imagination or temptations to do other work ever deflected him from his purpose. He kept the goal before his mind, and he saw to it that he got there. Apart from deference to the voice of authority, he never lightly undertook a new obligation; but if he did, you might be perfectly sure that he would see it through. He was a man to rely on. He never wavered. He was a man who could look over a period of fifteen or twenty years and not recall a single morning when he remained a second in bed after the call at 5.30, He might have a headache or other ailment, but he simply “got up”. I venture to say that in forty years he never missed a quarter of an hour of the spiritual duties appointed by his rule. He had the heroic fidelity of the saints.

It was clear to others that in recent years his health was not good, but he never spoke a word of his health, never in his life complained, and he consistently refused proffered alleviations. Though extremely grateful for offered help, he always declined it. When I was his superior for a few years, I was in a position to know more than others about his ailments, and I had good reason to wonder at his constancy and patience. He had no fear whatever of death and no wish whatever to live unless he could keep in harness, Constitutionally Father Manning could never be among the unemployed. The limbs might be unwilling, but the strong will was always able to drive them to the task. And till close on his seventy-seventh year that task was always done with wonderful thoroughness.

During the vacation last summer he badly needed a rest, but among other works which he undertook during the recess he gave an eight-day retreat to the Sisters of Charity at Essendon. During the retreat he was far from well and seemed constantly on the point of a break-down, Indeed, he suffered much pain. The Sisters begged him to desist, but he insisted on making the effort and went through the whole retreat with its thirty-two lectures. The Sisters, who were greatly impressed by the retreat, expressed the opinion that Fr Manning would never give another. It was a prophecy justified by events. He returned to St Patrick's very unwell. Even at the end of the holidays he was clearly unfit for a serious effort, but he insisted on making it. When schools were resumed he went on with his usual work till the middle of the year. Then, in great pain he had to retire to Mount St Evin's. On the evening of 9th July he was dead. And his death was that of a true man, a hero, and a saint. May he rest in peace!

At the end of the Requiem Mass at St. Ignatius Church, Richmond, His Grace, Dr Mannix, paid the following tribute, which sums up with perfect accuracy the life of Father Manning:

“For close upon forty years Father Manning has been working continuously in the Jesuit schools of Australia. Outside his own Society his name has been rarely heard. But the fathers who were associated with him and the boys who passed through his classes know the holiness of his life and the value and thoroughness of his work. He was indeed a man of God in our midst, a man whose whole life was filled with work and prayer. . His work itself was a prayer, and he seemed to be always united to God in a remarkable manner. For years he suffered a good deal, and yet he was always at his post and no one ever heard him utter a word of complaint. A few weeks ago he found he could hold out no longer and he went to the hospital knowing, I think, that his end had come. In his last days his suffering was great, but he bore it with the patience and calmness and resignation which had marked his whole life. His work and his sufferings are over, and he has, we may be sure, entered to his reward”.

E BOYLAN SJ

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Denis Manning (1848-1924)

A native of Dingle, was admitted to the Society in 1867 and ordained in 1885 at St Beuno's in Wales. He spent three years of his regency at the Crescent, 1874-77. In 1889, Father Manning was transferred to the Australian mission. He laboured at Sydney as master and minister until 1897 when he took up duty as prefect of studies at St Francis Xavier's, Kew, Melbourne where he remained for the next seven years. In 1904 began his long association with St Patrick's, Melbourne where he was many years prefect of studies. At the time of his death, Father Manning was entering on his forty-fourth year as master in the colleges, a record almost unique in the Society.

Maher, Thomas, 1859-1917, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1659
  • Person
  • 29 September 1859-27 March 1917

Born: 29 September 1859, Paulstown, County Kilkenny
Entered: 09 September 1876, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 1892
Final Vows: 02 February 1897, Sacred Heart College SJ, Limerick
Died: 27 March 1917, Willesden, England

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.
Older Brother of Martin Maher - RIP 1942
Early education at St Stanislaus College SJ, Tullabeg

by 1896 at Vienna Austria (ASR-HUN) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Came from a very respected family and two sons were in the Jesuits. A younger brother Martin was in the Society - RIP 1942.

Early education was at Carlow College and later at Tullabeg under William Delany.

he did his Philosophy and Theology at Milltown, and also did Regency at Clongowes, Belvedere.
After Tertianship under Father Bulow at Vienna, he was at Crescent, and became Vice-Rector.
1897 He was appointed Rector at Crescent 01 November 1897, and continued in that role until March 1902. During his rectorship he erected a new facade on the Church, purchased the magnificent bell and tried to improve the schools in Limerick.
He was on the Mission Staff for a while and then joined the Gardiner St community. He spent many years there and was particularly successful in his Catechism classes.
1914 Towards the middle of this year he began to show signs of failing health. He went for a short time to London as a Military Chaplain.
He returned to Ireland and took charge of the Public retreats.
Continuing to suffer poor health it was recommended that he go to Petworth in Sussex. He went from there to Willesden in London, and he died there 27 March 1917. His brother, Martin said the requiem Mass.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commonality

Father Thomas Maher (1859-1917)

Brother of the preceding (Martin), entered the Society in 1876. He spent three years of his regency here, 1876-89 and returned later as prefect of studies in 1894. He was appointed vice-rector of the college in 1897 and later, rector, which office he held until 1902. From that year until his death, Father Maher was a member of the Gardiner St community.

MacErlean, John C, 1870-1950, Jesuit priest, historian and archivist

  • IE IJA J/462
  • Person
  • 15 February 1870-24 March 1950

Born: 15 February 1870, Belfast, County Antrim
Entered: 28 September 1888, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1904
Final Vows: 15 August 1907, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 24 March 1950, Milltown Park, Dublin

Brother of Andrew MacErlean - LEFT 1908

by 1893 at Exaeten College, Limburg, Netherlands (GER) studying
by 1895 at St Aloysius, Jersey Channel Islands (FRA) studying
by 1906 at Manresa, Spain (ARA) making Tertianship
by 1925 at Rome, Italy (ROM) writing Province History

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online :
MacErlean, John Campbell (Mac Fhir Léinn, Eoin)
by Vincent Morley

MacErlean, John Campbell (Mac Fhir Léinn, Eoin) (1870–1950), Irish-language scholar and church historian, was born 15 February 1870 in Belfast, son of Andrew MacErlean, legal clerk, and Eliza MacErlean (née Campbell). Having attended St Malachy's College, Belfast, he entered the Jesuit novitiate at Tullabeg, King's Co. (1888), and graduated with a BA from the Royal University (1892). After further study on the Continent he returned to Ireland and taught classics and four modern languages (Irish, French, Italian, and German) at Clongowes Wood College, Co. Kildare, for six years. His colleagues at Clongowes included Fr Patrick Dinneen (qv), and MacErlean has been credited with arousing the latter's interest in Irish.

MacErlean showed an interest in Irish as early as 1887 when he collected phrases while on a brief visit to Rathlin Island, although it was not until 1895 that he published this material. He was elected to the Gaelic League's central branch in 1899 and his first scholarly work, an edition of the poetry of Geoffrey Keating (qv), appeared in 1900. After his ordination in 1904 he completed his religious training at Barcelona, where he also acquired a knowledge of Spanish. On his return to Ireland he began to research his most important work, an edition of the poetry of Dáibhí Ó Bruadair (qv) that appeared in three volumes between 1910 and 1917. In the same period he assisted his fellow Jesuit Edmund Hogan (qv) in the preparation of Onomasticon Goedelicum, an index to Irish placenames that was published in 1910. MacErlean was also drawn towards church history: in 1912 he edited seven poems addressed to Eoin Ó Cuileanáin, bishop of Raphoe (1629–c.1658) in the first volume of Archivium Hibernicum; in 1914 his study of the synod of Ráith Bressail, based on the evidence of Keating's Foras feasa ar Éirinn, appeared in the same journal; for many years he was a frequent reviewer of books on church history for Studies; and in 1939 he argued in Analecta Bollandiana that the ‘Silva Focluti’ mentioned in the Confessio of St Patrick (qv) should be identified with modern Magherafelt. Charged by his superiors with the task of collecting materials for a history of the Irish province of the Society of Jesus, he spent two years researching the subject in the archives of Italy, Spain, and Portugal and compiled copious notes, but the history remained unwritten at his death. He also researched the history of the Irish Sisters of Mercy, and the material he collected was used by a biographer of Catherine McAuley (qv).

MacErlean taught theology in the Jesuit novitiate at Milltown Park, Dublin, for twenty-five years and continued to live there until the end of his life. He died in Dublin on 24 March 1950.

‘Irish in Rathlin’, Irisleabhar na Gaedhilge, Dec. 1895, 140; Roland Burke Savage, Catherine McAuley: the first Sister of Mercy (1949), p. ix; Ir, Independent, 25 Mar. 1950; Proinsias Ó Conluain and Donncha Ó Céileachair, An Duinníneach (1958), 102–5; Hayes, Sources: periodicals, iii, 460–62; F. X. Martin and F. J. Byrne, The scholar revolutionary (1973), 317; Aubrey Gwynn, ‘A forgotten Irish theologian’, Studies, xliii (1974), 259; Beathaisnéis, iii (1992), 53

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 25th Year No 3 1950

Obituary

Fr. John MacErlean (1870-1888-1950)

Fr. John MacErlean was born in Belfast on 15th February, 1870: and was educated at St. Malachy's College. He entered the noviceship at Tullabeg 28th September, 1888, and graduated in the Royal University in 1892. He did philosophy at Exaten in Holland and in Jersey. He taught for six years in Clongowes. He did theology in Milltown Park and was ordained 31st July, 1904; Tertianship followed, in Barcelona.
As a young man he collaborated with Fr. E. Hogan in the compilation of the standard work on Irish place names. He worked for two years in the libraries and archives of Italy, Spain and Portugal. He devoted many years of strenuous research to the promotion of the cause of the Irish martyrs.
For twenty-five years he was Professor in Milltown Park.
He published scholarly editions of the works of Keating and O'Bruadair for the Irish Texts Society, and contributed many articles to “Analecta Bollandiana”, “Gaelic Journal”, “Archivum Hibernicum”, “Studies” and “Irish Monthly”. He supplied much of the matter for other historical writers.

An Appreciation :
In the old Gaelic economy there was a class of men called fir leighinn: men of learning, professors, lectors. From these Fr. John MacErlean got a surname of which he was proud and to which he brought honour.
Father MacErlean was a versatile man, He excelled not only in the usual studies of the Society, but in much else. It is doubtful whether any one of our time had such a comprehensive and accurate knowledge of the language, history and literary monuments of Gaelic Ireland. He was an admirable Latin and Greek scholar. He knew Sanskrit and Hebrew, and among modern languages, German, French and Spanish. He had a special gift for languages. He was not, perhaps, specially fluent in speaking, though the writer remembers his free German spoken in the Roman Forum to a lady who sought information about a monument. It is a little difficult to define in what his power lay. He seemed to reverse the conventional direction in language study which is to work from the periphery to the centre. He appeared to begin at the centre and proceed outwards. Even a Cursory examination of his editions of Keating and O Bruadair attests the power and accuracy of his scholarship in a domain in which he had to depend on his own resources and could not with impunity fall below the exacting standards of Irish textual studies.
For many years Fr. MacErlean taught Church History in Milltown Park. He specialised in the History of the Irish Church and of the Irish Province of the Society. In the former domain he had few peers, in the latter none. He devoted much time and labour to collecting and collating materials for Irish hagiography, for Irish Causes for Beatification, in particular for the Cause of Mother Catherine McAuley, Foundress of the Sister's of Mercy. We have heard it reported that an ecclesiastical judge acclaimed him as an incomparable witness before such tribunals.
But the quality of Fr. MacErlean's learning was even more remark able than its range. His mind was acutely critical not only in professional subjects, but in the discussion of current topics or of a newspaper report. It was also very exact. He was impatient of approximations and of loose generalities. He acquired the scholastic genius for bringing the question at issue to the test of the simple proposition with subject and predicate clearly defined. He had considerable dialectical skill and could defend his views with great ingenuity. He enjoyed nothing better on a rustication evening that defending some unpopular cause against all comers. He had a natural attraction for difficult studies and problems, and was never satisfied until he had got to the root of a question or reached the prime sources. He had a bent for establishing indices and vocabularies. The index to Migne in the Milltown Library is his, so is a vocabulary to the Writings of St. Patrick, so, too, is a valuable glossary of words and phrases from old Irish Texts. Apart from the daily paper he had little or no interest in ephemeral literature, but there was no new publication of scholarly interest which escaped his attention.
Fr. MacErlean's production in later years did not answer common expectation. We are the poorer for want of a history of the Province from one who wrote well and had a unique knowledge of the sources. As an offset to this loss we may notice that the Archives are the richer for the mass of historical material which he collected for others to exploit. Further, it may be fairly contended that the less he published over his own name in later years, the more he helped and inspired others to write. He was constantly reviewing some MS at the author's request, providing references and reading lists, solving historical and textual problems. He gave freely of his learning and time to many, and the annotations which he wrote in his neat legible hand in answer to a question were a model of accuracy and relevancy,
In fine Father MacErlean was a scholar of the first rank, not surpassed in his own field by any contemporary and worthy of a place among the eminent Irish scholars of the New and Old Society.
So far we have dealt with Fr. MacErlean's academic achievements. Of other things we must speak briefly. He was a man of strong character and uncompromising opinions strongly held on many subjects. He defended them in a spirit of independence and with great moral courage, though without rancour or bitterness. For all his learning he was the most modest and simple of men. He had a special charism for the direction of religious women. Communities to whom he had given the Exercises in his youth were still asking him twenty and thirty years later. He was much consulted by convents of the Dublin district, Nor should we omit to record his apostolate over many years in Donnybrook Convent. Only those who have met the sisters in charge could credit the amazing influence and power for good which he exercised over the penitents.
Not so long ago Fr. MacErlean told the writer that every night he recited a Gaelic quatrain which dedicates lying down to sleep as lying down to die. This was one of the rare and fugitive glimpses of the inner life of a great and good man who was not given to self-revelation, Ar Dheis De go raibh a anam.

Kenny, Peter, 1851-1912, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1530
  • Person
  • 10 August 1851-19 July 1912

Born: 10 August 1851, Tullamore, County Offaly
Entered: 29 September 1869, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 1884 Leuven, Belgium
Final Vows 02 February 1889, Coláiste Iognáid SJ, Galway
Died: 19 July 1912, Ms Quinn’s Hospital, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street community at the time of death.

Younger Brother Timothy was Provincial - RIP 1917; Uncle of Paddy Kenny - RIP 1973

by 1872 at Roehampton London (ANG) Studying
by 1873 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) studying
by 1874 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1875 at Stonyhurst England (ANG) studying
by 1882 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1888 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He was of a very old Catholic family in Tullamore. His older brother Timothy had been Provincial - RIP 1917

After First Vows He taught at Clongowes, and also studied Philosophy and Theology at Louvain, where he was Ordained.
After Teritianship he was sent to Galway, where he showed great talents as a Preacher.
1894 He was sent to Gardiner St.
1903 He returned to Galway as Operarius. He was soon in failing health and died there 10 July 1912 having been removed to Ms Quinn’s Hospital, Mountjoy Square beforehand.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Peter Kenny (1851-1912)

Brother of a former Provincial, Father Timothy Kenny, was born near Tullamore and entered the Society in 1872. Shortly after his ordination, Father Kenny was appointed to the Crescent but remained here only two years, 1885-87. With the exception of eight years, 1894-1902, the remainder of his religious life was spent at St Ignatius, Galway. He died in Dublin after a brief illness.

Jones, Daniel, 1816-1869, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/454
  • Person
  • 01 February 1816-02 June 1869

Born: 01 February 1816, Banada Abbey, County Sligo
Entered: 15 May 1844, Hodder, Stonyhurst, England - Angliae Province (ANG)
Ordained: 1852, St Beuno's, Wales
Final vows: 02 February 1860
Died: 02 June 1869, Milltown Park, Dublin

Older brother of James - RIP 1893; Cousin of Nicholas Gannon - RIP 1882

First Irish Province Novice Master 1860-1864

by 1847 in Clongowes
by 1851 at Laval (FRA) studying Theology
by 1854 Teaching at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG)
by1859 at St Eusebio, Rome Italy (ROM) making Tertianship
by 1860 Mag Nov at Milltown

◆ Fr Edmund Hogan SJ “Catalogica Chronologica” :
Son of Daniel and Maria née MacDonnell (daughter of Miles of Carnacon, Co Mayo). Brother of James RIP 1893 Loyola, Guipúzkoa, Spain

Early education and Prior Park, Bath, then Louvain and Trinity College Dublin. On his father’s death he succeeded to the family estate, became a magistrate and deputy-lieutenant for Sligo, and was once put in nomination to represent the County in Parliament. Growing weary of the world, he determined to consecrate himself to God in the Society of Jesus, joining the Irish Vice-Province, and his Noviceship was at Hodder, 15 May 1844, aged 28.

1846-1847 After First Vows he taught Grammar at Clongowes.
1847-1851 He then studied Philosophy and some Theology at Laval, and the finished his Theology at St Beuno’s, being Ordained there.
1852 Appointed Socius to the Novice Master at Hodder, while completing his Tertianship at the same time.
1854-1857 Professor of Moral Theology at St Beuno’s, and then taught the short course in Hebrew, whilst acting as Spiritual Father.
1857-1858 Sent to Gardiner St as a Missioner, but soon left for Rome, having got permission to make a second Tertianship, since the first was too much interrupted at Hodder.
1859 Sent to Milltown as Minister
1860-1864 Having taken Final Vows, he was appointed Rector of Milltown and the first HIB Master of Novices, the Vice-Province having been raised to a full Province in 1860.
1864 He was succeeded by Joseph Lentaigne, so he became Spiritual Father at Milltown, and Director of the Spiritual Exerecises to externs, whilst at the same time being Socius to the Provincial.
1869 He died a holy death at Milltown 02 June 1869 Milltown aged 53. A full account of his sickness and death appeared in “Letters & Notices” Vol vi, pp 172 seq :
“Father Jones was a profound Theologian, and deeply versed in Canon Law, and was consulted with very great confidence by many persons far and near. is varied talents were enhanced by a singular humility, a most amiable disposition and a childlike simplicity, and he could never be brought to look upon himself as fit for any post of honour or responsibility. Death alone had anticipated his knowledge of the fact that he had been appointed Provincial”.

He was thrice elected Procurator to represent the Irish Province in Rome : 1860, 1863 and 1868.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Daniel Jones 1816-1869
Fr Daniel Jones was born at Benada Abeey County Sligo on February 1st 1916. He made his classical and higher studies at Prior Park, the University of Louvain and Trinity College Dublin. On the death of his father he succeeded to the family estate, and became a magistrate and deputy-lieutenant for Sligo. Growing weary of the world, he entered the Society at Hodder in 1844 for the Irish Province.

In 1850 he was made Socius to the Master of Novices at Hodder, while doing his tertianship at the same time. In 1857-1858 he was a Missioner at Gardiner Street, but soon left for Rome, having obtained leave to make a second tertianship, due to the interruptions of the first one. He was then appointed first Rector of Milltown Park and Master of Novices.

In 1864 he was succeeded as Rector by Fr Lentaigne, he himself becoming Spiritual Father and Director of retreats. Three times successively he was elected Procurator to represent the Irish Province in Rome. He was a holy man, and also the author that handy little booklet on the Morning Oblation. He was so humble in himself that he never considered himself fit for any post of responsibility. Death alone anticipated his knowledge of the fact that he had been appointed Provincial.

He died a holy death at Milltown Park, June 2nd 1869.

Gwynn, William, 1865-1950, Jesuit priest and chaplain

  • IE IJA J/1397
  • Person
  • 17 March 1865-22 October 1950

Born: 17 March 1865, Youghal, County Cork
Entered: 20 October 1883, Milltown Park Dublin; Dromore, County Down
Ordained: 29 July 1900, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1903
Died: 22 October 1950, Milltown Park, Dublin

First World War Chaplain

Older brother of John - RIP 1915

by 1888 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1890 at Exaeten College Limburg, Netherlands (GER) studying
Came to Australia 1902
by 1902 at Linz Austria (ASR) making Tertianship
by 1919 Military Chaplain : 8th Australian Infantry Brigade, AIF France

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
William Gwynn’s father was a military man and had been transferred to Galway by the time that William and his younger brother John (who also entered the Society) were ready for their schooling. Both boys were educated at St Ignatius' College Galway. Gwynn entered the Society at Milltown Park, 20 October 1883, and studied rhetoric as a junior up to II Arts at the Royal University while living at Milltown Park, 1885-87. Philosophy was at Louvain and Exaeten. 1887-90, and regency at Belvedere Clongowes, and Mungret, 1890-97. Theology followed at Milltown Park. 1897-1901 After tertianship at Linz, Austria, 1901-02 with his brother John, Gwynn, he was sent to Australia where he taught at Riverview, St Aloysius' College and St Patrick's College, 1902-11, before engaging in parish ministry at Sevenhill, 1911-13, and Norwood 1913-17. He taught for a further few years at St Patrick’s College 1917-18, before becoming a military chaplain of the 8th Infantry Brigade AIF, 1918-20, travelling to Egypt, France and Germany. Gwynn returned to Ireland after the war and taught philosophy and mathematics at Mungret. He was later in charge of the People's Church at Clongowes until 1930, and then performed rural missionary work retreats with great vigor and success throughout the country, a ministry he enjoyed while in Australia. In 1930 he was transferred to parish work at Gardiner Street until 1944. In earlier he was in charge of the Night Workers' Sodality. For the last six years of his life he was attached to Milltown Park, living in great cheer and contentment, praying for the Society.
The Irish Province News, January 1951, described Gwynn as an original character. In whatever company he found himself he became the centre of interest by his wit and personality. He was extraordinarily outspoken and frank in his remarks about others and himself. He never made any secret about his own plans and projects. At first sight, he might have been seen as egotistical or cynical or a man who had shed many of the kindly illusions about human nature. But much of that frankness was part of his sense of humor and a pose, it helped to make him interesting and to amuse. He was not a man to give his best in ordinary, every day work. He wanted change and variety. He liked to plough a lonely furrow a man of original mind, who had his very personal way of looking at people and things. He had all the gifts of a preacher - appearance, voice, personality, an original approach to any subject, and a gift for a striking, arresting phrase. His retreats were memorable for their freshness and originality. As a confessor some respected him for being broad, sympathetic and understanding.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 26th Year No 1 1951

Milltown Park :
We regret to record the death, on. Oct. 22nd, of Milltown's Grand Old Man, Father William Gwynn. Only a few days before we had celebrated the Golden Jubilee of his priesthood and heard a message from him, wire-recorded in his sickroom.

Obituary :
Father William Gwynn
Fr. Gwynn, who died after a brief illness at Milltown Park on 22nd October, was born at Youghal, Co. Cork, on the 17th March, 1865. His father was a military man and had been transferred to Galway by the time that William and his younger brother John (who also entered the Society) were ready for their schooling. So, it was at St. Ignatius' College in that city that they both received their education. William entered the noviceship at Milltown Park on 20th October, 1883, and had Fr. William O’Farrell for Master of Novices and also for Superior when the new novitiate at Dromore was opened in May of the following year. He took his Vows at Milltown Park on 1st November, 1885, and studied rhetoric up to II Arts at the Royal University. He went to Louvain and Exaten (in Holland) for his philosophy, 1887-90, and in the latter year began his Colleges. He taught for six years at Belvedere, Clongowes and Mungret, in that order, and then studied theology at Milltown Park, where he was ordained on 29th July by Dr. William Walsh, Archbishop of Dublin. After his fourth year's theology he went, with his brother Fr. John, to Linz in Austria for his tertianship. In the autumn of 1902 Fr, William was sent to Australia, where he taught at Riverview, Sydney, for a year and then at St. Aloysius for six and at St. Patrick's, Melbourne, for two years. He was operarius at Sevenhill 1910-12 and at Norwood Residence for the following four years when he had charge of the men's sodality and the confraternity of “Bona Mors”. When at St. Patrick's, Melbourne, as master and operarius in 1918, he was appointed chaplain to the 8th Australian Infantry Brigade and travelled with his men to Egypt, France and Germany. He was not “demobbed” till 1920, and thereafter remained in the Province. For the next two years Fr. Gwynn was philosophy and mathematics master at Mungret College and then went to Clongowes, where he had charge of the People's Church till 1930. During this period he conducted retreats with great vigour and success up and down the country, a ministry to which he had devoted himself zealously when in Australia.
In 1930 Fr. William was transferred to Gardiner Street and was operarius till 1944. For the first dozen years of this period he was also in charge of the Night Workers' Sodality, in which he took a great interest. For the last six years of his life he was attached to Milltown Park, where he lived in great cheer and contentment, discharging his task of “orans pro Societate” agreeably and, we may well hope, fruitfully. Two days before his death a graceful tribute to him appeared in the papers on the occasion of the golden jubilee of his Ordination to the priesthood.
Fr. Gwynn was emphatically a character, an original. In whatever company he found himself, he became at once the centre of interest by his wit and personality. He was extraordinarily outspoken and frank in his remarks about others and himself. He never made any secret about his own plans and projects, about those little manifestations of self-interest which most people keep discreetly veiled. He was equally frank and outspoken about others. At first sight, one would think him egotistical, or cynical, or a man who had shed many of the kindly illusions about human nature. But much of that frankness was part of his sense of humour and a pose. It helped to make him interesting and to amuse.
He was not a man to give his best in ordinary, hum-drum, every clay work. He wanted change and variety; lie liked to plough a lonely furrow. He was a man of original mind, who had his own very personal way of looking at people and things. He had all the gifts of a preacher, appearance, voice, personality, a very original approach to any subject, and a gift of a striking, arresting phrase. His retreats, too, very memorable for their freshness and originality.
He was the least pharisaical of men. He aimed sedulously at concealing his solid piety and simple lively Faith. His rather disconcerting frankness, his trenchant wit, his talk about himself, were really a pose by which he tried to mask his spiritual inner self. It could not be said that he had a large spiritual following of people who looked to him for help. But what he missed in numbers was made up in quality and variety. It was well known that men of the world who got no help from other priests made Fr. Gwynn their confessor and friend. He was broad, sympathetic and understanding and no one knows the amount of good he did to those who came to depend on him. R.I.P

Gill, Henry V, 1872-1945, Jesuit priest, scientist and chaplain

  • IE IJA J/17
  • Person
  • 08 July 1872-27 November 1945

Born: 08 July 1872, Cabra, Dublin City
Entered: 17 April 1890, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 29 July 1906, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1911, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 27 November 1945, St Vincent's Nursing Home, Dublin

Part of the St Ignatius, Lower Leeson Street, Dublin community at the time of death

Younger brother of Frederick Gill - LEFT 1928

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

by 1896 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1908 at Oxford England (ANG) studying Science
by 1910 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship
by 1917 Military Chaplain : 2nd Royal Irish Rifles BEF France

◆ Jesuits in Ireland https://www.jesuit.ie/blog/damien-burke/a-sparrow-to-fall/

A sparrow to fall
Damien Burke
A BBC Northern Ireland documentary, Voices 16 – Somme (BBC 1 NI on Wednesday 29th June, 9pm) explores the events of 1916 through the testimony of the people who witnessed it and their families. Documentary makers and relatives of Jesuit chaplain Willie Doyle were shown his letters, postcards and personal possessions kept here at the Irish Jesuit Archives. In the 1920s, Alfred O’Rahilly used some of these letters in his biography of Fr Willie Doyle SJ. Afterwards they were given to Willie’s brother, Charles, and were stored for safekeeping in the basement of St Francis Xavier’s church, Lower Gardiner Street, Dublin in 1949. In 2011, they were accessioned into the archives. Fr Willie Doyle SJ was one of ten Irish Jesuits who served as chaplains at the battle of the Somme (1 July- 18 November 1916): seven with the British forces; three with the Australian. Their letters, diaries and photographs witness their presence to the horror of war.

Fr Henry Gill SJ, 2nd Royal Irish Rifles (11 July 1916):
Just a line to say I am still alive. We are of course, as always, “in it”...I have been in, and I feel I know more than I want about shells of all sizes and conditions. It is a horrible and squalid business. Trenches full of mud with bodies of dead Germans and British lying unburied all along. Please God it will end soon, and that we may be able to forgot it all as quickly as possible. Gill was tasked with writing to relatives of soldiers who had been killed. These letters followed a pattern, where the following were mentioned, even if false: a quick death, little suffering and recent reception to the sacraments. He only lived a few minutes after he was shot and can have suffered but little pain, He always went to Confession and Holy Communion before an attack, now you may therefore be at ease about him. The letter was written by Gill to Maggie Duffy of Belfast in September 1916. Her husband, John Duffy was killed at the battle of the Somme in July 1916. Your Husband lived a good life and died a Hero’s death, that will not make your sorrow less, but it will help you to bear it in resignation to God’s will, Who, does not even a allow a sparrow to fall without his Providence

https://www.jesuit.ie/blog/damien-burke/the-last-parting-jesuits-and-armistice/

The last parting: Jesuits and Armistice
At the end of the First World War, Irish Jesuits serving as chaplains had to deal with two main issues: their demobilisation and influenza. Some chaplains asked immediately to be demobbed back to Ireland; others wanted to continue as chaplains. Of the thirty-two Jesuits chaplains in the war, five had died, while sixteen were still serving.
Fr Henry Gill SJ, on leave on 10 November 1918 wrote:
In the mean time I had made arrangement for a trip of the greatest possible interest to myself. I was to be motored to Chaumout to get the train to Paris...and on the way I was to pay a visit to Domremy the birthplace of Joan of Arc. I looked forward to this visit with great pleasure. I had set out from Rouen, where the Saint was put to death, to begin my work at the front, and now after almost four years I was to visit her birthplace, and her Basilica, and to have the opportunity of making a pilgrimage to thank her for her protection during these years. For I had set out under her patronage. Fr Gill physically survived the war, but mentally, would suffer from what we call today post-traumatic stress, but in his time, was called nerves.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 1st Year No 3 1926
Fr Henry Gill has received a communication from the President of the French Republic thanking him for distinguished service during the late war.

Irish Province News 6th Year No 3 1931
Rathfarnham :
Our Minister, Fr. Henry Gill, has had the honour of being elected a member of the Royal Irish Academy.

Irish Province News 21st Year No 1 1946
Obituary :
Fr. Henry Gill (1872-1890-1945)
Fr. Henry Gill died very peacefully in St. Vincent's Nursing Home at 8.30 a.m. on Tuesday, November 27th, whilst Mass was being offered for his intentions by two or three of the Community, at Leeson Street, He had been ailing for the past six months with an internal trouble which was diagnosed as cancer of the liver, but he was mercifully spared any acute pain, and it was only in the last few days of his life that his heart began to show serious signs of weakness. Indeed he took an active interest in the routine of daily life throughout his illness, and three days before his death was still able to correct final page proofs of a small “Life of Saint Joseph” which he had written during the past year. At the foot of the last page of these proofs he wrote in a hand that was shaky, but still legible : “Saint Joseph, Patron of a Happy Death, pray for us”.
Fr. Gill was born at Roebuck House near Dublin on July 8th, 1872. He lived to be the eldest surviving son of the late H. J. Gill, formerly a member of the Irish Party and head of the well-known publishing firma of Messrs. M. H. Gill and Son, Ltd. His grandfather had been Lord Mayor of Dublin, and Fr. Gill was a staunchly loyal son of the city of Dublin throughout his long life. He was educated at first in a small day-school at No. 6 Harcourt Street, where Newman had formerly opened one of his Houses for resident students of the Catholic University. From this preparatory school Henry went to Clongowes, where he remained until the summer of 1889. He then spent some months as a student at old University College on St. Stephen's Green, and did not enter the novitiate until April of the following year. In later life he used to tell a humorous tale of the downcast young citizen of Dublin who journeyed by train and car to the Tullabeg of those far off days. His vocation, so he would argue, was a clear instance of the triumph of God's grace over every natural inclination! After two years in the Bog, Henry came back to the city and spent the next three years and a half at Milltown Park, where he was beadle of the Juniors and attended lectures at the old College in Mathematics and Science. Thence he went to Louvain for his Philosophy, 1895-8, where he was brought into contact with professors who were eager to explain traditional principles of philosophy in terms of modern science. On his return from Louvain Mr. Gill spent the next five years in the Colleges (Limerick, Galway and Clongowes), but gave little promise at this time of the distinctions that were to come to him in later life. He was indeed curiously unable to teach a straightforward class, even in his own favourite subjects, though he was later to display an exceptional gift for the exposition and quiet criticism of scientific principles. From 1903-7 he studied Theology in Milltown Park, and was ordained there by Archbishop Walsh on July 18th, 1906.
Fr. Gill was then granted permission by Fr. Conmee to study the Physical Sciences at Cambridge for the next two years. Professor J. J. Thompson was then organising the Cavendish Laboratories as a centre of world-famous scientific research, and Fr. Gill had the good fortune to be associated for a time with some of the men who were later to make history in the development of modern Physics. He never lost the memory of those happy days; and when his old Professor published his autobiography in 1936, Fr. Gill reviewed it in Studies under the well-chosen title : “Brave Days at Cambridge”. He was a student of Downing College, but resided in St. Edmund's House where he had the late Most Rev. Dr. McNulty, Bishop of Nottingham, as his friend and fellow-student. Fr. Gill's own interests were centred at this time on the problems of seismography, and he read a paper to the British Association in 1913 in which he put forward an ingenious theory to explain the distribution of earthquakes in time and space. He was also keenly interested in the development of Wireless Telegraphy - then in its initial stages - and was accustomed to give popular lectures in Dublin on this and kindred subjects. He attended many of the later annual meetings of the British Association, and was frequently invited to preach at some Catholic church during its sessions.
After his period at Cambridge Fr. Gill was sent to Tronchiennes in Belgium for his Tertianship. He was then stationed for three years in Belvedere, until he came to Rathfarnham Castle as its first Spiritual Father in 1913. A year later came the First Great War, and Fr. Gill. was one of the first to send in his name to Fr. Provincial as volunteering for work as Army Chaplain. His offer was accepted, and he spent the next four years in the trenches of Flanders, with no more interruption. than the customary short leaves from active service. Those who remember his visits to Rathfarnham during these intervals will recall the impression of a man who seemed strangely ill-assorted with military life. Yet the plain truth is that both officers and men of the regiment to which he was attached (Second Battalion of the Royal Irish Rifles) were devoted to him, and the gallantry with which he responded to every claim on his services during those four grim years of trench warfare is attested by the double award of Military Cross and Distinguished Service Order. One officer who was with him throughout those four years and who was present at his funeral spoke with real emotion of his memories. “He seemed like a lost soul wherever you met him”, was his comment, “but he was always there when wanted, and was afraid of no man”. His unfailing sense of humour and his great gifts of companionship made him a special favourite with the officers mess. But, to the end of his days, he was in touch with some of the men who bad served under him, and their letters revealed the same genuine affection for their old ‘Padre’.
After the war Fr. Gill came to University Hall for five years, where he assisted Fr. George Roche and Fr. Wrafter in their work for the students of University College, and was also able to continue for a. time his former research-work. But his vitality had been much lessened by the long experience of the war-years, and he soon abandoned active research-work. . He went as Minister to Belvedere College in 1923. Here he spent the next seven years, and became a very loyal Belvederian. He was then transferred as Minister for one year to Rathfarnham Castle. The last change came in 1931, when he joined the Leeson Street Community as their Fr. Minister and later as Spiritual Father. For the last fourteen years of his life it is no exaggeration to say that Fr. Gill's kindly personality and the stimulus of his conversation made community life a joy to many of his brethren. He was also, for many years past, a regular contributor to Studies, The Irish Monthly and the Irish Ecclesiastical Record. His contributions to the latter were published in book form in two small volumes entitled “Jesuit Spirituality” (1935) and “Christianity in Daily Life” (1942), both of them full of his characteristic common sense. A selection of the many essays on scientific topics which he had contributed to Studies, Thought and the Irish Ecclesiastical Record was issued by Messers. Gill and Son in 1943 under the excellent title “Fact and Fiction in Modern Science”. It was at once most favourably received both in England and Ireland. In the United States the impression made was so remarkable that Fordham University. undertook to produce a special American edition of this work, which was issued some months before Fr. Gill's death. He also published in 1941 a short biography of the celebrated Jesuit physicist, Fr. Roger Boscovich, which was no more than a brief sketch of a more ambitious work which he had planned for some years past, but was unable to complete owing to his failing, health. May he rest in peace.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Henry Gill 1872-1945
Fr Henry Gill was born at Roebuck House Dublin on July 8th 1872, son of HJ Gill, former Irish Party Member of Parliament, and head of the publishing firm, Gill’s O’Connell Street Dublin.

Henry was educated at Belvedere College and entered the Society in 1890, after a short period as a student at ‘6 St Stephen’s Green. In the course of his studies he displayed remarkable talent in science, and consequently, after his ordination, he was sent to Cambridge for tow years to study under Sir J Thompson.

On the outbreak of the First World War, he volunteered as a chaplain and served throughout the whole course. After the War he resided at University Hall for 5 years, and finally after various periods as Minister in various Houses, he settled down in Leeson Street for the rest of his life as Spiritual Father and writer.

He was a regular contributor to “Studies”, the “Irish Ecclesiastical Record” and the “Irish Monthly”. His published works include : “Jesuit Spirituality”, “Christianity in Daily Life”, “Fact and Fiction in Modern Science”. The latter book is still a favourite and enjoys a steady sale in the United States. He also published a biography of the celebrated Jesuit physicist Fr Boscovitch.

He died on November 27th 19456. He was a deeply religious man, with a remarkable sense of kindly humour, and his sayings at recreation and his stories are still recounted to the younger generation.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1946

Obituary

Father Henry Gill SJ

On Nov 27th, in St Vincent's Nursing Home, died very peacefully, Fr Henry Gill SJ. He was well known to many Belvederians and his passing means for them the loss of an esteemed friend.

From 1909-12 he was on the teaching staff here, and was also Director of the BVM Sodality. Then again from 1923-30 he was Minister, Director of the Sodality of the Holy Angels, and of the Conference of St Stanislaus. Those who were here during those years will well remember him for his kindly humour and deep spirituality.

A man of great gifts, and one who used them well and carefully, this quiet, unassuming man had a busy and an active life. After his earlier studies at Louvain, he studied at Cambridge from 1906-08, under Prof J J Thompson, at the Cavendish Laboratories.

Then came the Great War, and he was one of the first to volunteer as a chaplain. The war record of this quiet man will come as a revelation to many. He received, during these four years, the double award of DSO and MC, and his unfailing serise of humour and quiet gifts of companionship made him a special favourite with the men.

Still another side of his work was to be revealed in his later days - in his writings. He had been for many years quietly contributing to Studies, The Irish Monthly and The Irish Ecclesiastical Record. His contributions to the latter were published in book form in two small volumes entitled “Jesuit, Spirituality” (1935), and “Christianity in Daily Life” (1942), both of them full of his characteristic common sense. A selection of his many contributions on scientific subjects was issued in 1943 under the title, “Fact and Fiction in Modern Science”. Three days before his death, he corrected the final proofs of a small “Life of St. Joseph”. At the foot of the last page of these proofs he wrote in a hand that was shaky but still legible, - “St Joseph, patron of a Happy Death, pray for us”.

It was a fitting ending to a life which was to be crowned by a happy death. RIP

◆ The Clongownian, 1946

Obituary

Father Henry Gill SJ

Henry Gill was the second of the six sons of Mr H J Gill, JP, MA, head of the publishing firm of M H Gill & Son of Dublin. Katharine Tynan Hinkson wrote a delightful account of her friend Mrs Gill and of the family life at Roebuck House; it showed from what a good source was derived the charm which Fr Henry's many friends always found in him. All the boys went to Clongowes, and during the last two decades of the 19th century the name “Bottles” was in familiar and affectionate use; its origin, according to the legend, had something to do with the relation between a gill and a pottle, two antique measures of capacity which we were supposed to know something about.

Henry left Clongowes in 1889, and entered the novitiate at Tullabeg the following year, hating it but feeling he had to do it. Having to do it, he did it thoroughly, and after a very few years the stamp of the Society on him was unmistakeable. Fortunately, while it deepened the spiritual side of his character, it did not destroy or even diminish his exquisite sense of the comical, a source of continual surprise and delight to those he lived with.

After the usual round of studies and teaching, he was ordained at Milltown Park in 1906. During his studies he had shown particular aptitude for Physics, and as a Scholastic he read a paper (I think to the RDS), embodying the results of some ingenious research work. After his ordination he went to Cambridge, where he worked in the Cavendish Laboratory under J J Thomson and took his MA degree. It was the beginning of a new era in Physics, inaugurated chiefly by Thomson's theories and experiments. Fr Gill was profoundly interested, then and later, and his interest found expression in a number of articles in various journals. These articles formed the core of his book, “Fact and Fiction in Modern Science”, which appeared in 1943, and which was warmly received in England and America. An American edition was sponsored by Fordham University.

In 1913 he expounded to the British Association a new theory of the origin of earthquakes, which he supported by some very striking experiments. But in 1914, as soon as the war began, he offered his services as a chaplain, and served through the whole war. He was awarded the MC and the DSO, besides various foreign decorations; officers and men in the battalion to which he was attached testified to his heroic courage and devotion and his unfailing gaiety in the worst circumstances. I spoke to him once of this. He said: “Well, one made the offering of one's life at Mass in the morning, and then it didn't matter”. His deepest and most real interests were the eternal ones.

These interests found expression in his books, “Jesuit Spirituality”, “Christianity in Daily Life”, and “St Joseph”. This last was the theme of his meditation during the last two years of his life; indeed he finished it on his death-bed, and the invocation at the end, St Joseph, “patron. of a happy death, pray for us”,' was written by him just two days before he died, Death found him as cheerfully ready as life had always found him. May he rest in peace.

M F Egan SJ

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Henry Gill (1872-1945)

A native of Dublin and a member of the well-known publishing family, was educated at Clongowes and entered the Society in 1890. He pursued his higher studies at University College, Dublin, Louvain, and Milltown Park, where he was ordained in 1906, and Cambridge University. He spent one year of his regency at the Crescent, 1898-1899. Father Gill showed little aptitude for teaching in spite of his splendid intellectual gifts. He volunteered for a chaplaincy in the first world war and was many times decorated and mentioned in despatches. He wrote much on scientific subjects for learned reviews and was the author of three widely read spiritual books: Jesuit Spirituality, Christianity in Daily Life, St. Joseph.

Finlay, Thomas A, 1848-1940, Jesuit priest and economist

  • IE IJA J/9
  • Person
  • 06 July 1848-08 January 1940

Born: 06 July 1848, Lanesborough, County Roscommon
Entered: 01 November 1866, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 1880
Final Vows: 25 March 1885
Died: 08 January 1940, Linden Nuring Home, Dublin

Part of the St Ignatius, Lower Leeson Street, Dublin community at the time of death

Older brother of Peter Finlay - RIP 1929

by 1869 at Amiens France (CAMP) studying
by 1870 at Rome Italy (ROM) studying
by 1871 at Lacens College Germany (GER) Studying
by 1878 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) studying

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Note from Peter Finlay Entry
Early education was at St Patrick’s Cavan. Admitted aged 15 by Edmund J O’Reilly, Provincial and his brother Thomas A Finlay was a fellow novice.
Note from James Redmond Entry
He studied Rhetoric at St Acheul, Amiens with Michael Weafer, Thomas Finlay and Peter Finlay, Robert Kane and Vincent Byrne, among others.

See: Morrissey, T. J. (2004). Thomas A. Finlay: Educationalist, editor, social reformer, 1848-1940.

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online
Finlay, Thomas Aloysius
by Thomas J. Morrissey

Finlay, Thomas Aloysius (1848–1940) and Peter (1851–1929), Jesuit priests, scholars, and teachers, were born at Lanesborough, Co. Roscommon, sons of William Finlay, engineer, and Maria Finlay (née Magan), who had four other children: three daughters, all of whom became religious sisters, and a son William, who became secretary of Cavan county council. Tom and Peter were educated at St Augustine's diocesan college, Cavan (predecessor to St Patrick's College), and in 1866 both entered the novitiate of the Society of Jesus at Milltown Park, Dublin. Subsequently, they were sent for studies to St Acheul, near Amiens, after which they moved in somewhat different directions.

Thomas Finlay went (1869) to the Gregorian University, Rome, and thence, after Garibaldi's invasion, to Maria Laach where he was trained (1871–3) in modern scientific methods and was impressed by the new agricultural policy of the Prussian government, an experience he drew on in his later work. On his return to Ireland (1873) Tom joined his brother at the Crescent, Limerick, where he stayed till 1876, acting as headmaster as well as teaching German and French. He also found time to publish, under the pseudonym ‘Thomas Whitelock’, a best-selling novel, The chances of war, based on the life of Owen Roe O'Neill, which went through several editions. In addition he wrote pamphlets and was co-founder of the periodical Catholic Ireland, which became the influential Irish Monthly. In 1877 he went to St Beuno's for theology, and was ordained in 1880. His self-reliance, great energy, equable temper, and gifts for making and keeping friends were already in evidence, as also his prowess as a conversationalist and a fisherman. In 1881 he was placed in charge for a short time of St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, near Tullamore, before being entrusted with the joint task of rector of Belvedere College, Dublin (1882–7), and fellow of the RUI in classics. In 1883 he and Peter were appointed joint professors of philosophy at UCD. He occupied the chairs of philosophy (1883–1900) and political economy (1900–30). Hence his unusual distinction of professing in three different disciplines – classics, philosophy, and political economy. Like Peter, he was a highly successful lecturer, noted for his clarity of exposition, and popular also with the students for his human qualities and his policy of promoting responsibility and independence. At Belvedere he built a new wing and purchased additional playing fields, while at the same time reconstructing the philosophy programme of the Royal University and responding to demands for retreats and spiritual lectures from the clergy of different dioceses. In 1887 he took up residence at UCD and turned again to writing as well as teaching. He translated articles from German on philosophy, and Stockle's History of philosophy. The extent and range of his articles during a busy life may be judged from the incomplete list of titles in R. J. Hayes's Sources . . . articles in Irish periodicals. He founded and edited the Lyceum magazine (1889–94) and the New Ireland Review (1894–1911), which was succeeded by Studies in 1912. In addition, as part of his deep involvement in the Irish cooperative movement, he founded and was an incisive editor of the Irish Homestead. In support of the movement, he traversed the country preaching the merits of being industrious and self-supporting, and won support among northern unionists as well as southern farmers. Sir Horace Plunkett (qv), founder of the movement, termed him ‘a remarkable living Irishman’ who had ‘largely moulded my own life work’, and who, ‘for a full half-century, laboured disinterestedly for the moral, social, and economic uplifting of the Irish poor’ (A page of Irish history, 246–7). Finlay's strong advocacy of high moral standards in public life made him enemies in the Irish parliamentary party; and his critical review of Cardinal James Gibbons, Our Christian heritage (1889), led to complaints to Rome from American Jesuits and his suspension from writing (1890–92).

Despite these varied activities, he was primarily an educationalist. Apart from his teaching in Jesuit schools and at UCD, he was a commissioner for intermediate education for many years, was active in establishing and administering a system of technical education at the start of the century, was editor-in-chief of the ‘School and College’ series of books for pupils and students, and inspired and guided those who created the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction. Moreover, he was for many years a prominent member of the senate of the NUI and of the governing body of UCD, and was chairman (1909–38) of the trustees of the NLI. Little wonder that his successor to the chair of economics, George O'Brien (qv), remarked in Studies (1940) that ‘to write about him is like writing about a number of persons rather than a single man’. He alleged that in forty-seven years Finlay ‘never broke an engagement, never missed a lecture, never was late for a meeting’. Finlay's retirement (1930) was marked by a collection to provide a presentation portrait (now in UCD) by Leo Whelan (qv). It was so generously subscribed that funds were available to endow an annual Finlay lecture on an economic theme; the first was given by John Maynard Keynes. Tom Finlay died 8 January 1940 in his ninety-first year. He had been an invalid from 1936.

The brothers were among the most influential academics in Ireland in the last quarter of the nineteenth and the first quarter of the twentieth centuries. Thomas was described by W. E. H. Lecky (qv) as probably the most universally respected man in Ireland. Peter, who professed theology in Britain, America, and Ireland for 44 years, was widely consulted on most aspects of theology and highly regarded for his gifts of exposition.

Provincial consultors' minute book, 20 Feb. 1890 (Irish Jesuit archives, Dublin); Irish Jesuit Province News, Dec. 1929 (private circulation); ‘Sir Horace Plunkett on Professor Finlay's career as social reformer’, Fathers of the Society of Jesus, A page of Irish history: story of University College, Dublin, 1883–1909 (1930), 246–57; W. Magennis, ‘A disciple's sketch of Fr T. Finlay’, Belvederian, ix (summer 1931), 19; obit., Anglo-Celt, 13 Jan. 1940; George O'Brien, ‘Father Thomas A. Finlay, S.J., 1848–1940’, Studies, xxix (1940), 27–40; Aubrey Gwynn, obit., Irish Province News, Oct. 1940 (private circulation); R. J. Hayes (ed.), Sources for the history of Irish civilization: articles in Irish periodicals (1970), ii, 310–12; Thomas Morrissey, Towards a national university: William Delany, S.J. (1835–1924) (1983); Trevor West, Horace Plunkett: co-operation and politics (1986)

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 2nd Year No 2 1927

University Hall :
On November 16th the Community at Lesson St. celebrated the Diamond Jubilee of Fr T Finlay. As a scholastic, Fr Finlay helped Fr. Matt Russell to found the Irish Monthly and the Messenger. The latter periodical ceased to appear after a short time; it was to be revived later, again under Fr Finlay's inspiration. He took a leading part in conducting the brilliant but short-lived “Lyceum”, and its successor the New Ireland Review. For Belvedere College his rectorship represented, until quite lately, the high-water mark of its success. Since 1883 he has been a Professor at University College, first under the Royal and then under the National University. During that time he has been prominent in many movements for the betterment of his Country. He was a member of the Boards of National and of Intermediate Education, is still Chairman of the National Library, Committee, has organised food depots for the poor, while his work for industrial and agricultural co-operation has won him fame in many lands. As a preacher and a lecturer his success has been extraordinary. And though he no longer appears in the pulpit, his power and his popularity as a lecturer are as great as ever. From 1912 to 1922 he was Superior in Leeson St, and President of University Hall.

Irish Province News 9th Year No 1 1934

Leeson St :
Monday, November 20th, was a red-letter day in the history of Leeson street, for it witnessed the celebration of the Golden Jubilee of the House's foundation. In November, 1833. the Community came into being at 86 St Stephen's Green, where it remained until 1909, when the building was handed over to the newly constituted National University. The Community, however, survived intact and migrated to a nearby house in Lesson Street, where it renewed its youth in intimate relationship with the Dublin College of the University.
Its history falls this into two almost equal periods, different, indeed, in many ways, yet essentially one, since the energies of the Community during each period have been devoted to the same purpose, the furtherance of Catholic University Education in Ireland. A precious link between the two eras is Father Tom Finlay, who was a member of the Community in 1883, and ever since has maintained his connection with it. His presence on Monday evening, restored to his old health after a severe illness was a source of particular pleasure to the whole gathering. It was also gratifying to see among the visitors Father Henry Browne, who had crossed from England at much personal inconvenience to take part in the celebration. Not only was Father Browne a valued member of the Community for over thirty years, but he acquired additional merit by putting on record, in collaboration with Father McKenna, in that bulky volume with the modest title " A Page of Irish History," the work achieved by the House during the first heroic age of its existence. It was a pleasure, too, to see hale and well among those present Father Joseph Darlington, guide, philosopher and friend to so many students during the two periods. Father George O'Neill, who for many years was a distinguished member of the Community, could not, alas. be expected to make the long journey from his newer field of fruitful labor in Werribee, Australia. Father Superior, in an exceptionally happy speech, described the part played by the Community, especially in its earlier days of struggle, in the intellectual life of the country. The venerable Fathers who toiled so unselfishly in the old house in St. Stephens Green had exalted the prestige of the Society throughout Ireland. Father Finlay, in reply, recalled the names of the giants of those early days, Father Delany, Father Gerald Hopkins, Mr. Curtis and others. Father Darlington stressed the abiding influence of Newman, felt not merely in the schools of art and science, but in the famous Cecilia Street Medial School. Father Henry Browne spoke movingly of the faith, courage and vision displayed by the leaders of the Province in 1883, when they took on their shoulders such a heavy burden. It was a far cry from that day in 1883, when the Province had next to no resources, to our own day, when some sixty of our juniors are to be found, as a matter of course preparing for degrees in a National University. The progress of the Province during these fifty years excited feelings of admiration and of profound gratitude , and much of that progress was perhaps due to the decision, valiantly taken in 1883 1883, which had raised the work of the Province to a higher plane.

Irish Province News 15th Year No 2 1940
Obituary :
Father Thomas Finlay
When the Editor of “Province News” did me the honour of inviting me to write a notice of Father Finlay's life, he added a comment on the usual summary of dates which he
enclosed from the annual Catalogues : “Never did Catalogues conceal so completely the life of a Jesuit as Father Finlay's Catalogues conceal his splendid and most active life.” There is a great deal of truth in this comment, though the fault does not lie with the compiler of the annual Catalogues. From his early years as a Scholastic in Rome, Maria Laach, Limerick and St. Beuno's, Father Tom was never lacking in that remarkable power of initiative which enabled him to attempt and accomplish so much during his long life of ninety-one years. His initiative was largely personal, and many of the works for which he was known throughout the country are not even mentioned in the official records of the Catalogues. Apart from his activities, Father Tom's fame was largely due to his great gifts of personal charm, sympathetic kindness and quiet humour. No man was better. fitted to make friends everywhere, and Father Tom made and kept a host of friends during his long and most useful life. Even his birthplace is matter for dispute among the learned. He was always claimed as a Cavan man; but a record is extant from his novitiate, in which he himself has entered his birth-place as Lanesborough, Co. Roscommon. The mystery is solved by a reminiscence, of which he was proud. His father was an engineer on the Shannon River works, and young Tom Finlay was born on an island just north of Lough Ree, which his father was later to submerge beneath the waters of the Shannon. One of his favourite reminiscences was of a Hedge-schooI which he attended somewhere near the Shannon in the early fifties. The master used to test the ability of his pupils by making them spell “Antitrinitarian.” But discipline was too severe for the engineer's young son, and he ran away home from class on the second or. third day. He was then sent to school at St Patrick's, Cavan, where he remained until he entered the Jesuit novitiate at Milltown Park, on November 12, 1866. He took his first vows at Milltown on the Feast of St. Stanislaus, 1868. Just seventy years later it was any privilege to say Mass for Father Tom at Linden Convalescent Home on the Feast of St Stanislaus, 1938. He had then been an invalid for two years and was almost ninety years old. He had been wheeled into the Convent Chapel in a chair, and heard his Jubilee Mass in the midst of the patients and children of Linden. “Consummatus in brevi explevit tempera multa.” The young novice of 1868 can have little dreamed how many long years lay before him. But there was a great deal of simple novice's piety about Father Tom in his last years. Day by day he was wheeled into the Chapel for his morning Mass; and it was seldom indeed that he would allow his nurse to keep him away from the Chapel for the daily Rosary, which he loved to recite with the other patients every evening. From Milltown he was sent to the French Juniorate at Saint-Acheul. where he spent part of the year 1869. Then, with Father Vincent Byrne as his companion, he was sent to the Gregorian at Rome, where they witnessed the stirring scenes of the Vatican Council and Garibaldi entry into Rome. In 1936, Father Vincent McCormick, then Rector of the Gregorian visited Dublin, and stayed in Lesson Street, where Father Finlay was still resident. He was introduced as a past student of the Gregorian. “And when were you in Rome?” asked the Rector, not realizing how old his new acquaintance was “At the Vatican Council” was the smiling answer, and Father Tom’s eyes were twinkling, for he felt that he had scored a point. Garibaldi's entrance into Reine threw the Gregorian into confusion, and Father Tom was sent to Maria Laach, where he spent the next two years (1871-73). It was here that he was impressed by the new agricultural policy of the Prussian government - a lesson in practical economics that he was later to turn to most practical uses. And it was from the German Fathers at Maria Laach that Father Tom received his training in modern scientific methods, which (for a time, at least) made him anxious to specialise in Biology. His intellectual activity during these years must have been remarkable. When he became Professor of Metaphysics in Father Delany's University College ten years later, one of his chief enterprises was to bring Irish Catholic students into contact with modern German thought by the translation of German works on Scholastic Philosophy.
From 1873-76 Mr. Thomas Finlay was teaching his class at the Crescent College, Limerick, with extra work as French and German master and (for the last two years) as Prefect of Studies. A full programme for most men. and the work was not lessened by the fact that the Irish schools were adapting themselves to the new Intermediate System in these years. Mr Finlay's results were brilliant in the new system of competitive examinations, but that did not prevent him from writing his historical novel, “Chances of War,” during these same years. As an old priest, with a long record of useful work behind him, he was fond of telling a story that happened in these Limerick years. Some of the older Fathers found this young scholastic too enterprising, and complaints reached the Irish Provincial, who was a firm believer in the established order of things. Father Tuite summoned the budding author to his presence, and gently suggested to him that “he should remain in his legitimate obscurity.” But the Society has its own ways of checking too great enterprise for a time, and Mr. Finlay was sent to St. Beuno's for his four years of Theology in 1877.
Father Tom was ordained in 1880, he lived to say the Jubilee Mass of his ordination in 1930. There is no trace of his Tertianship in the official Catalogues, and the reason is not far to seek. When Father Tom emerged from Theology in 1881 the Irish Province was faced with an unusual responsibility. The Catholic University which had been founded, with Newman as Rector, in 1851, had failed, so far as practical results were concerned. But the long struggle for equality of rights in University education had at long last met with a partial response from the English Government of the day. The Royal University of Ireland was founded as an examining body, with a limited number of endowed fellowships, in 1881, and the Irish Hierarchy invited Father William Delany, whose energy and ability had made Tullabeg a centre of intellectual life, to take over control of University College under the new conditions. Father Finlay was sent to Tullabeg without further delay, to assist Father Delany as Assistant Prefect of Studies. From Tullabeg a small group of Jesuit Fathers came to Temple Street in Dublin, whilst the Bishops were negotiating the final transfer of University College. As soon as the teaching staff of the new College was formed, with Father Delany as first Rector, Father Finlay was nominated to one of the fellowships in the Royal University, and was appointed Professor of Metaphysics. He held this chair until 1900, when he resigned it in favour of his most brilliant student in these early years, the present Professor William Magennis. Meanwhile, another of his brilliant students, William Coyne, had been appointed Professor of Political Economy. University College suffered a sore loss by William Coyne's death in 1904 and Father Tom Finlay, who had meanwhile taken a leading part in the Co-operative Movement throughout the country, took over the vacant Chair of Political Economy in the same year, He held this chair until the end of the Royal University in 1909; and was immediately appointed to the same chair in the new National University of Ireland. It was this chair that he resigned in 1930, having taught his classes without interruption for forty-seven years (1883-1930). It was his boast that, during all those years he had never omitted a lecture for ill-health or any other reason. God had certainly blessed him with a wonderfully strong and harmonious constitution.
During the first five years of his new career, Father Finlay was not resident in St. Stephen's Green, but was Rector of Belvedere College (1883-87) with his duties as fellow and professor of the Royal University as an extra charge. It is indeed hard to understand how any man can have thrown himself with such energy into his various activities as Father Finlay did during these early years. In Belvedere the new school-buildings were rising as proof of his keen organising ability; and they were only the symbol of an active intellectual life that was attracting general attention to the College. Father Finlay planned a whole series of school text-books and copy books that were to help him pay off the debts incurred in the erection of the new buildings. But this policy was checked for a time, and Father Finlay left Belvedere for University College in 1887. Memories still survive among some old inhabitants of North Dublin : Father Tom Finlay, as a young, vigorous and good-looking priest, riding a fine, black horse down the streets of Dublin to the Phoenix Park. For the Rector of Belvedere College was a conspicuous figure in the social life of Dublin City at that time. The friendships which Father Tom made in the 'eighties and nineties opened up a new sphere of activity, which led to his becoming one Of the best-known and influential priests in the country. His influence in Government circles was very great. He was appointed a Commissioner of National Education, a Trustee of the National Library, and a member of various Royal Commissions. His word was often decisive in the appointment of some Catholic to a post that had hitherto been jealously reserved by the Protestant ascendency, and Father Tom had the knack of making himself liked as well as respected for his solid judgment and courageous support of what he held to be good and true. During these same years he founded and edited two notable monthly magazines : “The Lyceum” (1889-94), and the “New Ireland Review” (1894-1911). There is no space here to tell in any detail the story of Father Tom Finlay's work for the Irish Co-operative Movement, by which he will probably be chiefly remembered in Irish history. It was work that could only be done by a man who had attained the special position which he held in Irish public life. But it is worth recording that gratitude to Father Tom was felt by the poor as well as the rich, for he would spare no time and trouble if he thought the Irish people could be helped by his labourers. His memory is perhaps most cherished .in Foxford Co. Mayo, where he took a leading part in the establishment of the Providence Mills, that have been founded and managed from the first by the Irish Sisters of Charity. During his last illness two of the workers in the Mills were married in Foxford. They were old friends of Father Tom, and they were not satisfied until they had travelled to Dublin in one of the lorries owned by the Mills, to get the old priest's blessing on their married life. When news of his death reached Foxford this year, telegrams of condolence were sent by the staff as a whole, and by some of his personal friends in the Foxford Mills. A notice of Father Finlay's life would be incomplete without some reference to the out-door sports which he had always clung to, in the midst of his busiest years. He was a firm believer in the policy of one good holiday a week, for which good Jesuit tradition can be quoted. His own tastes favoured fishing and shooting, and his friendships. through the country gave him opportunities that were sometimes perhaps the subject of envious comment. Father Tom and his brother Father Peter were keen sportsmen, but it is not certain that their skill was equal to their interest in the sport. Both men were individualists; and their individualism was sometimes erratic in quality, One leading Irish statesmen still has memories of a day's shooting on the lands of O'Conor Don. The party went to to the bog after breakfast; and a council of war was held during the lunch interval. The more cautious members gave it as their opinion that there was only one completely safe position in the field. You could get it by drawing a straight line between the two brothers Finlay! Even his brethren in Leeson Street were sometimes inclined to be sceptical. To the very end, when Father Tom was already long past eighty he made it a practice of. going off for a few days fishing in the Easter holidays, and Good Friday was not complete unless Father Tom brought home a salmon for the community. It was always welcome; but some at least of the Fathers used to murmur that perhaps a faithful Gilly in Co. Wexford was as much responsible for the salmon as Father Tom. But that was a joke that no one would venture to make in Father Tom’s presence. The end came, after four long years of illness, on January 8th. 1940. Father Tom had been stricken down in Leeson Street in the early autumn of 1936, and ever since he had been confined to his bed-room and an invalid chair. It was a long trial, which he bore with wonderful patience, and it was good to think that so many of his friends showed their loyalty and gratitude to him by their frequent visits and messages of sympathy. He died peacefully, having spent the last two days in almost continuous prayer. The funeral Mass at Gardiner Street gave a last opportunity for a tribute of respect and affection, which, once more, revealed the wide connections that Father Tom Finlay had made in his long and laborious
life. May he rest in peace. “A. Gwynn”

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1931

A Disciples Sketch of Father Tom Finlay SJ - William Magennis

When I first saw Father Finlay he was the youthful Rector of Belvedere College. Of middle height, squarely built - so the ordinary man of his physique would be described. But in Father Finlay's case, the face at once captured and held one's notice. It was a strong, somewhat Milesian face, marked with firm decision; not stern, however, for the shrewd bright eyes were always ready to light up with a genial smile. Even then they had that surround of wrinkles which are supposed to indicate advancing age but are more likely to be born of frequent laughter. His hair was coal-black and it lay on his shapely head just as Mr Leo Whelan's masterpiece of portraiture shows it in the painting with which he has immortalized himself.

Like, “Father O'Flynn”, Father Finlay had and still has - the wonderful way with him. Tho' he was Rector and I was an Intermediate boy, he treated me - or so it seemed to me as an equal. Never in his career, not even when in later years he was an intimate of Mr Gerald Balfour, Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Lady Gerald Balfour (a very exceptional and gifted woman of influence) and was high in the councils of the great, did he ever “put on side”. He was invariably simple, and unpretentious, apparently unconscious of his own per-eminence.

At the time I first came under his spell, he had built Belvedere College, for he was full of enterprise and courage. In spite of his humility he had faith in his own designs and projects. To me he is the living embodiment of Russell Lowell's dictum. The confidence of the world is guided to a man by a well grounded confidence in himself.

The building was erected on the grounds of Belvedere House, one of those glorious mansions which serve to make us realize to what a level of superb culture the eighteenth century Anglo-Irish - or were they Irish English? - had attained. The Rector's reception-room was at the back of the grand salon, a former music-room probably, and its windows looked out on the facade of the new building. It was there I saw him first, and the memory of him, in his fine environment, remains to me a living vivid memory unduled by all the years between.

Not the least, by the way, of his minor contributions to Dublin's improvement, was the pious care with which he had the exquisitely beautiful stucco enrichment by Italian artists that decorate the hall and staircase of the mansion, restored and delicately picked out in refined colouring.

In those years Belvedere had no playing fields; but later on, he bought grounds between Palmerston Road and Cowper Road, and constructed a bridge across the railway line to give access to them.

He was then a Nationalist in politics, and had considerable weight with not a few of the Irish Parliamentary Party. He secured entrance into the Party for Sir Thomas Grattan Esmonde, but Parnell rather suspected the neophyte as a possible instrument of a Jesuit intrigue. That superstition about Jesuitry dies hard, or rather, it lives hard; Even John Dillon, a devoted Catholic, shared it: he said to me one day - in a moment of expansion during our campaign for a new University - “That friend of yours, Father Finlay, is one of the d---est intriguers in Ireland!” When I expostulated that others might engage in intrigue, but Father Finlay never, Mr, Dillon retorted, “That only shows how he has hoodwinked you!!!”

In course of time I became a teacher of English Literature in Belvedere, and as I was simultaneously a student of Father Finlay in Philosophy, I enjoyed the inestimable advantage of walking with him from his house to the old University College in St Stephen's Green, where he lectured as a Fellow of the Royal University in Mental and Moral Science - as Philosophy was then nicknamed for prudential reasons.

T D Sullivan, poet and patriot, had fallen on evil days financially and was losing heavily on the weekly which he had acquired from his more eminent brother, “A M” Sullivan. This, “The Nation” (founded by Thomas Davis, the elder Dillon and Gavan Duffy) lived largely on recollections of its past, and had a slender circulation. Father Finlay came to T D's rescue by suggesting that three of us, of University College, should be permitted to contribute articles. The present Professor Robert Donovan, who was a tutor in English and several years our senior, Joe Farrell (long years dead) and I were thus introduced to Journalism under Father Finlay's auspices.

The mention of this serves to introduce another of his projects - provision of a Club which would serve as a social centre for Catholic professional men and others in Dublin who had passed through “Tullabeg” (then a College for laymen), Clongowes, Mungret or St. Ignatius. The late Sir Joseph McGrath (who died Registrar of the National University) and his partner “Dan” Croly, MA, who was lecturer in many Catholic institutions, were the only people connected with it whom I ever knew. It was called the “Lyceum Club” and it had the ambition, I heard, at one time to rival the Trinity College Club in St Stephen's Green. It was, however, a vaulting ambition, and it “fell on the other” financially. It was still alive, tho' moribund, when Father Finlay had us made members of it, that we might have the facilities it provided for reading magazines and reviews.

Writing and publishing had always a powerful attraction for Father Finlay. While a “scholastic” he wrote an Irish historical novel treating of the times of Owen Roe, “The Chances of War”, by Rev Thomas Whitelock - I had the pleasure in later years of making it a school reader with my photograph of the author as a frontispiece. He helped the Land Movement, I remember, by pamphleteering - one pamphlet, I remember “Ricardo on Rent”. The Lyceum was a more ambitious - undertaking, a monthly magazine cultivating philosophic politics, sociology, and the Arts, especially Literature. In the first years, Father Finlay was The Lyceum. But I need not recite its history in detail here, for my old friend and college companion-Professor John W Howley of University College, Galway has performed that service with consummate ability and considerable accuracy, in view of the fact that he was not a Lyceum-ite, his history of it forms a chapter in “A Page of Irish History” (Talbot Press). His tireless anxiety to develop his students led him to initiate all sorts of College Societies, not to speak of the Sodality. One of these was a Shakespeare reading society, and Father Finlay was fond of explaining to us different interpretations of favourite passages. I fear, however, few of our number had any histrionic capacity. He promoted, notwithstanding, college theatricals and one of his younger “stars” Tom Molloy, grew stage-struck and joined the company of Beerbohm Tree. I saw him on the boards of the “Gaiety” as Roseneranz or was it Guildenstern? - in Hamlet. He worked up also a Debating Society; and under its favouring conditions “Alex” Sullivan, now Sergeant Sullivan, KC, of the London Bar, first displayed his hereditary powers of oratory.

As regards public speaking, Father Finlay taught by example. He was never what I would call an orator. He was always a finished speaker. He himself, I fancy, rather scorned those elements, rhetorical turns of expression, semi-poetical diction, ornament and emotional appeal, which mark out oratory from the less ornate utterance of ideas. There are sincere souls to whom these “flights” savour of insincerity, or affectation. Where Father Finlay excelled was in the orderly marshalling of his facts, in lucid exposition, and ice-cold, clear-cut, hard, close reasoning that never turned aside until it had remorse lessly demolished the opponent's case. I have always thought what a magnificent equity lawyer and Lord Chancellor were lost to fame when T A Finlay entered the Jesuit Order.

There is, indeed, in the present generation a young T A Finlay who has already made his forensic mark, is an KC and TD, and will assuredly one day ornament the bench of the Supreme Court.

At the expiration of his rectorship, Father Finlay took up residence in University College, where Father Delany reigned as President, The building, famous from long before, as the city dwelling-house of Buck Whalley (a Hell Fire Club-inan with Curran) had been the scene of Newman's ill-starred attempt to found a Catholic University. Father Delany and Father Finlay, aided by colleagues like the historian of Cromwellian Ireland, Rev Denis Murphy; the Irish Mezzo-fanti, Rev J O'Carroll; Rev Gerard Hopkins, the poet; Rev Joseph Darlington (friend of Everyman), were able in some miraculous fashion, to galvanize the corpse that Newman's failure had left unburied, into healthy, vigorous life. And its activities made the National University of Ireland possible.

In St. Stephen's Green, Father Finlay found more leisure - if “leisure”can be used, without a “Bull”, to name a host of varied occupations. He gave scholarly courses of Lenten Lectures, making dry-as-dust Theology a popular “draw”; he organised Needlework Depots, creating industries, and enlarging employment for women and girls; helped to establish woollen mills; founded a publishing firm; was controlling editor of “The New Ireland Review”, and editor-in-chief of “The School and College Series” of books for pupils and students; assisted the Creamery movement; lectured all over Ireland in praise of co-operative industry; inspired and guided the men who created the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction.

During the Parnell leadership controversy, Father Finlay, who, in virtue, perhaps, of his semi-Scottish ancestry, had always been rigidly austere in moral matters even to Puritanism, assailed Parnell vigorously, and joined with the late Mr Tirnothy Healy in calling for his deposition. To me, an ardent Parnellite, it seemed an unhappy alliance. The friendship of the two men, thus begun, remained firm and unbroken till death, some months ago, severed it rudely.

Father Finlay magnanimously forgave my political break-away from his leadership; and it speaks eloquently for his tolerance, that the strong divergence of opinion which grew up between us as the years went by never threw its shadow on our relations as co-workers in the production of school-books, and as colleagues in the University Department of Philosophy.

The hero-worship with which from the first years I could not but reverence him, survived in spite of his union with the Horace Plunkett group in a movement into which Nationalist prejudice did not permit of his being followed. Father Finlay, thanks to his reaction against Parnellism, and his deepened sense of the vital importance of economic matters in the life of the Nation, had come to consider direct, constructive effort among the farmers a more potent instrument of building up a prosperous, Catholic Ireland than political action in way of agitation could ever provide. His satirical humour, of which he has a fund, loved to play its blistering tongue on the moving and passing of resolutions, and “voicing the aspirations of a down-trodden and oppressed nationality”. Clap-trap, raimeis, make-believe, falsities and lies, he abominates by instinct. And, I fear, he relegates our political propaganda to that infamous dust-bin of things despicable.

They who have only an external acquaintance with Father Finlay cannot even guess what depths of genial humanity lie hidden from them in the man. It would, I know, displease him were I to make public here even a fraction of what I know of his innumerable benefactions. St Francis of Assisi was happily styled the “friend of every friendless beast” : Father Finlay I would style the
friend of all the friendless poor. He has a strong sense of duty; but his large heart gives as strong an urge.

Father Finlay has a keen zest for shooting and fishing, he has fished trout from every lake in the Comeragh hills, in Galway and Mayo, Sligo and the North-West. He has no less zest for humorous narrative; and can rival, at times, even Dickens in giving a comic colouring to the most unpromising materials.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1940

Obituary

Father Thomas Finlay SJ

Though he was not educated at Belvedere it would be the blackest of ingratitude if Belvedere did not recognise in Fr Tom Finlay one who had paramount claims upon the School. Others have spoken and written of the wider activities with which this great man's later life was crowded, but we cannot o help rejoicing that the educationalist, who was for many years a pillar of the
National University and an outstanding force in the intellectual life of his country, served his apprenticeship to education and public affairs in Belvedere.

He was a young man, a very young man as Jesuits go, when in 1883 he s became Rector of Belvedere. Yet, he had already about him the elements which were to build up his great prestige. He was already associated with those views and projects which made him not only an ideal Commissioner of Education, and Dean of the Philosophic Faculty in his University, but Founder of the Irish Co-operative Movement and of University Hall. In a true sense, he was the second founder of Belvedere. Materially; certainly. For with the widest vision, backed by the financial resources of his own active brain and pen, he set to work to provide adequate accommodation for a great School for over fifty years.

Incredible as it seems, Belvedere had then carried on with no larger accommodation than the stately drawing-rooms and parlours of Lord Belvedere, where ugly partitions hid the beauty of the decoration and familiarity exposed it to damage. It is hard to-day to realise what those improvised class-rooms and mutilated halls must have been like; what handicaps it had of air and light and heat and cold, and noise and crowding. Fr Finlay swept all that away. First, built the new school buildings in solid red brick which now, as then, though almost doubled by recent additions, housed the Senior school. There was a fine, if small, chapel, excellent laboratories, a “manual work” room, and plenty of class-room space, well lit and warmed. It was work done, not for a day or a year, but for a century or two at the least. Not content with this achievement, he built our theatre and gymnasium, built it so well that it serves admirably the needs of what has become one of Belvedere's most remarkable activities, our popular opera week. In its construction vision, vision once again united with common sense, the spacious and solid with the practicable and the useful. Lastly, he acquired that fine mansion, fit neighbour to Belvedere House, which had been the residence of the Earls of Fingal. Part of this was designed as club house, it has since served to house the Irish Messenger Office, whose connection with Belvedere has been so happy a thing for the School. But for many years before Fr Finlay's policy could be carried further by the acquisitions Nos 7 and 8 Great Denmark Street, it served as a Preparatory school, too, and generations of Belvederians began their school life in the “Little” House. Such a record needs no emphasising. Fr Finlay's was a unique opportunity. He rose nobly to it, and all future generations have only to follow his lead..

Spiritually, perhaps, he meant even more to the School. For Fr Finlay was anything but a mere efficient machine, a juggler with bricks and mortar pounds and pence. To those who knew him that idea is so absurd as to be laughable. For those who did not, one glance at the fine countenance in Leo Whelan's portrait should reveal that wonderful combination of head and heart which made him the great man he was. One misses indeed the little smile the eyes began and the fine, sensitive lips finished, but there is in that broad clear brow and firm glance, and in the enviable repose of the features, a summary of Fr Finlay's qualities. He was one who loved knowledge greatly for herself but more for her kindness to mankind. He was one who loved boys, but again loved manhood more. This made him a teacher, a director of studies and a inspirer of studies at once zealous and not fanatical, wide and not wasteful, noble and not visionary. Of his government of boys. it can be said with certainty that it was much ahead, both in theory and practice, of the normal expectation of his time. Father Finlay was as incapable of harshness, even of what could fairly be called severity, as he was unyielding in his demand for the essentials and just in his sense of proportion. Character in him was fused with kindness. Only a few months before his death a distinguished Belvederian priest, whose picture adorns our pages, found himself in Ireland for a brief spell and learn of his old rector's accessibility even in retirement. He was on the eve of his departure to what is perhaps the world's most arduous and dangerous mission On the day he sailed he went out to Linden. There the two had long talk. Who shall say what they remembered or what they anticipated. But as his visitor rose to go Fr Finlay, with real feeling, asked for a last blessing and with tears in his eyes, his admiring son did for the last time what he was bidden The episode is characteristic. To hear Fr Finlay talk of his old boys was to hear him tell stories of the happy intercourse that can exist between master and boy almost in proportion to the humility, nay, the reverence of both.

He was too short a time (1883-1888) in Belvedere, for it was impossible to expect he should be allowed to give to one limited sphere and group the talents which have enriched the nation. But he never altered his allegiance to his old School. At the Centenary Celebrations in 1931, when he was well over eighty he preached the sermon at the commemorative High Mass, and linked with glowing words, a worthy past to the hopes of a proud future. God spared him to his ninety-second year, with all his wonderful powers of mind and affection intact, and in the final years he would enquire from his visitors after the health and happiness of the School which he had led out of the stages of childhood to the full growth of manhood and maturity. Always it was with a mind eager to hear of new effort and fresh achievement, so that his hearers surely cannot doubt that it will be part of his reward to assist from the Kingdom of Glory those who still struggle with the problems, the works and the opportunities in which he merited so splendidly of boyhood, of his country and of God.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Thomas Finlay (1848-1940)

Entered the Society some eight months after his younger brother. He also did all his higher studies abroad, as, in those days, the Irish Province of the Society had not enough men to maintain their own houses of studies. Thomas Finlay was a student of philosophy in Rome when Garibaldi took the city. He finished his philosophy in Germany and it was during this time he first acquired his interests in scientific methods of agriculture. He spent his regency at Crescent College, 1872-1877. In 1875, although he was still only a scholastic, he was appointed prefect of studies. His versatility was remarkable during his years in Limerick: he was master, prefect of studies, master of the choir and novelist! it was at this time he published his novel, “The Chances of War”. Shortly after his ordination in 1880 a new and brilliant career lay ahead for him. He became a Fellow of the newly established Royal University of Ireland and until 1900 was professor of metaphysics. It is a significant tribute to his physical, no less than his mental energy, that for the first five years of his professor ship at University College, Dublin, he was also Rector of Belvedere College.

In 1900, Father Finlay, who for years had taken a leading part in the co-operative movement, was appointed to the chair of Political Economy, and held this post with distinction for the next thirty years.

Doyle, Charles, 1870-1949, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/129
  • Person
  • 26 October 1870-15 June 1949

Born: 26 October 1870, Dalkey, County Dublin
Entered: 14 September 1889, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 30 July 1905, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1908, Belvedere College SJ, Dublin
Died: 15 June 1949, St Vincent's Hospital, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death

Brother of Fr Willie Doyle - RIP 1917

by 1893 at Exaeten College Limburg, Netherlands (GER) studying
by 1895 at Valkenburg Netherlands (GER) studying
by 1896 at Enghien Belgium (CAMP) studying
by 1907 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship

◆ Fr Francis Finegan : Admissions 1859-1948 - Took First Vows at Milltown Park February 1892

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 23rd Year No 4 1948

Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin.
We moved in on Saturday morning, 14th August. Fr, Superior (Fr. McCarron), Fr. Minister (Fr. Kearns), and Bro. E. Foley constituted the occupying force, and Fr. T. Martin not only placed his van at our disposal, but gave generously of his time and labour for the heavy work of the first day.
A long procession of vans unloaded until noon, when the men broke off for their half-day, leaving a mountain of assorted hardware and soft goods to be unpacked and stowed. By nightfall we had a chapel installed, the kitchen working, dining-room in passable order, and beds set up, so we said litanies, Fr. Superior blessed the house and consecrated it to the Sacred Heart.
Next morning Fr. Superior said the first Mass ever offered in the building. It was the Feast of the Assumption and a Sunday, so we. placed the house and the work under the Patronage of Our Lady and paused to review the scene. Fr. Provincial came to lunch.
The building is soundly constructed from basement to roof, but needs considerable modification before it can be used as a temporary Retreat House. The permanent Retreat House has yet to be built on the existing stables about 130 yards from the principal structure, but. we hope to take about twenty exercitants as soon as builders, plumbers, electricians, carpenters and decorators have done their work.
Fr. C. Doyle is equipping and furnishing the domestic chapel as a memorial to Fr. Willie, who worked so tirelessly for the establishment of workingmen's retreats in Ireland. A mantelpiece of this room has been removed, and thermostatically controlled electric heating is being installed. Lighting is to be by means of fluorescent tubes of the latest type.
With all due respects to the expert gardeners of the Province, we modestly assert that our garden is superb. Fr. Provincial was so impressed by the work done there that he presented us with a Fordson 8 H.P. van to bring the surplus produce to market. Under the personal supervision of Fr. Superior, our two professional gardeners took nine first prizes and four seconds with fourteen exhibits at the Drimnagh show. Twelve of their potatoes filled a bucket, and were sold for one shilling each. The garden extends over 2 of our 17 acres and will, please God, provide abundant fruit and vegetables.
From the beginning we have been overwhelmed with kindness: by our houses and by individual Fathers. Fr. Provincial has been a fairy-godmother to us all the time. As well as the van, he has given us a radio to keep us in touch with the outside world. We have bene fitted by the wise advice of Frs. Doyle and Kenny in buying equipment and supplies, while both of them, together with Fr. Rector of Belvedere and Fr. Superior of Gardiner Street, have given and lent furniture for our temporary chapel Fr. Scantlebury sacrificed two fine mahogany bookcases, while Frs. Doherty and D. Dargan travelled by rail and bus so that we might have the use of the Pioneer car for three weeks. Milltown sent a roll-top desk for Fr, Superior's use. To all who helped both houses and individuals we offer our warmest thanks, and we include in this acknowledgement the many others whom we have not mentioned by name.
Our man-power problem was acute until the Theologians came to the rescue. Two servants were engaged consecutively, but called off without beginning work. An appeal to Fr. Smyth at Milltown brought us Messrs. Doris and Kelly for a week of gruelling labour in the house. They scrubbed and waxed and carpentered without respite until Saturday when Mr. Kelly had to leave us. Mr. Hornedo of the Toledo Province came to replace him, and Mr. Barry arrived for work in the grounds. Thanks to their zeal and skill, the refectory, library and several bedrooms were made ready and we welcomed our first guest on Monday, 30th August. Under the influence of the sea air, Fr. Quinlan is regaining his strength after his long and severe illness.
If anyone has old furniture, books, bedclothes, pictures, or, in fact anything which he considers superfluous, we should be very glad to hear of it, as we are faced with the task of organizing accommodation for 60 men and are trying to keep the financial load as light as possible in these times of high cost. The maintenance of the house depends on alms and whatever the garden may bring. What may look like junk to an established house may be very useful to us, starting from bare essentials. Most of all, we want the prayers of the brethren for the success of the whole venture, which is judged to be a great act of trust in the Providence of God.
Our postal address is : Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin.

Irish Province News 24th Year No 4 1949

Obituary

Fr. Charles Doyle (1870-1889-1949)

He was born on 26th October, 1870 at ‘Melrose’ Dalkey, Co. Dublin, the son of Mr. Hugh Doyle, an official of the High Court of Justice in Ireland. Educated at Ratcliffe College, Leicester, by the Fathers of Charity, where he spent six years, he entered Tullabeg on 14th September, 1889. After two years' Juniorate at Milltown, he did philosophy at Exaten and Valkenburg, Holland for two years and for one year at Enghien in Belgium, and then was master for six years at Belvedere College. He studied theology at Milltown where he was ordained on 30th July, 1905. His third Probation he made at Tronchiennes. He was professed of the four solemn Vows at Belvedere on 2nd February, 1908. A brief record entered up by him in the Catalogus Primus of the year 1930 contains the following summary of the offices he held prior to his appointment as Procurator of the Province in 1925 : "Proc. dom. an. 9: Min. an. 5 ; Soc. mag. nov. an. 3 ; Rect. an. 10.'' He was Rector of the Crescent from 1912 to 1918, then for a short year Rector at Rathfarnham Castle in 1919, where he was succeeded by Fr. John Sullivan, and Rector of Belvedere College from 1919 to 1922.
During the last year of his life Fr. Doyle was subject to many infirmities and had to go to hospital frequently, but despite this he carried on manfully at his appointed tasks and observed common life with edifying fidelity: He died at St. Vincent's Hospital on 15th June, 1949.

An Appreciation :
From the above rather bald and barren collection of dates and places certain events stand out with arresting interest in the life of Fr. Charles Doyle : that he held most of the offices of trust in the Society, that in addition to having been Minister, and Socius to the Master of Novices, he was three times Rector and for nearly 25 years held the onerous post of Procurator of the Province, that he died in his 79th year within a few months of his Diamond Jubilee, a man who can deservedly be reckoned among the “bene meriti" of his generation in the Society.
It would be impossible in a short appreciation such as this to do justice to the many aspects of such a long and varied career. All we can hope to do is to give a few impressions that may serve to describe in outline :
(1) The brother of Fr. Willie.
(2) The Procurator of the Province.
(3) The Man of God

The Brother of Fr. Willie :
The reason, perhaps, why Fr. Charles Doyle's name will be best remembered by posterity is because he was the brother of a saint, or at least of a candidate for canonization. One might add that it is the only pretext he himself would have advanced as a claim for immortality: His veneration for his brother was a veritable hero-worship, the advancement of his cause a holy obsession from which his mind never deflected. There were only three pictures in his room, all of Fr. Willie, as the youth, the young priest, the missioner and chaplain.
Some may see therein an excessive family glorification, but who that has ever read "Merry in God” could not feel "proud' of having had such a brother. Fr. Doyle moreover had additional reasons for sustaining his devotion, for be alone could measure, by a mail-bag that brought letters from every corner of the globe, the universal veneration in which his saintly brother was held, and as a consequence there was none more confidant than he that God willing, the day would eventually come when Fr. Willie would be elevated to the altars of the Church.
Procurator of the Province :
Only one who has held the office of Procurator for a considerable time can appreciate the monotony of the task, the unavoidably material outlook it engenders in the mind, and the intimate contact into which it brings one with the Mammon of Iniquity. It requires much agility of mind and sublimation of the mental processes to convert every figure entered in a ledger and every letter tapped out on a typewriter into an act of the pure love of God. Fr. Doyle, however, appears to have acquired this gift and perhaps also to have discovered therein a clue to the secret of the countless aspirations made by his saintly brother. For twenty-five years he held the office of Procurator of the Province and may without exaggeration be described as the Procurator “par excellence”. Under his skilful guidance the book-keeping of the Province and in the Province was re-organised and standardised. His own books were a model of neatness, accuracy and meticulous care.
He was approachable at all times and patient with all comers, even when they broke into the middle of a long tot or disrupted the counting of a sheaf of notes. For all his manner betrayed, they might only have disturbed him in a cross-word puzzle or a game of patience. He had a keen sense of humour too and enjoyed the good-humoured banter that from time to time was levelled against the hapless holder of his office. He enjoyed the bon mot of the facetious father who said that book-keeping in the Society should be labelled “leger de main” and every holder of the office provided with a treatise on that particular form of craftmanship. No one chuckled more wholeheartedly than he at the alleged quotation from a certain Domestic Exhortation : “In olden days a subject, starting on a journey, meekly approached his superior on his knees with a request for a paternal embrace and a blessing ; now he brazenly beards the Bursar on his hind-legs with a demand for treasury notes and a voucher!”
As a " distraction” from the work of book-keeping he turned his attention to the task of censorship. For over twenty years the words “Censor Deputatus, Carolus Doyle”, were wont to meet the eye on most of the Province and Messenger Office publications. Not that this implied that he had read through everything that bore his sanctioning name on the title page, for presumably even a Censor Deputatus can appoint a deputy in his place. Such was certainly the case with “Carolus Doyle, Censor Deputatus” of many publications in the Irish language, his knowledge of which he could frankly confess was practically nil!
But book-keeping remained his paramount care. Three times within the last twelve months of his life he was compelled to go to hospital and on each occasion he insisted on bringing all the essential paraphernalia of his office with him. Perhaps, it may be urged, he acted unwisely in so doing and should have accepted the services of an “adjutant”, but error, if error there was, was one of judgement, that only served to emphasize his outstanding devotion to duty and his desire to carry out his “job in life” even to the end.
The Man of God :
But the dull routine of book-keeping did not damp his ardour for spiritual things or lessen his desire to take a share in the work of the Ministry. As a young priest and even well past middle age he was recognised as one of the outstanding preachers of the Province, distinct in delivery, sound of doctrine and above all with a telling way of driving home the truth, however unpalatable to his hearers. His Lenten lectures on “The Home” were said to have reached a financial peak, even for that famous annual feature in Gardiner St., though he himself would have been far from using such a measuring rod as a test of their success.
Every year, until his failing health compelled him to reduce the numbers, he gave from four to five retreats and only twelve months ago, in his seventy-eighth year, with sentence of death hanging over him, he conducted a priests retreat, which many a younger man would have hesitated to undertake. The “tableaux vivants”, which were a marked feature of his retreats did not win universal appreciation, but none could question the zeal and sincerity which inspired them.
Except for the purpose of giving retreats and making the annual audit of the accounts of the Province (”Praecursor Visitationis” was one of his soubriquets) he never wandered much abroad and agreed with Thomas A. Kempis “that they who do so seldom thereby become holy”. Indeed, his room was his castle and his only regular wanderings therefrom were for the purpose of making a lodgement in the bank or having a friendly interview with the Income Tax Commissioners.
For the rest, he was the “beau ideal” of Common Life. An early riser with an early Mass every morning, a man who never missed recreation or Litanies (and how grateful some tired father was when he recited them in his stead on a confession day), a man who always answered the first sound of the bell, leaving not only the letter but the figure unfinished, a man who sang his simple song on Christmas night but who also, despite every pretext, always went to bed in good time.
He was not without his idiosyncrasies, however (as what holy man is not?) and it was said of him, as of others who regulate their lives with clock-like precision, that he looked askance at those who, he suspectedwere ready to throw a spanner in the works of what they regarded as excessive routine rigidity. There were occasions too, when he could be exacting to a degree, as his companions knew to their cost. He was notoriously allergic to noise. His hearing was so acute that ever the winding of a watch or the striking of a match was said to reach his ears from overhead and woe betide the man who dropped his boots above him! No time was lost in admonishing the boot dropper, yet it was done in such a disarming fashion that no feud ensued - but the boots ceased dropping!
But, if he could be exacting at times, he was ever ready to make allowance for the foibles of others and never completely lost the human touch himself. His partiality for sweet things, even in old age, was such as would have given serious cause for alarm in the case of a school boy, and even a youngster might have envied the gusto with which he pursued the daily adventures of “Gussie Goose and Curley Wee”. “Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto”, might have been his motto, but “Merry in God” would be more appropriate and could be applied to him with the same aptitude as it was to his saintly brother. For beneath all his merriment lay an abiding sense of the Presence of God.
In that presence he closed his accounts with a smile on his face. If ever he had an overdraft in the Bank of Heaven, it has long ago been converted to a comfortable credit balance, and if his spiritual petty cash did not always balance, 'twas only a matter of pence which the great Auditor assuredly has long since overlooked. May his saintly life and simple merriment long continue to be an inspiration to all those. who are destined for the unenviable task of having care of the purse.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Charles Doyle 1870-1949
Fr Charles Doyle was born in Dublin on October 24th 1870. He entered the Society at Tullabeg in 1889. He made his Philosophical studies at Valkenburg, his Theology at Milltown Park, and his tertianship at Drongen in Belgium.

His life in the Society was spent in offices of administration, being Minister for five years, Rector for ten, and Procurator of the Province for the last twenty-five years of his life.

He was the elder brother of Fr Willie Doyle, whose life he wrote “Merry in God”, and for whose beatification her worked hard for many years.

He was an exemplary religious, an excellent member in community, and he was noted especially for his unfailing cheerfulness. In his personal life he practiced a constant severity or even austerity. Outside the Society he was well known for his Lenten Lectures delivered in Gardiner Street. As a Retreat giver he was much sought after.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1950

Obituary

Father Charles Doyle SJ

Father Charles Doyle died in St. Vincent's Nursing Home on 15th June, 1949, after a long illness patiently endured. He was born at “Melrose”, Dalkey, in 1870, and was the son of the late Mr. Hugh Doyle, an official of the High Court of Justice in Ireland. His early education was with the Fathers of Charity, Ratcliffe College, Leicestershire, where he spent six years. He had very kindly recollections of his school-days and he kept in touch with the Ratcliffe Father's up to his death last year. He joined the Society of Jesus in 1889, and passed through the various stages that the Order requires of its members - two years' novitiate in Tullabeg, two years' juniorate at Milltown Park, three years, philosophy at Valkenberg, Holland, and Enghien, Belgium, six years, teaching at Belvedere College, four years, theology at Miiltown Park, where he was ordained priest in 1905. He completed his religious training by doing his “Tertianship” or third year at Trouchiennes, Belgium.

He held responsible and important positions in the Order during his life as a priest. Immediately after his Tertiarship he was appointed Assistant Master of Novices at Tullabeg. He was Rector of Crescent College, Limerick, from 1912 to 1918, of Rathfarnham Castle in 1919, where he was succeeded by the late Father John Sullivan. He returned to Belvedere College as Rector for the next three years. From 1925 until his death twenty-four years later he was the Provincial Bursar, having charge of the accounts of the Irish Province.

Fr Charles Doyle was a brother of the late Father Willie Doyle, the well-known and saintly chaplain, who was killed in 1917 during the first world war, while administering to the soldiers on the battlefield. His admiration for his chaplain brother amounted almost to hero-worship. He laboured assiduously in collecting evidence of his brother's sanctity and he kept a list of all the favours obtained through his intercession. He was responsible for the publication of a life of Fr Willie called “Merry in God”, which was read all the world over. There were only three pictures in Father Doyle's bedroom, and they were all of Fr Willie at various stages of his career - as a young boy, as a young priest and as a chaplain.

As has already been stated, he was the Provincial Bursar for twenty-five years. But as well, at other stages of his career he was put in charge of the accounts and finances of a few of the Houses of the Irish Province. He had a great aptitude for this kind of work. Under his direction and advice the account books and all the book-keeping of the Irish Province was improved and reorganised. His own account books were perfect models of nreatness, accuracy and the greatest care. His interest in his work was very great, for instance, he had to go to hospital three times during the last year of his life. On all three occasions he insisted on bringing his account books with him. He certainly remained in harness and at his post up to the very end of his life.

He was above all a fervent religious and a man of the highest spirituality. He was a great model to all by his piety, his self-denial, his observance of rule and his observance of common life. He rose at 5.30 every day, said an early Mass and attended all the Community duties day after day with the greatest regularity. He avoided all exemptions even when his health was in a very precarious state. With all this he had a keen sense of humour, and enjoyed the good-humoured banter which is so often found in Community life. He was approachable at all times and most ready to oblige. Every year until his health gave away he spent his summer vacations in giving several retreats to priests and nuns. The retreats were greatly appreciated and are still well remembered by those who made them. About a year before his death he conducted a Priests Retreat in spite of his 78 years of age. He was also an eloquent preacher. His voice was pleasing and distinct, and as might be expected from such a man, his sermons were always most carefully prepared. On one occasion he gave a series of Lenten Lectures in Gardiner Street on the “Home”, and they drew great crowds from all parts of the city and country. These Lectures of his are regarded as among the best that were preached in Gardiner Street. And that says a great deal because the Lenten Lectures were given by some of the most distinguished preachers of Ireland and England,

He was an excellent teacher, but very strict. Some past Belvederians have still vivid recollections of his strictriess as a master. But his strict methods were tempered by kindness and justice, so that the boys had a great respect and veneration for him. As Rector of Belvedere he did much for the College. The number of students increased during his term of office, and as might be expected from his genius in the administration of temporal affairs the finances of the College greatly improved. The games also flourished under his jurisdiction. During the period he was Rector the Belvedere Team made some bold bids to win the Senior Cup, and they succeeded in winning the Junior Football Cup. Foundations were being laid for the excellent teams that Belvedere has put into the field ever since.

Father Doyle is survived by his brother Mr Robert Doyle, KC, former Recorder of Galway, to whom we extend our deepest sympathy. May he rest in peace.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Charles Doyle (1870-1949)

Born at Dalkey and educated in England, entered the Society in 1889. He pursued his higher studies in Valkenburg, Enghien and Milltown Park, Dublin where he was ordained in 1905. During his life, Father Doyle occupied many positions of trust. He came as master to the Crescent in 1911 and was appointed Rector of the College the following year. Father Doyle's rectorship at the Crescent was passed in difficult times: the college was badly in debt and, owing to the short supply of Jesuit masters, the task of main taining the school was onerous in the extreme. During his six years here, he was a strenuous worker in the classroom and the church. On leaving the Crescent, he was successively Rector of Rathfarnham Castle and Belvedere College. The last twenty-five years of his life were spent in the exacting work of bursar of the Irish Jesuit Province. During his last years, he published (anonymously) a biography of his celebrated brother, Father Willie Doyle.

Dargan, Daniel, 1915-2007, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/592
  • Person
  • 24 January 1915-21 September 2007

Born: 24 January 1915, St Stephen's Green, Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1933, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1946, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1951, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 21 September 2007, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death.

Middle brother of Bill - RIP 1983; Herbert - RIP 1993

Great grandnephew of Daniel Murray, 1768-1852, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

◆ Interfuse
Interfuse No 134 : Christmas 2007
Obituary
Fr Daniel (Dan) Dargan (1915-2007)

24th January 1915: Born in Dublin
Early education at Christian Brothers, Patrick's Hill, Cork, Patrician Brothers, Mallow, and Clongowes Wood College
7th September 1933: Entered the Society at Emo
8th September 1935: First Vows at Emo
1935 - 1938: Rathfarnham - Studied Classics at UCD
1938 - 1941: Tullabeg - Studied Philosophy
1941 - 1943: Belvedere - Teacher (Regency)
1943 - 1947: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
31st July 1946: Ordained at Milltown Park
1947 - 1948: Tertianship at Rathfarnham
1948 - 1983: St. Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street
2nd February 1951: Final Vows
1948 - 1957: Editor “Pioneer”; Assistant Director Pioneers 1957
1977: Director of Pioneers; Editor “Pioneer”
1977 - 1980: Assistant Director of Pioneers; Editor “Pioneer”; Assisted in Church
1980 - 1983: Superior; Director, SFX Social Service Centre
1983 - 1991: St. Ignatius, Galway -Parish Priest
1991 - 2003: Sacred Heart Church, Limerick -
1991 - 1992: Ministered in Church
1992 - 1994: Minister; Ministered in Church; House Staff; Director of Pioneers' Society
1994 - 2000: Superior, Prefect of the Church; House Staff; Director of “Pioneers” Society
2000 - 2003: Prefect of the Church; House Staff; Director of “Pioneers” Society, Director Sodality BVM & St. Joseph; Promoter of Missions; President of Cecilian Musical Society; House Consultor
2003 - 2007: Cherryfield Lodge - Praying for Church and Society
21st September 2007: Died at Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin.

Homily preached by Barney McGuckian at the Funeral Mass in Gardiner Street, September 24, 2007
“Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom” (Luke 23:42). These are the words of a man who discovered the identity of Jesus with practically his last breath. They are still appropriate today as we take our leave of Fr Dan Dargan, a man who spent the greater part of ninety years trying to plumb the depths of the mystery that is Jesus, nearly seventy-five of them in the Society of Jesus and thirty-five of them in the community here at St Francis Xavier's. These words are among the Last Seven that loomed so large in the devotion of the people here in the Church during Dan's early years here. He himself must have preached on them on a number of occasions and learned from the edifying attitude and example of the Good Thief. Fr Donal O'Sullivan, novice master of some of us here, (neither the very old nor the very young), used to say that we were all most appropriately represented on Calvary: by two thieves, a good one and a bad one, but both thieves all the same! All of us try to rob God of the glory that is His.

The Good Thief has the distinction of being the only person in the New Testament who addresses Jesus simply as Jesus, without further qualification. Others added titles such as the Christ, Son of David, Master, Rabbi, Teacher, Lord. He simply calls him Jesus or, more probably, Joshua which in his native language literally means "God saves". At this stage all that matter is salvation. The other qualifications are superfluous. As a Jesuit, Dan would have known the importance the founder attached to the very name Jesus. Indeed Ignatius was prepared to abandon the whole project to found an order if he was not permitted to use the very name Jesus.

“Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom”. This request came at the conclusion of an altercation between two of the condemned men about the identity of the third. One was so incensed at the obtuseness of the other that he rounded on him: “Have you no fear of God at all?” He is astonished that even at this late stage, with death staring him in the face, the other man has not even the beginnings of wisdom that comes from a healthy fear of God.

He himself is obviously sorry for his own past life and would love, if possible, to undo it, even at this late stage. He decides to go for it. In a great act of faith he takes the chance that the inscription over the head of Jesus really means what it says: “Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews”. He simply asks Jesus to remember him when he comes into his Kingdom.

The reply must have astonished him as much as it does us. “Indeed, I promise you. This day you will be with me in Paradise”. He pulled off the biggest job of his life when he was already on death row. All he did was to make a good confession and say his prayers, which is all any of us have to do if we want to join him in Paradise.

Dan did not wait to the end of his long life to do this. Dan was born into a privileged situation in the best sense of the word. He came from a happy Catholic family with a long tradition of service to the Church and the Irish people. An intensely private person he did not wear his heart on his sleeve but you just knew it was in the right place. He once confided to me that after his father died his mother told him that they had never had a row during the whole course of their married life. I think this must have had a profoundly formative effect on himself. He was a man of peace who tried to spread it wherever he found himself.

An industrious man, I always thought his signature tune should have been “Perpetua mobile”. It used to introduce Joe Linnane's “Question Time” on Radio Éireann on a Sunday night many moons ago. Perhaps that was the Dargan in him. In a John Bowman programme a few years ago I learned that William Dargan, his illustrious ancestor, builder of so many of the railways of the country at one stage employed something of the order of 140,000 workers. The ecumenical dimension of the family's contribution is evidenced by the fact that even within the last two decades large bridges in both Belfast and Dublin have been named after Dargan. Queen Elizabeth II came over to open one of them. Two of that great man's uncles were hanged in Wexford during the '98 rising.

No Jesuit could lay more claim to a funeral here in St. Francis Xavier's than Dan. His great grand uncle, Archbishop Daniel Murray of Dublin, offered the first Mass here in the Church 175 years ago this year. He himself gave the best years of his life to all the apostolic activity of the house, especially the Pioneer Association, the Pioneer Club and the Pioneer magazine. He was first editor of the magazine, which is still thriving in spite of the changes in society. It will celebrate its 60th birthday in January coming.

He was beloved of the staff in the office, more like an elder brother than a boss. It is wonderful to see two of his secretaries here with us today, Geraldine White (then Murtagh) and Maureen Manning.

In an interview with an internal Jesuit periodical (Interfuse #124) a couple of years ago he confided that he still holds the Clongowes record for the largest score ever run up at cricket, that he played schools tennis at Interprovincial level, and made the First Rugby Fifteen. It was while a student at Clongowes that his decision to enter the Jesuits matured and he followed his elder brother Bill, and later was followed by his younger brother, Herbert. At Clongowes he was privileged to know Fr. John Sullivan whose funeral took place in the college during his final year before going to the novitiate. It was appropriate that his mortal remains for the last two nights in the Sacred Heart Chapel besides those of the great Servant of God.

I first met Dan in August, 1955, when he was on holidays in the Glens of Antrim with Fr Kieran Hanley. They came to see around our family farm, where my father and his brothers had gained a reputation for advanced methods in pig breeding. I was deputed to show these two Jesuits around. I recognised Fr Dan from photos in the Pioneer magazine. It was obvious that the farmer was Kieran Hanley, and that Dan was only there to make up the numbers. When Kieran was dying I brought this up: “I don't think Dan had much interest in the pigs that day”. Kieran pulled himself up in the bed and said, “Absolutely none whatsoever”. But it was typical of Dan to fit himself into whatever situation he found himself in.

I was privileged later to work for a number of years as his Assistant before succeeding him as Central Director of the Pioneers. In that role he was totally at the beck and call of everyone. He drove to parishes, schools, colleges and halls all over the country, never sparing himself. He had not a fanatical bone in his body. He understood the Pioneer Association as an expression of devotion to the Sacred Heart. It would never have entered his head that there was anything evil about wine. But he did realize that if not used wisely and well it can lead to endless heartbreak and sorrow. He was convinced that the Pioneer way of prayer and consecrated abstinence could make a significant contribution to the quality of life of the whole community.

He invested a great deal of time and energy into the Pioneer Club on Mountjoy Square, especially the musicals. He survived the occasional storms in that particular tea-cup. I remember one of his wry comments. “It's extraordinary how the closer people get to the stage the more unreasonable they become”.

Dan appeared always to be in good health, although I learned from one of his Jesuit colleagues, the late Pearse O'Higgins, that as a young Jesuit he became seriously ill. His life was in danger. As a last resort his father, who had the reputation of being a brilliant diagnostician, agreed to examine his son, He came to the right conclusion, prescribed accurately, and his son lived to be 92.

During his declining years Dan was a model patient. He was always in good humour, kept himself alert with the Irish Times crossword every morning, and kept up his reading to the end, both serious and light. He confessed that he had read all Jeffrey Archers novels. I am prepared to forgive him this.

The response of Jesus to the Good Thief was unambiguous. “Indeed, I promise you, today you will be with me in paradise”. The first Joshua led the Chosen People into a Promised Land. We pray that today Jesus, the true Joshua take his friend Dan to the definitive Promised Land to be with Him in joy and happiness forever. As one of those who, with his brothers Bill and Herbert, have instructed many in virtue, surely he will be among those whom the Prophet Daniel tells us will shine as bright as stars for all eternity.

◆ The Clongownian, 2007

Obituary

Father Daniel Dargan SJ

Dan was born into a privileged situation in the best sense of the word. He came from a happy Catholic family with a long tradition of service to the Church and the Irish people. An intensely private person he did not wear his heart on his sleeve but you just knew it was in the right place. He once confided to me that after his father died his mother told him that they had never had a row during the whole course of their married life. I think this must have had a profoundly formative effect on Dan. He was a man of peace who tried to spread it wherever he found himself
His early education began with the Christian Brothers in Cork and the Presentation Brothers in Mallow. His five years at Clongowes (1928-1933) saw a period of great transformation with the “New Building” changing the physical face of the College in 1929. In an interview with an internal Jesuit periodical a couple of years ago he confided that he still holds the Clongowes record for the largest score ever run up at Cricket, that he played schools tennis at Interprovincial level and made the First Rugby Fifteen. It was while a student at Clongowes that his decision to enter the Jesuits matured and he followed his elder brother Bill and later was followed by his younger brother, Herbert, At Clongowes he was privileged to know the saintly Fr John Sullivan, whose funeral took place in the college during his final year before Dan left to enter the Society of Jesus, to begin a long and richly filled life continuing his Family's tradition of service to the Church and the Irish people”.

He began his period of formation with a BA In Classics at UCD, followed by Philosophy in Tullabeg (the former St Stanislaus College boarding school which amalgamated with Clongowes in 1886). He spent two years in regency in Belvedere before going on to Milltown Park, Dublin, for Theology. He was ordained there on St Ignatius Day 1946. Then began his long association with St Francis Xavier Church, Gardiner Street, for 35 years, most of them spent as Editor and later Director of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association. He was first Editor of the magazine which is still thriving in spite of the changes in society and which will celebrate its 60th birthday early 2008. He was beloved of the staff in the office, more like an elder brother than a boss.
In that role he was at the beck and call of everyone. He drove to parishes, schools, colleges and halls all over the country, never sparing himself. He had not a fanatical bone in his body. He understood the Pioneer Association as an expression of devotion to the Sacred Heart. It would never have entered his head that there was anything evil about wine. But he did realize that if not used wisely and well it can lead to endless heartbreak and sorrow. He was convinced that the Pioneer way of prayer and consecrated abstinence could make a significant contribution to the quality of life of the whole community. He also invested a great deal of time and energy in the Pioneer Club on Mountjoy Square, especially the musicals.

After three years as Superior of the Community and Director of the Social Service Centre and at an age (68) when many of his contemporaries in the world were well retired, Dan started out on 20 years of parish ministry, serving first the Jesuit Church in Galway and then the Crescent in Limerick, where, at the age of 88 he was still Prefect of the Church, Director of the Pioneers, Director of the Sodality of Our Lady and St Joseph, Promoter of Missions and President of the Cecilian Musical Society!

An industrious man an understatement!), Dan's signature tune could have been “Perpetua mobile”. Perhaps that was the Dargan in him. In a John Bowman programme a few years ago we learned that William Dargan, his illustrious ancestor, builder of so many of the railways of the country at one stage employed something in the order of 140,000 workers. The ecumenical dimension of the family's contribution is evidenced by the fact chat even within the last two decades large bridges in both Belfast and Dublin have been named after Dargan. Queen Elizabeth II came over to open one of them. Two of that great man's uncles were hanged in Wexford during the ‘98 rising

With his brothers Bill and Herbert, Dan has ensured that that his family's long tradition of service to the Church and Ireland will long be remembered and, with them, he himself will surely occupy a privileged place when that service is recorded in our country's history.

Dan appeared to always be in good health although as a young Jesuit he became seriously ill and his life was in danger. As a last resort his father, who had the reputation of being a brilliant diagnostician, agreed to examine his son. He came to the right conclusion, prescribed accurately and, in 2003, in sight of his 90th birthday, Dan joined the Jesuit Community in Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin, where his final mission was “to pray for the Church and the Society” he had loved and served so well, During his declining years he was a model patient. He was always in good humour, kept himself alert with the “Irish Times” crossword every morning and kept up his reading to the end, both serious and light. He confessed that he had read all Jeffrey Archer's novels.
Dan's great grand uncle, Archbishop Daniel Murray of Dublin had offered the first Mass in the Church of St Francis Xavier in 1832, and so it was doubly fitting that, as the autumnal leaves began co turn, Dan's Jesuit Companions should gather with younger generations of the Dargan Family to bid him adieu at his Requiem Mass and to celebrate a richly filled and fruitful life in sight of his century. May he rest in peace.

BMcG

Colgan, John, 1846-1919, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/578
  • Person
  • 08 November 1846-26 June 1919

Born: 08 November 1846, Kilcock, County Kildare
Entered: 12 November 1867, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 1883
Final Vows: 02 February 1886
Died: 26 June 1919, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Brother of James - RIP 1913

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

by 1870 at Amiens, France (CAMP) studying
by 1871 at Leuven, Belgium (BELG) Studying
by 1882 at St Beuno’s, Wales (ANG) studying

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
After Noviceship he studied Philosophy in Europe, was Prefect for a long time at Clongowes for Regency, and then did Theology at St Beuno’s.
After Ordination he was appointed Socius to the Novice Master at Dromore, eventually becoming Master himself.
1888 Dromore Novitiate was closed and he took the Novices to Tullabeg.
1890 His health had begun to suffer so he was sent to Clongowes as Spiritual Father, and did this for a number of years.
He was next sent as Minister to Milltown for a couple of years, but again returned to Clongowes in the same capacity as before.
1901 He was sent to Gardiner St. He was always in compromised health and had a very weak voice, but worked away there for a number of years.
In the end he had a very long illness which he bore with great patience and he died at Gardiner St 26 June 1919. His funeral was held there, very simply, as it was difficult to get a choir together at that time.

◆ Fr Francis Finegan : Admissions 1859-1948 - Made his first Vows at St Acheul, France 13 November 1869

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father John Colgan 1846-1919
Fr John Colgan was born at Kilcock County Kildare on November 8th 1846.

At the end of his theological studies he was appointed Socius to the Master of Novices at Dromore, eventually becoming Master of Novices himself. In 1888 Dromore was closed and he took the novices to Tullabeg.. His health broke down and in 1890 he went to Clongowes as Spiritual Father. In 1901 he was posted to Gardiner Street.

He was never of robust health and he laboured according to his strength for a number of years. His last illness, which was long, he bore with great patience until his death on June 28th 1919. His funeral took place after Low Mass, as it was impossible to get together a choir of priests. His funeral was very simple, as every Jesuit’s should be.

◆ The Clongownian, 1920

Obituary

Father John Colgan SJ

John Colgan passed quietly away at St Francis Xavier's Presbytery, Gardiner Street, on June 19th last year. He was in Clongowes from 1860-67, where his brothers James and Edward, who both predeceased him, were also students. Fr Colgan spent most of his earlier life as a Prefect in Clongowes, Externally cold and formal, he was in private a most kind-hearted and even indulgent man. His Theological studies over, he was sent as Socius to the Master of Novices at Dromore, county Down. He subsequently became Master of Novices himself, and it was he who took the Novices to Tullabeg after that college had been amalgamated with Clongowes. Not long after, his health breaking down, he came to Clongowes as Spiritual Father, at which post - excepting a short interval as Minister at Milltown Park - he remained until 1901. The remainder of his life was spent in works of the ministry at St Francis Xavier's, Dublin, where he rarely left the precincts of the Presbytery except for an occasional short walk. His interest in and kindly disposition towards visitors helped not a little the success of his sacredotal functions. To his sister we tender the sympathy of many generations who knew Fr Colgan.

Byrne, Patrick J, 1908-1968, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/738
  • Person
  • 26 January 1908-13 March 1968

Born: 26 January 1908, Dun Laoghaire, County Dublin
Entered: 02 September 1925, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 27 August 1938, Ignatiuskolleg, Valkenburg aan de Geul, Holland
Final Vows: 02 February 1943, Clongowes Wood College SJ, County Kildare
Died: 13 March 1968, Jervis Street Hospital, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death

Younger brother of Tommy Byrne - RIP 1978

by 1936 at Valkenburg, Limburg, Netherlands (GER I) studying

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 43rd Year No 3 1968

Gardiner Street
The even tenor of our ways was rudely disrupted by the 'tragic death of Fr. Paddy Byrne in a road accident on the night of 12th March. A note on the circumstances of the occurrence, based on the horarium made out by Fr. B. O'Neill, a witness and almost a fellow-victim, is appended to the obituary account.
The remains were removed from Jervis Street Hospital on Thursday evening at 5.15. It was a moving and unique tribute to him from his old friends the Civic Guards of whose sodality he had been director. All the traffic lights in O'Connell Street were turned off (at the peak hour), the Guards on duty stood to attention as the cortege passed and saluted, all along the route to Gardiner Street. As someone remarked, it was a pity Fr. Paddy was not alive to see it.
The funeral took place on Friday morning after Office and Mass at eleven o'clock, to Glasnevin Cemetery. His brother Fr. Tom sang the Mass, with Fr. Superior as deacon and Fr. O'Neill as sub-deacon. Very Rev. Fr. Provincial presided. The Bishop of Nara, an old friend of the family, attended. The church was packed to overflowing. There was a very good representation of his old friends from Clongowes, from the Army, the Guards and, of course, all his clientele from his well-known box in the corridor. His death leaves a big gap in our midst in Gardiner Street for he was a great community man. A more detailed appreciation on him will be found in the Obituary notices.

Obituary :

Fr Patrick Byrne SJ (1908-1968)

Fr. Patrick Byrne was born in Dun Laoghaire (then Kingstown) on 26th January 1908. He was educated at O'Connell School, North Richmond Street, Dublin, and always maintained an affectionate loyalty to the Irish Christian Brothers. Paddy, along with his elder brother, Tommy, was an altar-server at Gardiner Street : thus his acquaintance with old vintage of Jesuit preachers eloquent orators who captivated the Dubliners of earlier generations went back very far and he could list their names for the edification of his own contemporaries. When Tommy had just completed his noviceship, Paddy entered the Society at Tullabeg.
After three years of juniorate in Rathfarnham and two years of philosophy at Tullabeg, he went to Mungret as a teacher for three years. He taught mathematics mainly, but also took some classes for Geography, Latin and other subjects. In 1935 he began Theology at the German house of studies, Ignatiuskolleg, Valkenburg, Holland, where he was ordained. He was one of the first group of tertians at Rathfarnham, the outbreak of war had occasioned the policy of having tertianship in Ireland instead of at St. Beuno's, Wales.
In 1940 Fr. Byrne returned to the colleges and served as an unremitting teacher of Mathematics at Mungret for two years and at Clongowes for twenty. In 1962 he was transferred to Gardiner Street, where he remained until he was accidentally killed at the end of the Novena of Grace this year.

• The following paragraphs give a memoir-sketch from the pen of a colleague.
Was it Chesterton who remarked that we, rational animals, make a fetish of consistency, whereas of all the animals we are inconsis tently the most inconsistent? That was true of Fr. Paddy Byrne known affectionately as “Patch” among his closer friends in the Society. He was a strong personality, a character, but a personality revealing on closer examination traits running counter to each other in a very human inconsistency.
Outwardly he was a rugged individualist, cynical, tough, hard boiled. Inwardly, deep down, he was of softer fibre, one might even say, over emotional. He had an intense love of the Society, especially Gardiner Street, and all that appertained to it, where in his early days he was an altar server. He had his heroes from those days, Fr. Bury, Fr. Tom Murphy, Fr. Kirwan. No one could now come up to their standards nor equal their achievements. Clongowes also had a niche in his heart; Clongowes where he spent upwards of twenty years teaching and looking after the grounds. Yet he could be fiercely critical of individual Jesuits, if in his opinion, they had let down the Society. Careerists and exhibitionists were anathema to him. His criterion of a good Jesuit was one who did a good day's work and work for him meant primarily work in the classroom. At the same time, he, himself, in the opinion of many was no great advertisement for the same Society, mainly owing to his manner of speech and carelessness about his personal appearance. This latter external fault sprang from his excessive love of poverty which often degenerated into love of economy. He could not stand anything that smacked of waste or extravagance among Ours : “Pouring the people's money down the drain” was his way of describing this. He took pride in the fact that the ordinary coat he wore in the house was over twenty year's old, a cast-off of Br. Corcoran's rescued at Clongowes. At the same time no priest could look more impressive than himself with his height and commanding presence when dressed and smartened up for an occasion, and his speech was always impeccable in his public utterances.
Though outwardly rugged in manner and facetiously cynical in his conversation - that exterior was his defence mechanism. It concealed a heart, tender (I do not exaggerate) to the point of pain. For his mother, whose photograph always held a place of honour in his room, he had a love and reverence that amounted almost to adoration. Her opinions and sayings he often quoted as oracular. For Mary, the Mother of God, he had such a tender devotion that he found it difficult to recite her litany in public without being moved and his voice breaking. This same emotional susceptibility appeared in his confessional work and in the parlour when on “domi”. The sad cases, the tragic stories all took their toll of him. He identified himself with his client, was never niggard of his time or sympathy. He had a special grá for defenceless widows and lonely spinsters, living on meagre pensions and apt victims of red tape and tricksters. During the few years he spent in Gardiner Street he endeared himself to the old women of the neighbourhood. Some saw in him a great resemblance to Spencer Tracy, the actor, others were reminded of the good Pope John. An old bicycle was his means of propulsion up to hospitals and off to remote side streets on errands of mercy and friendly interest. “I was rebuilding my house, Father”, one of his friends reminisced, “he'd often drop by and examine progress and make sure the contractors weren't cheating me”. Talking of his bicycle, an institution in Gardiner Street, his favourite pastime, apart from golf, was to go down to the docks on his warhorse and sit on the wharfs reading his office and chatting to the dockers. He had the human touch in excelsis : nil humanum illi alienum.
He used to say that his long years of teaching in Clongowes had unfitted him for church work. The fact of the matter is, the comparatively few years he spent in Gardiner Street brought out the basic pastoral traits in him. He was diffident of himself in his public appearances, yet his sermons and addresses to the various sodalities he directed in his time, were always meaty and genuinely appreciated by his audiences. His big appearance and naturally slow delivery lent weight and authority to his utterances. This was only to be expected, for he was of very high intellectual ability.
His years in the juniorate and University College, Dublin, were devoted to science and mathematics, during which period he had charge of the now-defunct seismograph. His regency was spent in Mungret. He was more at home in theology than in philosophy, both moral and dogma, in which disciplines he was at once clear, accurate and reliable. At the same time he took pride in his knowledge of farming. I suspect his secret ambition as a Jesuit was to be put in charge of a farm. His criticism of procurators of our farms was scathing, with perhaps one exception. He was adept with his hands with mechanical devices and electrical gadgets : his elaborate electrical invention for lighting cigarettes was a great source of amusement to his friends. His room was full of clocks he was mending for his clientele in the church. He was a fund of esoteric information on all subjects ranging from good recipes for the kitchen to cures for varicose veins.
His intellectual powers, however, were marred by two faults. Firstly he was never able to convey his ideas clearly to an audience. This was sometimes manifest in his teaching, in his relations with superiors, in social intercourse. He was inarticulate, spoke in unfinished sentences and gestures, with resultant impatience when the listener failed to understand. So he gave the impression of being supremely intolerant of fools. Paradoxically enough, he was master of the telling phrase, the quip, some of which will go down in history. Secondly, his intellect was impeded by deep prejudices. His years in Valkenburg imbued him with a horror of Nazism which coloured a great deal of his political thought. He blamed all the world's troubles on clumsy American diplomacy. It was futile to argue with him on matters Irish. As for innovations in the liturgy, he had no time for them. He had witnessed the beginning of this movement in Germany long before Vatican II and was not impressed. Indeed he never tired of hearing the story repeated of the old woman who asked her confessor, “Father, is it a mortal sin not to join in the shoutin' at Mass?” To many generations of Clongownians he was known as “The Genius”. Perhaps with the schoolboys unerring instinct to pinpoint a basic trait, they were right. He was a genius but cursed by an inability to express himself clearly, because from his early days he never disciplined that genius by writing. Whenever he did so (and it was torture) as in his sermons and addresses, he was precise and telling. He was a man of strong opinions with a weltanschauung, as he used to call it, which often enough gave rise to weltschmerz.
Yes, he was a character and his tragic passing creates a gap in Gardiner Street not easily filled. He will be missed too, by many young Jesuit priests of the Province to whom he was guide, friend and counsellor during their college days, Ours don't usually cry over the death of Ours but there were many who were not ashamed to drop a tear over “Patch”. Of the contradictory traits which went to make him what he was, his qualities of heart, sympathy and understanding, were basic and permeating. A man who succeeded in his time in winning the affection of his fellow Jesuits, in worming himself into the hearts of the people of Gardiner Street, was certainly of solid worth in that which is, after all is said and done, the essential, love of one's fellow men and he went before his master full of good works and fortified with the rites of the Church he loved and served so well. He loved a joke and I'm sure he'll give a wry smile as I suggest this epitaph-a parody of a phrase famous in rugby circles : “He went over the line, festooned with souls”. May he rest in peace.

12th March 1968 : Fr. Patrick Byrne, being on “domi” duty, was constantly called to the parlour during the afternoon and evening, He helped Fr. O'Neill in sorting out the Mass stipends and Br. Davis in counting the Novena of Grace offerings. He assisted in giving Holy Communion at the evening Mass. He presided over his St. Vincent de Paul Confreence meeting. Coming from a final parlour interview and confession at 11 p.m., he had a late supper in the refectory and went out with Fr. O'Neill for a breath of fresh air at the end of a tiring day. As they were crossing an apparently deserted street at the corner of Mountjoy Square, a van suddenly swept towards them at high speed. Fr. O'Neill saw the van, uttered a warning and jumped forward to the kerb, thinking that they were evading the danger together, but - “I heard a tremendous thud or impact and saw Fr. Paddy tossed into the air, turning over and landing on the pavement with a horrifying bump. I ran to him, called him by name, got some reaction and immediately absolved”. He had been struck on the head and must be on the verge of death. Fr. MacAmhlaoibh brought the oils from nearby Gardiner Street and gave the last anointing on the way by ambulance to Jervis Street Hospital. The medical and nursing staff made a supreme effort to save Fr, Byrne's life, until soon after midnight he was pronounced dead.

Bellew, Christopher, 1818-1867, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/63
  • Person
  • 25 July 1818-18 March 1867

Born: 25 July 1818, Mountbellew, County Galway
Entered: 11 February 1850, Issenheim, Alsace, France - Franciae Province (FRA)
Ordained: 1856, Montauban, France
Final Vows: 03 December 1866
Died: 18 March 1867, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner St, Dublin

Older brother of Michael RIP 1868

by 1853 at Vals, France (TOLO)
by 1854 in Cologne, Germany (GER) studying Theology 1
by 1855 at Malta College (ANG) for Regency
by 1857 at Montauban, France (TOLO) studying Theology
by 1860 at St Beuno’s, Wales (ANG) studying Theology

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Son of an Irish Baronet (probably the Galway Parliamentarians of the 18th and 19th Centuries). Older brother of Michael RIP 1868. Their home was frequently visited by Jesuits, and this helped develop a great love in Christopher for the Society.
After his early education in Grammar and Humanities, he went to Trinity. As he was an eldest so, his family wanted to prepare him as the future representative of the family in an understanding of Society and Politics. So he also travelled much in Europe for that purpose.
In about 1840 a “fashionable marriage” was announced in the Press between the eldest son of and old Catholic Baronet, and the eldest daughter of an old Protestant Baronet, Sir John Burke of Marble Hall. All preparations were in place and the bridegroom went to Clongowes to make a Retreat before his marriage. His younger brother Michael, already being in the Society, meant that the interest of the Community is Christopher was higher than usual. he impressed all with his piety. Waiting for news of the marriage, it seemed to have been delayed, and after a while, there was a rumour that he was in a Novitiate on the Continent. Apparently an issue had arisen which had proven a stumbling block, namely Christopher’s insistence that any children should be raised Catholic. He communicated this to his bride whilst on retreat. A suggestion came back from her family that perhaps any girls would stay with the mother’s religion. Christopher responded by saying that he could not accept this arrangement. He wrote again indicating that the only solution was to relieve her of her promise, and to declare arrangements at an end. Her family wrote back acceding to his request that the children would all be Catholics, but this letter arrived too late - he had left Clongowes, and nobody knew where he was. For some years he did not return to Ireland, and when he did, he was Rev Christopher Bellew SJ. In the meantime, Miss Burke had herself become a Catholic, and lead a very holy life, remaining single, and devoting her life to charitable works.
Christopher joined the Society at Issenheim in France, and after First Vows, began studies in Philosophy at Vals, France. He was later sent to teach Grammar at a TOLO College. While there he became ill, and so was sent to Malta, where he remained as a Teacher for two years. He then returned to France and was Ordained there 1856 at Montaubon.
He then returned to Ireland and spent three years teaching at Colleges.
1859 He was sent to the Dublin Residence as Operarius, and remained there until his death 18 March 1867. He had been very zealous in the hard work of the Confessional.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Christopher Bellew 1818-1867
The life of Christopher Bellew reads like some edifying romantic tale. He was born in Mount Bellew County Galway, the eldest son of Sir Michael Bellew, Baronet. From his earliest years he had a great knowledge and love of the Society, for during his father’s lifetime “Ours” used frequently visit the family mansion, and stay a few days there.
Having completed his early studies, he was sent by his family to Trinity College Dublin, where he went through a distinguished course. He then travelled extensively on the continent to complete his education.
About the year 1840, his forthcoming marriage to the eldest daughter of Sir John Burke of Marble Hall, was announced in the Press. The bridegroom came to Clongowes to make a retreat prior to his marriage. Needless to say the Community at Clongowes were intensely interested in the matter, especially as Christopher’s younger brother Michael was already a Jesuit. Weeks passed, and still no account in the papers of this fashionable marriage. At length a rumour started which grew into a certainty, that the bridegroom was in a Jesuit noviceship somewhere on the continent.

What had happened was this : All the preliminaries to the marriage had been settled except one, the religion of the children, as the intended bride was a Protestant. According to a custom, which rightly or wrongly existed at the time, the bride’s family insisted that the girls of the marriage should follow the religion of their mother. To this condition the bridegroom would not agree, and he wrote to say that he released the young lade from her promise and that the negotiations were at an end.

The upshot of this was that the young lade became a Catholic and led a holy life in single blessedness, devoting her time to works of charity.

Christopher entered the noviceship at Issenheim in Alsace. He was ordained priest at Montaubon in 1856. Recalled to Ireland, he taught for three years in the Colleges, and then was stationed for the rest of his life at Gardiner Street. There he was an outstanding operarius, zealous and untiring in the confessional.

He died on March 18th 1867. He succeeded his father Sir Michael Bellew in 1855, and is listed in Burke’s Peerage as the Reverend Sir Christopher Bellew.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Christopher Bellew (1818-1867)

Was master at the Crescent from 1860 to 1861 and again from 1862- to 1864. He was the eldest son of Sir Michael Bellew, Bart, of Mountbellew Bridge, Co Galway. After his studies at Clongowes, he entered Trinity College, Dublin and later got a commission in the army. He was heir to the title and family property but resigned his claims in 1850 to enter the Society. The story of his call to the religious life is curious, if not even romantic. From his family's viewpoint, he had made an excellent match in becoming engaged to the daughter of Sir John Burke of Marble Hall, Co Galway. Unfortunately, his bride-to-be was a Protestant, and her family insisted, according to the custom of the time, that any daughters born of the marriage should follow their mother's religious beliefs. Young Bellew, as the time for the marriage-ceremony approached, decided to return to Clongowes to make a retreat under one of his old masters. During his stay at Clongowes, he wrote to Sir John Burke, insisting that all children of the marriage must be Catholics. The Burkes replied that they could not accede to his demands. Bellew now intimated that he felt bound in conscience to terminate the engagement. This time, the Burkes, anxious that the marriage should be gone on with, waived their demands on the religion of their future grand-daughters. But the letter arrived too late to find him. Christopher Bellew had gone abroad. Later it was learned that he had entered the Society in Alsace. On the completion of his noviceship, he entered on his philosophy studies at Vals in the Lyons Province of the Society, and is next heard of as master in a Jesuit College of the Toulouse Province and later in Malta. He returned to France for the study of theology and was ordained at Montauban. Here, it can be recalled, that his former bride-to-be, Miss Burke of Marble Hall, on learning of Christopher's vocation, became a Catholic herself. She never married but spent her life in works of zeal and charity.

Father Bellew's priestly life was short. After his time in the Crescent, he was transferred to Gardiner St Church where he died three years later. Old newspapers of the time refer to him as “The Rev Sir Christopher Bellew, Bart, SJ”. He never used the title himself, although he could not legally renounce it. He was long remembered at Gardiner St Church as a zealous priest, especially in the laborious work of the confessional.

Wrafter, Joseph, 1865-1934, Jesuit priest and chaplain

  • IE IJA J/705
  • Person
  • 09 August 1865-05 September 1934

Born: 09 August 1865, Rosenallis, Co Laois
Entered: 03 November 1883, Milltown Park, Dublin/Loyola House, Dromore, County Down
Ordained: 30 July 1899, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1902
Died: 05 September 1934, St Vincent’s Hospital

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death

Early education at St Stanislaus College SJ, Tullabeg

Chaplain in the First World War.

by 1894 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1901 at Sartirana, Merate, Como, Italy (VEN) making Tertianship
by 1917 Military Chaplain : 8th Royal Munster Fusiliers, France
by 1918 Military Chaplain : 7th Leinster Regiment, BEF France
by 1919 Military Chaplain : Chaplain to the Forces, Schveningen, Netherlands

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Note from Nicholas Walsh Entry :
He died in the end room of Bannon’s corridor, and the Provincial William Delaney and Minister Joseph Wrafter were with him at the end.”

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/blog/damien-burke/a-sparrow-to-fall/

A sparrow to fall
Damien Burke
A BBC Northern Ireland documentary, Voices 16 – Somme (BBC 1 NI on Wednesday 29th June,
9pm) explores the events of 1916 through the testimony of the people who witnessed it and their families. Documentary makers and relatives of Jesuit chaplain Willie Doyle were shown his letters, postcards and personal possessions kept here at the Irish Jesuit Archives. In the 1920s, Alfred O’Rahilly used some of these letters in his biography of Fr Willie Doyle SJ. Afterwards they were given to Willie’s brother, Charles, and were stored for safekeeping in the basement of St Francis Xavier’s church, Lower Gardiner Street, Dublin in 1949. In 2011, they were accessioned into the archives.
Fr Willie Doyle SJ was one of ten Irish Jesuits who served as chaplains at the battle of the Somme (1 July- 18 November 1916): seven with the British forces; three with the Australian. Their letters, diaries and photographs witness their presence to the horror of war.

Fr Joseph Wrafter SJ, 8th Royal Munster Fusiliers (06 July 1916):
It is a very terrible thing where a show is on & no one I know wants any more of it than he has seen if he has been in it at all. But of course all have to see it through & the men are really splendid...Between killed & wounded we lost in that period quite a fourth of our Battalions & the Leinsters nearly as many. But they did good work & the enemy got a good deal more than they gave. It is dreadful to see the way the poor fellows are broken & mangled sometimes out of all recognition.

https://www.jesuit.ie/blog/damien-burke/jesuits-and-the-influenza-1918-19/

Jesuits and the influenza, 1918-19
Damien Burke
The influenza pandemic that raged worldwide in 1918-19 (misnamed the Spanish flu, as during the First World War, neutral Spain reported on the influenza) killed approximately 100 million people.

The influenza was widely referenced by Irish Jesuit chaplains in the First World War. And Fr Joseph Wrafter SJ writing in December 1918: “the influenza is raging here and all over Holland as everywhere”.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 9th Year No 4 1934
Obituary :
Father Joseph Wrafter

Father Wrafter died at St. Vincent's Hospital on Wednesday 5th September, 1934. For a considerable time he had been in very poor health, even before he left Clongowes in 1932, he had suffered a good deal. He was an invalid for nearly the two years he spent in Gardiner St., yet, with his usual courage, he did very fully all the work he was allowed to do. At last he was compelled to go to St. Vincent’s, where for some three weeks before his death he was very often quite unconscious.
In next number, we shall give a short sketch of his life in the Society.

Irish Province News 10th Year No 1 1935
Father Joseph Wrafter Continued
Father Wrafter was born near Rosenallis in Leix on the 9th August, 1865. He went with his two elder brothers, William and Thomas, to Tullabeg in 1877, where he remained until

  1. On November 3rd of that year he entered the Novitiate which was then at Milltown Park, but was transferred the following year to Dromore, Co. Down. He next spent a year
    as a Junior in Milltown, and had just begun his Philosophy there, when in November, 1886, the year of the amalgamation (Tullabeg and Clongowes) he was sent to Clongowes. He was Third Line and Gallery Prefect there for three years, and from 1889 to 1891 had charge of the Large Study. In the former of these years he utilised his great histrionic powers in getting up “The Tempest” which was an unqualified success. In 1891 he was appointed Higher Line Prefect although he had not yet done his Philosophy, and was the youngest man on the prefectorial staff. But his strength of character and sense of justice made up for these drawbacks. In 1893, after seven years' work as a scholastic in Clongowes, he went to Louvain for Philosophy, and in 1896 to Milltown Park for Theology, joining the Long Course.
    In the early summer of 1899 he went down to Clongowes to stay for about a month, in order to take the place of Father Fegan who had left to undergo a serious operation. However Father Wrafter remained in Clongowes the following year as Prefect of the Small Study, and next year saw him a Tertian in the Province of Venice.
    From 1900 to 1903 he was stationed in University College St, Stephen's Green, as Minister. After a year on the Mission Staff, with headquarters at the Crescent, Limerick, he renewed
    his connection With Clongowes, this time as Minister, remaining there until 1908, when he went to Gardiner St. and, in addition to the ordinary work, got charge of the Police Sodality. The next year he was appointed Minister and held that position until 1942, with the exception of a break of three years (1916-1919), when he was Military Chaplain in France and Holland. While at the front he distinguished himself by his great coolness and bravery. He was awarded the MC, but an officer who himself won the V.C., said that “every day, Father Wrafter did things that deserved the VC”.
    In 1924 he became Minister in Leeson St., and had charge of University Hall. Next year he again took up work in Clongowes as Minister and held the position for ten years. It was during these years that the new building was erected in Clongowes, in which Father Wrafter took a very great interest. 1934 saw him once more in Gardiner St, but incapable of much active work. However, as long as he possibly could, he said Mass and attended to his Confessional to which he had always been most devoted.
    He celebrated his Golden jubilee in the Society in November 1933, but did not long survive the event. The malady to which he had long been subject - phlebitis - had poisoned his system and after some weeks in hospital he died on 5th September 1934.
    The most remarkable thing about Father Wrafter's life in the Society was his long term of office as Minister in all twenty six years, thirteen in Clongowes, ten in Gardiner Stand ten in the University. He possessed in a high degree the qualities required for that office. He was a fine organiser quickly saw what was wanted, and then had the power to descend to details. He was extremely just and patient and was moreover the very soul of generosity, loving to see and to make others happy. To the poor also he was very kind. Many of the beggars and tramps who came to Clongowes made it a point to ask for Father Wrafter, they almost seemed to be personal friends of his so familiarly did he chat with them.
    What struck one most in Father Wrafter was his strong will and his great sense of duty Whatever he took in hand he saw through, and whatever was his duty would be done thoroughly. During his last few years as Minister in Clongowes he suffered from phlebitis which caused his legs to become very much swollen and painful, but unless absolutely forbidden by the doctor, he was sure to go down to the refectory to preside at the boys' meals. He was indefatigable in his care of and kindness to the sick, frequently visiting them in the infirmary during the night. This did not prevent him from being the first to rise in the morning. He always said the 6 o'clock Mass. Indeed it was wonderful how he contrived to do with so little sleep. In his last illness this strength of character was most noticeable, for though he suffered very much he never complained, but always made as little as possible of his sufferings. The nurses who attended him marvelled, and were much edified at his patience and resignation.
    How much his kindness and help to so many were appreciated was shown by the number of people, many of them in humble circumstances who called at the hospital to enquire for him during his last illness. R.I.P

◆ The Clongownian, 1935

Obituary
Father Joseph Wrafter SJ

There is something of the lacrimae rerum in the ending of the notice in last year's “Clongownian” of Father Wrafter's Golden Jubilee as a Jesuit, The words were, ad multos annos. That was in June, and the 5th of September brought the sad news that he was dead, So the words must now change to ad annos aeternos.

Fifty years, of which twenty were in and for Clongowes. How true it is to say for : Clongowes. Though he never forgot his old school Tullabeg, yet it had for his practical mind been merged in the sister College.

Loyalty seems, to one who knew him well, to have been the note of his character. Of the three loyalties, Loyalty to the Jesuit Order, Loyalty to Clongowes, Loyalty to his friends, the first two naturally became one, fused into one, the second becoming the practical expression of the former.

There is hardly a corner in the House where one who knows will fail to find traces of his watchful care. Under him the Infirmary became the highly efficient department it is. The great Well was a matter of real need, not merely of convenience. The College Grounds and the Garden were a concern of his, run with an eye to efficiency as well as to beauty, as if they had been his only care. As to the New Building : it had been a thought of his for thirty years in plan, and one need not say that the interest never flagged. Perhaps a practically minded Old Clongownian would say that the 'Boys' Refectory is the spot most associated with his genial presence and ceaseless care. One such, not of the immediate Past, said to me the other day: “The two men who resumed Clongowes life for us fellows were Father Wrafter and Father John Sullivan”. It sounds strange at first hearing, but on reflection one is more and more convinced of its truth. They were very unlike in what was obvious, but very like in what most caught the House : they both loved the boys.

His friends were legion and they were very true, for they knew by experience how unfalteringly they could rely on his interest and honest advice, One felt, said one of them, that you could tell him anything and be sure of his sympathy. This was strikingly true during the last year of his life, when he was a constant sufferer. He would drag himself to the parlour to see a friend, they never suspecting at what cost.

The elements were so mixed in him that he remained human and strong. It is easy to find a man in which one or the other predominates. The result is poor. In Father Wrafter they worked to a unity that won love in the best sense of the word.

To his sister, Mrs. Murray, we offer our sincerest sympathy. We use the words in the strictest sense, knowing how united the brother and sister were. On her yearly visit to him one saw renewed the finale of George Eliot's great novel Now many of us will join with her in murmuring :

But for the touch of a vanish'd hand
And the sound of a voice that is stilled.

-oOo-

Father “Joey” Wrafter : A Memory

It must be well over half a century ago that I, a small boy, first met “Joey” Wrafter, when I found myself a Third Liner at Clongowes. After such a long time it is not perhaps, surprising that the order in which events occurred has become rather mixed, and I must confess that I don't remember what exact position he held when first found myself an inmate of the school. I rather think that Father (then Mr) Gleeson was Third Line Prefect. My memories of Mr Wrafter are very clear, indeed, as they should be, for no small boy had ever a better kinder friend than I found in him. He indeed kind to all boys. It was part and parcel of his make-up, and as a result was liked and trusted by them.

Looking back over the fifty odd years, I recognise that this was the salient point of his character; kindness, understanding and sympathy with all boys, and in particular, with small boys. I never knew him to be hard or ungenerous to one of them, not was he prone to punish where punishment could be avoided,

Naturally, some of us knew him better than others, and were looked on by him as special friends. I am very proud to think that I could count myself as one of this group. Amongst others of this group I remember Geoff Esmond, Jim Clarke and Dominic Kelly, to mention only a few. Those who remember Father Wrafter in after years will, I am sure, wish to get some idea what he was like as a young man. Well, he was very slim and upright, handsome of face in an aquiline way, with the cheeriest of smiles. He was always very trim and neat, had small and well-made hands and feet, and was very graceful in all his movements. He was a delightfully light and fast runner, and kept himself extremely fit. He, at that time, could not have weighed more than about 10 stone.

Can you think of a fencer standing slim, butt muscular, head up, with a keen, clear cut face ready for a bout with the foils? Well, that is exactly the picture I get when I look back and remember Joey Wrafter in the late 80's and early 90's of last century.

Though not posing as a great book man, he was keen-witted, a good talker, and in some things exceptionally clever.

Though he played football and cricket, he did not seem to be very interested in games, but during my time at Clongowes he proved himself a master of the art of producing plays. This was his hobby, and he took the keenest delight in staging all sort of shows from farces and pantomime to Shakespeare.

I took part in most of the plays produced by him during my time, and remember amongst many others a farce called “Bombastes Furioso”, also a pantomime, “Alladin”, in which I starred as the Widow Twanky, and Shakespeare's “Tempest”, in which I took the part of Trinculo.

Well the years move on and we with there. Father Wrafter has left us, but I for one can say with truth that the memory of him and his great goodness and kindness to one small boy lives on and will not be forgotten till I also go the way we all must go, and not even then I hope.

When I was a boy at Clongowes “Joey” Wrafter was one of the very best. RIP

JGG

-oOo-

Father Wrafter as Army Chaplain

In November of 1915, the 8th Battalion, Royal Munster Fusiliers, with the other units of the 6th (Irish) Division, after a year's training at Kilworth, were awaiting orders at Blackburn for the move to France. A few days before the unit entrained, an orderly informed me that the Colonel, known amongst his friends as “Mike”, wanted to see me urgently in the mess.

“Read this wire”, said he, as I entered. Mike was one of the hard-living, hard swearing type of old soldiers. “They are sending us a priest. What the blazes shall I do with him? Should I offer him a drink when he comes?”

When I came again to the mess, a few hours later, I found the Colonel and priest swopping yarns over the fire and a whiskey and soda. And so began a strange friendship which lasted without end between “Mike”, a Protestant, if he had any religion at all, with no control over his language even before a priest-and Father Wrafter, a devout Jesuit with much knowledge of the world and great understanding. Years after, when Mike knew his end was coming and the Protestant clergyman was announced, - his only words were : “Tell him to go to the devil, the only person I want near me is Father Wrafter”.

Practically all the men in the regiment were Catholics, and when the unit arrived at the front, Father Wrafter's worth was soon recognised. His influence amongst them was on a par with the Colonel's, and more than once Mike asked the Padre to give the men a good talk at Mass about something that they should have done or something they should not have done and did. The effect was excellent.

For the four battalions in the Brigade there were two Catholic chaplains, and Father Wrafter looked after the welfare of the 7th Leinsters as well as the 8th Munsters. Of the two battalions, one was usually in the front line and one in reserve trenches, or in billets behind. In this way it often fell to the Padre to do three or four tours : in succession with the regiments in the front line, where his splendid help was most needed. On one occasion he spent a month on end in the front trenches. Yet, during these days of static warfare, I never knew him to miss saying daily Mass, sometimes in an open trench with a box as his altar, sometimes in a little dugout, where there was room only for himself and his servant, one Thunder, known in the regiment as “Lightning”, on account of his extreme slowness of movement.

For two years Father Wrafter served with the 8th Munsters in France. He was a well-known figure in the Irish Division ; there were few officers from the General downwards who did not know him personally. In the line he worked day and night attending the sick and wounded and burying the dead. Woe betide the Colonel if the Padre was not informed immediately any casualties occurred; and it was wonderful what confidence he gave the men, who knew he could be there as soon as anything happened. When it came to going over the top, Father Wrafter was always somewhere near the front line, even when the Colonel cursed him for leaving battalion headquarters. He was then a man fifty and portly, leading what was for him a strange life, yet he took the knocks and the kicks with a smile which was good see and did no end of good in the regiment.

On one occasion, in 1916, when the Brigade was in reserve at Les Mines, the Germans sent over gas at night and the masks of the men in the front. trenches proved ineffective against it. The casualties were heavy the Germans had followed up the gas by a night attack-and next night the Munsters were sent up to the front line on relief, The trenches were a veritable shambles. Corpses, with their bodies and faces distorted in their death agony, were piled in the trenches and littered the ground near them. For four nights, from dusk to dawn (the MS has from dawn to dusk) the Padre worked with his men, burying the dead as best he could. More often than not, shell holes formed the ready-made graves. A mournful sight it was this burial gang working under fire by the pale light of the moon.

Yet, nothing daunted the chaplain's spirits, and he was ready to crack a joke with all and sundry. Just before this gas attack, the General came to inspect the 8th Munsters, He stepped out of his car opposite the quarter-guard and questioned the sentry about his duties. The sentry, well coached, repeated them all, ending with the usual, “in the event of any unusual occurrence report to the guard commander”. “And what would you call an unusual occurrence, my man?” asked the General. “Well, sur, if I saw the sintry box markin' time”. A cloud collected on the General's brow; then he looked at the Padre and moved on quickly.

In 1917, Father Wrafter won the Military Cross, a reward he richly deserved, though he himself was the last to acknowledge this, His rectitude was such that the things he did seemed to him to be nothing but his ordinary duty. His real reward was the way that the men of his regiment maintained and practised their religion--the number of men who approached the altar rails, when the battalion had an opportunity of attending Mass behind the lines, surprised the local inhabitants.

In late 1917, the 6th Irish Division was reorganised and the 8th Munsters, or what was left of them after two years' fighting, were drafted to another battalion of the regiment. Father Wrafter was then offered an appointment as Senior Chaplain at one of the bases in France - a “soft job”, - with two assistants. This offer he stoutly refused to accept and continued to serve as regimental Chaplain to the Munsters until the end of the War. Later he went to Holland, as Chaplain to a prisoners of war camp. In November of 1917 I sailed for India and temporarily lost touch with him.

Next time I met him was in 1924 as his guest at Clongowes, where he was then Minister. The Jesuit robe had taken the place of the military uniform, which was the only garb the men of the 8th Munsters had seen him in, but the man was unchanged. He was the same strong, genial Padre, whose courage and cheerfulness had been an inspiration to all who had met him during the terrible years of the War.

JO'B.

-oOo-
1929-32 - “The Minister”

It was not till Father Wrafter had left us for Gardiner Street that we fully realised what a place he had won for himself in the life of the boys here. It is not an easy thing to win that place and it is harder still to keep it, but of him both were true. When you were well, you felt how much you depended on him for the creature comforts of the Refectory. When you were ill, his genial visits in the Infirmary were things to look forward to.

He was in truth a hard man to replace, so that his visit of a few days on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee had a quality unlike that of the coming of anyone else, The boys loved to gather round him and one could notice how newcomers to whom he was a stranger looked with envy at such gay gatherings.

One could notice too, how the older trades men about the College seemed as glad to meet him as we did.

The writer of these notes well remembers his first official contact with Father Wrafter. It was my first night at Clongowes and having got from my Line Prefect to “follow the crowd”, I found myself in the Refectory for tea, an extremely subdued unit in an extremely boisterous throng. Suddenly a bell went and in the midst of a profound silence a massive figure rose with infinite dignity to say Grace. This said, he sank down again slowly and gazed with the broadest of smiles all round the Refectory. After a few moments he came down from the box and began a triumphal procession through the Refectory, pausing at each table to shake hands with the “old boys” and to discover among the “new” the son or nephew or young brother of old friends,

Afterwards when the days had grown to weeks and weeks to months, an extremely insignificant member of Rudiments decided to go for his first sleep (having, I am afraid, very little the matter with him). I well recall the mingled hope and fear with which I awaited my turn. At last it came and the climb up the three steps seemed endless, to be confronted with the huge figure of the Minister. One quick glance to assure himself that it was nothing very serious and then he learnt back good-humouredly to listen to my plea of a headache. A few seconds of doubt and uncertainty and then my name went down in the notebook and I go off with the world a much brighter place. One of the most characteristic things about him was the tolerance with which he would listen to the malingerers at the foot of the steps as they arranged their complaints and yet would hear them afterwards in the best humoured manner possible. Suddenly he would come down from the box and make his way to the Infirmary with the Third Liners whom he had refused clinging to the wings of his gown and clustering round him - looking for all the world like some great liner surrounded by her tugs. But there was one thing about him that lays bare his character better than twenty pages of “The Clongownian” : if ever he had occasion to send anyone “up” for any misdeed in the Refectory or outside it, the offender had only to ask for a sleep that night and he was sure to get it.

Kindliness was, to my mind, the outstanding trait that made him universally beloved here among us.

P Meenan

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Joseph Wrafter (1865-1934)

Born at Rosenalis, Leix, and educated at Tullabeg College, entered the Society in 1883. He pursued his higher studies at Louvain and Milltown Park where he was ordained in 1899. His association with the Crescent was short, 1903-04 when he was a member of the mission staff. With the exception of the period of the first world war. Father Wrafter's life was spent between Dublin and Clongowes. He was a member of the church staff, Gardiner St at the time of his death.

Weafer, Michael, 1851-1922, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/2234
  • Person
  • 16 August 1851-26 March 1922

Born: 16 August 1851, Galway City, County Galway
Entered: 06 September 1866, Milltown Park
Ordained: 1883
Final Vows: 22 February 1887
Died: 26 March 1922, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin

by 1869 at Amiens France (CAMP) studying
by 1870 at Rome Italy (ROM) studying
by 1871 at Maria Laach College Germany (GER) Studying
by 1881 at Oña Spain (ARA) studying
by 1886 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He made his Noviceship at Milltown under Luigi Sturso.
After his Novitiate he was sent to France for Rhetoric and Rome for Philosophy.
He had to leave Rome due to political troubles and finished his Philosophy at Maria Laach.
He was sent first to Clongowes and then as Prefect to Tullabeg for Regency.
He was sent to Oña for Theology.
After Ordination he was sent teaching for several years at Crescent and Galway. He was rector for three years in Galway and then joined the Missionary Staff.
1904 He was sent to Gardiner St and lived there until his happy death 26 March 1922. He was six years Superior there 1912-1919.
He was a very fluent and ready speaker with good knowledge of French, Italian, German and Spanish. He was very kind to the sick and dying

Note from James Redmond Entry :
He studied Rhetoric at St Acheul, Amiens with Michael Weafer, Thomas Finlay and Peter Finlay, Robert Kane and Vincent Byrne, among others.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Michael Weafer 1861-1922
Fr Michael Weafer was born in Galway on August 29th 1861, and he was educated at St Ignatius Galway. He was one of those who made their noviceship under Fr Sturzo at Milltown Park in 1866.

He was present in Rome studying Philosophy during the Revolution of 1870, and with Fr Patrick Keating had to finish his studied at Maria-Laach.
Fr Weafer was Rector of Galway from 1901-1904. The rest of his life was spent mainly in Gardiner Street, of which he was Superior from 1912-1919.
He was a very fluent and ready speaker, with a good knowledge of French, Italian, German and Spanish. He was renowned for his kindness to the sick and dying.
He died on March 25th 1922.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Michael Weafer (1851-1922)

Was born in Galway and entered the Society in 1866. His first association with the Crescent was during his regency, 1878-80. He spent two more year on the teaching staff after his ordination and later completed his higher studies in Belgium. In 1889, the annua mirabilis of the Crescent in the last century, Father Weafer returned as prefect of studies and remained on the Crescent staff until 1900, when he was appointed rector of St Ignatius, Galway. At the end of his rectorship at St Ignatius, Father Weafer was transferred to Gardiner St., Dublin, where he laboured at the church until his death. He was superior of the Gardiner St community from 1912 to 1919.a

Waters, Michael 1829-1895, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/445
  • Person
  • 01 November 1829-22 November 1895

Born: 01 November 1829, Trim, County Meath
Entered: 01 February 1867, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: Maynooth - St Patrick’s College, Maynooth, County Kildare - pre Entry
Final Vows: 15 August 1879
Died: 22 November 1895, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublinn

by 1869 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He had been Ordained at Maynooth and was a curate in Mullingar for a number of years before Ent.

1870-1875 He was sent to Galway.
1876-1878 He was sent to Limerick.
1879 He was sent to Gardiner St and remained there until his death 22 November 1895
He was a Minister in some of these Residences and universally loved by all.

The day after his death the Freeman’s Journal wrote :
“He was for a time zealously devoted to the work of the Missions, and afterwards in the capacity of the Spiritual Director of the Sacred Heart Home and Manager of SFX Schools in Lower Dorset St. He gave great service to the cause of the protection and education of the children of the poor. . He was also Spiritual Director of the SVP Conference attached to Gardiner St, and was always foremost in any effort they made for the relief of the destitute and orphaned. Even in the ranks of the gifted Order to which he belonged, his death will create a gap which it will be hard to fill”.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Michael Waters 1822-1895
Fr Waters was a native of County Meath, and having been ordained at Maynooth, he worked as a curate in Mullingar for some years. He entered the Society in 1867.
He was stationed first at Galway, then in Limerick, but was at Gardiner Street that his great work was done. As Spiritual Director of the Sacred Heart Home and Manager of St Francis Xavier Schools, he rendered great service to the cause of the children of the poor. He also directed the Society of St Vincent de Paul, which provided another means for him to help his beloved poor.

He died on November 22nd 1895. The Freeman’s Journal on the following day among other tributes, paid him the following “Even in the ranks of the gifted Order to which he belonged, his death will create a gap which it will be hard to fill”.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Michael Waters (1829-1895)

A native of Co Meath, was a secular priest of the diocese of Meath when he was admitted to the Society in 1867. He had studied at Maynooth and was a curate for some years at Mullingar when he decided to enter the Jesuit Order. After the completion of his studies in the Society, he was stationed for some years at St Ignatius, Galway. Father Waters's association with the Crescent was short. He spent only two years, 1875-78, in Limerick but his work proved of lasting character. He was appointed to organise the Sodality of the Blessed Virgin for women, a work set on sure foundations that has endured and increased in strength throughout the past four score years. His remaining years were spent in Dublin, at Gardiner St, where his work amongst the poor was long remembered.

Ward, Séamus, 1935-2011, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/799
  • Person
  • 31 May 1935-22 February 2011

Born: 31 May 1935, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1953, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 10 July 1968, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1975, St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street
Died: 22 February 2011, St Mary Star of the Sea, Key West, Florida, USA

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death

Nephew of Eugene - RIP 1976

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

by 1971 at USF San Francisco, USA (CAL) studying
by 1972 at St Michael’s Bronx NY, USA (NEB) studying

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/seamus-ward-rip/

Seamus Ward RIP
Seamus Ward SJ passed away in Florida yesterday, 22 February. He was staying at St. Mary, Star of The Sea Church, Florida. Earlier, he had had a fall away from the house on 18th February and broken his femur. He was badly shaken and was hospitalised. The doctors advised that he was unlikely to recover. He needed a breathing machine. Fr Conall O’Cuinn, Rector of Milltown Park, and Eoghan, a nephew of Seamus, travelled to the USA on Tuesday 22nd and were met at the airport and taken straight to the hospital. They were waiting for them before removing the breathing machine. There was time for prayers and singing Ag Criost an Siol and Soul of My Saviour. Seamus died very quietly and peacefully about 15 minutes later. May he rest in Christ’s Peace!

https://www.jesuit.ie/news/burying-seamie-2/

Burying Seamie
There was something astonishing about the obsequies of Fr Seamus Ward, whose death was reported in the last AMDG Express. Within the Irish Province he had a low profile,
partly because of his wretched health. He had taught in Bolton Street DIT, and served the Jesuit Refugee Service in Africa. Fr Tom Layden wrote of his “pioneering spirit, inquiring mind and independence of outlook”: a kind man, with an attitude of welcome and encouragement for those around him. He worked out of weakness, a real pastoral asset with which people could identify. His two funerals, one in Florida where he served a parish, the other in Gonzaga chapel, were memorable events, crowded with his kith and kin and friends who loved him and grieved deeply. In death as in life Seamus could spring a surprise.

◆ Interfuse No 145 : Summer 2011 & ◆ The Clongownian, 2011

Obituary

Fr Séamus (Seamie) Ward (1935-2011)

31st May 1935: Born in Dublin
Early education at Clongowes Wood College
7th Sept. 1953: Entered the Society at Emo
8th September 1955: First Vows at Emo
1955 - 1958: Rathfarnham - Studied Arts at UCD
1958 - 1961: Tullabeg - Studied Philosophy
1961 - 1964: Belvedere College - Teacher
1964 - 1968: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
10th July 1968: Ordained at Milltown Park, Dublin
1968 - 1969: Tertianship at Rathfarnham
1969 - 1970: Rathfarnham - Chaplain in DIT Bolton Street
1970 - 1972: Fordham, USA-Studied Sociology; Assisted in Holy Family Parish, NY
1972 - 1974: Rathfarnham - Chaplain in DIT Bolton Street
1974 - 1978: John Austin House - Chaplain in DIT Bolton Street
2nd February 1975: Final Vows
1978 - 1979: Campion House - Chaplain in DIT
1979 - 1982: Rathfarnham - Curate in Wicklow parish
1982 - 1985: Dolphin's Barn - Parish Curate
1985 - 1986: Clongowes - Sabbatical year
1986 - 1988: Clongowes - Assistant Librarian
1988 - 1989: Ethiopia - Jesuit Refugee Service
1989 - 1991: Belvedere College - Refugee work: Cairo, JRS Rome and Ethiopia
1991 - 1992: Working with refugees in Sierra Leone and Somalila
1992 - 1994: Working with refugees in Mali
1994 - 2005: Belvedere College - Pastoral care of refugees.
2005 - 2011: Milltown Park - Parish Chaplaincy, USA
22nd February 2011: Died in Florida USA

Fr Seamus was at St. Mary, Star of The Sea Church, Florida. He had a fall away from the house on 18th February and broke his femur. He was badly shaken and was hospitalised. The doctors advised that he was unlikely to recover. He needed a breathing machine. Fr Conall O Cuinn, Rector of Milltown Park, and a nephew of Seamus’, Eoghan, travelled to the USA on Tuesday 22nd and were met at the airport and taken straight to the hospital. They were waiting for them before removing the breathing machine. There was time for prayers and singing Ag Críost an Siol and Soul of My Saviour. Seamus died very quietly and peacefully about 15 minutes later. May he rest in the Peace of Christ.

Obituary by Brendan Duddy and Noel Barber
Seamie Ward was one of 8 children. He had 5 brothers and 2 sisters who were at the heart of his life. He had a marvellous relationship with his siblings and with their children. I got to know him during our time in UCD. When I arrived in Rathfarnham, he took me under his wing and showed me the ropes. The regime was tight and he found the rules of the house somewhat oppressive but he did not take them too seriously. We all felt that we did not have enough time for study; most of us accepted this state of affairs but he did not. He would put his umbrella over his bedside lamp and read through Troilus and Cressida into the night. Serious would have been his fate had he been caught. While others dutifully made off on bikes on special free days, he usually had other ideas, bringing me on one occasion to the Shelbourne Hotel where his father awaited us and ordered toast in a magnificent silver bowl and coffee laced with brandy.

In days when it was presumed that one had to avoid any reading of material that was not 'wholesome', he had the nerve to borrow Joyce's Ulysses in the ritual brown paper bag which the kind librarian passed surreptitiously under the counter, On more regular lines he introduced me to O'Casey's plays and to Swinburne's Atalanta in Calydon. He took a good degree in English, enjoyed the literary delights that were on offer and ignored what was not to his taste. There was an iconoclastic side to him which to some looked as if he saw all authority as authoritarian. There was a shyness which he concealed with a brusqueness that could be disconcerting but he was true gold as a friend. Philosophy in Tullabeg followed where the isolated life did not entirely suit him and literature rather than philosophy captured his interest but doing what was necessary he got through without much effort albeit with little joy but used his time to indulge his literary tastes and to make many excursions, licit and illicit. I then went to Zambia and he to Belvedere where an observer noted that he showed remarkable administrative talents as an assistant to the Prefect of Studies, the formidable Jack Leonard, whose approval and fulsome praise he won. He proved to be a severe disciplinarian and an exacting task master who exercised his authority with a firm hand. However, he won the admiration of the pupils if not their lasting affection. It was noticeable that a number of middle aged men turned up to his funeral – his former pupils from his Belvedere days; they remembered him with something approaching reverence.

His years in Theology were not entirely happy and a contemporary of his considered that his attitude towards authority hardened and he ended up asking to have his ordination postponed to the end of his fourth year. Following his Tertianship in 1968-69 he spent one year in the Dublin Institute of Theology, Bolton Street, before going to Fordham where he took an MA in Sociology. He then returned to Bolton Street where he remained until 1979. I worked with him there and once again he was my mentor and guide. He introduced me to all sorts of people: porters, sweepers, electricians, cooks, his friends in Sean Mc Dermot Street where I became life-long friends with his friends. With these people he was Newman's Perfect Gentleman at ease with all and generous with his time and energy to a fault. He took particular care of foreign students helping them to find their feet. He then spent 3 years (1979-82) as a curate in Wicklow. There he was wonderful with the children, the old folks and with pre-marriage couples. For recreation he took to the joys of sailing, most often with his brother. He moved to Dolphin's Barn in 1982 where he had three not very happy years. He became somewhat restless and spent a few years in Clongowes during which he was unfocused and dispirited.

Then he opened up a new life for himself with the Jesuit Refugee Service from 1988 to 1994. He served in Cairo, Ethiopia, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Mali. A person who knew him well in his JRS days commented on his remarkable ability to live in the most austere circumstances, and to accept the hardship and isolation of his assignments without complaint, his great love and devotion to the poor and the weak and the excessive physical demands he made on himself. On the other hand it was noted that for one of his ability and sterling work he lacked self-confidence to a surprising degree and showed that below the surface there could be strong anger which would occasionally flare.

In 1994 he returned to live in Belvedere as a sick man in the grip of severe emphysema but he found a modus vivendi. To avoid the wet, cold Irish winter he began to do supply parish work in California and then Florida where he flourished as he did in Wicklow years before. He devoted himself to the poor and the weak; he gave of his time and people took the chance to pour out their hearts to him and he listened, gave sound advice and became the wise old man.

In the midst of his successful apostolate, he had a fall, went into hospital where, because of his underlying condition, an operation was out of the question. Inevitably he took a bad turn and died quietly and peacefully. As a Jesuit, he was not prominent and was never well known in the Province but despite his difficult middle years and the poor health of his later years he achieved a great deal at the frontiers.

Tighe, Patrick, 1866-1920, Jesuit, priest, chaplain and missionary

  • IE IJA J/2184
  • Person
  • 02 August 1866-05 April 1920

Born: 02 August 1866, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1891, St Stanisalus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 1903, Naples, Italy
Final Vows: 02 February 1908, Sacred Heart College SJ, Limerick
Died: 05 April 1920, St Mary’s, Miller St, Sydney, Australia

First World War chaplain

by 1895 at Enghien Belgium (CAMP) studying
by 1901 in San Luigi, Napoli-Posilipo, Italy (NAP) studying
by 1905 at St David’s, Mold, Wales (FRA) making Tertianship
Came to Australia 1913
by 1917 Military Chaplain : 15th Battalion, France

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
After Ordination he was appointed Master of Novices for a short period, then he was transferred to Gardiner St.
Later he was appointed Rector of Mungret, but only stayed in this job for a short while due to health reasons.
He was then sent to Australia where he worked in one of the North Sydney Parishes.
He volunteered to be a Chaplain and came to Europe with Australian troops.
When he returned to Australia his health broke down and he had an operation for a malignant tumour. He died shortly after the operation 05 April 1920. He was much loved.
(there is also a long homily preached by Father Tighe at St Mary’s, Sydney, on the topic of Revolution and War)

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Patrick Tighe was educated at Belvedere College, and graduated with a BA from the Royal University, Dublin. He entered the Society at Tullabeg, 7 September 1891, was a junior
preparing for public examinations at Milltown Park, 1893-94, and studied philosophy at Enghien, Champagne. He taught for a few years, 1896-1900, at Mungret, studied theology at Posillipo, Naples, 1900-04, and did tertianship at Mold, Wales, the following year.
He was a rural missioner, and involved in parish work in Limerick, 1905-10, except for a time as socius to the master of novices at Tullabeg, 1906-07. He gave retreats, stationed at Gardiner Street, Dublin, 1910-12, and for a short time was rector of Mungret, 1912-13. Because of ill health was sent to Australia.
He worked first at Lavender Bay, 1913-15, and then, 1915-17, was military chaplain at the No. 1 General Hospital, Heliopolis, and latter served with the 15th Battalion AIP in France and Belgium. He returned to Australia and to the parish of North Sydney after the war.
Tighe was a remarkable speaker, preacher and retreat-giver, but had a weak chest. The latter raised speculation as to how he was accepted into the military He had been suggested as master of novices in Australia, and probably performed the duties for the first few months in 1914, but because of ill health another Jesuit was chosen.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Patrick Tighe 1866-1920
Fr Patrick Tighe was born in Dublin of an old Catholic family. He received his early education at Belvedere and entered the Society in 1891.
His course complete, he was made Rector of Mungret, but he held this office only for a short period, owing to ill health. For the same reason he went to Australia where he worked in one of the Sydney parishes. On the outbreak of the First World War he came to Europe as a Chaplain to the Australian Forces. After his return to Australia, his health broke down completely, and he was operated on for a malignant tumour. `He died shortly after the operation on April 5th 1920. He had been Master of Novices in Australia for some time. He was a man who showed in all his exterior actions a spirit of deep recollection.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Patrick Tighe (1866-1920)

A native of Dublin, entered the Society in 1891. He made his higher studies at Enghien and Naples where he was ordained in 1903. He was appointed a member of the mission staff at the Crescent in 1905 and remained here until 1910. Father Tighe was later rector of Mungret for a brief period and served as chaplain with the Australian army in the first world war. His later years were spent on the Australian mission.

Sweetman, Michael J, 1914-1996, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/558
  • Person
  • 20 March 1914-23 October 1996

Born: 20 March 1914, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 12 September 1931, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1945, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 03 April 1983, Loyola, Eglinton Road, Dublin
Died: 23 October 1996, Glengara Nursing, Glenageary, County Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

https://www.dib.ie/biography/sweetman-michael-a8409

Sullivan, Blessed John, 1861-1933, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/415
  • Person
  • 08 May 1861-19 February 1933

Born: 08 May 1861, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1900, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 28 July 1907, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1915, Clongowes, Wood College SJ
Died: 19 February 1933, St Vincent’s Nursing Home, Dublin

Part of the Clongowes Wood College, Naas, Co Kildare community at the time of death.

by 1903 at Stonyhurst England (ANG) studying

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online :
Sullivan, John
by Conor Harper

Sullivan, John (1861–1933), Jesuit priest, was born 8 May 1861 at 41 Eccles Street, Dublin, the youngest child in a family of four sons and one daughter of Edward Sullivan (qv), barrister, and his wife Elizabeth (Bessie) Josephine (née Baily) of Passage West, Co. Cork. There is an impressive perspective from the doorstep of the old Sullivan home sweeping down to the elegant and noble dimensions of St George's church, Hardwicke Place, where John was baptised into the Church of Ireland on 15 July 1861. Soon after John's birth, the Sullivan family moved to the more fashionable south side of Dublin where they settled at 32 Fitzwilliam Place. This was to be the Sullivan home for more than forty years. John had one sister, Annie, and three brothers, Edward (qv), Robert (who drowned in a boating accident in Killiney Bay), and William, a resident magistrate. According to the tradition of the time the Sullivan boys were brought up in their father's protestant faith and their sister Annie followed her mother and was raised a catholic.

In 1873 John and his brother William were sent to Portora Royal School, Enniskillen, as their older brothers had been before them. Portora's reputation had grown considerably under Dr William Steele (qv), an enlightened and progressive headmaster. John's years at Portora were happy. In one of his few published writings he gives an insight into his school life, writing of his first arrival at Portora ‘bathed in tears’, but when, five years later, the time came for him to leave he wept ‘more plentiful tears’. After Portora he became an undergraduate at TCD, where in 1883 he was awarded the gold medal in classics. Having achieved a junior moderatorship in classics, he started to study law. But in 1885 he was devastated by the sudden death of his father, then lord chancellor of Ireland. He subsequently continued his studies at Lincoln's Inn, where he was called to the English bar in 1888. Due to his inheritance, he was financially comfortable, and was noted for his fashionable dress and good looks. He travelled a great deal throughout Europe and was a cycling enthusiast. While in Greece he visited the monastery of Mount Athos and was deeply marked by the experience.

In December 1896, to the utter surprise of his family, he became a catholic and was received into the church at Farm Street Jesuit church in London. His family was ‘shell shocked’ when the news reached Dublin, according to Nedda Davis, granddaughter of his brother William. Not that the members of his family were hostile to his decision. His mother was a devout catholic but John had never shown any particular interest in religion. More surprises were to follow when his manner of life changed sharply. He adopted a simple style of living that was also reflected in his manner of dress. From this time he was a regular visitor to the Hospice for the Dying in Harold's Cross in south Dublin, and helped the poor in many ways. Then in September 1900 he entered the Jesuit noviciate at Rahan, which was known as Tullabeg, near Tullamore, Co. Offaly. In September 1902 he took his vows for life as a member of the Society of Jesus. Having studied philosophy at Stonyhurst College in Lancashire, he returned to study theology at Milltown Park, where he was ordained on Sunday 28 July 1907. He was then sent to teach in Clongowes Wood College in Co. Kildare. From that time, with the exception of the period 1919–24, when he was rector of the Jesuit house at Rathfarnham Castle, he was a member of the Clongowes community. Most of the boys whom he taught considered him to be different to other Jesuits. He was regarded as a holy man but, like many a good scholar, was a poor teacher.

His reputation for holiness went far beyond the classroom at Clongowes. He also ministered from the People's Church, which served as a chapel of ease to people who lived in the environs of Clongowes. He was much sought after as a confessor and spiritual guide. The poor and the needy found him to be a reliable friend, and he was a constant visitor of the sick. Stories of his care of the sick are legion, as are claims to have been cured by his prayers (detailed by Fergal McGrath in his biography). His reputation as a healer continues, and his cause for canonisation has been pursued.

Sullivan lived a rugged and ascetic life. His meals were simple, mainly a diet of dry bread, porridge, rice and cold tea. He slept little, spending most of the night in prayer. His room at Clongowes lacked even simple comforts. The fire in winter was lit only when he was expecting a visitor. His life of austerity and prayer reflected the hardship and simplicities of the early Desert Fathers. He wore the worn patched clothing of the very poor. To the time of his death he was in demand as a preacher of retreats to religious communities of men and women, which again provided an experience of holiness rather than eloquence. One interest from the past which he maintained was an interest in cycling. His old-fashioned bicycle was a familiar sight on the roads around Clane, and he was known to have cycled to Dublin on more than one occasion to visit the sick. When not travelling by bicycle, he usually walked, a stooped, shuffling figure.

Nothing is known of his political views at a time of political upheaval in Ireland. He always maintained close contact with his protestant family who reciprocated his warm affection and concern. His brother Sir William (d. 1937) travelled from England to be with him when he was dying.

He enjoyed good health until shortly before his death, maintaining his rigorous round of visits to the sick, giving retreats and working in Clongowes. On the morning of 17 February 1933 he suffered violent internal pain and was brought to St Vincent's nursing home on Leeson Street where he died 19 February 1933. He was buried at Clongowes but his remains were exhumed in 1960 and transferred to the Jesuit church of St Francis Xavier on Gardiner Street. The popular novelist, Ethel Mannin, based her novel Late have I loved thee (1948) on Sullivan's life.

Fergal McGrath, Father John Sullivan (1941); Mathias Bodkin, The port of tears: the life of Father John Sullivan, S. J. (1954); Morgan Costello, The saintly Father John: John Sullivan S. J. (1963); Fergal McGrath, More memories of Father John Sullivan (1976); Peter Costello, Clongowes Wood. A history of Clongowes Wood College 1814–1989 (1989); McRedmond; Conor Harper, ‘Father John Sullivan – a man for others’, The Clongowes Union centenary chronicle (1997)

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/fr-john-sullivan-sj/fr-john-sullivan-sj-portrait/

Fr John Sullivan SJ: A short biography
John Sullivan was born in Dublin on 8 May 1861. His father, the future Lord Chancellor of Ireland Sir Edward Sullivan was a Protestant. His mother, Lady Bessie Josephine Sullivan was a Catholic. John was baptised in St. George’s Protestant Church on 15 June 1861 and brought up in the Protestant tradition of his father. From his earliest years John enjoyed the benefits of a home which radiated warm affection, high culture and sound scholarship.
In 1873 John followed in the footsteps of his brothers and went to Portora Royal School, Enniskillen in Northern Ireland which had the reputation of being the most eminent Protestant school of the day. He spent happy years at Portora and in later years admitted that he went to Portora “bathed in tears” but when the time came to leave he “wept more plentiful tears”.
After Portora, John went to Trinity College Dublin. He distinguished himself in his university studies and in 1885 he was awarded the Gold Medal in Classics. After gaining a Senior Moderatorship in Classics, John started to study law. It was at this time that his father, the Lord Chancellor of Ireland Sir Edward Sullivan, died suddenly. The shock had a devastating effect on John.
The promising young scholar left Ireland and continued his legal studies at Lincoln’s Inn in London where he was called to the Bar in 1888. At this time, due to his inheritance, he was very comfortable in financial terms, noted for his fashionable dress and handsome appearance. He travelled extensively around Europe and was a keen cycling enthusiast. He stayed at the Orthodox monastery of Mount Athos in Greece and was friendly with the monks.
Then, in December 1896 at the age of 35, he made a momentous decision. He was received into the Catholic Church at the Jesuit Church, Farm Street, London. From this time onward a marked changed was noted in his manner of living. On returning to the family home in Dublin, he stripped his room of anything that was superfluous, satisfying himself with the simplest of furniture on a carpetless floor. The young man, who was formerly noted for his fashionable dress, contented himself with the plainest of clothes.
He became a regular visitor to Dublin hospitals and convents where he was a welcome visitor. He had a remarkable gift for putting patients in good humour and showed special sympathy toward the old, bringing them gifts of snuff or packages of tea and reading for them from religious books.
In September 1900 John Sullivan decided to enter the Society of Jesus. The two years of novitiate in St. Stanislaus College, Tullamore, were followed by studies in philosophy at Stonyhurst College in England. From the beginning, he was clearly different to other Jesuits. He gave himself completely to his new way of life. All who lived with him were struck by his dedication to prayer and to religious life. Despite his outstanding gifts, he never paraded his knowledge but was always careful to help others whenever possible.
In 1904 he came to Milltown Park to study theology and he was ordained a priest on 28 July 1907. He was then appointed to the staff in Clongowes Wood College, Co. Kildare where he was to spend the greater part of his life as a Jesuit, apart from the period 1919-1924 when he was Rector of Rathfarnham Castle, the Jesuit House of Studies in Dublin.
Fr. John’s reputation for holiness spread rapidly around Clongowes and the neighbourhood. Despite his brilliant mind and academic achievements it was his holiness that was recognised. Many revered him as a saint. He prayed constantly – he walked with God continually – he listened to Him and he found Him and God worked through him. Many who were in need of spiritual or physical healing flocked to him and asked his prayers – and strange things happened. The power of God seemed to work through him and many were cured.
He was always available to the sick, the poor, anyone in need. The call to serve God in serving those who suffered in any way was a driving force for the rest of his life. He was always caring for others – a source of comfort and peace to anyone in trouble. He brought many to God by pointing out the way that leads to the deepest and ultimate peace. He was always at prayer whenever possible. Every available moment was spent in the chapel.
He walked with God and lived every conscious moment in his nearer presence. At times he hardly seemed to notice the ordinary world around him. He was in constant union with his Maker and cared little for the material things of life. One old lady who lived near Clongowes managed to penetrate the secret of his extraordinary holiness: “Fr. Sullivan is very hard on himself – but he is never hard on others”. He ate the plainest of food and lived a life of severe penance. He left everything in order to follow the call of his Lord and Master and he found the riches of a different order. What a contrast with the rich young man of his earlier years!
Fr John Sullivan died in the old St. Vincent’s Nursing Home in Leeson Street, a short distance from the Sullivan family home on 19 February 1933. Since that time, he has been revered by many as a saint. During his lifetime many flocked to him in times of trouble and anxiety, confident of the power of his prayers – and that confidence continues. He is still loved and remembered.
Declared:
Servant of God in September 1960; Venerable November 2014; Beatified 13 May 2017

https://www.jesuit.ie/blog/gavin-t-murphy/blessedly-funny/

Blessedly funny
Blessed Elect John Sullivan once asked a student what the ladies were like in his Latin class, to which the student replied ‘Rather plain.’ A gleam of amusement came into Father John’s eyes as he exclaimed: “In God’s name, there, I didn’t mean that. What are they like in Latin?”
It is in this light that I look into the personality of probably the holiest Irish Jesuit in tangible memory (1861-1933). So much of our lives are influenced by early days. John came from a blessed childhood in a happy, loving home. He had three brothers and one sister to play with as he grew up in Dublin and his parents invested in his education at Portora Royal School in County Fermanagh.
John won the college gold medal in Classics at Trinity College Dublin and later pursued law. Through a long, slow process of conversion, John’s protestant viewpoint became a Catholic one, and he entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1900. A fellow-novice Mgr. John Morris stated, ‘Were it not for his sense of humour, he might have awed us, as all were conscious that he was very holy.’
He was fast-tracked to the priesthood and sent to Clongowes Wood College, the Jesuit boarding school in County Kildare. Schoolboy John Fitzgerald remembered him fondly: “Meeting you on a stone corridor on a bleak cold winter’s evening he would clap those hands and say, ‘Cheer up, cheer up’. Yes, we loved Father John, or Father Johnny O as we used to call him.”
Moreover, Father Sullivan expressed himself through his physical appearance. “His boots were mended and mended again and again until they became a joke, but when people tried to get him a new pair he would have none of it.” For someone who was once dubbed the best dressed man in Dublin, his old friends and family must have been stirred by this drastic change, in line with the ruggedness of St. Francis of Assisi, one of his favourite saints.
Father John was not dependent on external conditions to make him happy. He beamed with the inner joy of faith and tried to guide others along their paths. He once recounted to a fellow-Jesuit, with an appreciative smile, his efforts to get an old man to take the pledge. “Ah Father,” was the reply, “you never saw a jolly party round a pump.”
I am inspired to follow in Father John’s footsteps; it is delightful to see how his wit was compatible with his holiness. Like him, I pledge to embrace the cheerfulness of our Church.

◆ Irish Jesuit Missions : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/fr-sullivan-the-last-witness/

Fr Sullivan: the last witness
Fr John Fitzgerald SJ, the last surviving Jesuit to have been taught in Clongowes by Fr John Sullivan, shared some precious memories at the commemorative Mass :

The bones of Fr John Sullivan are your precious possession. They draw his clients from near and far. If John is beatified, St Francis Xavier’s will be a place of pilgrimage like St Thomas a’Becket is at Canterbury, Blessed Pope John XXIII at St Peter’s, Bl. Mother Teresa at Calcutta, and as Cardinal Newman will be at the Oratory in Birmingham. The people in a quiet corner of County Kildare still keep such fond memories of John. They were greatly saddened when his bones were taken away from them for Gardiner Street in 1961. It is a sad separation they will always feel. In fact his grave has been visited ever since.
The relocation of Father’s bones is as good for his cause as it is for you who give them this new home. You have always by your devotion shown how grateful you are to have him. You bring him day by day the stories of your needs – they are always pressing and often sad. John listens – he was always a ready and eager listener to others’ worries.
Coming to St Francis Xavier’s was in a sense a homecoming. John had been baptised in Temple Street (St George’s), and Dublin was his home until he joined the Jesuits. During the years in Clongowes, the City’s hospitals, the Mater included, were within range of his trusty old bicycle.
Sometimes people have asked me what was he really like. Some have a nagging impression that he must have been an ascendancy type, as his father was a baronet and he had passed through Portora Royal School to Trinity College. My own memory of him – clear and vivid – is of a humble, entirely self-effacing person, riveted on the one thing necessary, the commandment of love. He was completely focussed on the needs of others, particularly of the poor and suffering. For him the face of the Lord was there. Gardiner Street would have been an ideal assignment with so much sickness, suffering and poverty all around in the hungry years between the wars.
Clongowes in its rural isolation does not seem an ideal place for one so drawn to the poor and suffering. I knew John in the last three years of his life – my memories are boy’s memories – a child’s impressions – but still so vivid. His appearance so well captured in Sean Keating’s drawing – the sunken cheeks, the fine crop of brown hair, the bowed head, the penetrating eyes – a true man of God. I remember his wrinkled leathery hands. Meeting you on a stone corridor on a bleak cold winter’s evening he would clap those hands and say “Cheer up, cheer up, cheer up”. He well knew the mood of small boys – short of funds, nursing chilblains and facing into two hours’ study. I have a memory of Johnny O shuffling quickly from the sacristy, head bowed, halting at the altar rails – a welcome interruption to the evening rosary. Always he would describe a visit he had made to some sick or dying person. He was no gifted story-teller, no gifted preacher. There were no embellishments; sincerity shone through, telling of his complete devotion to the sick and needy.
John was occupied with the People’s Church and the boys’ spiritual needs with very little teaching. He took the smallest ones for Religion classes. Often we delighted to annoy him by rowdiness and irreverence. This drew the condemnation we intended: “Audacious fellow – pugnacious fellow!” Deep down we revered him, but we played on him.
If some day you visit the Boys’ Chapel, you see at the back on your left Fr John’s Confessional. The “toughs” – the ones never selected as prefects and who won no prizes – were most often there. The smaller boys would crowd into his very bare room after supper. We would come away with rosaries and Agnus Deis which John got from convents he knew. The People’s Church is the easiest place for a visitor to find. There is where John spent long hours and helped so many in times of trial. There he prayed long after the boys were tucked in bed.
Father John was our Spiritual Father. His life and interests revolved round the boys’ spiritual needs. He took no part and had no interest in our games – never appeared at matches, debates, concerts or plays. Free time meant time for prayer or the sick. No use asking Johnny O to pray for victory at Croke Park today, but he will listen to your sorrows, he will pray for your sick and departed ones.
The day of Fr John’s funeral in 1933 comes back clearly. I was in the youngest group and so was up front in the Chapel, and near the coffin. I tried without success to cut off a splinter – as a keepsake, a relic. We had been privileged to know Fr John for three years. Not everyone is so blessed – perhaps only a few have been close to saintliness in one who so well mirrored the Lord Jesus, the Suffering Servant. It is a joy to be here in St Francis Xavier’s and to share your treasure – the Venerable John Sullivan.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 8th Year No 2 1933

Obituary :

Fr John Sullivan

Needless to say the entire Irish Province keenly feels the loss of one of its holiest and most esteemed members, Father John Sullivan. He died at St; Vincent's Hospital, Dublin, Sunday, 19th February, 1933.
The Father Rector of Clongowes has very kindly sent us the following appreciation, written by Father Mulcahy :
It was in Clongowes that Father John spent twenty of the thirty-three years of his religious life. Thirty-three years in the Society is a comparatively short time. but these years were so full that one must truly say that Father Sullivan explevit tempera multa. The impression left on us all is that he has left a blank that bewilders us with its greatness. One does not feel that he is gone from us. One half expects to and him going about his multitudinous spiritual activities as usual. Death, especially in a college full of young life, is usually associated with an uncanny feeling , but, for us in Clongowes for the boys as well as for the community the effect of his death is rather one of triumph, of pride in having possessed such a man of God, of still possessing him but with greater power to help, with a wider sympathy for our weaknesses and our needs, with a truer interest in us in those things that matter.
Last evening two Lower Liners were talking to me about him and the remark came quite simply from one of them, a very ordinary lad in a low class, “Sir, is it not a great thing to be able to say .that you were taught by a saint?, and the funny thing is that we knew it even when we ragged him a bit.” And the other chimed in in the patois of the Line. “Sir, you never hear of a man they knew was a saint while he was dodging about”.
Born in Dublin, 8th May, 1861, the third son of the late Sir Edward Sullivan, Bart., formerly Master of the Rolls and Lord Chancellor of Ireland. he was educated at Portora School. In the Clongowes Museum are three large silver medals won there:; for English Literature in 1877, the Steele Memorial Prize, July, 1879 and another Midsummer 1879 " In Classics." . He graduated at T,C.D., where he won several medals. We. have one 1883, “Literis Humanioribus feliciter excultis. His classical attainments were of a very high order and not of the dry-as-dust kind, for he made several walking tours in Greece, Macedonia and Asia Minor to trace out in stone and dust the lore he loved.
1898 saw him received into the Church and on September 7th, 1900, we find him in Tullabeg. He did Philosophy at Stonyhurst, 1902-04 , Theology at Milltown Park, 1904-07. The rest of his life he spent in Clongowes, except 1913-14 when he was in the Tertianship at Tullabeg, and 1919-24 when he was Rector of Rathfarnham Castle - twenty years of unceasing care for the souls of the boys in the college, which care did not stop when they had left for the bigger world of life. A large sheaf of telegrams and letters received by the Rector expressing sympathy on the news of his death shows how this care was appreciated.
In charge of the public church attached to the college, he came into touch With an ever-growing circle of the faithful. His life, already more than fully occupied, was invaded by those who came long distances to ask his advice, to avail of his ministrations as Confessor, to ask for his blessing on the sick and, as they insisted, to hope for a cure even of cases despaired of by doctors. The poor and the sick and above all the dying were, one is hardly afraid to say, his “joy”. The reverence in which he was held and the confidence in him was shown very simply the morning of his funeral. Father Rector had said Mass at 9 o'clock in the public church, the old boys' chapel. When the Mass was over the congregation moved up quietly to the coffin and all, many kneeling, blessed the coffin repeatedly, placing on it objects of piety, rosaries, crosses prayer-books, etc, Later when the grave, was filled in and bishop and priests and boys had moved away, the people who felt that now his power was greater than ever, came to carry to their homes some of the earth that covered him. “O Grave, where is thy victory”.
So our loss to the eye is a gain to our faith.
"One example, out of many that might be given, of the power of his prayers may be cited : A man was dying in a neighbouring town. He had refused to see a priest though urged to do so by the nurse who was nursing him and by the doctor. Word was sent to Father Sullivan to come to see him. Father Sullivan, however, was not able to go, but sent word that he would say Mass for him at 9 o'clock the following morning. At 9.30 on that morning the man of his own accord asked for a priest and was prepared for death which took place on that day.
Father Sullivan's last illness was very brief. On Monday, 6th February, the doctor ordered him to the infirmary, as, amongst other things, one of his arms was showing nasty signs.
This did not appear to be serious and the arm was practically healed on Thursday the 16th when he was allowed up. He said that he had not felt better for fifty years. About 11am on Friday he complained of very severe pains. The doctor was sent for immediately, and as he was not satisfied sent for a surgeon who declared that an immediate operation was necessary. At 3 p.m Father Sullivan was removed in ambulance to Dublin, and was operated on about 5 pm. This revealed a very serious state of affairs, and the doctors could
hold out no hope of recovery. Father Sullivan lingered on until Sunday night, and died at 10.55. He had been conscious all Friday and Saturday, and had received Holy Communion
on each day. When asked how he felt his invariable answer was “' Wonderfully well, thank God”. After the operation he suffered very little pain.
Father G. Roche has been good enough to send the following extract from a letter :
Although never having met him, I know him well through the boys. I think the way they expressed themselves in their weekly letters home plainly tells what they thought of him. “Father Sullivan (we call him the Saint, Mum) is dying, you will be sorry to hear. By the time this letter arrives he will probably be in heaven. A strange coincidence, the night, Sunday and Monday, Jim (an elder brother who has left school) could not sleep thinking of Father Sullivan and his devotion to the Sodality, and he told me that he felt he must keep on repeating whatever prayers were usual, seeing all the time Father Sullivan. He was shocked when a friend passed him on a paper yesterday and asked : Did you know him?”
Father Roche adds : " Father Sullivan died at 11pm on Sunday, the very night that Jim saw him. A great many requests for relics have come to us.

Irish Province News 23rd Year No 1 1948

The Tribunal for the Informative Process in Fr. John Sullivan's Cause was set up by Dr. McQuaid, Archbishop of Dublin, on the 24th October, 1947. The first Session was held at Archbishop's House on 30th October ; subsequent Meetings will take place at the Presbytery, Upper Gardiner Street. Fr. Charles O'Conor is Vicepostulator. The following letter was addressed to the Province by Rev. Fr. Provincial on the occasion of the setting up of the Tribunal :

28th October, 1947 :
Reverend and dear Fr. Rector,
PX. In a letter dated 24th October, 1947, His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin, writes :
“I have great pleasure in informing you that I have this day instituted the Tribunal for the Ordinary Informative Process in the Cause of the Beatification and Canonization of the Servant of God, John Sullivan, Priest of your Society”.
The first session of the Tribunal, appointed by His Grace, will take place at Archbishop's House next Thursday at 12 noon. It is the first stage in a very long process which we hope and pray may one day have its happy issue in one of our own Province being raised to the honours of the Altar. I commend the Cause, now about to be opened, to the prayers of all ; and I ask each priest to say a Mass (first intention) and those who are not priests to offer Mass, Holy Communion and the Beads once for the success of the Informative Process which begins on Thursday.
May God, who glorifies those who glorify Him, be ever increasingly honoured in the honours given to His servant ; may Ours be more powerfully and effectively incited to strive for that sanctity proper to the Society by considering this new and contemporary example of virtue ; may our Province in its present necessities have in Father John Sullivan a powerful intercessor with God.
Commending myself to Your Reverence's holy Sacrifices and prayers.
I remain,
Yours Sincerely in Xto.,
THOMAS BYRNE, S.J.

Irish Province News 24th Year No 1 1949

On 6th November Fr. Daniel O'Connell, of the Viceprovince, who during his stay in Ireland gave evidence in Fr. Sullivan's cause, left Southampton for U.S.A. on 6th November.

Irish Province News 27th Year No 1 1952

FR. JOHN SULLIVAN'S CAUSE :
As the result of close upon seven years of fairly constant work, official registration of evidence in the two preliminary processes De Fama Sanctitatis et de non-cultu, in connection with Fr. Sullivan's Cause, has now been completed. These processes provide the evidence that must enable the Congregation of Rites to determine whether the matter of the Cause is one deserving of the official sanction of the Church or not.
In all something over fifty witnesses have been examined: roughly about two thirds of whom were from the Province—the rest externs. Except for certain inaugural meetings of the Ecclesiastical Court at which his Grace had to preside (which were held at Archbishop's House) all but one of the meetings for registration of evidence have been held at Gardiner St.
At an early date in the proceedings Fr. Curtin who was acting Notary of the Court was replaced by Fr. Michael Brown, Archbishop's House, and somewhat later the first President of the Court, the late Archdeacon MacMahon, took ill and died. Very Rev. Canon Neary, already a member of the Court, was appointed new President and Dr. O’Halloran of City Quay was added to complete the requisite number of judges. Mgr. Dargan and Fr. Barry of High Street have been all the time attached to the Court. At all times the members of the Court have showed great interest in the Cause and have manifested a graciousness and generosity that has been most striking. They have had more than a hundred sessions involving their presence at Gardiner St. from 11 a.m. till about 4 p.m.
The next stage in the proceedings is to have all the evidence transcribed and collated with the original record after which al will be ready for transmission to Rome.
Great help has been given by many in the Province by the distribution of leaflets and relic cards. A considerable number of records of favours of most varied kinds has also been accumulated. From letters received it is clear too that a great many Masses and prayers are being constantly offered for the success of the Cause.

Irish Province News 28th Year No 2 1953

A further stage in the Cause of Beatification and Canonisation of Fr. John Sullivan was reached in the New Year : edicts concerning his Writings were simultaneously issued by the Archbishop of Dublin and by the Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin in their respective dioceses.

The following is the text of Dr. McQuaid's edict :

To the Clergy and the Faithful of the Diocese of Dublin.
In accordance with the Instructions of the Holy See, which requires that writings (if any) attributed to Servants of God whose Causes of Beatification and Canonization are being canonically investigated should be collected and examined we hereby command the Clergy and Faithful of this City and Diocese who possess any writings of the Servant of God, Father John Sullivan, S.J., such as sermons, letters, diaries, autobiographies, whether written by him in his own hand or by others at his dictation, to present themselves within the space of one month from this date at Archbishop's House, Dublin, for the purpose of handing over such writings or properly authenticated copies thereof. Any person knowing that writings of the above-mentioned Servant of God are held by others is bound to communicate his information to Archbishop's House, Dublin.

John Charles,

Archbishop of Dublin,
Primate of Ireland. Given at Dublin, this 1st day of January, 1953.

Irish Province News 35th Year No 4 1960

The final session of the Ordinary or Informative Process in the Cause of Beatification of the Servant of God, Father John Sullivan, S.J., was held at Archbishop's House, Dublin, on 4th July. His Grace the Arch bishop, Index Ordinarius in the Process, presided.
In the lengthy final session, the Acta were read and signed by all present, after they had been formally authenticated by the Archbishop. The evidence of the sanctity and heroicity of virtue of Father John Sullivan, evidence in regard to his writings and non cultus, which had been collected during the course of the Process and transcribed into ten bound volumes, was placed in a specially-made oak container, sealed in eight places, inside and outside, by His Grace in the presence of the Delegate Judge, the Assistant Judges and the Officials of the Process. Six additional seals were then set on the container and it was entrusted, together with a sealed letter of His Grace, to the Vice-Postulator of the Cause, Very Reverend Fr. Charles O'Conor, S.J., Provincial, for personal transmission to the Sacred Congregation of Rites in Rome.
This evidence will be examined by the Sacred Congregation of Rites, which will then decide in regard to the holding of a further Process, known as the Apostolic Process, in the Cause.
The authentic copies of all the original documents in the case were then sealed by His Grace the Archbishop and placed in the Archives at Arch bishop's House, until such time as the Holy See may direct that they be reopened.
The case containing the evidence was brought to Rome in August by Mr. Seán Ó hÉideáin, Secretary at the Irish Embassy to the Holy See. It was given diplomatic coverage through the courtesy of the Department of External Affairs.

Irish Province News 36th Year No 1 1961

EXHUMATION AND TRANSFERENCE OF REMAINS OF FR. JOHN SULLIVAN
The exhumation of the remains of the Servant of God, Fr. John Sullivan, S.J., and their transference to St. Francis Xavier's Church, Upper Gardiner St., Dublin, took place on 27th-29th September. This step was taken by the Vice-Postulator of the Cause of Fr. Sullivan, Very Rev. Fr. Provincial, on the advice of Fr. Paul Molinari, the Postulator, and with the approval of Very Rev. Fr. General and the Ordinaries of the archdiocese of Dublin and the diocese of Kildare and Leighlin, and the permission of the respective public authorities.
The proceedings at Clongowes were presided over by Right Rev. Mgr. James J. Conway, P.P., V.G., appointed Judex Delegatus by His Lordship the Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin, assisted by Right Rev. William Miller, P.P., V.G., Promotor Fidei. His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin was represented by Rev. Michael Browne, D.D., Notarius. Witnesses to the identity of the grave were Fr. P. Kenny, S.J. (who was Minister of Clongowes at the time of the burial in 1933) and two employees of Clongowes, John Cribben and Frank Smyth. Fr. Molinari, the Postulator, who had come from Rome, remained until a late stage in the exhumation; Fr. Provincial, Fr. B. Barry, Fr. Socius, and Fr. H. Lawton Rector of Clongowes, were present throughout. The doctors charged with the examination of the remains were Dr. Edward T. Freeman, Dublin, and Dr. George O'Reilly, Kilcock, Dr. Brendan O'Donnell, Medical Officer, Co. Kildare, Mr. Joseph Reynolds, Inspector, Public Health Department, Naas, and Mr. Patrick Coen, Chief Health Inspector, Dublin Corporation, represented the public authorities. The actual exhumation was carried out by two gravediggers from Glasnevin Cemetery, under the direction of Mr. John Doyle, Superintendent. Half-a-dozen members of the Garda Siochana, under the direction of Chief Superintendent O'Driscoll, Naas, were on duty to secure complete privacy for the proceedings.
At 10 a.m, on 27th September, the clergy, witnesses to the identity of the grave and gravediggers assembled in the Castle, and took the required oath not to remove anything from the coffin or to place anything in it which might be regarded as a relic. At the graveside all present were warned by the Notarius that the same obligation applied to them under pain of excommunication reserved to the Holy See. The exhumation commenced at 10.30 a.m. The day was fortunately fine, though very cold. At a few minutes before twelve, when the excavation had reached a depth of about four feet six inches, the breastplate of the coffin was found, and just as the Angelus was ringing, the outline of the coffin became visible. It was apparent that the headstone and cross had not been placed exactly over the coffin, so that what now appeared was one side of the coffin, This necessitated further excavation to remove the earth from the other side. It was also apparent that the lid of the coffin had decayed. From now on, the excavation was very slow, trowels only being used for fear of damage to the remains. About an hour later, the feet of the remains were uncovered, the boots being intact, Finally, when the grave had been considerably widened and as much as possible of the earth removed, it was found that the sides and bottom of the coffin were intact, and that thus it could be raised completely from the grave. This was accomplished at 5.40, and the coffin was placed in the hearse - again just as the Angelus was ringing and brought in procession to the People's Church and thence to the adjoining classroom. The two doctors worked from 7.30 to 10.30 p.m, preparing the remains for re-burial. These were laid out on a pallett covered with white silk and then transferred to the inner oak coffin, into which was put a copper cylinder containing the authentication signed by various witnesses, clerical and lay. The leaden coffin surrounding the inner coffin was then closed and soldered and sealed in two places with the seal of the Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin. During this process, Dr. Freeman dictated to the Notarius a full account of the exhumation and the medical findings. Finally, at 1 a.m. the leaden coffin was placed in the outer oak coffin, which was transferred to a catafalque in the People's Church.
Next morning, Fr. Rector celebrated Mass in the presence of the remains, the church being filled with the senior boys and many of the faithful. Immediately after Mass, pilgrims from the surrounding country side and even from distant areas began to arrive in large numbers and continued all day. At 7 p.m. a queue of over a hundred was waiting outside to secure admittance to the church. At 9.30 p.m. the coffin was transferred to the Boys' Chapel. The following morning, 29th September, the stream of pilgrims began again. Their devotion on both days was most edifying, evidencing itself by their kissing the coffin and touching it with beads, prayer-books and other objects of devotion.
At 2 p.m. the Absolution was pronounced by Fr. Rector in the presence of the Community and boys. The funeral procession then proceeded up the avenue, preceded by the entire school and followed by a large crowd of the faithful and some fifty cars. At the front gate, the boys lined each side of the avenue. The procession then proceeded to Dublin. At almost every house and crossroad groups of people had gathered, and knelt as the hearse passed. At Clane and Celbridge, schoolchildren lined the route. At Lucan, two Garda patrol cars joined the procession, going in front to secure an uninterrupted passage. On arrival at the city, a Garda motor cyclist gave warning to the Gardai on duty on the quays, who stopped traffic from the side streets. As a result of this careful organisation, spontaneously arranged by the Garda authorities, the procession reached Gardiner Street punctually at a few minutes to 4 p.m.
It was received on the steps of the church by Most Rev. Dr. McQuaid, Archbishop of Dublin. With him were the Bishop of Nara, Most Rev. Dr. Dunne, the Archbishop of Malacca, Singapore, Most Rev. Dr. Olcomendy (who was visiting Dublin), Right Rev. Mgr. Boylan, Right Rev. Mgr. O'Reilly, Right Rev. Mgr. Glennon, Right Rev. Mgr. Deery and Right Rev. Mgr. O'Regan. The members of the Province paid a most worthy tribute to the saintly memory of Fr. Sullivan, some 250 of them being present. Though no publicity had been given to the proceedings, the church was crowded, Much credit is due to Fr. M. Meade, Superior, Fr. D. Mulcahy, Minister, and Fr. J. McAvoy, who acted as marshal, that the ceremony was conducted so smoothly and with such dignity. After the Absolution, the remains were brought to the vault which had been specially built, adjoining the Sacred Heart chapel. The vault was blessed by His Grace the Archbishop, who was assisted by Very Rev. Canon O'Donnell and Very Rev. M. Canon Boylan. The coffin was then deposited on two pillars of limestone, the ornamental grille was closed, and the ceremony concluded with the singing of the Benedictus by the Milltown Park choir. That evening, there was an uninterrupted stream of pilgrims to the vault, and the indications since then are that it has been accepted by the people of Dublin as one of their recognised places of pilgrimage.

The Roman Documents Referring to the Cause of Fr. Sullivan
956—1/960
DUBLINEN.
Beatificationis et Canonizationis
Servi Dei IOANNIS SULLIVAN, Sacerdotis Professi Societatis Iesu.
Instante Rev-mo P. Paulus Molinari, Generalis Postulator Societatis Iesu, Sacra Rituum Congregatio, vigore facultatum sibi a Ss-mo Domino nostro IOANNE PAPA XXTII tributarum, benigne indulget ut processus ordinarius informativus super fama sanctitas, vitae, virtutem et miraculorum in genere Servi Dei Ioannis Sullivan, Sacerdotis professi eiusdem Societatis Iesu, clausus sigillisque munitus in Actis eiusdem Sacrae Rituum Congregationis asservatus, aperire valeat : servatis omnibus de iure, stylo et consuetudine servandis.Contrariis non obstantibus quibuslibet.
Die 16 Septembris 1960.
+C. CARD. CICOGNANI,
S.R.C. Praef.

Prot. 956-2/960
DUBLINEN.
Beatificationis et Canonizationis
Servi Dei IOANNIS SULLIVAN, Sacerdotis Professi Societatis Iesu.
Clausus sigillisque munitus invenitur in Actis Sacrae Rituum Con gregationis processus ordinaria potestate in Curia Dublinensi instructus super CULTU NUNQUAM PRAESTITO Servo Dei Joanni Sullivan, Sacerdoti professo Societatis Jesu. Hinc Rev-mus P. Paulus Molinari, Postulator Generalis eiusdem Societatis, a Sanctitate sua humiliter postulavit ut dicti processus aperitionem indulgere benigne dignaretur. Sacro porro eadem Rituum Congregatio, utendo facultatibus sibi ab Ipso Ss-mo Domino nostro JOANNE PAPA XXIII tributis, benigne annuit pro gratia juxta preces: servatis omnibus de jure, stylo et con suetudine servandis.
Contrariis non obstantibus quibuslibet.
Die 16 Septembris 1960.
+C. CARD. CICOGNANI,
S.R.C. Praef.

956-2/960
DUBLINEN.
Beatificationis et Canonizationis
Servi Dei IOANNIS SULLIVAN, Sacerdotis Professi Societatis Iesu.
Rev-mus P. Paulus Molinari, Generalis Postulator Societatis Iesu, ad pedes Sanctitatis Suae provolutus, humiliter postulavit ut processus ordinaria auctoritate in Curia Dublinensi constructus super scriptis Servi Dei Ioannis Sullivan, Sacerdotis professi eiusdem Societatis, et in Actis eiusdem Sacrae Rituum Congregationis, clausus sigillisque munitus, asservatus, rite aperiatur. Sacra porro eadem Rituum Congregatio, vigore facultatum sibi a Ss-mo Domino nostro IOANNE PAPA XXTII tributarum, attentis expositis, benigne annuit pro gratia iusta preces: servatis omnibus de iure, stylo et consuetudine servandis,
Contrariis non obstantibus quibuslibet.
Die 16 Septembris 1960.
+C. CARD. CICOGNANI,
S.R.C. Praef.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father John Sullivan SJ 1861-1933
In Eccles Street Dublin, on May 8th 1861, John Sullivan, of Sir Edward Sullivan, Bart. later Attorney-General, Master of the Rolls and finally Lord Chancellor of Ireland. Sir Edward was a Protestant, his wife was a Catholic, and as was common in those days their daughter Annie, the eldest of the family was baptised and reared a Catholic, and the boys as Protestants. So, John Sullivan was baptised into the Protestant Faith in St George’s Church, Temple Street. John was sent to Royal Portora School in 1873 where he remained for six years.

In 1879 he won a classical scholarship to Trinity College, did his law degree at Lincoln’s Inn, London and was called to the English bar in 1888. The followed a period during which he travelled extensively on the Continent. In 1889 he was received into the Catholic Church by Fr Michael Gavin SJ, at Farm Street, London. Three years later he entered our noviceship at Tullabeg, and was ordained at Milltown Park by Archbishop Walsh in 1907.

He spent almost all his life at Clongowes, with an interval as Rector of Rathfarnham, 1919 to 1924. Being in charge of the People’s Church, he devoted himself with intense zeal to the sick and the dying, and acquired a reputation for extraordinary sanctity and the working of miracles.

He died on February 19th 1933, and almost immediately there sprang up, on the part of the people a spontaneous cultus to him. The initial step in his cause for canonisation was taken up in 1947 with the setting up of the Judicial Informative Process. The final step in Ireland was taken in July 1960 when the evidence as to his heroic sanctity was forwarded to Rome in bound volumes.

Meantime it was decided to translate his body from the cemetery in Clongowes to Gardiner Street. On Tuesday September 27th, the body was exhumed in the presence of official witnesses. It was not found incorrupt. On September 29th, encased in a set of coffins, the body was solemnly conveyed to Dublin, and placed in a beautiful new tomb visible to the public. There it lies awaiting the verdict of the Church, the object of veneration daily of hundreds of visitors.

MEMORIES OF FATHER JOHN SULLIVAN

Bob Thompson took an interesting initiative in writing to the senior members of the Province who knew our Servant of God - whether as boys in Clongowes Wood or as fellow members of a Jesuit Community. Here are the ten replies received.

My acquaintance with Fr John Sullivan is limited to the retreat he conducted for my vows for September 2nd, 1930. Emo was only three weeks old when we started that retreat. An Ambulacrum served as a Chapel, but Fr Sullivan spoke to us in the Conference Room. There was an aisle between two rows of tables with a dais in front of one row. Fr Sullivan always came into the room with a quick lively sort of run, and would drop on his two knees on the floor, not the raised edge of the dais.

When he spoke, all the while he held a crucifix in one hand, and stroked his dark greying hair with the other. He seemed to find all he wanted to say on the crucifix.

Three things I remember about that retreat. First, it was a marked contrast to the one I heard the previous year from Fr Michael Browne. Fr Browne was austere, severe and for me awesome . Fr Sullivan seemed to spread around him a warmth and a kindliness.

The second thing is a letter he read to us. He introduced it by saying: “These are not my thoughts, but they are the thoughts of an elderly priest in the Province and I give them for what they are worth”. The letter went something like this:

You are going to give the novices their retreat. Would you please impress on them the importance of the virtue of Charity. I'm an old man in the Province now and I can honestly say that I have experienced very little Charity, but I have met with an awful lot of diplomacy...

The third thing that remains with me is that while he made no effort at eloquence, and often cut short descriptions with an "and all that", he could still be very graphic. I can still see and hear his account of Peter's reaction to John's “It is the Lord” - “SPLASH” and Peter is in the water".

During that retreat I was anything but filled with consolation. I can still remember a glow of happiness when I made my confession to Fr John. I can't recall what I said, or what he said, but I can't forget the joy and peace I felt leaving his room.

One other memory of those days: Fr Lol Kearns - go meadai Dia a ghlóir - made that retreat too. He used to tell this story against himself. He knew Fr John had the reputation of being a saint, and he wanted to be able to say that he had visited the saint in his room, so he concocted a difficulty.

“Father in my class in Mungret I could name eight boys who would have been better suited to be Jesuits than I am. I ask myself why did God call me, rather than one of them?”

“Ah now! Carry on! Carry on! and thank God for his bad taste”.

-oOo-

Fr John Sullivan was Rector of Rathfarnham Castle during my first year there as a junior. One's first impression of him was quite frightening -- the gaunt face, the shabby clothes, greenish but scrupulously clean, the extreme austerity of his meals.

But in short time one became aware of something extra ordinarily attractive about him. It is difficult to put into words, but one came not merely to "make allowances" for him, or just to like him, but genuinely to love him. His one aim in life seemed to be to prevent anyone admiring him. In that he failed miserably.

One of the older Jesuits told me how, at a meeting of the Classical Society of UCD, which Johnny was persuaded to attend, the Juniors who were there were immensely impressed by the deference shown to Johnny by their Professors and several Dons from Trinity College. One got accustomed to being accosted in the avenue by some poor person who had come a long way “to see the priest who works miracles”.

Johnny had a puckish sense of humour which normally was kept strictly hidden. But on one occasion which I heard of it popped out. Paul O'Flanagan, who later became a splendid preacher, was doing Science, and tried by all means to avoid the chore of preaching in the refectory. However, on the last available day Paul was summoned by the Rector. One excuse after another were exposed in their feebleness by the stern Rector. Then Johnny said with what must have been a twinkle in his eye: “In God's name there, aren't you in charge of the seismograph?” “Yes, Father”, said Paul. “Well, wouldn't it be a terrible thing if there was an earthquake and there was nobody there to attend to it? You had better not preach”.

I remember very vividly the satisfaction with which Johnny read out in the Refectory the announcement of the appointment of Fr John Keane as his successor as Rector. It was as if he was muttering to himself “that's one in the eye for you, John Sullivan”.

He was unforgettable. He was a Saint.

-oOo-

I was in Clongowes for two years only - 1931-1933 - as a Scholastic, and during those two years Fr John was resident there.

He was Spiritual Father in the community, and he gave the Customary Domestic exhortations in the Domestic Chapel. As a scholastic, I recollect that we were obliged to visit him from time to time and, if we failed in that duty, I recall that he would come to see us in our rooms and talk to us about any matter that we might like to discuss with him. He was always helpful, kind and friendly.

One small matter concerning him remains vividly in my memory. During lunch-time break when we came to the refectory, he would gently ask us to sit down, and he would come around with the tea pot, pouring the tea for us, saying that we were hard at work and that he had nothing to do. While this caused me personally a little embarrassment it also filled me with admiration for his humility and fraternal charity.

We were aware that he regularly visited the poor, the sick and distressed people in the surrounding district and frequently one would see him moving fast - trotting really - down the avenue from the college in pursuit of that work. It was also well known, of course, that people came regularly to consult him and to seek his advice and direction in their troubles, worries and needs. I think I am also right in saying that during school hours (classes, recreation or otherwise) he was always available in a room in the college for pupils who might wish to visit or consult him.

There is nothing further which I feel that I could add of a personal nature concerning Fr John. Of course, all of us were well aware of his undoubted sanctity and his fully committed
Jesuit way of life.

-oOo-

Reams could be written about Fr John. I knew him and had him for my confessor - 1924-1926. Most patient and kind to all of us, especially his class. He had combined sixth year for RK, a most unruly lot and poor Fr John had no control, but we revered and loved him so he got us to learn something about our religion.

I entered the Noviceship from that class and persevered, Fr John's prayers!? One night during recreation I was in the library - Fr John had forgotten to pull down his blind. He was on his knees praying before a crucifix. I didn't read a word watching him - face transformed, immobile. A man devoted to God - all of us know that. May he be raised to the altar.

-oOo-

The only contact I had with Fr Sullivan was a retreat at Emo Park around 1935. Most of us found it rather dull and boring. It was obvious to all of us that he was a very saintly man. He spent very little time at meals, and piety seemed to 'ooze' from him.

He had a great devotion to Our Blessed Lady, and if you met him in the house, or grounds, he had his rosary beads in his hands.

I never lived in the same community, and so I cannot say much more about him.

-oOo-

A master was out ill. Two classes were put together (usually disastrous). Fr John was teaching them religion. He was going through St Luke's Gospel with great fervour but we were talking all the time - this almost entirely because of the mixture of classes. He would read on and comment as if he didn't notice, then he would stop: “Too much talk, too much talk, Jim E. down there you're not listening, not listening to St Luke the most beautiful book in the whole world, not listening there”. But sometimes when our ignorant and unmannerly talking almost drowned him he would get really angry and give out forcefully, mostly in the same words as above. Then he would perceptibly repent of his anger and end up with a joke and as good a smile as he could manage, always with the words: “Can't get a word in edgeways, trying hard, no hope, no hope”.

There had been snow for days and days. Everyone cooped up. no games. During “shop” one day Fr John came down and offered to take his classes - or perhaps the whole Higher Line - out for a walk. A good many came. We went out the front gate and did a circuit on the road. Many walked abreast with him. I forget what he was talking about. It might have been his travels in Greece. Perhaps half way around he struck for home across the snowy fields. Before us we saw a wide slobbery gap into the next field. Cattle had churned a large area of it into slush. Seeing it he repeated “C'mon, c'mon, c'mon” and started off in a wobbly run. I think his hands were up his sleeves. We all joined in and slushed through the muddy gap. We did the same in the next gap.

He was walking down the Higher Line Gallery, keeping close to the wall and very bowed. I saw his knee through a very loosely half-stitched vent in his trouser. Either the gown or the trouser had a green black shiny look.

I was in the infirmary in a room with two others. Fr John came in and knelt in turn at each bed to hear confession. He said a few encouraging words I think, but I don't remember.

He said the boys' Mass every day. Often he would stop on the way out - and I think sometimes on the way in - near the altar rail and speak rapidly with great sincerity and feeling. You didn't understand all he said, but he made an impact.

The windows of the old chemistry room faced across towards the study building, and faced the window of Fr John's room. One day a boy in the class called us over to the window; through the window of Fr John's room we could see him at his kneeler praying. We were not surprised.

His room was off the study stairs, the Higher Line dormitory opened on to the same stairs. On the way down the Mass in the morning the so-called “toughs” used to line up for confession.

-oOo-

As it was my privilege of living for sixteen years in the same community with Fr John, my most vivid recollections of him are his heroic practice of poverty in his personal life, and his utter dedication to all who were poor, to the sick and needy in a wide area around Clongowes. His names is held in awe to this very day by the relatives of all those people he had helped, both spiritually and physically, and indeed, by the many who never met him or had any connection with him. He is a living presence around Clongowes.

Though there are many accounts of Fr John's powers of healing, I am glad to recall Mrs. Tom Smyth's story to me about herself. Long before my time, she was an invalid, and not able to move around. When the family were out, they would close the door for safety sake. On a certain day there was a loud knock on the door. She didn't answer it. Then there was a second, and so she crawled up with the aid of a chair. When she opened it she recognised Fr John. He said he was looking for the invalid. “Can you help me? I am the invalid Father”. He told her to kneel down. It caused her intense suffering. He nearly drowned her with holy water and prayed over her (her own words). That is the limit of my knowledge. She was happily married to Tom Smyth when cured, and lived a long life.

She died only last year. When I was on retreat in Clongowes, I felt sad to think of other days when we played cards in the farm yard with Tom and his wife,

-oOo-

Although I have never lived with Fr John Sullivan as a member of the Jesuit Community at Clongowes, I did, in fact, live for five schools years, 1928-33, under the same roof as “Johnny-O”, as we boys affectionately called him among ourselves. Nor was I taught by him, save on rare occasions when one of our regular teachers being absent, Fr John might be sent to look after us'. I can only recall one such occasion, when he made his usual hurried entry into our noisy classroom and without ado knelt, with head bowed, to recite the “Hail Mary”, as was the custom among the Jesuit masters in my time. With eyes still downcast, but occasionally glancing at the class, he stood before us and put a question on Geography to the class in general. "Where is Bessarabia, there! Bessarabia, there?", Glancing hopefully from one side of the silent class to the other. As I recollect, only one boy gave a satisfactory answer. Father John went on to tell us of some of his personal experiences in the South-Eastern part of Europe, including his visits to the Orthodox Ministries in Greece.

To the query “did I know him?” my first inclination would be to say, “yes, of course, I knew him”. Didn't everyone at Clongowes know him, and know him for what he undoubtedly was, a very holy Jesuit priest, first and last! Didn't he offer Mass, Monday to Friday, in our presence at 7.30 in the morning? Didn't he often ask our prayers for some sick or dying person; for some old Clongownian or Jesuit what had died? Didn't we see him kneeling outside his Confessional, (the one nearest the entrance on the left-hand side) several nights of the week, as we boys came out of supper? Didn't we know that on Saturday nights, the ‘hardened sinners’ amongst us found refuge in his ‘box’!!. Didn't we hear, day in, day out, from Jesuit Brothers, Scholastics and Priests how great was the demand for his help, not only by local people in trouble or in sickness, but from people far off? And more to the point, didn't we see or meet with him as he made his way, hurriedly to be sure, thro' the chattering throng of boys on the old Lower Line Gallery or elsewhere, talking now to one, now to the other?

I recall quite clearly two such occasions when he spoke to me in the midst of the 'madding crowd'. The first was on the noisy Third Line Gallery. I turned around to find him standing behind me with head slightly bowed, and his left hand brushing back the hair off his forehead - (this was a characteristic gesture). “What's your name, boy?” he asked. I told him. “I know your brothers”, was his reply. He then said, “Are you a Pioneer?”, and before I could answer “No, Father”, he said; “You know, you ought to be, for the love of God”. “Yes, Father”, I said. “Be in the Sacristy before Supper”, he replied and was gone. So I became a “probationer” (at the age of 14) on that day and a Pioneer two years later. It didn't cost me anything then or later, thank God, although it was much later that I came to appreciate the graces which flowed from this 'chance' meeting with a holy priest.

The second such meeting was equally unexpected and abrupt. It happened in October 1932, a few months before his death, on February 19th, 1933. He appeared from nowhere in the middle of a crowd of higher-liners and this time with the ghost of a smile on his rugged face, eyes lowered and hands half-clapping. Without any introduction, he kept repeating. “The word is VISCERA, VISCERA, VISCERA, not VISCERIA, VISCERIA. A common word there”. I was nimble in mind in those days and I knew almost immediately that he was correcting my pronunciation of a word - I'm sure there were many others - which occurred in the “Evening Office of the Dead” which the members of the Sodality of Our Lady used recite at their Saturday night meetings in the Sodality Chapel in the Castle. “Thank you, Father”, I muttered, and he ended the interview as he had begun it; “Yes, VISCERA, a very common word, there”. He was off again.

I might underline here a fact about Fr John's spirituality which made a deep and lasting impression upon me. It was his devotion to the Holy Souls. As this is a very Catholic devotion, he must have learned it, either from his mother or after his conversion, when his reading would have opened up the wonderful possibility of his being able to keep his dead relatives and friends for whom, up to this, he was not accustomed to pray. Whenever, or however he came across this practice, he made it part and parcel of his daily prayer life. In his week-day Masses and in his Sodality Masses on Saturdays, we boys were asked to pray for some person recently deceased. On rare occasions, too, we were asked to pray for some “poor man or woman dying in great pain”. The Holy Souls were for him the poorest of the poor because tho' they were in need, they could neither help themselves nor beg for help from the living! The doctrine of the Communion of Saints was one that appealed to him. For Christ's words were as true of them as any of the living: “As often as you do it to one of these, my least brethren, you do it for me”. Father John was ever on the “look-out for Christ in need”.

There was a third meeting which comes to my mind. My two brothers and myself had got permission to go to Dublin on a Playday in Autumn 1931. We had to rise early to catch a Provincial Bus that passed thro' Clane about 7.45 am on its way to the City. As we made our way we came to the straight part of the road which ends at the “Jolly Farmers”, we saw Father John jogging towards us. He evidently had been out on a nearby sick-call or bringing Holy Communion to some regular client and was returning “at speed” lest he be late for the Boys Mass at 8.00 am. He slowed down as he passed saying “God Bless you have a good day there” and was gone. I mention this passing encounter to record what I and the boys of my time frequently witnessed, namely his jogging along the avenue or around the Higher-Line track in the early morning. This, no doubt kept him fit; for physically fit he was, despite the austere life he freely lived so that he might be a minister of God after the example of Christ. Indeed, he had to keep fit, if he was to reach so many sick persons by walking or by riding his bicycle. Although I never saw him riding, I heard about it, some years before I went to Clongowes, from my mother. My eldest brother, John, took very ill at Clongowes on October, 1924. He was operated on in Dublin but given very little hope of recovery. Father John used to ride up from Clongowes in every kind of weather, spend half an hour praying over the dying boy. And then, off again back to Clongowes. After several days, when his life hung on a thread, my brother started to recover, and finally did so. My mother always maintained that her son's recovery was due to the prayers of Father John.

St Leger, John, 1798-1868, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/413
  • Person
  • 25 January 1798-27 December 1868

Born: 25 January 1798, Waterford City, County Waterford
Entered: 07 September 1818, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 16 June 1825, Stanhope Street, Dublin (Irish Sisters of Charity) by Archbishop Murray
Final Vows: 15 August 1832
Died: 27 December 1868, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Brother of Robert St Leger - RIP 1856, and a nephew of John St Leger RIP 1783

by 1839 in Calcutta Mission

◆ Fr Edmund Hogan SJ “Catalogica Chronologica” :
Brother of Robert St Leger, and a nephew of John St Leger RIP 1783

◆ HIB Menologies SJ : Nephew of John St Leger RIP 1783, and a brother of Robert St Leger RIP 1856

Early education was at Clongowes in Humanities and Rhetoric.

He made his Philosophy and Theology studies at Tullabeg, and was duly Ordained and worked in Priestly Ministry. he was admired as an energetic and eloquent Preacher, possessing an unusual ability to insert in his words, the forcible language of others, without allowing it to be perceived.
1834 He accompanied his brother Robert to India, and for some time exercised the ministry of Chaplain to the British Forces stationed at Dumdum, near Calcutta. Here his eloquence was also noted.
1840 He returned to Ireland, and took up the office of Rector at Tullabeg for one year, having previously held this position before he went to India. he was remarkable for his management of temporal affairs, his rigid economy and attachment to poverty.
Before going to India, he had suffered a lot from neuralgia.
When he left Tullabeg, he spent some months with his brother Robert at Killiney, before being sent to Gardiner St with him, and he worked as an Operarius there. He worked there with great zeal and edification for many years.
His death was sudden and caused by paralysis. He died at Gardiner St 27 December 1868

Note from Robert St Leger Entry :
1817 Sent to Tullabeg to establish a Novitiate there, and to open a small school, which later became St Stanislaus College. For some years this house suffered from extreme poverty, and it was almost as though he could not appear for a time without being in danger of being arrested. His brother John, having completed his Noviceship, displayed considerable talent for economy and the management of the school, so the debts were cleared and the number of pupils increased. It was possibly an error that Robert appointed John as procurator, as his economies were rather severe. A Visitor was sent from England, and Robert was soon removed.
1834 He was appointed Vicar Apostolic in Calcutta, India, and his brother John accompanied him.

St Leger, Robert, 1788-1856, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/36
  • Person
  • 08 February 1788-22 June 1856

Born: 08 February 1788,Waterford City, County Waterford
Entered: 07 September 1807, Hodder, Stonyhurst, England - Angliae Province (ANG)
Final Vows: 09 December 1821, Palermo, Sicily
Died: 22 June 1856, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Brother of John St Leger - RIP 1868, and a nephew of John St Leger RIP 1783

Superior of St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly: 7 July 1818-1831
First Vice-Provincial of Irish Vice-Province of the Society of Jesus: May 1830-1834; 1841-1850

in Clongowes 1817
in Tullabeg 1818/9
1st Vice Provincial 1830
by 1839 in Calcutta Mission

◆ ◆ Fr Edmund Hogan SJ “Catalogica Chronologica” :
Nephew of John St Leger RIP 1783, and a brother of another John St Leger RIP 1868
1830 Vice-Provincial and again in 1841.
1834 Vicar Apostolic in Calcutta, India. (cf “Mission du Bengale” Fr H Josson SJ, 1924, pp 162-185)
He was remarkable for his gentleness of disposition, clearness of mind, and accurate knowledge of Theology, which he had studied and graduated DD at Palermo.

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Nephew of John St Leger RIP 1783
Early education in Humanities and Rhetoric at Stonyhurst before Ent.
One of a band that were sent to Sicily after First Vows, where he studied Philosophy and Theology for six years Graduating DD.
1815 Sent to Ireland and on the Waterford Mission for a while.
1817 Sent to Tullabeg to establish a Novitiate there, and to open a small school, which later became St Stanislaus College. For some years this house suffered from extreme poverty, and it was almost as though he could not appear for a time without being in danger of being arrested. His brother John, having completed his Noviceship, displayed considerable talent for economy and the management of the school, so the debts were cleared and the number of pupils increased. It was possibly an error that Robert appointed John as procurator, as his economies were rather severe. A Visitor was sent from England, and Robert was soon removed.
1830 Appointed Vice-Provincial
1834 He was appointed Vicar Apostolic in Calcutta, India, and his brother John accompanied him. It was unfortunate that ANG opened a school in Calcutta at the same time as Robert, and both he and the ANG Rector were at variance in their views. Complaints were sent to Rome, and perhaps too readily accepted by the General. Robert was unhappy with the position he found himself in, and so he returned to Ireland.
1840 He was appointed Rector of Clongowes which was in sever financial debt at the time
1841 Appointed Vice-Provincial again, holding the position for nine years, and entertained Father General Roothaan in 1849. He was succeeded in 1851 by John Curtis.
1851 He went to live in a house in Killiney, which had been bought with the view of opening a chapel there. This didn’t work out, so he moved to Gardiner St and remained there until his death. His health had been failing, and he was less able to work.
He was a saintly and spiritual man, always held in high esteem by Ours and externs.
The suavity of his manners won over all whom he encountered. When he first came to Ireland from Sicily, his austerity was so great that he applied for permission to refrain from eating meat, and this was refused. He loved the Cross, and asked other to pray for that Grace for him.
He was, at the same time, a man of strong will, and was thought to perhaps stick too rigidly to his own views. He was a man of great erudition and literary knowledge and was also a good Theologian. He was remarkable for his gentleness of disposition, clearness of mind, and accurate knowledge.
His mind became weak in his last illness, which was protracted and severe. He died 22 June 1856

◆ Fr Joseph McDonnell SJ Past and Present Notes :
16th February 1811 At the advance ages of 73, Father Betagh, PP of the St Michael Rosemary Lane Parish Dublin, Vicar General of the Dublin Archdiocese died. His death was looked upon as almost a national calamity. Shops and businesses were closed on the day of his funeral. His name and qualities were on the lips of everyone. He was an ex-Jesuit, the link between the Old and New Society in Ireland.

Among his many works was the foundation of two schools for boys : one a Classical school in Sall’s Court, the other a Night School in Skinner’s Row. One pupil received particular care - Peter Kenney - as he believed there might be great things to come from him in the future. “I have not long to be with you, but never fear, I’m rearing up a cock that will crow louder and sweeter for you than I ever did” he told his parishioners. Peter Kenney was to be “founder” of the restored Society in Ireland.

There were seventeen Jesuits in Ireland at the Suppression : John Ward, Clement Kelly, Edward Keating, John St Leger, Nicholas Barron, John Austin, Peter Berrill, James Moroney, Michael Cawood, Michael Fitzgerald, John Fullam, Paul Power, John Barron, Joseph O’Halloran, James Mulcaile, Richard O’Callaghan and Thomas Betagh. These men believed in the future restoration, and they husbanded their resources and succeeded in handing down to their successors a considerable sum of money, which had been saved by them.

A letter from the Acting General Father Thaddeus Brezozowski, dated St Petersburg 14 June 1806 was addressed to the only two survivors, Betagh and O'Callaghan. He thanked them for their work and their union with those in Russia, and suggested that the restoration was close at hand.

A letter from Nicholas Sewell, dated Stonyhurst 07 July 1809 to Betagh gives details of Irishmen being sent to Sicily for studies : Bartholomew Esmonde, Paul Ferley, Charles Aylmer, Robert St Leger, Edmund Cogan and James Butler. Peter Kenney and Matthew Gahan had preceded them. These were the foundation stones of the Restored Society.

Returning to Ireland, Kenney, Gahan and John Ryan took residence at No3 George’s Hill. Two years later, with the monies saved for them, Kenney bought Clongowes as a College for boys and a House of Studies for Jesuits. From a diary fragment of Aylmer, we learn that Kenney was Superior of the Irish Mission and Prefect of Studies, Aylmer was Minister, Claude Jautard, a survivor of the old Society in France was Spiritual Father, Butler was Professor of Moral and Dogmatic Theology, Ferley was professor of Logic and Metaphysics, Esmonde was Superior of Scholastics and they were joined by St Leger and William Dinan. Gahan was described as a Missioner at Francis St Dublin and Confessor to the Poor Clares and Irish Sisters of Charity at Harold’s Cross and Summerhill. Ryan was a Missioner in St Paul’s, Arran Quay, Dublin. Among the Scholastics, Brothers and Masters were : Brothers Fraser, Levins, Connor, Bracken, Sherlock, Moran, Mullen and McGlade.

Trouble was not long coming. Protestants were upset that the Jesuits were in Ireland and sent a petition was sent to Parliament, suggesting that the Vow of Obedience to the Pope meant they could not have an Oath of Allegiance to the King. In addition, the expulsion of Jesuits from all of Europe had been a good thing. Kenney’s influence and diplomatic skills resulted in gaining support from Protestants in the locality of Clongowes, and a counter petition was presented by the Duke of Leinster on behalf of the Jesuits. This moment passed, but anti Jesuit feelings were mounting, such as in the Orange faction, and they managed to get an enquiry into the Jesuits and Peter Kenney and they appeared before the Irish Chief Secretary and Privy Council. Peter Kenney’s persuasive and oratorical skills won the day and the enquiry group said they were satisfied and impressed.

Over the years the Mission grew into a Province with Joseph Lentaigne as first Provincial in 1860. In 1885 the first outward undertaking was the setting up of an Irish Mission to Australia by Lentaigne and William Kelly, and this Mission grew exponentially from very humble beginnings.

Later the performance of the Jesuits in managing UCD with little or no money, and then outperforming what were known as the “Queen’s Colleges” forced the issue of injustice against Catholics in Ireland in the matter of University education. It is William Delaney who headed up the effort and create the National University of Ireland under endowment from the Government.from the Government.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Robert St Leger SJ 1788-1856
Robert St Leger came from a family that lived in Waterford, where he was born February 8th 1788. He was a nephew of John St Leger of the old Society, and had a younger bother John who was also a Jesuit.

In 1817 Fr Robert was sent to the newly acquired property at Tullabeg to open a novitiate and a small school there. It was a difficult undertaking financially. Indeed, it was said that at one period the College was so heavily in debt, that Fr Robert could not appear in public for fear of arrest.

He became Vice-Provincial in 1830, and again in 1841. He was also for some time Vicar Apostolic in Calcutta.

In 1851, he opened a new house, Druid Lodge in Killiney, but the venture was not a success.

He played a big part in the founding of the Irish Sisters of Charity, being the spiritual director of Mary Aikenhead. When he was Rector of Tullabeg, she came to Rahan Lodge to be in touch with him while writing the Constitutions,

His last years he spent in Gardiner Street and he died there June 22nd 1856.

Seaver, Matthew, 1816-1872, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/2102
  • Person
  • 28 September 1816-26 February 1872

Born: 28 September 1816, Rush, County Dublin
Entered: 02 October 1835, Hodder, Stonyhurst, England - Angliae Province (ANG)
Ordained: 1851
Final vows: 02 February 1860
Died: 26 February 1872, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Older brother of William Seaver - RIP 1891, and Uncle of Elias Seaver - RIP 1886

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Older brother of William Seaver - RIP 1891, and Uncle of Elias Seaver - RIP 1886
Early eductaion was at Clongowes.
After First Vows and studies he was sent to Clongowes, as prefect and teaching Grammar for a umber of years. He was also Minister there for a time.
1855 He was appointed Rector at Tullabeg, succeeding John Ffrench, who had been appointed Rector of Belvedere.
1861-1864 Joseph Dalton succeeded him at Tullabeg, and he was appopinted Rector of Belvedere.
1864 He was appointed Procurator at Clongowes, and later also as Minister.
1866 He was sent to Gardiner St, where he remained until his death 26 February 1872.

He contracted small pox from one of his penitents, and indeed died before she did. A large number of people attended his funeral.

He was a man of great administrative capacity. he built the large wing at Tullabeg, which bore his name, and he was admired by everyone who knew how a College ought to be built. He was very zealous and kind to the sick. He also kept many from souperism (during the famine times, accepting food along with Protestant instruction). During an outbreak of small-pox in Dublin, he showed heroic charity and zeal. With his own hands, he placed many people who had died from the disease in their coffins, when friends and family had fled. he ultimately succumbed to this disease himself.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Matthew Seaver 1816-1872
Born in Dublin on September 28th 1816, Matthew Seaver was educated at Clongowes. He entered the Society in 1835.

When Fr Ffrench became Rector of Belvedere in 1855, he was succeeded by Fr Seaver as Rector of Tullabeg. In 1861 he was Rector of Belvedere until 1864. He spent the remainder of his life at Gardiner Street.
He was a man of great administrative ability. He built a large wing at Tullabeg, which to this day bears his name and is admired by everybody who knows how a College ought to be built.
He was very zealous, extremely kind to the sick and especially successful in rescuing souls from the snares of “souperism”.
During an epidemic of small pox in Dublin, he displayed heroic charity. With his own hands he coffined several victims of the disease, when all others had fled in terror. He contracted the dreaded disease himself and died a true martyr of charity on February 26th 1872.

Ryan, Patrick, 1918-1998, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/615
  • Person
  • 26 February 1918-31 May 1998

Born: 26 February 1918, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1937, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Final vows: 15 August 1948, Belvedere College SJ
Died: 31 May 1998, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death.

by 1979 at Lahore, Pakistan (MIS PAK) working

◆ Interfuse
Interfuse No 101 : Special Edition 1999

Obituary

Br Patrick Ryan (1918-1988)

26th Feb. 1918: Born in Dublin.
Pre-entry experience: He did a commerce course in the Technical School, Parnell Square.
He was employed as a clerk for 4 years.
7th Sep. 1937: Entered the Society at Emo.
8th Sep 1939: First vows at Emo.
1940 - 1941: Galway, Cook
1941 - 1945: Clongowes Wood College, Cook.
1945 - 1958: Belvedere, Sacristan
1948: Tertianship at Tullabeg,
He took Final Vows on 15th Aug. 1948, at Belvedere.
1958 - 1977: Gardiner Street Church, Sacristan (Assistant sacristan/Parish work since 1975)
1977 - 1978: Milltown Park, Sacristan
1978 - 1980: Pakistan, Administration, Loyola Hall.
1980 - 1993: Milltown Park, sacristan.
After that, he helped with administration: post, papers, etc.

In latter years, Pat went across to Cherryfield Lodge for an occasional rest and nursing care. He loved the place, and the nurses were very fond of him. His last stay lasted six weeks during which he showed signs that old age was catching up on him. Even when his voice went, he could converse in a whisper till the end. He died perfectly resigned and at peace on Sunday morning 31st May 1998.

Homily at the funeral Mass of Br. Pat Ryan, SJ
Pat Ryan died peacefully at Cherryfield Lodge early on the morning of May 31st, 1998 - the Feast of Pentecost. Today we gather to give thanks to God for Pat Ryan's life, and to pray that he will now enjoy God's presence for ever. Pat dedicated his life to the Lord in the Society and worked in a number of Jesuit apostolates with great dedication and fidelity - the longest of these were in Gardiner Street, where he was Sacristan for eighteen years.

Our readings today speak to us about the Christian vision that inspired Pat's life over eighty years. Brother Patrick Joseph Ryan was born on the 26th February 1918. He attended the Local National School in Phibsboro, and followed this with a commerce course at a technical school. Pat then worked for four years as a clerk before entering the Society of Jesus in 1937. His work in the Society began with some assignments that he did not like very much. He served as an assistant cook in two of our Colleges and then from 1945-1958 he was in Belvedere College as a sacristan and general houseman. From 1958 to 1977 he was a sacristan in our large public Church here, St. Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street. From 1975 to 1977 he trained in a new sacristan and worked as a member of the newly established parish team. In 1978 he was appointed to replace the Sacristan at Milltown Park and also to work in the Library. Providence had its own special plans for Pat at that time and I will return to that a little later!

As Pat came in recent weeks to recognize that he was nearing the end of his life, he expressed in a very peaceful and serene way his gratitude to God, to his family and relatives, to his many friends in the Society of Jesus and outside for the many blessings he had received during the course of his life. For many of us here in the Jesuit Community at Milltown Park, Pat's great appreciation for his vocation to the Jesuit way of life will be linked with a memorable celebration we had at Milltown last September as we celebrated Pat's sixtieth anniversary as a Jesuit.

Pat's faith was nourished in his family, where he received a strong sense of Christian values. This led him to join the Society of Jesus in 1937. His first assignment was as a cook in Galway - a job he didn't like too much! Pat spent long periods after this in three communities: Belvedere, Gardiner Street and Milltown. Since 1980 he has been a member of the community at Milltown, spending short times at Cherryfield Lodge when he needed some quiet and some nursing.

Pat spent two years in Lahore, Pakistan from 1978 to 1980. He enjoyed the completely different perspective on life that this stay in Lahore gave him. He wrote in a letter; “There is no other way to describe it all only that it is a completely different world out here. In six weeks here I have heard and seen things I never really knew existed. I went into a Mosque the other day and saw the Muslims at Prayer. Very devout. Indeed, I had to take off my shoes and I was provided with a very small hat to wear. If some of my fellow Irish Jesuits had seen me they would have wondered what had happened to ultra conservative Pat Ryan ... The one thing I must admit I do find hard here is the loss of the companionship of my fellow Irish Jesuits. Unfortunately I was spoiled by the friendship of the young men at Milltown during my very happy stay there. However it is a small price to pay for the opportunity to giving testimony to my belief in God and I am happy to do so”.

In his eighteen years as sacristan here in Gardiner Street, Pat worked very hard in the Parish and in the Church. In his own quiet and efficient way Pat lived out his Jesuit vocation in a life of service inspired by his love for Jesus Christ, his Lord and Master. In Milltown Pat was able to continue that life of generous service. In recent years, he knew the limits that his health put on his activities. But he paced himself well - like any good Everton player!

In the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius, we are invited in the Contemplation to Achieve the Love of God, to grow in our awareness of the way God is present in all life and is giving Himself to us. Pat's life showed that sense of God's presence and he learned to find God in all things. One of the places that Pat found God was in his great love of soccer. He was a great Everton fan, with Everton colors proudly displayed on his door! That simple enjoyment of soccer, that sense of fun about life, that ability to joke with his community and friends were great gifts he brought to us all.

Pat died early on the morning of the Feast of Pentecost, at 12:20 am. At Pentecost the Holy Spirit comes as a gift to the Christian community. In Pat's life we have glimpsed what the fruits of the Spirit are: love, joy, peace, gentleness, patience, self-control. Pat's faithfulness, his gift of “keeping going” (to use a phrase which Séamus Heaney uses to describe his brother going through the ordinary activities of the day) have been an inspiration to us - a breath of the Spirit. We now give Pat back to God who has given him to us. We return him to God with a profound sense of gratitude.

Frank Sammon

Rorke, Andrew H, 1834-1907, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/387
  • Person
  • 18 December 1834-27 May 1907

Born: 18 December 1834, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 12 September 1853, Amiens France - Franciae Province (FRA)
Ordained: 1869
Final Vows: 02 February 1872
Died: 27 May 1907, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Cousin of Andrew J Rorke - RIP 1913

He taught with great success at Clongowes and Galway. He was Minister at both Galway and UCD, and then for many years Minister and procurator at Gardiner St, where he died 27 May 1907.
He was a learned man, but somewhat peculiar, especially in his last years.

Note from Joseph O’Malley Entry :
1859 he was sent to Tullabeg as Lower Line Prefect with Andrew H Rorke as Higher Line.

Ronan, William, 1828-1907, Jesuit priest and chaplain

  • IE IJA J/382
  • Person
  • 13 July 1825-10 December 1907

Born: 13 July 1825, Newry, County Down
Entered: 13 November 1850, St Acheul, Amiens, France (FRA)
Ordained: 1848 - Maynooth College, County Kildare - pre entry
Final Vows: 02 February 1865
Died: 10 December 1907, Mungret College, County Limerick

by 1855 in Istanbul?
by 1864 at Rome Italy (ROM) making Tertianship
by 1899 at Villa Saint-Joseph, Cannes, France (LUGD)

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He had studied at Maynooth and was Ordained 1848 for his native Diocese of Dromore before Ent.

A Few years after his Novitiate he went with Fr Patrick J Duffy as a Chaplain in the Crimean War, where he worked for more than a year in the hospitals of Scutari Hospital (of Florence Nightingale Fame in the Istanbul Region) and other Military stations.
On his return to Ireland he worked for many years as a Missioner, and became well known in almost every diocese and district in the country. Few men were better known as a Spiritual Director in religious communities through Ireland as well as the clergy of many Dioceses.
He was Superior in turn of the Galway and Limerick houses, and was known for extraordinary zeal and devotion to the Sacred Heart. he shared this devotion with one to Our Lady of Lourdes and St Joseph.
1880 While Rector in Limerick, he founded the Apostolic School, and when Mungret was given to the Jesuits, and the AS moved there, he became its first Rector. He considered the founding of the AS as the greatest work of his life. He travelled to the US in 1884/5 to get funds for the AS so that he could set up a more permanent financial foundation for it.
1887 He began the second phase of his life as a Missioner in Ireland, and continued this even when he was appointed Superior at Gardiner St.
1897 By now he was compelled to give up active work due to ill health and he spent some years in the South of France.
1901 He was sent back to Mungret and spent the last six years of his life there as Spiritual Father and Confessor to the Community and students. During these years he had the great consolation of seeing the growth of the College, and always spoke of those Priests, former students, working in all quarters of the world, as his children.

His last days were happy ones “How good God is to me and how happy I am to be here”, were almost the last words he spoke when he was in the full of his health. It was a massive stroke which brought about his death on 10 December 1907 at Mungret, and he was buried in the College Cemetery, following a funeral procession which was led by the younger students walking in twos, followed by the clergy, the the coffin borne by senior students and then the mourners, of whom there were many. Afterwards many stories were shared by his former students in Mungret and the Crescent, as well as many who had come to know him through his Missionary work. General Sir William Butler (who had been educated at Tullabeg), who had visited Father William three days before and listened carefully to him as he spoke about his time in the Crimea, and Sir William thought of him a a soldier of the truest type :
“he said to me some memorable things in that first and last interview I had with him on December 9th. Amongst other things he said ‘In the hospital near Scutari I suppose more that 1,000 poor soldiers from the Crimea were prepared for death by me. Some were able only to utter an ejaculatory prayer, some of them had known little of their faith before this time, but I have never doubted for one moment that every one of those poor souls went straight to Heaven. And when I go and meet them in Heaven, I think they will elect me their colonel, and I shall stand at their head there. I pray our Lord that he may take me at any moment. I am quite willing to go, but I say that I am ready to stay too, if he has any more work for me to do here’. It is an intense satisfaction to me that it was given to me to see this grand veteran on this, his last full day of his long and wonderful life - all his faculties perfect”.

Note from Patrick Hughes Entry :
1888 He was appointed Rector of Galway, and continued his involvement in the Mission Staff. On Father Ronan’s retirement, he was appointed Superior of the Mission Staff.

Note from Christopher Coffey Entry :
He died peacefully 29 March 1911, and after the Requiem Mass he was brought to the small cemetery and buried between Brothers Franye and MacEvoy, and close to the grave of William Ronan.

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online :
Ronan, William
by David Murphy

Ronan, William (1825–1907), Jesuit priest and Crimean war chaplain, was born 13 July 1825 in the parish of Clonduff, near Newry, Co. Down, son of Patrick Ronan, farmer. His mother's maiden name was Rooney. He was educated at St Patrick's College, Maynooth, and was ordained priest in 1848, entering the Society of Jesus in November 1850. Completing his noviciate at Dromore, Co. Down, he studied philosophy at Saint-Acheul, near Amiens, France, and went to Laval (November 1852) to study theology. In 1854 he joined the Jesuit community at St Francis Xavier's in Gardiner St., Dublin. At the end of 1854 he was appointed to serve as a chaplain with the army in the Crimea. This was the first occasion since the reign of James II (qv) that catholic chaplains had been given official status in the British army, and Ronan (along with fellow Jesuit Patrick Duffy and some Irish diocesan priests) travelled to the Crimea at the end of 1854. Specifically instructed to look after the welfare of the Irish Sisters of Mercy working in the hospital at Scutari, he arrived in January 1855 and immediately clashed with Florence Nightingale, who was in charge of the hospital. He disagreed with the way the Irish nuns were employed and also found them living in unsuitable conditions. Following negotiations with Nightingale, the conditions for the Irish nuns improved. He outlined his initial impressions of the Scutari hospital in a letter (preserved in the Dublin Diocesan Archive) to his superior in Dublin, Fr Robert Curtis, SJ. While in the Crimea he occasionally found some Irish secular priests to be hostile towards the Jesuits and experienced particular difficulties with one priest, Fr Michael Cuffe.

Returning to Ireland at the end of 1855 in bad health, he initially worked as a missioner. A noted preacher and retreat-giver, he toured the towns and cities of Ireland before being appointed superior of the Galway Jesuit community. He took his final vows in February 1865. In 1880 he became rector of Limerick and founded the Irish Apostolic School, which transferred (1882) to Mungret College. He then travelled to the USA on a fund-raising tour and raised over £10,000 (1884). In 1887 he worked as a missioner again before joining (1893) the Gardiner St. community, of which he was made superior in July 1895. His later years were overshadowed by controversy, as he was accused of an improper relationship with a wealthy widow, Mrs Doyle. He denied these accusations but spent some time abroad, living first in Jersey and then in the south of France. In 1901 he returned to Mungret and remained at the college until his death. On 9 December 1907 he was visited by Gen. the Rt Hon. Sir William Butler (qv), who was recording the accounts of men who had served in various military campaigns of the nineteenth century, including the Crimean war. At the end of his interview, Ronan remarked ‘I pray hard that He may take me at any moment. I am quite willing to go but I say that I am ready to stay too, if He has any more work for me to do here’ (cited in Murphy, War Correspondent, 45). The next day, 10 December 1907, he suffered a stroke and died. He was buried in the college cemetery at Mungret.

There is a substantial collection of his papers in the Irish Jesuit archives in Dublin. There are further letters in the papers of Cardinal Paul Cullen (qv) in the Dublin diocesan archives.

Fr William Ronan, SJ, files in Irish Jesuit Archives, Dublin; Freeman's Journal, 12 Dec. 1907; Evelyn Bolster, The Irish Sisters of Mercy in the Crimean war (1964); Louis McRedmond, To the greater glory: a history of the Irish Jesuits (1991); Tom Johnstone and James Hagerty, The cross on the sword: catholic chaplains in the forces (1996); David Murphy, ‘Irish Jesuit chaplains in the Crimean war’, War Correspondent, xvii, no. 1 (Apr. 1999), 42–6; id., Ireland and the Crimean war (2002); Thomas J. Morrissey, William Ronan, SJ: war chaplain, missioner, founder of Mungret College (2002)

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father William Ronan 1825-1907
Fr William Ronan was born on July 13th 1825 in County Down. He was ordained priest in Maynooth for his native diocese of Dromore. After two years as a secular priest he entered the Society in the Crimean War, where he laboured for more than a year in the hospitals of Scutari, where, as he afterwards recounted to a famous friend he met there, Sir William Butler, “more than 1,000 soldiers were prepared for death by me”.

On his return to Ireland he worked on the Mission Staff, and he was a much sought after giver of retreats to religious and diocesan clergy. He was Superior in turn at Galway and the Crescent. It was while he was Rector of the Crescent that he founded the Apostolic School, first at the Crescent, and then with the help of Lord Ely and the Abbé Heretier, in Mungret, where he became the first Rector. He went to the United States in 1884 to collect funds for the new College.

After another period on the Mission Staff and a period as Superior at Gardiner Street, owing to ill health he had to spend some years in the South of France. In 1901 he returned to Mungret, where he spent the last six years of his busy and extraordinarily fruitful life.

He was a man of remarkable zeal and fervent piety, outstanding for his devotion to the Sacred Heart, and to which devotion he attributed the great success of all his undertakings.

On the last day of his life, chatting to his old friend Sir William Butler, and referring to the soldiers he had anointed in the Crimean War, he said “I have never doubted for one moment, that every one of these poor souls went straight to heaven, and when I go and meet them in heaven, I think they will elect me their colonel, and I shall stand at their head there”.

Death came on him unexpectedly at six o’clock on the evening of Tuesday December 10th 1907, after he had spent an hour in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, as had been his custom for many years. He survived a heart attack long enough to receive the Last Rites, and was buried in a spot chosen by himself years before, facing the window of the College Chapel.

◆ The Mungret Annual, 1908

In Memoriam : Rev Father Ronan SJ (1825-1907)

by Thomas Cassidy (Matriculation Class)

We saw a flower in bloom one summer day,
The glowing dawn imbued its petals sweet,
But when the night came on it passed away
And fell a faded cluster at my feet.

We saw another power in bloom full bright,
And in its day its sweetness far it shed;
But then, when o'er it fell the robe of night,
A crown of splendour settled on its head.

O God; we missed him, but he'was Thine own,
A benefactor and a friend to all;
And called by Thee he fled unto Thy Throne
To answer sweetly to Thy loving call.

He was a man of constant mind and strong,
Of powerful frame, more powerful still in prayer;
Throughout his life, and that had been full long,
He breathed heavenly sweetness everywhere.

And Mungret stands his living monument,
Looks o'er his grave and guards his memory,
Prays for him e'er, and thanks the hand he lent,
To breathe in her a soul so heavenly.

List, sainted Father, to thy children dear,
Who in thy widowed habitation dwell:
We pray thee, in our need be evěr: near
Far from us drive the tempting powers of hell.

That on that day, sweet saint, when nations rise.
To bliss eternal, or to lasting woe, .
We may with thee ascend unto the skies,
And bless the days you spent with us below.

-oOo-

Obituary

Rev William Ronan SJ (1825-1907) : Founder of The Apostolic School and Mungret College

In the afternoon of Tuesday, December 10th, 1907, while the boys were at supper, a rumour reached both their refectories that Father Ronan had been taken suddenly ill, The Apostolics soon learned the whole truth and knew that he whom they looked upon as a father, and whom all the boys in the College had learned long ago to revere as saint, had gone to the reward for which he had laboured so long.

Full particulars, however, were not known till about two hours later when all the boys had assembled in the College chapel for night prayers and the spiritual director of the pupils detailed to them the circumstances of Father Ronan's unexpected, but singularly happy death. The boys listened with awestruck and eager attention,

Fr. Ronan was apparently in his usual vigorous health a few hours before. Some of the boys had seen him come to the chapel about 5 p.m., as he was accustomed to do every evening, to spend an hour in prayer in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. He returned towards his room about 6 p.m. He spoke for a short time to a father of the community a little while later on, and after leaving the room of the latter seems to have been struck with a sudden fit of apoplexy in the cloister... leading to his own room, Here he was found a short time after 6 p.m., prostrate and speechless, but still breathing, 'The Father Rector was immediately summoned and, assisted by several of the community, administered Extreme Unction. The dying man gave no further sign of consciousness, and calmly breathed his last while the prayers for the dying were being recited by those present.

The boys were profoundly impressed by the story; and the lessons of Father Ronan's life his singleness of purpose, his zeal for the Master's glory, his union with God-now came home to all most strikingly, as it was so clear that these were the only things that retained their value when the Almighty Master sent the final unexpected summons. And while all joined in performing the Stations of the Cross for the repose of the good father's soul, the prayer uppermost in their hearts was “may I, too, die the death of the just, and let my last end be like to his”.

Father Ronan had attained the ripe age of 82 years. He was in the sixtieth year of his priesthood, and the 58th of his life in the Society of Jesus. He was born July 13th, 1825, in Co. Down. He read his ecclesiastical course in Maynooth, where, in the year 1848, he was ordained priest for his native diocese of Dromore. After about two years work as a secular priest he entered the Society of Jesus in 1850. A few years after his novitiate he went with the Rev Fr Duffy SJ, as chaplain to the British forces in the Crimean War, where he worked for more than a year in the hospitals at Scutari and other military stations. After returning to Ireland he laboured for many years as a missioner, and became well known in almost every diocese and district of the country. His untiring zeal, his spirit of prayer, and his power of work, secured extraordinary fruit to his missionary labours; and ill very many parts of the country his name is even still held in benediction. Few men were better known for more prized as a spiritual director of religious communities of both sexes throughout Ireland, and of the clergy in very many dioceses. He resided in turn in the Jesuit houses in Galway and Limerick; in the latter of which he was Superior; and here, too, his zeal, his spirit of prayer, and his extraordinary devotion to the Sacred Heart brought manifest blessings on his work.

He also had a wonderful devotion to, and confidence in the Blessed Mother of God, under the invocation of Our Lady of Lourdes, a devotion which he constantly preached and recommended; and he himself always attributed the temporal success and prosperity which were never wanting to any of his undertakings to his confidence in St. Joseph.

In 1880, while Rector of the Crescent College, Limerick, Father Ronan founded the Irish Apostolic School; and when Mungret College was handed over to the charge of the fathers of the Society of Jesus, and the Apostolic School transferred thither in 1882, he was first rector of Mungret. A full account of these events has already been given in the Jubilee Number of the “Mungret Annual”, July, 1907. The founding of the Apostolic School he always regarded as the great work of his life, and one which he said God enabled him to accomplish, as the result of twenty years of constant effort and prayer for its realisation.

Up to that required to found the Apostolic School on some the United States, in order to procure the funds.

In 1884 and 1885, Father Ronan travelled in the United States, in order to procure the funds required to found the Apostolic School on some kind of permanent financial basis. Up to that time he had depended solely on the support and alms of the clergy and faithful throughout Ireland.

In 1887, he began the second period of his career as a missioner in Ireland, continuing to do great work in this capacity, even after he became Superior of St. Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, Dublin, in the middle nineties. In 1897, however, being now in the seventy-second year of his age, he was compelled to give up active work, and he spent the following years in the South of France.

In 1901, Fr. Ronan returned once more to Mungret, after an absence of fourteen years, and there he spent the last six very happy years of his busy and extraordinarily fruitful life. During that time the greater part of each day was spent in prayer. He still continued, however, in his capacity of spiritual father of the house, and confessor of very many of the pupils of the College, to do remarkable work for the great cause of the salvation of souls, to which his life was devoted with such extraordinary singleness. Not the least fruit of his spiritual direction of the pupils during this time was the practice of daily Communion, which, owing to his special encouragement, became common in the College, and practically universal among the Apostolic students.

During the last years of his life he had the consolation of seeing the growth and progress of the College and the Apostolic School, which, under God, owed their existence to him, and he always spoke of the priests educated in the Apostolic School and now labouring in the ministry in all quarters of the world, as his children.

Few men are privileged to live and die a life of such quiet but unvarying success as Father Ronan; and to the lot of very few, indeed, will fall such consolation as he must have enjoyed a few months before his death, when the College which he looked on as his own child, and in which he lived as a beloved and revered father, celebrated her silver jubilee. Although his. death was unexpected, the great wish of his closing years was granted: that he should celebrate the Holy Sacrifice, which he had never once voluntarily omitted during the three score years of his priestly life, on the morning he was to meet his Maker.

Fr Ronan was not a man of exceptional intellectual powers, but he possessed what is infinitely more valuable in the race of life : indomitable strength of will, a power of perseverance in the teeth of all difficulties, and a cheerful courage that bore him up and inspired a certainty of success even when affairs looked most unpromising. He had a clear idea of his purpose and object, and went straight and frankly for it without recking of minor obstacles. He had a wonderful faith in the all-ruling Providence of God, and calmly received all eventualities, whether apparently favourable or otherwise, as the outcome of the eternal decree which is formed by infinite Wisdom solely for our good. Hence, he never gave evidence of despondency or doubt, and his cheerful spirit, which he preserved to the day of his death, reacted on all around him.

Though a man of stern, determined, fearless : character, who flinched before no opposition, and knew not what it is to yield or compromise: where principle or what he considered the glory of God or the advancement of God's work was involved, he was in social relations singularly : amiable, and forgiving and considerate. Even to the last he was unusually free from the idiosyncrasies that often accompany old age, and was constantly bantered on his youthfulness of heart, He never denied that he was in a way the spoiled child of God's goodness, for he enjoyed life thoroughly, he said, and expected nevertheless to get off with little or no Purgatory after death. Even when he was over eighty years of age, none enjoyed a joke more or bore with better grace the turning of the tables against himself, or told a good story with richer humour, or contributed a more considerable share to the general social cheerfulness which he loved.

His spiritual life and his ascetical teaching bore the impress of his natural character. It was founded above all on the virtue of hope ; and he always insisted on prayer and union with God as the one means to do successful work in God's service.

When congratulated on all hands, as he was during the Jubilee celebrations in September, it seemed most striking to all how little he was moved or affected by congratulation or praise. His invariable reply was: “Thank God! It is all His work; I really had very little to do with it”.

A striking trait in Fr. Ronan's character was his singular loyalty to the claims of friendship. He had many friends, and his friendships seemed all.to be lifelong. In that matter he was always most sincere and earnest, and no trouble or in convenience seemed worthy of regard when it was a question of doing a service to a friend. .

“How good God is to me! how happy I am here!” were almost the last words he was heard to utter, while apparently in his usual vigorous health, and before he had yet felt the approach of the apoplectic stroke. which terminated his earthly career on the evening of December 10th.

The body of the deceased father was laid out in his room; and during Wednesday, December 11th, the pupils of both sections of the College visited the room to look on the venerated re mains, and to say a prayer beside the bier.

On the morning of December 12th he was borne to his quiet resting place in the College Cemetery, and laid in the spot--which he himself had carefully chosen long before - facing the window of the College Chapel, where the Blessed Sacrament is, which had been to him the great support and consolation of his life!

After the Solemn Requiem Office and Mass, which began before 11 am, in the College Chapel, the procession proceeded to the cemetery. The pupils of the College went first, marching two and two, and reciting aloud the Rosary ; next came the clergy in choral dress; after these the coffin was borne along on the shoulders of the senior students, and was followed by the mourners, who were present in considerable numbers.

Among those latter were some elderly men who retained vivid recollections of the missions preached by Father Ronan half a century ago; some others had been boys in Crescent College, Limerick, a quarter of a century later, when he was Rector and Spiritual Father of the pupils. A goodly number of the pupils of the Crescent College had come in a body to show their appreciation of the old Rector of their College; and General Sir William Butler was there to do honour, as he said to the saintly old veteran of the Crimea, whom he looked upon as a soldier of the highest and truest type.

Sir William had listened with intense interest three short days before in Mungret to Father Ronan, who then seemed quite hale and vigorous, as the latter recounted anecdotes of his life as Military Chaplain in the Crimea, and of his travels in the United States.

One statement which Father Ronan always insisted upon, when speaking of his work in the Crimea, and which he then repeated to General Butler, is interesting, and so characteristic of the man that we give it here. We quote from General Butler's account of their interview:

He said to me some memorable things on that first and last interview I had with him, on December 9th. Amongst other things he said:

“In the hospital near Scutari I suppose more than one thousand poor soldiers from the Crimea were prepared for death by me. Some of them were able only to utter an ejaculatory prayer some of them had known little of their faith before that time, but I have never for one moment doubted that every one of those poor souls went straight to Heaven; and when I go”, he added, smiling, “and meet them in Heaven, I think they will elect me their colonel, and I shall stand at their head there”; and again, “I pray our Lord that He may take me at any moment; I am quite willing to go - but I say, too, that I am ready to stay, if He has any more work for me to do here”.”

Sir William adds : “It is an intense satisfaction to me that it was given me to see this grand veteran on the last full day of his long and wonderful life - all his faculties perfect”. RIP

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father William Ronan (1825-1907)

A native of Co. Down was educated for the diocese of Dromore and ordained at Maynooth in 1848. Two years afterwards he entered the Society. He served as chaplain in the Crimean war. He became rector of Sacred Heart College in 1872 and occupied that post until 1882. During his rectorship, the St Joseph transept of the church was built and the three altars of the sanctuary consecrated. In 1880 he founded at the Crescent an Apostolic School or the education of boys who wished to serve in the missions. This school was transferred to Mungret in 1882 when the Jesuits acquired the property of the Mungret Agricultural School. Father Ronan spent two years in the USA, where he was able to collect enough money for the building of the Apostolic School wing. He spent some years on the mission staff and was for some years in Gardiner St, where he became superior. His last years were spent at Mungret College which will always be associated with his name.

Ronan, John 1893-1979, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/381
  • Person
  • 11 February 1893-08 August 1979

Born: 11 February 1893, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 02 June 1915, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Final Vows 02 February 1926, Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin
Died:08 August 1979, Milltown Park, Dublin

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 54th Year No 3 and 4 1979

Obituary :

Br John Ronan (1893-1913-1979)

John Ronan was born in Dublin on 11 February 1893. His family had Scottish connections and John used like to take his holidays in Scotland. It may well be that it was from his father he inherited his dry wit and his gift with words. He attended National School and then a Christian Brothers school to sixth standard, and joined the novitiate at Tullabeg in the year 1913. The precise date was a subject of controversy between John and a succession of editors of the Province Catalogue: in the Catalogue he consistently appears as entering in 1915; Fathers Aubrey Gwynn and Fergal McGrath, however, recall that John was in Tullabeg in 1913; further, John's Final Vow formula is dated 2nd February 1926, which indicates that he must have taken First Vows in 1915 or early 1916.
In 1918 a young man was despatched from Tullabeg to Gardiner Street; the Minister, Father Bury, greeted the news with joy: “This is splendid: he will tempt the Fathers to eat better because of his good cooking!” John was twenty-five then, and his gift for making people happy is well attested; he was asked for by various houses, and a member of the Province who arrived in houses which Brother John had just left recalls that John was remembered with gratitude and affection. Cooks have a central place and wield great power within their domains: John cooked for his brethren for thirty years and made them happy because he was generous, painstaking and thoughtful. He worked in Gardiner Street (1918-23), Rathfarnham Castle (1923 36), Belvedere (1926-29), Clongowes (1929-31), Emo (1931-35), Mungret (1935-38), Tullabeg (1938-43), St Ignatius, Galway (1943-47), Crescent (1947-48), Clongowes again (1948-58), Manresa (1958-59) and finally Milltown Park (1959-79).
It was during the last twenty years of his life that the present writer came to know and appreciate him. He was assistant to Brother John Rogers in the bindery and ad dom. He was neat and self-contained; had a small stocky frame, large and long face, black hair, steel rimmed glasses, black chesterfield and boots which had long since seen their best days; he made an unusual figure both within and outside the house. He loved the city of Dublin and was the best known of the community on the 11 bus route; drivers used make unscheduled stops to take him aboard. They loved him more for his easy chat and good-humoured wit than for the sweets he used give them. He aged imperceptibly, for he was built of durable stuff. He seemed indestructible, as was illustrated when at the age of eighty three he came limping home after an affair with a car; he was reluctant to admit to the accident, went off to take a bath to ease his wounds and was back in action the following day. He was delightfully unpredictable in ways, and free of shyness in his relating to others. To illustrate: passing the Gas Company showrooms one day, he looked in and saw a salesgirl within who looked very gloomy. He went in: “I'd like to ask you about a gadget which you're advertising; you don't seem to have it on display”. “What is it?” she replied grumpily. “Well, you've an ad saying: Make your tea in a jiffy! I'd like to see a jiffy and know how it works!” As she tried to explain she began to smile. After a while, he said: “I know well what a jiffy is, but you look a lot happier now than when I came in!” And off he went.
John was seventy years old when Vatican II came, bringing to an end an era of stability in which regularity of practice and unswerving loyalty to authority were the characteristic of the faithful, John among them. The way was opened for new forms of religious and personal expression, with questioning and experimentation the order of the day. Like many of his generation, John found the sweeping changes in Catholic and Jesuit life hard to understand; the new forms of expression and the eclipse of the old left him confused. He was ill at ease in the new Milltown Park, and voiced his reservations with great honesty to his superiors and to the community; he was distressed that his critiques met with little effective response; he felt that a sympathetic hearing of his views was not enough. Values were at risk, as his eagle eye could see, and he loved religious life and the Province enough to do what he could to safeguard these values. Now that we as a Province are moving into calmer waters we can be grateful to John and others like him who have acted as reminders of the central qualities which must characterise any religious life worthy of the name.
Together with the difficulty he experienced in adjusting to the upheavals of aggiornamento, John went through a long period of indifferent health. For sixteen years his problem was wrongly diagnosed and treated, until finally Dr Dan Kelly brought him relief. The wit which had been so noted in him before was less evident in the latter years, though it emerged in flashes still, and brought many a smile. The younger brethren who overslept were labelled “the rising generation”; “All for me, dear Jesus!” was a remark used for a certain Father whom John thought as caring for himself a little too well. Some found it disconcerting to pass him on the corridor and half-hear a devastating remark as he shuffled away, but this may have been a device to communicate and keep in touch with those whose ways he found hard to understand. He detested beards, and persisted for quite a time with one scholastic in an anti-beard campaign until the object of his attentions asked him to ease up, whereupon to his surprise John said: “I’m only waying it because I like you”! A few years ago he fell into conversation with a lady on the front drive: he confided that he had been sent down town to buy two butterfly nets for the Rector (these were in fact intended for the removal of leaves from the swimming pool), He then launched into an incisive commentary on the Rector’s general performance, and told how the superiors of old used stay in their offices and appear mainly at mealtimes whereas the present one ... etc., etc. At the front door the lady revealed that she was the Rector's mother. Nothing daunted, he bade farewell with the remark: “See if you can't do something with him!”
Over a long lifetime John used his gifts well; he was cook, dispenser, house steward, manuductor, assistant bookbinder; he was a respected watch-mender, fiddled with radios - one of his crystal sets is still extant; he made walking sticks for those who, unlike himself, enjoyed the countryside. The present writer, more than forty years his junior, never knew him in his heyday, but considers his sixty-six years of service to the brethren a remarkable achievement worthy of the gratitude which was expressed by the wide representation of Province members at John’s requiem. What I find more remarkable, however, is the manner in which he continued his life of service to the very end. He might well have felt that by his eightieth year he had done enough, that he was no longer needed or wanted, that he could legitimately retire. Instead he took on a new role - that of postman and messenger. In finding yet one more way to serve the brethren he was typical of a great tradition of Jesuit brothers; having early on, in the words of the Kingdom exercise offered himself “entirely for the work”, he carried through to the end his promise of availability. While he was glad to have a daily task and was upset when the protracted mail-strike from February to June of this year left him with little to do, the work took its toll, and he was frequently to be seen suffering from attacks of dizziness, sitting along the corridor with his head between his hands.
What was sad in the final years was that it was hard to convince him that he was appreciated. Superiors had with doubtful wisdom allowed too much to change for him to be other than wary of well intentioned compliments. He developed the habit of blessing himself as they went by. Yet he had his friends in the community, and also among the lay-staff. He delighted in chatting with the latter and running errands for them; he continued to get cut-price cigarettes in Clery's for one woman long after she had given up smoking, for she had not the heart to tell him she no longer needed them. Moreover, he always presented the best side of community life to outsiders. I quote from a letter of his nephew: “John always spoke with great pride of your Society ... and of the wonderful work which is being done by everyone within the order”. That reticence, however, which often blocks us from speaking within the community of that pride we feel for the brethren afflicted John too. There's the story of the two scholastics who came early to supper and found John sitting down before them. “Supper doesn't begin till six!” he admonished them. “Ah”, they answered, “but we have an excuse; we're off on apostolic work. We're working for God!” “That's obvious”, said John. “If you were working for anyone else you'd have been sacked long ago!”
Of the inner life of such a man one of my generation can only guess. Surely there must have existed a deep union between God and himself to make him so consistently faithful to his religious practices, so simple and frugal in his dress and way of life, so willing to live out a life of uneventful service. He had to face the sufferings of loneliness, ill-health, confusion and perhaps even a sense of betrayal over the changes that came in the last years of his life. One thinks of the hardships of the disciple’s calling in the gospel of Luke; of Ignatius' prayer: “To give and not to count the cost”; of Hopkins sonnet on St Alphonsus Rodriguez; of K Rahner's account of the “wintry spirituality of many Jesuits”.
His death, like his life, was simple, unadorned, unromantic and without fuss. When asked about his health earlier this year, he used reply: “I'm all right, Father, you have to keep going, if you lie down they'll put you in a box?” He was moved down to the Chapel Corridor a month before he died: he had already renamed that corridor “the coffin corridor” some time before. He accepted the change with macabre humour; the door of his new room would be just the right size to get out the coffin! He sought out his friend Dr Dan Kelly at St Vincent’s, the day before he died. He knew with his quiet realism that he was dying, yet he refused to stay in hospital; he wanted to die at home. A life-long Pioneer, he took a little brandy that night; the end came peacefully about 6 am the following morning; it is hard to think that he was reluctant to go. I like to think of him now as surprised by joy at his meeting with the Lord, amazed and delighted at hearing the divine commendation for his life of service. Gone now the misunderstandings that marred the last years; if the communion of saints means anything, we at Milltown Park may confidently hope that he will keep a brotherly eye on us and on our affairs, now that he has entered into new service as God's messenger of grace to us.

A writer from the Far East would like to add the following:
A fine, warm-hearted man, whose conversation on spiritual and secular matters had the quality of suavitas. Knowing that he was from the Coombe, I associated him with a man like Dean Swift - he had that observation of people and that natural eloquence of the Dubliner. A dedicated man, he had that warm humanity so befitting a Jesuit, and which the Brothers by their prayer and simplicity have given so fully to the Society. May he pray for us to be gifted with more vocations like his

Reidy, Michael, 1917-2008, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/795
  • Person
  • 23 October 1917-18 January 2008

Born: 23 October 1917, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1936, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1949, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1981, Belvedere College SJ, Dublin
Died: 18 January 2008, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/death-of-mick-reidy-sj/

Death of Michael Reidy SJ
Fr Michael Reidy SJ died peacefully in Cherryfield early on the morning of Friday 18 January 2008, aged 90 years. May he rest in the peace of the Lord. Fr. Michael (Mixer) in the loving care of the dedicated staff of Cherryfield Lodge Nursing Home; sadly missed and deeply regretted by his loving sisters-in-law Chris and Nonie, his nieces, nephews, grandnieces, grandnephews and a wide circle of friends, especially his very many past pupils of Belvedere College and by his Jesuit companions.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 24th Year No 2 1949
The Fire at Milltown Park :
Early in the morning of Friday, February 11th, fire broke out in the tailor's shop over the Refectory. The alarm was given and the Fire Brigade summoned. At first the progress of the fire was slow, but after a short time it became terribly rapid, and some of the Community were rescued barely in time. Fr. Johnston, Fourth Year Theologian, lost his life. He had remained to dress himself completely, as he was due to say Mass at the Sisters of Charity, Mount St. Anne's, and was asphyxiated by the fumes before he could escape - one may say, a martyr of Duty. Fr. Gannon got severely burned, and Mr. Reidy suffered injury to his spine as the result of a fall ; both are doing well and will, it is hoped, be none the worse in the end. The Fire Brigade was able to prevent the fire from spreading beyond the building where it had broken out.

Milltown Park, Dublin :
The morning of Friday, February 11th was a tragic morning here in Milltown Park. The two top stories of the Theologians House (built in 1908 by Fr. Finlay) were burnt out. Fr. James Johnston, a 4th Year Theologian lost his life, Fr. Gannon was severely burnt on his hands and face, and Mr. Reidy dislocated some of the vertebrae of his spine, jumping from a ledge underneath his window.
At 5.30 Br. Kavanagh discovered a fire in the Tailor's Room. He summoned Fr. Smyth, acting Minister, who telephoned for a fire brigade, while a few scholastics endeavoured, unsuccessfully, to extinguish the fire with Minimaxes and water. Br. Kavanagh carried. Fr. W. Gwynn (aged 84) to safety, and Fr. Smyth warned the occupants. of the Theologians House to make for the fire escape.
By this time the stairs end of the Theologians' House was burning fiercely; the fumes and heat in the corridors were unbearable, and it is due to the Mercy of God that so many were able to get to the fire escape before they were overcome with suffocation. In the meantime, the first of the fire brigades had arrived and Frs. Power, Hannigan, Gannon and a couple of scholastics were rescued. The firemen then concentrated on saving the New House which was by this time filling with smoke.
A roll-call shortly after 6 o'clock confirmed that Fr. Johnston was missing, but by this time the whole of the doomed wing was ablaze. Coincidentally with the celebration of the Community Mass at 7.15 the six fire brigades got the conflagration under control.
Offers of assistance and accommodation began to pour in from all sides and within a couple of days ran into thousands.
The Scholastics were transferred to the Retreat House, Rathfarnham, where they stayed for four days. They will always remember the kindness and hospitality shown by the Rector, the Community and the Retreat House staff of Rathfarnham.
On Tuesday 15th the Scholastics returned to Milltown, where a field kitchen, presented by the Army, had been installed. They occupied the Retreat House and many of the rooms had to accommodate two occupants, as the Minister's House also had to be vacated owing to damage and water.
On Friday 18th, the ‘octave' of the fire’, lectures were resumed, and routine was gradually established.
Fr. Gannon recovered rapidly and hopes to be back in Milltown soon. Mr. Reidy is also on his feet again, and he too hopes to be out of hospital in the near future, though he will be partially encased in plaster of paris for a considerable time.
The majority of the occupants of the Theologians' House lost all their personal effects, notes, etc. Fr. Gannon, however, being at the end of the corridor, and having his door closed, will salvage all his books and notes.

◆ Interfuse No 137 : Autumn 2008 & ◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 2008

Obituary

Fr Michael Reidy (1917-2008)

23rd October 1917: Born in Dublin
Early education at Belvedere College
7th September 1936: Entered the Society at Emo
8th September 1938: First Vows at Emo
1938 - 1941: Rathfarnham - Studied Arts at UCD
1941 - 1944: Tullabeg - Studied Philosophy
1944 - 1946: Belvedere College - Regency; H Dip in Ed
1946 - 1950: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
31st July 1949: Ordained at Milltown Park
1950 - 1951: Tertianship at Rathfarnham
1951 - 1982: Belvedere College - Teacher, Chaplain to News Boys Club and Legion of Mary; work with St. Vincent de Paul Society
2nd February 1981: Final Vows
1982 - 1983: Gardiner Street - Sabbatical (3 months)
1983-2001: Belvedere College -
1983 - 1999: Pastoral work Gardiner St.; “Penny Dinners”:
1999 - 2001: Off “Penny Dinners"; Spiritual Director (SJ)
2001 - 2008: Cherryfield - Prayed for Church and Society.
18th January 2008: Died peacefully at Cherryfield.

Frank Sammon writes:
Gerry Walsh, for so many years dedicated to the Jesuit Community at Belvedere and its apostolates, noted that “Mickser” rather than “Mixer” is the right way to spell the name by which Michael Reidy was known to generations of Belvedereans. There was an Irish Comedian whose name was Mickser Reid. Michael was happy to call himself “Mixer” or “Mickser” - and at one of our Class of 1966 Reunions he told us, with a laugh, that he was happy to be with us for our Class Reunion - as a “good Mixer/”Mickser”.

Michael Reidy was associated with Belvedere College for most of his life. He seemed to be the Jesuit with whom Belvedere Past Pupils could most easily indentify - because of his simplicity, his humility, his kindness, his good humour and his holiness. Michael lived out these aspects of Jesuit life in the Belvedere Jesuit Community. These years saw the Jesuit Community at Belvedere change from a community numbering close to thirty Jesuits to a community close to half that number. The style of Jesuit education at Belvedere changed significantly - envisaged through the changes in headmaster (Gerry McLaughlin, Diarmuid O Laoghaire, Jack Leonard, Bob McGoran, Noel Barber, Bruce Bradley, Leonard Moloney and Gerry Foley (the first lay Jesuit Headmaster of Belvedere).

Michael was a student of theology at Milltown Park when the fire at Milltown occurred in 1949. For several years some of the Jesuits studying theology at Milltown had their beds in the Milltown Park Library - between the shelves. Michael injured his back at the time of the fire...

As a teacher in Belvedere he taught Religious Knowledge and Irish. It was as Spiritual Father at Belvedere that he would have been best known by our generation at Belvedere (1960 1966). He organized the Sodality of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Society of St Vincent de Paul. He preached in the Boys' Chapel, And he interviewed each of the sixth year students (about seventy five in the class of 1966) as we prepared to leave Belvedere and began to make plans to get a job, study for one of the professions, leave Ireland for the UK, US or Canada, or join the Jesuits, one of the other orders or the Archdiocese of Dublin.

Henry Nolan was the Rector at Belvedere (1965), Jack Leonard was the Prefect of Studies. These were years when the Jesuits world-wide were introducing changes instigated by the Second Vatican Council and the Thirty First General Congregation of the Society of Jesus (1965-1967). These were years when the culture and the life-style of Jesuit Community life and Jesuit Education went through huge changes.

As Spiritual Father in Belvedere he interviewed all the Leaving Certificate class and discussed with them their plans for when they left Belvedere. I told Michael that I was thinking of joining the Jesuits. Michael suggested that I might like to talk to the Jesuit Provincial - Brendan Barry - who was then visiting the Belvedere Jesuit Community.

Maybe his attraction to the Belvedere Past was his availability and his interest in pupils and past pupils. They sensed that he was present with them and was happy to be with them. They felt, perhaps, that he was content to be there with them - sharing a memory, a bit of news, a joke. He was happy to be with a group connected with Belvedere. They felt he wasn't so busy that he would be rushing away from them.

Michael Reidy was linked in his last years with Cherryfield Community. He used a walking frame. In the years at Cherryfield he always looked forward to going back to Belvedere for a feast-day celebration in the Jesuit Community, an event organized by a class of old Belvedereans or to attend meetings connected with the Belvedere Lourdes group or the Belvedere Youth Club. He conveyed a sense of good humour - to “how are you?” the reply would come: “could be worse!”. There would be a chuckle that expressed a sense of humour as he bore his health struggles with patience. He kept an interest in the lives of the boys. He would mention that he met somebody - and would give a short account of their life. He would signal if there was a difficult situation in their life.

His involvement - in his later years - with the Lourdes group from Belvedere - was a very important commitment; his presence, his involvement in the committee and his appeal to the Past Pupils for financial support for the work. He worked a lot with Eamonn Davis in making the arrangements for the Annual Lourdes Pilgrimage.

Another big commitment he had was to the Belvedere Youth Club - as Chaplain. This would have commenced - in the years soon after his ordination - with his involvement as Chaplain for the Sunshine House groups at Balbriggan; and with the Belvedere Newsboys Club which later became the Belvedere Youth Club. Paul Brady, Director of the Belvedere Youth Club, and Michael Reidy were awarded the Belvedere College Justice Award. Michael was involved in organizing Retreats and Mass for the Belvedere Youth Club. In recent years he would have been present at most of the gatherings.

What was it in him that drew people to him? His humour, his wit, his enjoyment of celebrations. Michael liked a party. He enjoyed gatherings of Past Pupils. He felt happy to be associated with Belvedere College and with the groups that sprouted from it. He was blessed to live almost his entire life in Belvedere College.

In a life-time of 90 years, almost all were spent in Belvedere - as student, scholastic, young Jesuit priest, as a “mature” Jesuit and as an older Jesuit. “Per Vias Rectas” was the legend that Michael was happy to give shape to his Jesuit life.

The decision to amalgamate the Jesuit Communities of Belvedere College and the Gardiner Street Jesuit Community meant that Michael was stationed in Gardiner Street for a short number of years. He would make the journey from Great Denmark Street over to Gardiner Street at a slow pace - greeting people he met along the way and bringing his faith and his goodness to those he met along the footpath.

A final image of Michael Reidy that I came across in recent weeks was in a collection of photographs of John Paul II's visit to Ireland in 1979. One of the photographs of the Mass in the Phoenix Park shows a group of Irish priests during the Mass in the Phoenix Park. One can pick out Michael's profile among the faces of that huge crowd. That is an image Michael would be happy with - celebrating the Mass, in a large gathering of people with a huge cross-section of Irish people coming together for a special celebration led by John Paul II.

Redmond, John, 1924-2011, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/794
  • Person
  • 18 June 1924-29 September 2011

Born: 18 June 1924, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1942, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1956, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1959, Loyola, Eglinton Road, Dublin
Died: 29 September 2011, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death.

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/sadness-and-style/

Sadness and style
Fr John Redmond died peacefully in Cherryfield on 29 September at the age of 87. How would we like to remember John? In two scenes, from the start and the end of his adult
life. With a group of fellow about-to-be novices he hired a chauffeur-driven car and proceeded in style from Dublin to the noviciate in Emo. Other photos from this time show him handsome, stylish, full of charm. There is a transparent innocence and optimism in his face. He never lost that innocence. In his seventy years as a Jesuit, John schoolmastered and ministered as a priest. But he suffered from serious illness, initially depression, later accompanied by physical illness. Last month, after a particularly traumatic spell in hospital, he returned to Cherryfield literally weeping with joy that he would be able to die at home.
One remembers too a picture of the Belvedere Cricket Team from the college annual of 1942. A close friend describes it: “In the middle, small, confident, nonchalant in his blazer and whites is John the team captain (also a disconcerting slow bowler and steady bat). In the row behind, tall and angular, Dermot Ryan, namer of metropolitan parks. The photograph celebrates a victory and is full of life and promise.
Another memento from that time marks his victory in the Belvedere debating society. Classmate Garret Fitzgerald’s rapid-fire delivery had for once met its match. It was a wonderful consolation to the family that in his final days he returned to Cherryfield. Then he was at peace – like the man in Luke who was sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. That is how I will remember John, at peace at the end, as he was on that sunny day of cricket. I know he gave his best as a Jesuit for 70 years, even if he thought his best was not good enough. He never ceased to think of and pray for all his family and to thank God for all his good companions in the Society of Jesus. It is with thoughts such as these that I comfort myself.”
John’s contemporary, Dick Cremins, preached at the requiem Mass in Cherryfield:
“An early memory: in Emo we were gathered at the back door, waiting to go in after recreation. I said or did something unusual, at which he exclaimed encouragingly, “Brother Cremins, you missed your vocation!” Then his hand on his mouth, as he realised that in another sense this was not something one novice said to another. Even then John was the life and soul of the party.
In our years of formation, in Tullabeg and Milltown, he continued as a cheerful spirit, always engaged in the choir and on the stage. That was the man I left behind when I went to what was still Northern Rhodesia. We lost touch until 50 years later when I returned home and found he had become the Hermit of Cherryfield. He was odd, withdrawn, and never left his room. On the few occasions when I met him, I found him gracious, although I believe this was not the experience of every one, including his family. I heard then how he had isolated himself and given up work – until in the end there was no place for him except in this nursing home.
One of our contemporaries, Michael O’Kelly, who was a strong young man and one of the best footballers of our time, began in Tullabeg to complain about a pain in his knee. My reaction was to say to myself, “Why doesn’t he snap out of it and get on with life?” It was a cancer. In a short time his leg was amputated above the knee, and he died before he could be ordained. I learned not to take the pains of others so cavalierly.
Likewise, we should not underestimate John’s sufferings: isolation, depression (those who have never known it wonder why he didn’t snap them out of it), low self-esteem, a feeling of being useless and achieving nothing (what could be worse for a Jesuit?). John’s achievement was a life of suffering borne with great fortitude and who knows how much prayer. For that we give thanks.
Edmund Campion (d. 1581), in his Brag, spoke of being “merry in heaven” with his persecutors, a word he borrowed from Margerie Kempe (c. 1400). We pray that John may be merry with the Lord and that with help of his prayers we will join in their merriment when our time comes.

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 147 : Spring 2012

Obituary

Fr John Redmond (1924-2011)

18 June 1924: Born in Dublin.
Early education at St. Vincent's CBS, Glasnevin and Belvedere College
7 September 1942: Entered the Society at Emo
8 September 1944: First Vows at Emo
1944 - 1947: Rathfarnham - Studied Arts at UCD
1947 - 1950: Tullabeg - Studied Philosophy
1950 - 1952: Crescent College - Teacher (Drama, Choir, Games)
1952 - 1953: Clongowes - Teacher (Drama, Games)
1953 - 1957: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
31st July 1956: Ordained at Milltown Park
1957 - 1958: Tertianship at Rathfarnham
1958 - 1962: Loyola House - Teacher of Religion and Philosophy at Bolton Street
2 February 1959: Final Vows at Loyola House
1962 - 1975: Gonzaga College: Spiritual Director to boys; Teacher; Prefect; Sports Trainer
1964: Teacher (rugby, cricket, games); Sub-minister; founded Vincent de Paul for boys in the school
1975 - 1985: Belvedere College - Teacher; Spiritual Father to students
1976: Spiritual Father to Students IV, III, II, I
1981: Assisted in Gardiner Street Church
1985 - 1994: Gardiner Street - Assisted in Church
1994 - 1997: Milltown Park - Pastoral ministry
1997 - 2004: Sacred Heart Church, Limerick - Assisted in Church
2000 - 2004: Assistant to Prefect of Health
2004 - 2011: Cherryfield Lodge - Praying for the Church and the Society
from 2006 : Attached to Milltown Park Community

John Redmond was admitted to Cherryfield Lodge in September 2001 following heart surgery in the Mater Private Hospital, and recovered well. He became a full-time member of Cherryfield Lodge in 2004. Following the death of his twin sister Peg, his condition deteriorated, particularly in the last year. After 2 days in a coma, he died peacefully in Cherryfield Lodge at 9.30pm on Thursday 29 September 2011

Obituary : Paul Andrews

John entered the Jesuits in 1942, at a time when such an action was piously spoken of as “giving your life to God”. One was offering the Lord a chalice full of sweet wine, the whole of one's future. John made the offering with joy; he had a quality of optimism and enthusiasm which was infectious, and stood out even among the bright sparks who went with him to Emo. A couple of them joined him in hiring a chauffeur-driven car to carry them from Dublin to the noviciate. He wanted do it in style.

As we look back on his long life as a Jesuit, we can see how inadequate is the image of a goblet of sweet wine. Our lives and relationships are inevitably a mixed drink, bitter-sweet. We can see in retrospect what a mixture it was, at once richer and more painful than when we took vows. John's remarkable mother may have had some inkling of this. In his journal of jottings and quotations, John notes an extraordinary memory. On 18 June 1942: Upon my telling mother, with great joy, that I was going to join the Jesuits, she replied: “You do not know what you are doing!!!”

People have warm, happy memories of John in those early days: handsome, smiling and gifted in many directions. Despite his small stature he was a sportsman who could captain the Belvedere cricket team, swing a golf club, play a respectable game of soccer; and a debater who won the school prize ahead of the rapid-fire delivery of his classmate Garret Fitzgerald. He was at ease on the stage, singing, dancing, acting. And he was the best of company, with an unaffected charm.

He read English in UCD, and he left behind a journal with a telling collection of the literature that spoke to him, pages and pages of meticulously transcribed poems and prose. He obviously loved the romantic poets, Keats, Laurie Lee, Browning: The year's at the spring and day's at the morn... He copied at length St Augustine's account of the death of his mother Monica, and strong pieces from St Patrick, Newman and Fulton Sheen. Gerard Manley Hopkins features more than any other poet, but here we begin to see John's own history. He moves from Hopkins' wide-eyed love of nature: Look, look up at the stars! to the desolation of his late sonnets: I am gall, I am heart-burn. God's most deep decree Bitter would have me taste. My taste was me.

That gradual move from joy in the world around him to an overwhelming sense of his own inadequacy, is the story of his life, and difficult to understand from the outside. John taught in Bolton Street College of Technology for four difficult years, difficult because he was in strange territory with few of the old signposts to help him. He could not take for granted that his students were open to religion, much less that they were pious. Yet a recent encounter reveals another side of his ministry. David Gaffney was visiting houses in the parish of Esker when he met a parishioner outstanding for his devotion to the community and the parish. As they chatted, the man told David: As a young man I had no time for religion, really disliked it. But then I went to Bolton Street Tech and was taught by a priest called Father John Redmond; and he made such good sense of religion that it has stood to me ever since. I told John this story on his deathbed, but do not know if he was conscious enough to savour it.

John would have had little sense of success. In 1962 he moved into Jesuit schools, first Gonzaga, then Belvedere, as spiritual father, teacher and trainer of sports. He founded the Vincent de Paul Society in Gonzaga, and introduced generations of boys to an awareness of the poverty not far from their doors. He led pilgrimages to Lourdes, and could show a dazzling smile to the camera in the group photograph. But gradually in his middle years, in the nineteen sixties and seventies, he fell prey to the black dog of depression, which goes hand in hand with feeling unloved. The self-confidence needed to meet people, or to impose himself in a classroom, deserted him. He would look at his life, at his achievements, and wonder: is there anything there? Did I make any difference?

The changes in the church did nothing to cheer John. The new form of the Mass, which opened its treasures to so many Catholics, remained alien to him. The turmoil that followed Vatican II in the Church and in the Jesuits stirred him to anxiety and anger. That firm, well-rounded faith, nurtured in the hallowed parish of Iona Road, nursery of countless vocations, seemed to have less and less to say to the world around John.

His reaction to depression was to retire. It is not that he was neglected. While he did meet sometimes with the snap-out-of-it sort of advice, that was not the general pattern. In Gonzaga, Belvedere, Crescent, Milltown and Cherryfield, in varying degrees, his Jesuit colleagues agonised over how he could be lifted. Good professional help certainly mitigated some of the pain and damage. But increasingly through his seventies and eighties he tended to withdraw not merely from work but from his human contacts both with Jesuits and with his other kith and kin. Dick Cremins, a near-contemporary, was astonished on return from Zambia to find that the charming and sparkling young John he had known in the 1950s had become the hermit of Cherryfield. He could still be lovely company when the black dog was put outside the door. But most of the time he suffered, especially at losses like that of his twin sister Peg.

John's Requiem Mass was on the feast of a Scottish Jesuit martyr, St John Ogilvie. The government forces that captured him in Edinburgh, tortured him at length in the hope he would betray other Catholics. They crushed his limbs under huge weights. They pricked and pierced him with needles continuously for nine days and nights to keep him without sleep – but he maintained his patience and even gaiety right up to his last moment, when he was hanged in Glasgow.

John Ogilvie gave his life to God as a young man; John Redmond over nearly nine decades. It is only at the end that we can see what is meant by "giving our life to God". His tortures for the most part were not physical but interior, and they lasted for years. They climaxed during a terrible spell in hospital in his last month. When George Fallon arrived to drive him back to Cherryfield, the exhausted John broke down in tears of joy that he would be able to die at home. On the third page of his journal he had copied out Newman's prayer. Let me end with it:

“May He support us all the day long, till the shades lengthen and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then in his mercy may He give us a safe lodging and a holy rest and peace at the last”.

Power, Patrick, 1867-1931, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/364
  • Person
  • 20 January 1867-11 December 1931

Born: 20 January 1867, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 10 April 1885, Loyola House, Dromore, County Down
Ordained: 30 July 1901, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1904
Died: 11 December 1931, Milford House, Limerick

Part of the Crescent College, Limerick and St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street community at the time of death

by 1901 at Chieri Italy (TAUR) studying
by 1903 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Patrick Power entered the Society in 1885, and came to Australia and taught at Xavier College from 1892, where he was highly respected, teaching senior classes and serving as assistant prefect of studies. For one year, 1896, he was prefect of studies, as the rector who was holding the position became overworked. He returned to Ireland at the end of 1898, and after tertianship worked in schools and performed mission work.

◆ Irish Province NewsIrish Province News 7th Year No 2 1932

Obituary :

Fr Patrick Power

Fr. Power was born in Dublin on the 20 Jan, 1867. educated at Castleknock, and entered the Society at Dromore on the 10 April 1885. Two years Rhetoric, the first at Milltown, the second at Tullabeg, were followed by three years Philosophy at Milltown, and then Australia for five years, He spent all of them at Kew, where he was Prefect of Studies. or
Vice-Prefect, for four of these years.
Two years Theology at Milltown and two more at Chieri brought him up to the Tertianship, which he made at Tronchiennes 1902-03. Then followed various positions at Mungret, Tullabeg, Gardiner St., and the Crescent.
In 1908 he was appointed Rector of the Crescent, held that office for four years, and then went to Gardiner St., to which house he was attached until his death. He died at Limerick on Friday 11 Dec, 1931.
For 4 years he was Rector, for 5 Miss, Excurr., for 8 Praef Stud. (an 11 Mag), for 13 Dir. EX. Spir,, and for 17 Praes. Sod. Obviously, he often discharged at least two of these duties in the same year.
From the above short sketch it will be seen that Fr. Power had his share in nearly all the duties discharged by Jesuit priests and scholastics and in all of them he played his part capably and well. But it was as a director of souls that he will be remembered for a long time, and by a great many. His zeal knew no limits, he gave himself no rest, night, noon and morning, whenever the rule allowed, he was on the move. It will not be known until the great accounting day all he did for souls from the end of his Tertianship to the day of his death 28 years later, especially from 1912 to 1931 when he was stationed at Gardiner St. The great weapons he used, alter the Grace of God that he brought down on the work by prayer and a holy life, were kindness, sympathy, encouragement. Scrupulous people especially found in him a kind and helpful friend, and people who were not scrupulous pointed him out as the priest who showed them the easy road to heaven.
“You will catch more flies”, writes St. Francis de Sales, “or with a spoonful of honey than with a hogshead of vinegar.” Assuredly there was no trace of vinegar in Fr Power's character, but there was abundance of honey. Or, to vary the expression, “his nature was full of the milk of human kindness.” He was the very reverse of that class of directors so severely condemned by St. Francis Jeronimo “Never until the Last Judgment will it be known how many souls have been lost for want of sympathy on the part of the ministers of God.”
Possibly some of our very wise critics will say that kindness and sympathy are very good in themselves, but they can be so readily abused and played upon by tricksters that they are dangerous gifts. That is quite true. But if Fr Power was very kind and sympathetic, he was also very shrewd. His eyes were wide open, He had a keen insight into the foibles
and failings of human nature, and when .any of the trickster class tried to make capital out of his kindness they quickly found out that they had made the mistake of their lives.
In addition to all this Fr. Power was one of the best and most practical Moral Theologians that we had in the Province. His advice on knotty problems was often sought from many and widely separated parts of the country. His numerous penitents and others could depend that his counsel was dictated not only by kindness, and by a keen insight into human nature, but that it was based as well on the solid principles of Theology.
With priests as well as with the laity he was an outstanding success and his retreats to the clergy were highly appreciated.
No wonder then that in most parts of Ireland, for his name and influence were widely extended, was Fr. Powers death sincerely regretted. People felt that they had lost a kind friend and a wise counsellor whose loss it would be difficult to supply. And this feeling of regret and admiration is shared by every member of the Irish province who know him and loved
him, and who were helped along the narrow path by the bright and cheery example that he ever gave thorn. May he rest in peace.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Patrick Power 1867-1931
As a director of souls, Fr Patrick Power will long be remembered. His zeal knew no bounds. It will not be known until the Day of Reckoning all that he did for souls, from the end of his tertianship until the day of his death, December 11th 1931.

A great deal of this work was done while he was stationed at Gardiner Street, from 1912-1931. With priests too, he was an outstanding counsellor, and his retreats to them were highly appreciated. He was one of the best moral Theologians we have had in the Province.

A deep rooted sanctity, combined with great natural kindness, aided by a clear intellect, all combined to make him the director of souls that he was.

He was born in Dublin on January 20th 1867, and he was educated at Castleknock College.

◆ The Xaverian, Xavier College, Melbourne, Australia, 1932

Obituary

Father Patrick Power SJ

Father Patrick Power, who died at Limerick, Ireland, on December 11th, 1931, will be clearly remembered by Xaverians of 1892-1898. He was then a young scholastic. During the greater part of the time he was here he directed the College studies, and taught with brilliant success. He took a deep interest in all his boys - an interest which, in spite of distance and time, ended only with his life - or didn't end even then? The present writer can recall many a chat with Fr Power in recent years about the old days at Kew College. He was all eagerness to know as much as possible about his former pupils and it seemed that every name was clear in his memory,

Before coming to Australia he studied Philosophy for three years in Louvain, Belgium. On his return to Ireland for Theology after his period with us, he spent one year in Dublin, and then went to Italy-where, after a brilliant course in the higher studies, he was ordained priest. Subsequently, we find him a very successful missionary, well known all over England and Ireland. Later, he was Rector of the Sacred Heart College, Limerick. When his term of office as Rector expired, he was appointed to the staff of St Francis Xavier's Churclı, Dublin. In this busy centre of Catholic activities he laboured assiduously till stricken down by the illness which ended his so useful life. Father Power was a very impressive preacher. He never, indeed, affected the usual devices of pulpit oratory; but his sermons were packed with solid instruction, and enlivened by many a sally of native wit. So, it was always not only a pleasure to hear him, buthiis discourses left a lasting impression.

Perhaps it was as Confessor that lie did the greatest amount of good. When ever he revisited a town where he had once given a Mission, his confessional was besieged by grateful penitents. His mind was so clear and so well informed - his heart so kindly - that hundreds, both young and old, flocked to him for advice and direction. It may be said: truthfully that his arduous labours in priestly work shortened his life.

Those who had known better days, appealed specially to his sympathetic nature, and, in ways most unobtrusive and most tactful, he brightened many a life that would have otherwise been dreary. A wide circle of friends whose personal affection he had won, and many who were in distress, mourn the loss of him upon whose sympathy, judgment, and help they could always rely.

God give him the rest he deserved!

P J McC SJ

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Patrick Power (1867-1931)

Was born in Dublin and received his education at Castleknock College. He entered the Society in 1885 and began his higher studies in Dublin, His regency was spent in Australia where he was four years prefect of studies at the Jesuit College, Kew, Melbourne. On his return to Ireland he resumed his higher studies at Milltown Park but completed them at Chieri and Tronchiennes. He came to the Crescent in 1907 and in the following year was appointed rector, an office he held until 1912 when he became a member of the Gardiner St community to which he was assigned until his death. Father Power was an outstanding spiritual director in his day and was widely known to the clergy of Ireland through his many contacts made on the occasion of the diocesan retreats which he conducted. He died at Millford nursing home.

◆ SHC - Sacred Heart College Limerick 1932

Obituary

Father Patrick Power

His friends in Limerick, and they were many, were grieved to hear of the death of Fr P Power SJ, which took place at the Sacred Heart Convalescent Home, Milford House, Limerick, on Friday, Dec 11, 1931.

Fr Power was Rector here from 1908 to 1912. Since he left Limerick he was attached to St Francis Xavier's Church, Gardiner Street, Dublin. Yet though it is nearly twenty years since he had had direct connection with the College and with the Church in Limerick, few who have worked here are so well remembered by all. While he was ill at Milford House, one heard from those who had known him, young and old alike, stories of his kindness, sympathy and encouragement. Both in Limerick and in Dublin Fr Power was remarkable as a director of souls, for to his kind and genial manner was added a very deep understanding of human nature.

He was widely known through the country by priests and religious for the Retreats he conducted for them, and also by the laity for his practical sermons as a missioner. From all sides came genuine expressions of regret at the loss of a holy priest, who had helped so many, without thinking of himself. During the past few years his active life was interrupted by short periods of illness, but as soon as his strength revived he was busy again at work for others. Last summer he came to Limerick worn out after some months of sickness in a Dublin hospital. At times he seemed to be regaining his health and he often spoke of returning to his post at Gardiner Street. But God willed otherwise, and for some weeks before his death on Dec 11, it was clear that the end was near. During the long period of illness, his gratitude to all who did anything for him and his resignation to God's will produced a deep impression on those about him.

Several of his former penitents came from Dublin for his funeral. After the Office and Requiem Mass at the Sacred Heart Church, presided over by the Most Rev Dr Keane, Bishop of Limerick, the long procession of those who remembered him so well, wended its way to the cemetery at Mungret College. The coffin was borne by members of the Ignatian Sodality, some of whom had been boys at the school when Fr Power was Rector.

May God reward him for his kind and useful life so generously given in His service. RIP.

Power, Albert, 1870-1948, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/2000
  • Person
  • 12 November 1870-12 October 1948

Born: 12 November 1870, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 13 August 1887, Loyola House, Dromore, County Down
Ordained: 29 July 1906, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1909, Milltown, Park, Dublin
Died: 12 October 1948, Xavier College, Kew, Melbourne, Australia - Australiae Province (ASL)

Transcribed HIB to ASL : 05 April 1931

Educated at Belvedere College SJ

2nd year Novitiate at Tullabeg;
by 1894 at Cannes France (LUGD) health
Came to Australia for Regency 1896
by 1902 at Valkenburg Netherlands (GER) studying

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Albert Power came from a pious Catholic family, uninterested in politics. Their life centred the Jesuit church in Gardiner Street, and the Jesuits educated Power at Belvedere College. Albert's vocation was believed to be a great blessing by the whole family.
He entered the Society, 13 August 1887, First at Dromore, and then moved to Tullabeg under John Colman. He studied for his humanities degree as a junior at Tullabeg and Milltown Park, Dublin. His health was not good, and he was sent to Australia, 1895-1901, to teach the classics at Riverview. He was prefect of studies from 1899-1901. He returned to Europe and Valkenburg, for philosophy, and to Milltown Park for theology, 1903-07. He lectured in dogma and scripture, and held the office of prefect of studies and rector at Milltown Park, 1907-18. He was a consultor of the province from 1914-18.
Power returned to Australia to become the first rector of Newman College, Melbourne University, where he tutored in history and English. He was appointed the first rector of the diocesan seminary, Corpus Christi College, Werribee, as well as being consultor of the mission in 1923. He taught Latin, Greek, history, elocution, and Hebrew, as well as scripture at various times, and was much sought after by nuns for spiritual direction, which was “wise, firm and sure”. He had a special liking for Our Lady's Nurses at Coogee, founded by Eileen O'Connor, a good and holy lady.
Power had much Irish piety, but was not good in the apologetics of dealing with non-Catholics. He was a clear teacher, but not an original thinker. He had great devotion to God, the Church, the Society and to all in trouble. His published works included: “Six World Problems” (NY: Postet, 1927); “Our Lady’s Titles” (NY: Postet, 1928); “Plain Reasons for Being a Catholic: (NY: Postet, 1929), and many ACTS pamphlets, including “The Sanity of Catholicism” and “Do Catholics Think for Themselves?”. He retired to Xavier College in 1945 and remained there until his death.
Power was a very small man, and called 'the mighty atom' because of his abundant energy and ceaseless activity. He was first and foremost a devout Irish Catholic and all his later learning did nothing but reinforce the faith he had learned from his mother. But the intensity of his faith and devotion appealed enormously to the devout and to struggling souls, and he had a very wide spiritual clientele, especially among women.
He was also a genuine classical scholar and a first class teacher, much appreciated at Riverview by staff and students. He deepened his knowledge of scripture and was able to expound it better than most people. He was not particularly contemporary with theology, but in Latin, Greek or Hebrew, he was an expert. While his sympathies were somewhat narrow, and he found it hard to understand different personalities, he was a highly respected priest.
From external appearances, Power was a very successful Jesuit, projecting confidence and friendliness. His diaries, however, revealed an inner struggle to become the kind of person he believed that God and the Society of Jesus expected him to be. He typified most Jesuits who seemed to experience a continual tension between their individual personality and the expectations of formal authority.
But being a Jesuit for Power was not all romance and adventure to the ends of the earth. It also meant some internal changes in the person. Through socialisation processes in the Society, he believed that to be a good Jesuit he should avoid the things of the “world”. For him this meant obedience to the rules of the Society avoiding material and secular distractions, such as visiting “externs”, or interest in the political or social questions of his time. In the diaries he expressed the struggle within him to be such a person. In particular he recognised a tension in his life between fear and love, believing that love, confidence and hope were better motives for the Christian life than fear.
While respecting and admiring men who preached an austere life with much mortification and self-denial, he was never comfortable with that more traditional spirituality which had frequently caused him tension and “nerves”. Power suffered from scruples, and he needed to be encouraged in his convictions about a more joyful spirituality. However, he was sufficiency clear-minded to observe that too much self-introspection inflamed the scrupulous conscience and led to depression. He would prefer to convince himself that somehow his personal problems would be resolved once he became close to God.
He enjoyed meditating on the life of Christ, entering well into St Ignatius' use of the senses as the retreatant contemplated Christ in his humanity Power was more comfortable relating to a loving and caring Christ. In his diaries, sermons and lectures, he expressed a spirituality that accepted the whole human person, intellectual and affective.
Power's spirituality reflected much of the emotion of the French spiritual writers whom he claimed to value and whom he read at various stages through his life. St Francis de Sales was a good counter balance to Michael Browne's severe spirituality He read de Maumigny, de Ravignan, Lallemant, and St Therese. All these authors wrote about the importance of human emotions in the spiritual life. Human and consoling thoughts of joy and hope were needed in a soul that was torn by self-doubt and anxiety,
Power regularly expressed recognition of the movement of strong spirits within him, especially guilt, but as he grew in understanding of himself and learnt how to discern these spirits, he could offer himself sound advice, but he was not always able to put it into practice. He also worried about not possessing many human qualities. He wanted to be more patient, amiable, large-minded, more generous and self-sacrificing, courteous, and tolerant.
Despite his weaknesses, through direction and resection, Power seemed to grow in his spiritual life, becoming less introspective, more controlled and happy with his life. Learning to live with tensions, and working hard through teaching, writing, spiritual direction, and retreats, towards the end of his active life, he found the confidence to record :
“ I find it hard to resist a cry for help from someone i distress (of body or soul). And I think I can say - honestly- that during the past twenty years I have rarely (if ever) refused help when I could give it......”
Living in an age that generally promoted a severe spirituality Power exemplified those Jesuits who experienced tension when presented with an exclusively austere spirituality and he came to prefer a more fully human integration - a balance paradoxically more natural and instinctive to the older Irish traditions in which he had his roots.

Note from the Joseph A Brennan Entry
He was also chosen to superintend the foundation of Corpus Christi College, Werribee, whilst awaiting the arrival of the Rector, Albert Power.

Note from William McEntegart Entry
He arrived in 1926 and went to Corpus Christi College, Werribee, to teach philosophy. But it was not long before he clashed with the rector, Albert Power. McEntegart was a genial, easy-going man. Albert Power a small, intense, hard-drivlng and rather narrow man. The latter persuaded himself the former was having a bad influence on the students, and had him moved to Riverview in 1927. He had McEntegart's final vows postponed, despite clearance from the English province. After this treatment, McEntegart naturally desired to return to his own province, and left Australia in February 1929.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 24th Year No 1 1949
Obituary
Fr. Albert Power (1870-1887-1948) – Vice Province of Australia
A native of Dublin Fr. Power was educated at Belvedere College, and entered the Society at Dromore in 1887 at the age of 17. After a brilliant course at the old Royal University of Ireland, he taught at Riverview College, Sydney, and later studied philosophy at Valkenburg, Holland, and theology at Milltown Park, where he was ordained in 1906. He joined the professorial staff at Milltown Park, first as Professor of Dogmatic Theology and later of Sacred Scripture, and was Dean of Studies and Rector from 1910-18.
In the latter year Archbishop Mannix founded Newman College at the University of Melbourne and entrusted it to the Fathers of the Society. Father Power led a band of pioneer teachers to Newman and was its first Rector. From 1923-30 he was Rector of the new Regional Seminary, Corpus Christi College, Werribee, and continued until 1945 on its teaching staff. He was also for most of this period Spiritual Director of the seminarians, so that for nearly a quarter of a century he played a distinguished part in the training of the secular priesthood of the Archdiocese. In 1947 when celebrating at Xavier College, Kew, the 60th anniversary of his entrance into the Society he was honoured by the largest gathering of his former priest-students ever to assemble in Melbourne.
Father Power was a popular lecturer in the Catholic Hour broad cast from Melbourne. His books include “Plain Reasons for Being a Catholic”, “The Catholic Church and Her Critics”, and “Six World Problems”.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1949

Obituary

Father Albert Power SJ (1870-1948)

Fr Power was born in Dublin on November 12th, 1870 and died in Melbourne on October 12th, 1948. He had thus nearly eighty years on earth. Of these, forty-two were spent in Ireland, thirty-six in Australia, and in both he had accomplished so much that it was a constant source of wonder to those who lived near him not only that one small head could carry all he knew, but that one small frail body could perform all it was called upon to do. He worked smoothly, tirelessly, unobtrusively, but efficiently. It is, indeed, difficult to write about him without seeming to exaggerate, and no one would depreciate this more than himself, for he was naturally shy and retiring, as well as genuinely humble. Born in an intensely pious home he went early to Belvedere. Without the physique, aptitude or inclination for games he must have lived a little apart from the hurly-burly of a great school and concentrated all his energies on acquiring knowledge and holiness.

At the age of seventeen he entered the Noviceship and glided into the current of the new life so smoothly that it will have held less trials for him than for most. Certainly he took the Ignatian mould to perfection. Throughout his whole life he exemplified the “Book of the Exercises” as well as he was later to preach it to others. After the Noviceship he studied for the old Royal University and taking the Classical Course, he won all possible distinctions until he ended with first place in MA. Of the Classics he always remained a lover and a master. They were to serve him well in his sacred studies. He became in time something of a polymath. In his lectures he would often turn aside into very out-of-the-way paths of learning. This was not to the taste of all listeners, but for others it was a source of delight. He was never the dry-as-dust specialist.

In Philosophy and Theology he had the same success as at the University. So that it was only natural he should gravitate to Milltown Park at the end of his course, where he remained as Professor (a part of the time as Rector) until in 1918, he was invited to return to Australia, where he had spent six years as a scholastic teaching Classics. This time he went in the higher capacity of Professor of Theology and first Rector of Werribee College, near Melbourne, which Dr. Mannix had founded as a higher Seminary for the Archdiocese of Melbourne and its suffragan Sees. It was here his greatest work was done and here his last thirty- years were spent.

Dr Mannix had practically commandeered. him from Milltown Park. The Irish Province felt the sacrifice but made it whole-heartedly for such an important end. The personal victim felt it keenly; for he had thrown deep roots into the subsoil of ecclesiastical life in his native land and had made innumerable friends. He was human enough for all his exalted virtue, to feel the wrench acutely. But there was no hesitation. The call was too clear to leave a doubt about God's will. And that was for him always the thing that really mattered.

As a reward for his sacrifice Fr Power found a wider field for his talents, his zeal, his restless pursuit of the greater glory of God than he would have found at home. He was able to contribute to the growth and development of the young Australian Church, already so glorious and destined perhaps to far greater glory, in the days to come, by helping in the formation of its young clergy, and incidentally, by the spiritual direction of many of its nuns, No one was more in demand for their retreats or as extraordinary confessor.

But if Dr Mannix commandeered him in life he seems to have done so even more imperiously in death. He robbed the Jesuits of the handful of clay to give it what one might call an ecclesi- . astical state funeral. The Archbishop himself presided at the solemn requiem in St Patrick's Cathedral, three hundred and fifty clerics from all over the continent chanted in the stalls and Rev James Murtagh paid tribute to the dead Jesuit's services in a panegyric at once generous and palpably sincere. He résumés all in the words : “Fr. Albert Power was surely one of the mnost saintly, scholarly and influential priests Australia has ever known”.

Before quitting Ireland he had gone far towards establishing for himself a hardly less honourable reputation in the Irish Church, where he had already won the titles of “Albertus Magnus”, and “The Mighty Atom”. There was a spiritual dynamism about him which really did suggest what we now know as atomic energy. But it was harnessed not to the chariot of Mars but to the Ark of Salvation - which makes a difference!

It is to be hoped that both in Australia and Ireland the memory of him will long remain to be an inspiration in the spiritual warfare we are all committed to, the principles of which he taught and practised so long and so well.

Plunkett, Peter, 1794-1846, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/1991
  • Person
  • 26 June 1794-20 March 1846

Born: 26 June 1794, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 01 February 1817, Stonyhurst, England - Angliae Province (ANG)
Final Vows: 08 September 1837
Died: 20 March 1846, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He was the son of a housekeeper in Dublin Castle.

He was one of the first Brothers at Clongowes. Later he was sent to the chapel in Hardwicke St, and then moved with others into Gardiner St.
He was a tailor, cook, sacristan, buyer, refectorian and dispenser, always laborious, pious, simple and edifying, though often suffering from ill-health.
He died of consumption or something like it 20 March 1846 at Gardiner St.

Note from John Cleary Entry :
He took his First Vows at Clongowes 02 February 1819, and Charles Aylmer said the Mass. There were six others with him : Brothers Egan, Nelson, Plunkett, Mulligan, Bennett and Sherlock, all who persevered happily in the Society to the end.

Note from John Nelson Entry :
He took his Final Vows 02 February 1838 along with eleven others, being the first to whom Final Vows were given since the Restoration in Ireland. The others were : Philip Reilly of “Palermo fame”; Nowlan, Cleary, Mulligan, Michael Gallagher, Pexton Sr, Toole, Egan, Ginivan, Patrick Doyle and Plunkett.

O'Neill, Niall, 1926-2009, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/793
  • Person
  • 23 February 1926-19 November 2009

Born: 23 February 1926, North Circular Road, Limerick City, County Limerick
Entered: 07 September 1944, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1959, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1962, Clongowes Wood College SJ
Died: 19 November 2009, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.
Buried Mungret, Limerick.

Educated at Crescent College SJ

◆ Interfuse
Interfuse No 142 : Spring 2010
Obituary

Fr Niall O’Neill (1926-2009)

23rd February 1926: Born in Limerick
Early education at Crescent College
7th September 1944: Entered the Society at Emo
8th September 1946: First Vows at Emo
1946 - 1950: Rathfarnham - Studied Arts at UCD
1950 - 1953: Tullabeg - Studied Philosophy
1953 - 1956: Belvedere - Teacher
1956 - 1960: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
31st July 1959: Ordained at Milltown Park, Dublin
1960 - 1961: Tertianship at Rathfarnham
1961 - 1962: Clongowes- Lower Line Prefect; Teacher
2nd February 1962: Final Vows
1962 - 1967: Crescent College, Limerick - Spiritual Director (pupils); Confessor; Teacher
1967 - 1973: Tullabeg - Missions / Retreat Staff
1973 - 1989: Sacred Heart Church, Limerick
1973 - 1984: Missions / Retreat staff
1984 - 1989: Missions / Retreat staff; Promoted the Apostleship of Prayer and the Messenger
1989 - 2000: Tory Island - Parish Curate
2000 - 2001: Gort an Choirce - LeitirCeanainn, Dun na nGall
2001 - 2006: Gallen Priory Nursing and Retirement Home, Ferbane - Residential Chaplain
2006 - 2009: Della Strada, Limerick - Prayed for Church and Society
19th November, 2009: Died in Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Liam O'Connell writes:
Niall O'Neill grew up on the North Circular Road, Limerick. His family was important to Niall, and he remained close to his brother and three sisters. His father, Dick, died in his 40's, and a photograph from the ordination day of Niall and his mother, whom the family called Mater, had pride of place in Niall's room. All of his family shared a devotion to Our Lady of Lourdes, and a commitment to the care of the sick, and over the years their annual pilgrimages there also became a family reunion.

Niall took great pleasure in the achievements of his nieces and nephews, and they in turn were great at keeping in touch with him. He introduced them to music at an early age, buying guitars and a set of uileann pipes for them. They were most grateful to him for this, and many of them followed musical careers.

In 1944, during the World War, Niall left the Crescent and began his life as a Jesuit, when he went to Emo. Years later when Emo closed, Niall salvaged the bell from there, called the Challenger, and he used it to summon people to Mass on Tory Island. After studies in UCD and in Tullabeg, Niall taught as a scholastic in Belvedere where he also ran the Field Club, and he became a lifelong friend and supporter of the Belvedere Youth Club. In later years he went as chaplain with them on their annual seaside camp in County Meath.

During the years of study Niall belonged to a great group of Jesuit companions. These included Tom McGivern and Gerry Keane, who later worked in Zambia and Singapore, but they still remained his steadfast friends. Contemporaries enjoyed Niall's personal qualities, his rugged determination, his patriotism, his good humour, his talent as a musician, as a sportsman, as an actor, and as one of the authors of the pantomimes and reviews they produced regularly. In these they poked gentle fun at everybody and everything, and they maintained a sense of balance and good humour at a time of Spartan living conditions.

As a schoolboy Niall and a friend cycled from Limerick to Portlaoise on a bird watching expedition, to see the first collared doves in Ireland, and as a Jesuit this love of nature continued to enrich his life. Years later he attracted hundreds of 'twitchers' to Tory, by alerting the BBC to the presence on the island of a bird rarely seen in Europe. He amassed a specialised collection of Irish bird books, and even when in Cherryfield be sent for his binoculars so that he could continue to be close to the natural world.

After Tertianship Niall became Lower Liner Prefect at Clongowes. Then in 1962 he went to Limerick, to Crescent College as a teacher and Spiritual Father. In 1967 he joined the Retreat and Parish Mission staff. This new work brought him to every diocese in Ireland, giving parish missions that lasted up to two weeks at a time, and he worked closely with Seán Noonan and Kevin Laheen and Noel Holden. Niall had a great love of the lore of country places, and took many fine slide photographs of the places he visited.

For much of this time Niall continued to live in the Crescent, until he went in 1989 to live as the resident priest in Tory Island off the Donegal coast. He described this as the happiest period of his life, and he adapted his Munster Irish to Caighdeán Cuige Ulaidh. At this time he began to say the Divine Office and Mass in Irish, a practice he continued till the end. On Tory he also visited the sick, worked as a peacemaker, welcomed visitors, and brought encouragement and friendship to many, especially the housebound. He also had time to fish for his supper, and to wander in all weathers all over the island. In recent years he used to look at his collection of videos of life on Tory. These included pictures of the Ferry journey to Tory, programmes about Tory recorded from TG4, homemade videos that recorded the island way of life, and some great Atlantic storms.

We also have some beautiful photographs of Niall from Tory; processing outside the church with altar servers, with their vestments blowing in the wind; bounding over rocky outcrops with two beautiful dogs; ringing the bell for Mass, and smiling with delight as he greeted friends. In recent Niall used to receive a large post every day, and the Donegal postmarks on many of these letters were a sign of strong and lasting friendships formed on Tory.

In the year 2000 Niall had a stroke, and had to leave his beloved Tory. He always was a determined person, and entered into his rehabilitation programme with great resolve. He lived for a year in Cherryfield and then in Gort an Choirce, Letterkenny, before becoming Resident Chaplain, in Gallen Priory Nursing and Retirement Home, Ferbane, Co. Offaly. Gallen Priory is the site of a 5th century hermitage of Saint Canoc, on the River Brosna, and it is one of the oldest Christian sites in Ireland. Niall loved his time here, and became great friends with the sisters of St. Joseph of Cluny who lived there, and with the staff and the patients of the Priory. Again Niall was a constant friend the these people visited him often in Limerick for his last three years.

And every morning he spent two hours in his own little sanctuary, down by a bend in the River Brosna. Here he built a shaded seat at the base of an ivy clad tree, and trained the ivy so that it formed a canopy that gave shelter from the wind and rain. He prayed here, surrounded by a beauty that only comes slowly to those who know how to sit and wait. Here among the wildlife, including all the songbirds and otters and kingfishers, and other rare species he said his prayers. Ignatius of Loyola asks us to consider how God works and labours for us in all things created on the face of the earth. On this bend on the River Brosna, where the sky is constantly changing, Niall made time for God, and allowed God to touch his heart. Here he was like the person in Coleridge's poem:
“He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all...”
In 2006 Niall had to move again, because of ill health, this time back to Limerick, to Della Strada, Dooradoyle. He became a regular patient and visitor to Ward 2C in the Regional Hospital. Here he established a strong friendship with the nurses and doctors.

Niall was blessed by their professional and personal care, and by their friendship. Later Niall was to receive the same loving care at the Jesuit nursing home, at Cherryfield Lodge in Dublin.
Niall was stubborn and determined, and during national elections his trenchant views might not have been shared by many of his colleagues. But everybody who got to know him learned to have enormous respect for his integrity and his faithfulness to the Gospel, and they were grateful for the prayerful support we received from him. He had a public disagreement with another Jesuit colleague about Tory Island affairs, but in his final months Niall used this colleague's mortuary card as a bookmark and he became reconciled with him through in prayer.

People were struck by Niall's happiness. His faith and his Jesuit vocation brought him great joy, deep down contentment, the sort of joy that is bigger than any of life's difficulties. This was true especially in the last three years, when he was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer, which at first made speech difficult, and then impossible. However Niall never seemed to be wrapped up in himself. He was a great host to visitors to Della Strada, and even in illness he became their willing chauffeur. And whenever colleagues and friends faced a difficulty, they valued his prayers and his support.
During these three years of sickness, Niall spent much of this time praying, in the chapel with the curtains to the outside world drawn back, to let the world of nature in. God works and labours for us in all things created on the face of the earth. Every morning he put an apple on the ground outside the window of his room, to feed two blackbirds who became his companions. Then for much of the day he put a cushion on his lap, used his bad hand to steady a writing pad, and he proceeded to write long letters to his friends.

Niall O'Neill was closely connected to God, to God's creation and to his family and his Jesuit friends in the Lord. And that's not taken away by death. That faithful life and prayerful support is stronger than death, and we continue to be enriched by his faith and his hope and his love.

O'Mara, Patrick, 1875-1969, Jesuit priest, chaplain and missioner

  • IE IJA J/552
  • Person
  • 13 March 1875-23 March 1969

Born: 13 March 1875, Limerick City, County Limerick
Entered: 14 August 1892, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 26 July 1908, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 08 December 1967, St Francis Xavier, Gardioner Street, Dublin
Died: 23 March 1969, Our Lady’s Hospice, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death

Cousin of Joey O’Mara - RIP 1977

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

Chaplain in the First World War.

by 1896 at Valkenburg Netherlands (GER) studying
Came to Australia for Regency, 1898
by 1910 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship
by 1918 Military Chaplain : 58th CCS, BEF France
by 1919 Military Chaplain : 33rd CCS, BEF France

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Patrick O'Mara began his long life in the Society in 1892 at the age of sixteen, entering the novitiate at Tullabeg. At the end of 1898 he arrived at Xavier College to teach mathematics to senior boys and was first division prefect, 1901-02. He wrote a book on arithmetic, but apparently no copies survive.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 1st Year No 1 1925
Of the various pamphlets issued, half a million copies were distributed during the past twelve months. Devotional booklets are in especial demand, particularly the “Holy Hour” books, by Fr. P. O’Mara, of which 63,ooo copies were sent out during the past year, and an equal number during the preceding year

Irish Province News 2nd Year No 4 1927
Messenger Office :
Of reprinted pamphlets by Ours, 370,000 copies have already been bought up. Fr P O’Mara’s “Holy Hour” book, “An Hour with Jesus” easily holds the record. It is in its 45th edition, and the companion book “Another Hour with Jesus” is in its 21st.

◆ Irish Province News 44th Year No 3 1969 & ◆ The Clongownian, 1969

Obituary :

Fr Patrick O’Mara SJ (1875-1969)

Father Patrick O'Mara was, by a large margin, the senior member of the Irish Province. Though six months younger than Father Eddie Dillon (still happily with us). he entered almost five years earlier. He had completed the long span of 77 years in the Society and was in full activity up to within a year of his death.
He was born in Limerick on March 18th, 1875. His father, Stephen O'Mara, M.P., was the founder of the well-known family business and was several times Mayor of Limerick and later a member of Seanad Eireann. Patrick was the eldest of a family of nine. One of his brothers, Stephen, was, like his father, several times Mayor of Limerick. Another, James, played a prominent part in the national movement, which has been chronicled in his biography by his daughter, Mrs. Lavelle. The third brother, Fonsie, was prominent in business life in Limerick and Dublin. He too played an active part in the national movement and in 1918 was elected as the first Sinn Fein mayor of Limerick, The distinguished singer, Joseph O'Mara, director of the O'Mara Opera Company and father of Father Joseph O'Mara, was an uncle of Fr. Patrick's, being the youngest brother of Stephen O'Mara, M.P.
Patrick O'Mara was educated for four years at the Christian Brothers College. Limerick, and for another four at Clongowes. He entered the noviceship at Tullabeg in 1892. Amongst his fellow-novices we find some names once familiar in the Province, Patrick O'Brien, Esmond White, Michael Egan and Thomas O'Dwyer. After a year's juniorate at Milltown Park, he went to Valkenburg for philosophy, and at the end of his three years course was appointed to Xavier College, Melbourne, in what was then the Australian mission.
He spent seven years at Xavier. from 1898 to 1905, both prefecting and teaching. Father O'Mara so long outlived his contemporaries that no detailed information is available about these early years. He was, however, evidently a keen and able teacher of mathematics, and published in 1903 a textbook entitled Reasoned Methods in Arithmetic and Algebra for Matriculation Candidates, which went into at least four editions.
In 1905 he returned to Ireland for theology at Milltown Park, and was ordained on 26th July 1908. After tertianship at Tronchiennes, he taught mathematics and physics at Mungret for three years, and was then appointed to the mission staff. Rathfarnham Castle had just been opened as a Juniorate (1913). and he was a member of the founding community, together with three fellow-missioners, Fathers William Doyle, Joseph Flinn and William Gleeson. The catalogues assign him to Tullabeg from 1914 to 1916, but those who were at Rathfarnham during those years think that he remained there during all his time as a missioner, This was the period of the First World War, and in 1917 Father O'Mara was appointed a military chaplain (there were twenty two Irish Jesuit chaplains that year) and saw service at the 58th and 33rd casualty clearing stations in France. He rendered particular service to Portuguese troops and was awarded a decoration, : Officer of the Military Order of Christ, by the Portuguese Government.
In 1919 Father O'Mara returned to Rathfarnham and there followed a long period of work as a missioner. Here again we are faced by the difficulty that he so long outlived his contemporaries that information about this period of his life is scanty. It is certain, however, that he was a most devoted and successful Missioner. He was an orator of the old style, somewhat theatrical in his delivery, but most appealing to the congregations of those days. He took immense pains in preparing his sermons, and it is recalled that on his first appointment to the mission band, he went to England for a course in voice production. He was indefatigable in the laborious work of visitation and hearing confessions, and he was blessed with a strong constitution which made him a most reliable confrère, always ready for the most difficult assignment.
When Father O'Mara returned from the war to Rathfarnham, Father John Sullivan had just been appointed Rector. Father O'Mara contributed to the biography of Father Sullivan an incident which occurred in the November of that year. On his way back from a mission, Father O'Mara's bag was stolen from the platform of the tram on which he was travelling. The loss was a grievous one, as the bag contained the manuscripts of his mission sermons and retreat notes. On arrival at Rathfarnham, he confided his trouble to Father Sullivan, who assured him that he would immediately go to the chapel and pray for the restoration of the notes. Father O'Mara, though it was late at night, started jotting down all that he could remember of his notes, which were the result of years of work. At 11.30 p.m. Father Sullivan came to his room to tell him that a telephone message had been received from the Augustinian Church in Thomas St. to say that the bag, unopened, had been left at the door of the monastery. Father O'Mara's account concluded : “I was convinced at the time that it was a direct answer to Father Sullivan's prayers. I have not changed this opinion”.
In 1928 Father O'Mara was appointed to the staff of Gardiner Street, and entered on the activity which is most closely associated with his name, being appointed Director of the Sodality of the Sacred Heart, which involved the giving of the Holy Hour. This activity was interrupted in 1931, when he was appointed Rector of the Crescent College, Limerick. Here he undertook several extensions and improvements in the church, and was responsible for the installing of a new organ. On his return to Gardiner Street in 1934, he was at first assistant director of the Pioneer Association, but in 1937 reassumed the directorship of the Sacred Heart Sodality and the Apostleship of Prayer, which he retained for the next thirty years, as well as that of the Ladies' Sodality of the Blessed Virgin. During all this time his most notable activity was the giving of the Holy Hour, which became almost legendary in Dublin and its outskirts. He took the utmost pains in its preparation, and carefully wrote out fresh matter for each occasion. Many of the prayers and devotions which he used were embodied in four booklets entitled Hours With Jesus, the first of which had a circulation of over a million copies, whilst the others ran into the hundred thousands. His style of preaching was inighly dramatic, perhaps excessively so for some tastes, but it certainly appealed to his crowded congregations. It was remarkable that even in quite recent times, when preaching has to some extent lost its former attraction, "Father O'Mara's Holy Hour" was always certain to fill the church to overflowing.
If the old age of everyone were like that of Father O'Mara, the science of geriatrics would be superfluous. Until he was into his nineties, his appearance never changed. His abundant black hair was only slightly touched with grey, and he could have been taken for a well-preserved man in the late sixties. He continued in active work almost to the end of his life, hearing confessions, directing his two sodalities at Gardiner Street. He also directed the past pupils' sodality attached to the Dominican convent, Sion Hill, Blackrock from 1938 to 1966, when his health forced him to relinquish it. This sodality is one of the oldest in Ireland having been founded in 1852.
When one attempts to give some idea of what kind of man Father O'Mara was, two characteristics stand out. Firstly, he was utterly devoted to his priestly work. His sermons and his famous Holy Hour were prepared with laborious care. He was a devoted and sympathetic confessor He was always ready to share in work which lay outside his own particular sphere. Thus, he took a keen interest in the annual Foreign Mission week in Gardiner Street, to which the members of his Ladies' Sodality gave valuable assistance. Secondly, he was deeply devoted to the Society and the Province. He took the keenest interest in all that was going on, and was generous in his encouragement of others, especially of younger men. Those who were asked to help him were the recipients of praise so lavish that it might have seemed mere flattery but that his genuine gratitude and goodwill were so apparent. He employed on some occasions an amusing little technique, praising some work done for him, a sermon or talk, but adding : “Still, I think it was only your second best”. This was not meant to discourage, but rather to emphasise the fact that his praise was not undiscriminating.
It was only in the last year of his life that his health began to fail, and only in his last months that increasing weakness made it necessary for him to leave Gardiner Street for Our Lady's Hospice, Harold's Cross. He retained to the last the whimsical good humour that had characterised him all his life. Very shortly before his death, his confessor mentioned that a taxi was provided for him to visit Father O'Mara each week, and protested that he could very well come by bus. “But”, said Father O'Mara, “think of the prestige I get among the other patients by the fact that my confessor comes in a taxi”. His death occurred on March 23rd, and, as was to be expected, immense crowds gathered in Gardiner Street to express the reverence and gratitude they felt towards one who, for so many years, had spoken to them so movingly of the love of the Sacred Heart of their divine Lord. Requiescat in pace.

O'Leary, William J, 1869-1939, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/339
  • Person
  • 19 March 1869-16 April 1939

Born: 19 March 1869, Ranelagh,Dublin
Entered: 30 October 1886, Loyola House, Dromore, County Down
Ordained: 27 July 1902, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1906, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Died: 16 April 1939, St Ignatius College, Riverview, Sydney, Australia

Transcribed : HIB to ASL 05/04/1931

Early education at St Stanislaus College SJ, Tullabeg & Clongowes Wood College SJ

by 1891 at Leuven, Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1905 at St David’s, Mold, Wales (FRA) making Tertianship

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online :
O'Leary, William J.
by David Murphy

O'Leary, William J. (1869–1939), Jesuit priest and scientist, was born 19 March 1869 in Dublin, son of Dr William H. O'Leary (qv), MP for Drogheda 1874–80, surgeon, and professor of anatomy at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, and Rosina O'Leary (née Rogers). Educated at St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, King's Co. (Offaly), and Clongowes Wood College, Co. Kildare, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1886, completing his noviciate at Dromore, Co. Down. He studied philosophy and astronomy at Louvain and theology in Dublin, and then taught science at Clongowes. In 1908 he travelled to Strasbourg and studied seismology under Prof. Meinka, and on his return to Ireland he set up a meteorological and seismological observatory at Mungret College, Co. Limerick, remaining as its director until 1915. At the request of a joint committee of the British Association and the Royal Meteorological Society, he carried out a series of upper-air investigations using sounding balloons (1911–14). This was the most westerly series of observations taken in Europe, and the results of O'Leary's research were published in the journals of both societies. By 1911 he had also completed a new seismograph, and this instrument was later praised by the astrophysicist and cosmologist, (Edward) Arthur Milne (1896–1950).

In 1915 he moved to the Jesuit community at Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin, and founded a seismological observatory there. He constructed his own seismograph, which had a moving mass of one-and-a-half tons. This instrument was still giving excellent service in the 1940s. He had also become aware of the need for extremely accurate timing in seismology and, turning his attention to chronometry, developed a free-pendulum clock which he patented in 1918.

In 1929 he went to Australia, where he became director of the observatory at Riverview College, New South Wales. In conjunction with the Lembang observatory in Java, he began a programme of photographic research on variable stars. He discovered several new variable stars, and the results of his research were published in the journals of the Riverview and Lembang observatories and also in the Astronomische Nachrichten. An accomplished and humorous speaker, he was extremely popular as a lecturer at scientific and public meetings. He supervised (1933–4) the construction of one of his free-pendulum clocks for Georgetown University. The clock was built by E. Esdaile & Sons in Sydney and shipped to Washington DC in August 1934, and O'Leary visited Georgetown in 1938. He was a leading member of several scientific societies, including the RIA (elected 1919), the Royal Society of New South Wales, the Société Astronomique de France, and the Seismological Society of America. He was also a member of the Australian National Committee on Astronomy and was elected (January 1938) a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society.

He collapsed and died of a heart attack while playing golf (16 April 1939), and was buried at the Gore Hill cemetery, Sydney. There is a collection of his papers in the Irish Jesuit archives in Dublin, including seismological journals that he kept while at Rathfarnham. In February 1959 Georgetown University donated to the Smithsonian Institution its O'Leary free-pendulum clock and the collection of letters relating to its construction.

Fr William J. O'Leary, SJ, files in Irish Jesuit Archives, Dublin; The Catholic Press, 20 April 1939; Monthly Notice of the Royal Astronomical Society, vol. 100, no. 4, February 1940; Bulletin of the National Association of Watch and Clock Collectors, vol. 28, no. 240, February 1986, 44–51

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/jesuitica-earth-shakers-2/

JESUITICA: Earth-shakers
In the days when Rathfarnham Castle was still a residence for Jesuit university students, there was a seismograph (pictured here) housed in a small building off the drive. It was the creation of Fr William O’Leary, a Jesuit scientist with an avid interest in pendulums, who had already constructed a seismograph in Mungret in 1909. He had to keep air currents and spiders at bay, since their delicate vibrations could simulate the effect of major earthquakes on the sensitive instrument. He had dreadful luck in September 1923 when his seismograph was temporarily out of order during a catastrophic (over 100,000 dead) earthquake in Japan. But his pioneering work introduced generations of Jesuit students to the rigorous measurement and technical skill required in scientific research.

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
William O'Leary was educated at Tullabeg and Clongowes; his father was a surgeon and a Member of Parliament. While at Tullabeg he developed an interest in science. He entered the Society at Dromore, 30 October 1886, did his juniorate at Tullabeg, 1888-90, studied philosophy at Louvain, 1890-93, where he did much experimental work with the inverted pendulum. He later taught mathematics and physics at Clongowes, 1893-99, studied theology at Milltown Park, 1899-03, and finished his studies with tertianship at Mold, Wales, 1904-05. In 1900 he published a textbook on mechanics.
In an obituary notice in the “Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Vol. 100, No. 4,” 1940, it said that O'Leary's “mind ran on original lines. He was never content with stereotyped textbook solutions, he had to work out each problem for himself from first principles. In this way he was able to study many questions from a fresh angle and to develop original lines of research various branches of science. Combined with this was a highly developed inventive talent and the ability to design new instruments and the skill to construct them”.
After studies, O'Leary taught physics, chemistry and mathematics, and was assistant prefect of studies at Mungret, 1905-15, as well as director of the seismological and meteorological observatory At the request of a Joint Committee of the British Association and the Royal Meteorological Society he carried out a series of upper-air investigations by means of sounding balloons. These were the farthest west observations had been made in Europe at the time.
One problem in seismometry was to obtain an instrument with a fairly long period and consequent high sensitivity O'Leary provided a satisfactory solution by constructing a two
component horizontal seismometer with trifilar suspension. One of these instruments was completed in Mungret in 1911. Later, he lectured in mathematics to the juniors at Rathfarnham, 1915-18, and started seismological observatory His “O’Leary Seismograph” was at that time the first and only one in the world. He also worked with Professor John Milne at the Shide Observatory in the Isle of Wight, and from whom he acquired the Milne-Shaw seismograph for his own seismography station at Rathfarnham. With these two seismographs, O'Leary was able to supply earthquake information to the whole country. The need for accurate timing in seismology turned O'Leary's attention to chronometry He saw that the secret of precision timing was to be sought in a free pendulum. He was one of true pioneers in the development of the free-pendulum clock in 1918.
O’Leary was minister, procurator and teacher at Belvedere, 1918-19, and then lectured mathematics and physics to the philosophers at Milltown Park, 1919-29.
He was was appointed to the Riverview observatory in July 1929. Besides introducing various improvements in the seismological department, he initiated a programme of photographic research on variable stars in collaboration with the Boscha Observatory, Lembang. He also invented and built a blink comparator, which proved successful in searching for new variable stars. He discovered many new variable stars and published several papers on variables in “Publications” of the Riverview and Ban Len Observatories and in the “Astronomisrlne Nachrichten”. Other inventions included a recording anemometer and a petrol gas plant.
Scientists and the general public appreciated O’Leary's lectures on astronomy and seismology His light and humorous touch combined with his clarity of exposition to render topics intelligible and interesting. Together with his scientific work, he found time to do good work as a priest. Many found him a wise counselor, and a humble and lovable priest and colleague. He was a little man, happy, charming, and quite unassuming in spite of his deep knowledge and high reputation.
He remained at Riverview until his death in 1939, directing the observatory until 1937 when Daniel O'Connell became director. The end of his life occurred when he collapsed and died on the golf course just after driving off. The suddenness of his death was a shock to the community, but he had had a heart condition for some time. This did not prevent him from planning fresh research and for new instruments. The day before he died he discovered a number of new variable stars with his newly completed comparator, and that night worked at the telescope taking star photographs. O'Leary was a member of the Royal Irish Academy, the Royal Society of NSW, the Société Astronomique de France, the Seismological Society of America, Past President of the NSW Branch of the British Astronomical Association, and a fellow of the Australian National Committee on Astronomy.

Note from Daniel O’Connell Entry
At this time he came under the influence of William O'Leary, the Irish Jesuit astronomer and seismologist, who at that time was director of Rathfarnham Castle Observatory in Dublin. While at the Riverview Observatory, working under William O'Leary.........

Note from Edward Pigot Entry
His extremely high standards of scientific accuracy and integrity made it difficult for him to find an assistant he could work with, or who could work with him. George Downey, Robert McCarthy, and Wilfred Ryan, all failed to satisfy. However, when he met the young scholastic Daniel O'Connell he found a man after his own heart. When he found death approaching he was afraid, not of death, but because O’Connell was still only a theologian and not ready to take over the observatory. Happily, the Irish province was willing to release his other great friend, William O'Leary to fill the gap.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 1st Year No 2 1926

SCIENTIFIC WORK AND INVENTIONS - Fr William O'Leary :
1909 Seismological observatory established at Mungret
1910 New type of seismograph invented and constructed at Mungret; A meteorological station in connection with the Meteorological Office established at Mungret; A complete set of recording instruments was installed; New type of anemometer, recording average and wind direction, invented and erected.
1912 The systematic investigation, by sounding balloons of the upper atmosphere over Ireland was begun. This important work was entrusted to Mungret by a joint committee of the Royal Meteorological Society and the British Association, as representing the International Upper Air Investigation Society, with headquarters at Strasburg. Mungret was the only Irish station entrusted with this work; The Erin Petrol Gas Generator invented by Messrs Maguire & Gatchell took over the construction of those machines, and erected a large number of them throughout Ireland.
1916 The Rathfarnham Seismological Station was established. The instrument, of the Mungret type, but of an improved design, was constructed at Rathfarnham.
1918 Precision clock invented, embodying the principle of a free pendulum. A model of a “Vertical Component” Seismograph invented some 3 years previously, was exhibited at the British Association Meeting at Edinburgh.

Irish Province News 9th Year No 1 1934
An Australian contemporary gives the following welcome news :
The Rev William O'Leary, SJ., Director of Riverview Observatory has been elected President of the New South Wales branch of the British Astronomical Association. in succession to Mr. W. F. Gale. Father O'Leary is a famous scientist, with a special knowledge of earthquakes. He studied astronomy in Louvain, Belgium, and succeeded the late Father Pigot to the charge of Riverview Observatory in July, 1929. Formerly he was Professor of Mathematics and Physics at the Jesuit College, Milltown Park, Dublin.

Irish Province News 12th Year No 2 1937

Rathfarnham :
Seismological Station : A change was made in the method of recording un the O'Leary seismograph. The records are now made on smoked paper by a stylus which gives a very clear, delicate trace. This method replaces the former ink inscriptions and is calculated to give much greater sensitivity, The improvement was carried out at the suggestion of Father O'Leary, Director of Riverview College Observatory, who sent all the necessary detail of construction. On January 7th the first big earthquake of the year was recorded and the success of the new method was assured.

Irish Province News 14th Year No 3 1939
Obituary :
Father William O’Leary
Born, Dublin, 19th March , Educated Tullabeg, Clongowes
1886 Entered, Dromore, 30th October
1887 Dromore, Novice
1888-89 Tullabeg, Junior
1890-1892 Louvain, Philosophy
1893-1898 Clongowes, Doc
1899-1902 1899-1902 Milltown, Theology
1903 Clongowes, Doc
1904 Mold, Tertian
1905-07 Mungret, Doc. Adj. Praef. stud, Cons. dom.
1908-09 Mungret, Doc. Doc. Praes. Sod. B.V.M., Cons. dom.
1910-12 Mungret, Doc. Doc. Praes. Sod. B.V.M., Cons. dom.; Dir obser, seismol, et meteorology
1913-14 Munget, Doc an 17, Praes. Sod. SS Angel; Dir obser, seismol, et meteorology
1915 Rathfarnham, Lect. Math., Conf. N.N. ; Cons. dom. an 1
1916 Rathfarnham, Praef Spir, Lect. Math.; Cons. dom an 2.; seismol
1917 Rathfarnham, Praef Spir, Lect. Math.; Cons. dom an 3.; Dir obser
1918 Belvedere, Minister. Doc..' Cons. dom.
1919-23 Milltown, Lect. Math. et Phys. , Conf. dom.
1924 Milltown, Lect. Math. et Phys.; Conf. N.N.
1925-26 Milltown, Lect. Math. et Phys.; Praef ton; Theol et Phil
19277-28 Milltown, Lect. Math. et Phys.; Praef ton; Theol et Phil; Conf. dom.
1929 Australia, Riverview, Dir obser, seismol; Astron meteor
1930-37 Australia, Riverview, Dir obser, seismol; Astron meteor; Conf dom
1938-1939 Australia, Riverview, Adj Dir Spec; Dir sect seismol; Conf dom

Father O'Leary died in Australia, Sunday, April 16th, 1939
Father O'Leary was born in Dublin, 1869. His father William O'Leary, well known for his medical ability, and for time a Home Rule M.P. in the party of Isaac Butt. Father O'Leary was educated at Tullabeg and Clongowes. He was best known as a teacher of physics and astronomy in the Colleges and Scholasticates, and for his work on seismology. His scientific work tends to make us forget his other gifts as a preacher and Retreat-giver, in which he was remarkably successful. As student at Louvain he developed an interest in pendulums, which was the basis of his seismological activities. A full account of his work in that department has been given in the “Irish Jesuit Directory” for 1938. A visit to Prof. J, Milne's observatory at Shide, Isle of Wight, was the occasion of his applying his knowledge of pendulums to the construction of his first instrument at Mungret. During the following years he constructed and equipped a really good seismological and meteorological station there, which he left behind him as a monument to his energy and activity when he was transferred
to Rathfarnham. Here, with characteristic perseverance, he continued his work, and set about designing and constructing the instrument now in use at Rathfarnharn, in conjunction with a standard Milne-Shaw seismograph added to the Observatory in 1932. This instrument was not meant to replace the “O'Leary Seismograph”, but to give greater accuracy in the recording of earthquakes. The horizontal pendulum of the latter has a mass of 1 lb. , the O'Leary pendulum has a mass of 1.5 tons. This is the only instrument of its kind in existence, and gives an exceedingly large and clear record.
An essential element in the recording of earthquakes is a very accurate clock, which enables the exact time to be recorded on the chart. Father O'Leary designed such a clock, which includes features of great novelty. In connection with this instrument Father O'Leary paid a visit to the United States. The clock has been described by the director of a well-known observatory as “a piece of first-class and most original work”. It is of interest to put on record that Father O'Leary not only designed both clock and seismograph, but made almost every part of each, and erected them himself. In addition to these instruments he designed a system of supplying petrol-gas for laboratories far from a supply of coal gas. This apparatus had a considerable success, and for some years was on the market, until trade difficulties stopped the sale. In addition to the records of his observations, Father O'Leary wrote a text-book on mechanics.
When Father Pigot died in Australia, in 1929, then a portion of the Irish Province, Father O'Leary was chosen to succeed him as director of the Riverview College Observatory, which included astronomy, seismology and meteorology, where his knowledge and experience enabled him to do much valuable work.
His death came suddenly and unexpectedly, as he had been working in the observatory only the night before. The Australian and home newspapers contained most appreciative notices of his work. An indication of the esteem in which he was held may be gathered from the Press account of his funeral. Archbishop Gilroy presided at the Mass, at which were present Archbishop Duhig and Bishops Coleman, Dwyer and Henscke, together with some 200 priests and many representatives of Catholic schools. The laity included many distinguished scientists and representative men, such as the Attorney-General, etc. Father O'Leary was an F.R.A.S., and past-President of the British Astronomical Association.
Those who knew Father O'Leary will miss him not only as a worker, but still more for his great charm and his many gifts, which made him an excellent community man and endeared him to all by his cheerful companionship and great sense of humour. He was noted for his punctilious observance of all his spiritual duties, and died as he had lived, working for God. RIP
The following came from an Irish priest :
"During the last few weeks I have felt that I would like to write and offer to you and your distinguished Order my sympathy on the death of Father O'Leary. Many, I am sure, have written many others, too, better equipped than I, shall write about him but as a humble priest, I would like to add my humble tribute to the memory of a saintly priest and a learned Jesuit.
When I took up the paper a few weeks ago and read the cabled account of his death, I could read no further. I was truly grieved, for I felt I had lost a great friend, a friend who was, I thought, in perfect health, when I met him only a few months ago. Our friendship began ten years ago on the emigrant ship that was relentlessly taking both of us to Australia. He, fairly advanced in years, I, a young priest just ordained. He, the eminent scientist and inventor, on his way to take up one of the highest and most important positions in Australia, I an obscure priest, to take up duty as a curate in some parish in the Diocese of Sydney. None of us young priests realised that we were travelling with such a distinguished man. There was nothing that led us even to suspect it. He moved among us, spoke freely to us offered us his sympathy for he knew our hearts were full. His heart, too, was full, for he felt then that he would never see again his beloved Ireland. I often thought it was a pity that he should have to leave Ireland at his time of life, for he loved Ireland with a love that was passionate, yet tender. Whenever I visited him at Riverview, that College so beautifully situated on an eminence overlooking Sydney's wondrous harbour, his thoughts ever wandered back to Ireland. Like every exile. as he wrote himself, he hankered for the green hills of holy Ireland. Others shall appraise his work as a scientist and astronomer - to me he was always the humble, sympathetic, priestly friend. With his passing I have lost a great friend, and Australia has most certainly lost an able and scholarly Jesuit, and saintly priest.
I am sure that his soul passed through Ireland on its way to Eternity. May he rest in peace".

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father William O’Leary SJ 1869-1939
The name of Fr William O’Leary will go down in the Province as the founder of the seismograph at Rathfarnham Castle. He was also the inventor an ingenious clock and numerous other scientific devices, as well as author of a textbook on mechanics. But these achievements as a scientific inventor were hardly half the man.

He had a remarkable oratorical ability, and many a priest of the Province will recall his elocution classes … “O Mary, call the cattle home, call the cattle home across the sands of Dee”. He was a preacher and retreat giver of no mean order,

In 1939 he was appointed to the Directorship of the Observatory at Riverview, Australia. His end came suddenly on April 16th 1939, but found him not unprepared, for he was a religious of punctilious observance and scrupulous even to a fault in the matter of poverty.

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 109 : Summer/Autumn 2001

LEST HE BE FORGOTTEN : FR WILLIAM O’LEARY

Kevin A Laheen

There is a rumour doing the rounds in Rathfarnham at present that the building that once housed the seismograph will shortly be used as a snack-bar and tea room. Just in case there may be some truth in this rumour it would seem opportune to recall the name of Fr William O'Leary, SJ whose pioneer work in recording earthquakes won international acclaim for the seismograph station at Rathfarnham Castle.

Willie O'Leary was born in Dublin on 19 March 1869. The O'Leary family lived in Ranelagh. His father was a distinguished doctor, a Member of Parliament, and a personal friend of Isaac Butt. Willie spent the early years of his schooling in Tullabeg and then moved off to Clongowes when the two colleges were amalgamated in 1886. After his novitiate in Dromore he moved, back to Tullabeg to begin his Juniorate studies. In Tullabeg he manifested a great interest in and aptitude for science. It was during his philosophy years at Louvain that he did some experimental work on the inverted pendulum. This was the beginning of a lifelong work in the study of seismology which won for him an eminence in that science and in meteorology, and also, to a lesser degree, in astronomy.

During his years in Mungret College, 1905-15, his theories about earthquakes began to take practical shape. He built a house of solid stone some distance from the main building and in it he continued his study and experiments. His work during those years is well documented in the MUNGRET ANNUAL. However, it was in Rathfarnham Castle during the years 1915 17 that he built his own seismograph and the clock that recorded the time at which an earthquake took place. The famous “O'Leary Seismograph” was the only one of its kind in the world at that time and widespread interest in it was evident in international science circles.

He was on personal friendly terms with Professor John Milne, whose observatory in Shide, the Isle of Wight, he had visited on more than one occasion. Through this contact he acquired the Milne-Shaw seismograph for the station in Rathfarnham Castle. This instrument was not a substitute for Fr O'Leary's one, but both worked in tandem, recording the same earthquake though by different methods. The O'Leary seismograph recorded the quakes on a sheet of smoked paper on a large revolving drum, while the Milne-Shaw instrument recorded them by photography. It was interesting to watch the white lines being traced on the smoked paper as the drum revolved slowly while every minute the two glass pen nibs gave a tiny kick to the right in order to record the time.

Fr O'Leary's work received widespread notice in scientific publications. He was a Feilow of the Royal College of Science, and also a President of the British Astronomical Association. His reputation was so outstanding that when Fr Edward Pigot, SJ died in Australia in 1929, Fr O'Leary was requested to take his place as Director of the Observatory at Riverview College - “one of the highest and most important positions in Australia”. It was there during his early sixties that his work was highly appreciated and where at the same time he had an opportunity to further his own knowledge of astronomy.

Research and experimental work such as was done by Father O'Leary, is a very lonely occupation, and few people outside the researcher's field will manifest much interest. Fr O'Leary was fortunate in the fact that Fr Thomas V Nolan, SJ who was his Rector in Mungret College, appreciated his work and gave him every encouragement and support. Later Fr Nolan was appointed Provincial and in that office continued his sponsorship of Fr O'Leary's work. Providence was again on Fr Willie's side when they were both assigned to Rathfarnham Castle, Fr Nolan being the Rector and again continued to support him, especially in the erection of the seismograph station. He also encouraged Fr Willie to maintain his friendship with Professor Milne and to visit him at his observatory at Shide. Without this support one might be justified in asking if Fr O'Leary's experiments would ever have bome the fruit they eventually did.

In addition to his eminent place in the international community of scientists he was also a gifted preacher. He was much in demand as a retreat director, and was especially skilled in directing retreats to the clergy. His contemporaries found him a most affable companion who gladly shared his knowledge with anyone who manifested even the slightest interest in it. He died in Australia in 1939 in his seventieth year. Present at his funeral two archbishops, three bishops, over two hundred priests, and representatives from various branches of science. A priest who first met him on the ship en route for Australia, on hearing of his death, wrote, “In his passing I have lost a great friend, and Australia has certainly lost an able and scholarly Jesuit and a saintly priest”.

Should the building, which housed his seismograph station in Rathfarnham, ever become a snack-bar, it would certainly be appropriate to have a plaque or other memorial put up there. This would record the significant contribution to science that was made in that building, and would prevent the name and work of this great Jesuit from being forgotten.

I feel it is appropriate to conclude with a personal memory. One morning, midway through the Second World War, Dick MacCarthy and I were working in the seismograph station. Suddenly I noticed that the glass pens on the great revolving drum began to register a quivering motion. I called Dick and, in a matter of seconds, the pens went off in a swaying motion from left to right. We both realised that we were witnessing the great O'Leary seismograph recording an earthquake. Before the pens settled down, Dick had calculated that the epicentre of the earthquake was in the Pacific Ocean. In those days the house telephone was definitely off limits for all of us except Dick, who was allowed to use it for business connected with the station. He telephoned the Dublin newspapers with the news. An hour or so later we both cycled to the university for the morning lectures. Standing at the gates of the building was a newsboy crying out the greatest piece of misinformation ever heard, “Stop press! Stop press! Earthquake at Rathfarnham Castle!” We both had a laugh, and Dick said, “I bet the Rector will blame the pair of us for that”.

During the days of the war when news of any sort was censored and generous blackouts were imposed on any type of information, we were a real sensation among our fellow students for bearing the first bit of uncensored news to reach Dublin that day. Dick, who remained a close friend of mine all his life, died in Hong Kong a couple of years ago.

◆ The Clongownian, 1939

Obituary

Father William J O’Leary SJ

Father O’Leary was born in Dublin on March 19th, 1869. His father was Dr W O'Leary, a well-known doctor and a Home Rule MP in Isaac Butt's party. Father O'Leary was educated at Tullabeg (1880), but came to Clongowes at the amalgamation for a few months in the summer of 1886 to prepare for the “Autumn Matric”. He was a master at Clongowes 1893-'98, and again in 1903; after his ordination. Practically his whole life was occupied in the teaching of science and mathematics at Clongowes and Mungret, and in the Scholasticates of Rathfarnham and Milltown Park. During his philosophical studies at Louvain he became interested in pendulums, and did some very interesting experiments with compound pendulums, obtaining some beautiful curve records. This interest seems to have been the occasion of his interest in seismology later on. A visit to the observatory of Prof J Milne FRS., at Shide IOW., was the beginning of his work in that departinent. At Mungret he created a seismological and meteorological station which he fitted up with instruments of his own design. During this time he also made observations on high-altitude conditions by means of balloons. He was transferred to Rathfarnham in 1915, where he still further improved his apparatus, Here he designed and constructed one of the instruments still in use in the present station. This instrument is the only one of its kind in existence and gives a very open record. It is of the inverted pendulum type, and the “bob” weighs 1.5 tons! It was designed, constructed all except the “bob” and erected by Father O'Leary himself, who, in addition to his other gifts, was a skilled mechanic. Later on he was professor of Mathematics, Physics and Astronomy to the Jesuit philosophers at Milltown Park.

On the death of Father Pigot SJ, Director of the seismological and astronomical observatory of Riverview College, Sydney, he was appointed as his successor, and went to Australia in 1929. His previous studies and practical experience had fitted him for this position, and enabled him to do splendid work in his new post. Here, in addition to seismology, his work included such branches of astronomy as observations on solar radiation, and on variable stars. It is to be hoped that a full account of his work in Australia will be given us. As an inventor he also designed a method of supplying laboratories not in possession of coal gas, with petrol gas, both for illumination and heating. He published a text-book on mechanics, but, with the exception of the records of his observation, does not seem to have written anything else. Reference must be especially made to an accurate clock which he designed and constructed on principles first applied by him, which was for use in connection with his seismograph. Such a clock is an essential element in the recording of earthquakes, for it is necessary that a mark be made on the chart very accurately every minute. His clock combined the properties of extreme accuracy with the means of recording the minutes on the chart. Referring to this clock, Father D O'Connell SJ, the present director of the Riverview observatory, says that it is a most excellent and original piece of work. Except in the patent specification, the details have never been published. It is to be hoped that this will be included in an account of his scientific work.

But it would be a mistake to allow the record of his work as a scientist to render us oblivious of his other and far inore important qualities. All who knew Father O'Leary as a friend and companion need no reminder of his wonderful charm and gifts of character which made him popular with all. A great love of his country, and a strong sense of humour were characteristic of him. He has a fine voice, and as a preacher he was no less in demand than as a lecturer and giver of retreats. His friends have lost one who will not easily be replaced.

Himself the most unassuming of men, he was honoured by his scientific brethren, no less than he was loved by his brethren in religion. He was a member of the British Association, and more than once was special preacher at their meetings; he was also a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, and Past President of the NSW branch of the British Astronomical Association.

His death came suddenly. He had been suffering from his heart, but this did not interfere with his work, and he had been working in the observatory only the night before. An indication of the esteem in which he was held in Australia may be gathered from the press account of his funeral. Archbishop Gilroy presided at the Requiem Mass, at which assisted Archbishop Duhig, and Bishops Coleman, Dwyer and Henscke. In addition, there were 200 of the clergy, as well as representatives of the Catholic educational establishments. A large number of distinguished laymen were also present, including the Attorney-General, members of the University and the president of Astronomical Society and Government Astronomer. RIP

H V Gill SJ

-oOo-

The following appreciation is from the pen of one who for many years taught in the same college as Father Willy :

For many years after his ordination, Father O'Leary taught in Mungret, and for a considerable portion of that period acted as Prefect of Studies. A splendid master, be had the gift of imparting knowledge clearly and of getting the boys thoroughly interested in their work. His subjects were Science, Mathematics and Latin. His lessons in Geometry were particularly fascinating - his own consummate skill in the use of instruments and the beautifully accurate figures which graced his blackboard made his pupils quite enthusiastic in their efforts to imitate and emulate him. He made the dry bones of that subject live -no easy task where boys are concerned.

He was highly popular with all the boys, though he never showed any undue leniency. He was strict, but not severe, just and impartial. All these features were prominent in another sphere of school life; Father O'Leary possessed histrionic talent in a high degree. His production, in conjunction with the late Father Willie Doyle, of the “Mikado” inaugurated the revival of theatricals in Clongowes. In Mungret he staged the “Private Secretary”, a very successful performance, one of many similar triumphs.

In the spiritual sphere he did untold good. He was director of the sodalities, a superb preacher, being a first class orator. Only those who lived with him could appreciate to the full the power of his example. He was popular, as we have said, but he used this as a powerful influence for good.

Boys are proverbially prone to hero worship, and this small, though tremendously strong, straightforward, cheerful and great hearted priest won their affection and admiration. They appreciated his great qualities in life, and we trust they will not forget him in death. Requiescat.

John Casey SJ

-oOo-

Father H V Gill has mentioned above that Father O'Leary had a great love for his country; here is an extract from a letter of Father Willy's to a friend in Ireland, written for the New Year :--

“Dear Ireland, how I wish I could see you again. I am too old to fall in love with strange lands and I love you alone. May God bless every tree and every blade of grass in you, may God bless every mother's son in you, and may God keep the Old Faith in you”.

◆ Mungret Annual, 1937

Obituary

Father William O’Leary SJ

The death of Father O'Leary in Australia will be deeply regretted by many of his past pupils. An old Mungret boy of Father O'Leary's time there writes to the Editor :

“I was at Mungret for five years, and during all that time Father O'Leary was a master there. He taught us Latin, Religious Knowledge, Mathematics and Science. But he taught us many others things besides these. I don't think there was any master of my time there the boys thought more of, or who had more influence with them. For all his lack of inches - he only looked about 5ft. 4ins, in spite of the black hair brushed straight up from his forehead - he was a most virile personality. I will always carry with me as one of the clearest memories of Mungret the picture of Father O'Leary pacing up and down the stone corridor as we went on our way to Mass, wearing his biretta and with his head sunk on his chest for all the world like Napoleon”.

For a man of his intellectual attainments allied as they were in him with a natural agility of mind and speed of accomplishment - it must have been a heart-breaking task to expound the elements of euclid to a junior grade class not specially gifted above their fellows. Only once in my time did I ever see it overcome him, and that was an occasion that none who saw will ever forget. One day in dealing with a boy whom the Lord never meant to learn euclid, he allowed himself to be betrayed into one or two natural expressions of impatience - just so much and no more. It made no impression on us nor on the boy concerned - we were I fear a thick-skinned lot - but next day when the class began, Father O'Leary called out the boy and apologised to him coram publico in terms which penetrated to our subconscious preceptions far deeper than any sermon. Talking of sermons reminds me that he was the boys' favourite preacher and confessor. He had a deep musical voice and a gift of oratory and also an ability to teach elocution which were all his own. I don't know if elocution is still taught in the schools or if it has been crowded out by the modern programme : to judge by the sort of thing one hears in “talks” from Radio Éireann even from possessors of University Degrees - the art of speaking and reading aloud is a lost one. Anyone who ever was in Father O'Leary's class or in one of his plays learned how to open his mouth and sound his consonants. He used to teach us Byron's poem about the Assyrian coming down like a wolf on the fold - I have every word of it yet - and when you came to the line ‘With the dew on his brow and the rust on his mail’ - woe betide you if you put a ‘Jew sitting on the poor man's brow’.

Science was, of course, his first love, but even that gave way before his love for Ireland. To hear him speak of Irish history or to listen to him sing ‘The West's Awake’, as we so often did was to know that the fire that burned in the breast of his distinguished father burned just as fiercely in his own. He must have known when he left Ireland in 1929 that the chances of his ever seeing home again were very small how hard that thought must have been those of us who knew him can well realise. He went like so many other Irishmen - and Mungret men have gone - where duty called him, and if he rests at last far from his own land that he loved so well, there lie around him the bones of many of his kith and kin to foregather at the resurrection. All the boys of his time in Mungret will join with me in a prayer for one than whom no one stood higher in our affections as a priest, a master, or a friend”.

D Gleeson

O'Kelly, Augustine, 1876-1950, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/338
  • Person
  • 26 May 1876-22 July 1950

Born: 26 May 1876, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1892, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 01 August 1909, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1911, Mungrtet College SJ, Limerick
Died: 22 July 1950, Pembroke Nursing Home, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner St, Dublin community at the time of death

Educated at Belvedere College SJ

by 1897 at St Aloysius, Jersey Channel Islands (FRA) studying
by 1910 at Drongen, Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship
by 1927 at Liverpool, Lancashire (ANG) working

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 25th Year No 4 1950

Obituary

Fr. Augustine O’Kelly (1876-1892-1950)

Father Augustine O'Kelly, or as he was known to his many friends, Fr. "Gus” O'Kelly, died peacefully at the Pembroke Nursing Home on Sunday, July 23rd, 1950. He was born in Dublin on 16th May, 1876 and belonged to a well-known city family. After completing his education at Belvedere College he entered the novitiate at Tullabeg on the 7th of September, 1892. He spent many successful years in the Colleges in Clongowes and in Mungret. He was given charge of the Apostolic students in Mungret and many of those who were under him still remember him and speak of him with great reverence and affection.
After finishing in the Irish colleges he spent some years in parochial work in Liverpool and in Preston. This part of his life was characterised by great zeal and devotion, especially among the poorer classes. His success in instructing converts was remarkable, and this was largely due to his painstaking efforts. He was also interested in the many problems affecting married life and several invalid marriages were set right as the result of his efforts.
He returned to Ireland about a dozen years ago and the remaining years of his life were spent in zealous work in St. Francis Xavier's Church, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin, For a few years before his death, he was the victim of blood pressure and heart trouble. He went to Rathfarnham Castle for a short holiday in the middle of July of the present year. While there he had a heart seizure and had to be removed to the Pembroke Nursing Home. A stroke followed a few days later and this was the immediate cause of his death. During his illness he showed great edification to his nurses and to the Doctor who attended him,
The outstanding features of his life were that he was a very saintly man and an excellent religious. All through his life everyone regarded him as a very holy man of God, and as a man who loved his rule and practised it as perfectly as possible. The boys in the Colleges had this opinion of him. The people with whom he came in contact during his missionary career thought the same of him, and above all his religious brethren of the Society looked up to him as a great example of holiness and religious observance. He practised self-denial very intensely. For instance, during the later years of his life he had no fire in his room, even in the depths of winter. He ate no meat and he scarcely ever indulged in food which was specially pleasing to the palate. But his self-denial was not repellant, because he was the soul of kindness and good nature. Even when he was suffering he was always friendly and in good humour. This was especially manifest during the last years of his life when he suffered considerably. He was eagerly sought as a confessor both by externs and by his own brethren in religion. He was always faithful and punctual in his confessional and his penitents could rely on his being present at his post. He had a great sense of humour and enjoyed telling and listening to amusing stories, especially those of the sensational kind. He was a great lover of holy poverty and certainly felt at times some of its effects. His obedience was sometimes amusing to his brethren - for instance, he had his bag always packed so that he could leave any house where he was stationed at a moment's notice. He was a model of all the religious virtues and without any ostentation. Like His Divine Master he effaced himself in all things,
The news of his death was received with genuine sorrow by the many friends he had made in Gardiner Street, and elsewhere. He leaves a gap and will be sadly missed. May he rest in peace!

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Austin O’Kelly (1876-1950)

Was born in Dublin and received his education at Belvedere College. He entered the Society in 1892 and pursued his higher studies at the French scholasticate in Jersey and Milltown Park where he was ordained in 1909. He was a member of the teaching staff at the Crescent from 1923-25. Shortly afterwards he went over to England to work in the Jesuit churches at Preston and Liverpool. His chosen apostolate was amongst the poorer classes. Before the outbreak of the last war he was recalled to Dublin and continued his apostolate amongst the poor near Gardiner St Church.

O'Keeffe, Timothy, 1840-1923, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1916
  • Person
  • 25 January 1840-18 December 1923

Born: 25 January 1840, Limerick City, County Limerick
Entered: 03 September 1863, Milltown Park Dublin
Ordained: 1866
Final Vows: 02 February 1876
Died: 18 December 1923, Ms Quinn’s Hospital, Mounty Square, Dublin

Part of St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.

by 1866 at Leuven Belgium (BELG) studying

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He was a member of a prominent Limerick family. One of his brothers Francis was Mayor of Limerick (and MP for Limerick) during the troubled Land League days, and another was Rev Canon Joseph O’Keeffe PP of Rathfarnham.

His early studies were at Maynooth, where Cardinal Michael Logue was one of his classmates.
He completed his Theology at Louvain, and there had shown a natural attitude for Moral Theology, and this later made him a very good Spiritual Director.
After Ordination he was sent to Clongowes teaching, and then to Galway as an Operarius in the Church for seven years.
1879-1900 He was at Limerick, and was appointed Rector, and Minister, and was a strenuous worker in the Church.
1900 He was sent to Gardiner St where he worked until his health began to fail and confined him to his room. He died there 18 December 1923

Note from John Naughton Entry :
For the last year of his life he was in failing health, and about 10 days before death he was moved to Miss Quinn’s Hospital, Mountjoy Square, where he died peacefully. Fathers Matthew Russell and Timothy O’Keeffe were with him at the time.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Timothy O’Keeffe (1840-1923)

A member of an old Limerick family well known in the public life of the city, entered the Society in 1863. He had been a student at Maynooth when he felt that he was called to the religious life. He spent some twenty-one years at the Crescent from 1879 and was rector of the college from 1885 to 1891. After his term of office, he remained on the teaching staff and was in charge for many years of the women's Sodality of the Blessed Virgin. On leaving Limerick at the opening of the century, Father O'Keeffe was appointed to the Church of St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, where he laboured until his death.

O'Keefe, Edmund, 1927-2011, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/790
  • Person
  • 25 April 1927-13 October 2011

Born: 25 April 1927, Dublin, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1945, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1959, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 05 November 1977, John Austin House, Dublin
Died: 13 October 2011, St Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death.

Older brother of Fergus

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/fr-edmund-okeefe-rip/

Fr Edmund O'Keefe RIP
Fr Edmund (Ned) O’Keefe died peacefully in St Vincent’s Hospital on 13th October, at the age of 84. We offer sincere condolences to his younger brothers Fergus SJ and Niall, and to his wider family. Though born in Castlereagh, Ned lived and worked mainly in the Dublin area, teaching for many years in the colleges of technology. He spent himself especially on two causes, devotion to the Sacred Heart, and the canonisation of Fr John Sullivan. He worked on the staff of the Sacred Heart Messenger, and produced a Novena to the Sacred Heart for radio. He gave similar energy to the Cause of Fr Sullivan, and produced a CD on John’s life. He spent the last year of his life in fragile health in Cherryfield, but remained to the end an active and engaged member of the Milltown Park community.

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 147 : Spring 2012

Obituary

Fr T Edmund (Ned) O’Keefe (1927-2011)

25 April 1927: Born in Dublin.
Early education at Templerainey National School, CBS Secondary, Callan and Clongowes
7 September 1945: Entered the Society at Emo
8 September 1947: First Vows at Emo
1947 - 1950: Rathfarnham - Studied Arts at UCD
1950 - 1953: Tullabeg - Studied Philosophy
1953 - 1956: Clongowes - "Gallery Prefect"; Teacher (History and Geography)
1956 - 1960: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
31st July 1959: Ordained at Milltown Park, Dublin
1960 - 1961: Tertianship at St. Beuno's
1961 - 1962: Clongowes -- Third Line Prefect; Teacher (History, Geography and RK)
5 November 1977: Final Vows
1962 - 1963: College of Industrial Relations - Teaching in Rathmines College of Commerce (and and 3rd level)
1963 - 1966: Emo - Minister; Socius to Novice Director
1966 - 1974: SFX, Gardiner Street - Assisted in the Church; Chaplain to Kevin Street College of Technology
1974 - 1979: Austin House - Head Chaplain at Kevin Street DIT and Lecturer in Bioethics
1979 - 1980: Leeson Street - Head Chaplain at Kevin Street DIT
1980 - 1982: SFX Gardiner Street - Assistant Director of Pioneers; Assisted in Church
1982 - 1984: Campion House - Promoter of the Apostleship of Prayer and the Messenger
1984 - 1996: Austin House - Promoter of the Apostleship of Prayer and the Messenger
1992 - 1996: Sabbatical (to January 1993); John Sullivan Cross Apostolate
1996 - 2003: Belvedere College - Assistant Vice-Postulator of John Sullivan SJ Cause
2003 - 2011: Milltown Park - Assisted in Community; Assistant Vice-Postulator of John Sullivan SJ Cause
2010: Milltown Park - Residing at Cherryfield Lodge - praying for the Church and the Society
13th October 2011: Died Cherryfield

Fr. O'Keefe was admitted to Cherryfield Lodge in September 2009 following surgery. He improved fairly rapidly and was happy to stay on in our Nursing Home. He deteriorated over the last six months and was transferred to St. Vincent's Hospital after suffering a stroke three weeks ago. In the last week, it was clear that he was not going to recover. Family members and Jesuits kept an eye on him and prayed at his bedside up to the end. He died peacefully in hospital on the morning of 13th October 2011. May he rest in the Peace of Christ

Obituary : Paul Andrews
Ned was what he liked to be called, although he had lived through many changes: Edmund from birth, then Brother O'Keefe in the noviciate, and Mr O'Keefe in Rathfarnham, and Nedser in Tullabeg. He had grown accustomed to changes as he moved with his parents from one bank house to another: Castlerea, Sligo, Arklow, Callan. For six years, until the arrival of Fergus, and later Mary and Niall, Ned was an only child, but he showed an older brother's sense of responsibility.

Of his various homes, he would look back on the seven years in Arklow, from the age of 6 to 13, as the idyllic years: a little town where there were friends and fishermen, a reasonable school, a beach, a harbour for messing about in boats, Jack Tyrrell's boatyard, and the chance to ride a pony and join the hunt. The move to Callan and the CBS was hard. Ned found himself among Kilkenny farmers' sons, but was clueless about hurling, and living in the Bank House was seen as a wealthy outsider. It was a relief to move to Clongowes at fifteen, and to make new friends. He became a Pioneer and remained one all his life. He joined the Sodality and the FCA, and absorbed some memories of Fr John Sullivan, who was to be very important in his priestly life. He received his first Communion on the Feast of Saint Aloysius, 1934, and that was the name he took at Confirmation. His godmother gave him a statue of Aloysius, which graced the mantelpiece of his bedroom. So Ned moved like Aloysius into the Company of Jesus, and went to Emo in 1945. In giving his life to God he had a powerful model in his mother's cousin, Edel Quinn.

There was one special feature in his years of Jesuit formation. He did his tertianship in St Beuno's under Fr Paul Kennedy, an experience he always treasured. After it he was delighted to be appointed to Clongowes as Third Line Prefect, a job he loved. But only a year later Visitor McMahon scattered a large part of the Clongowes community, and Ned found himself a chaplain and teacher in the Colleges of Technology, first in Rathmines, later as Head Chaplain in Kevin Street. Not the easiest of assignments, but Ned brought a special strength to it. Unusually for a priest, he joined the Teachers' Union of Ireland, so that he could speak for those who needed a spokesman. He contributed much to the chaplain's role, lectured well on Bioethics, and created a Social Action group among the students. One summer he brought a group of building apprentices to work on a building project of the Kiltegan Fathers in the desert of Turkhana, Kenya, to show them a poverty more profound than anything in Dublin.

In his early fifties Ned moved to a new ministry: he spent eight years promoting the Sacred Heart Messenger and the Apostleship of Prayer, mostly in the West of Ireland. He claimed to have brought them into every school in County Clare, and reached a still wider audience when he collaborated with Stephen Redmond to produce a Novena to the Sacred Heart for local radio.

In 1992 Ned took up the apostolate of Fr John Sullivan's Cross, and was Assistant Vice-Postulator of Fr John's cause. He produced two videos, with great help from the Kairos group of SVD priests in Maynooth; they are still in use today. These interests stayed with him to the end of his days, when he lived in Milltown Park and finally in Cherryfield.

How will we remember Ned? As a devoted Jesuit, hard on himself, but with a kind and compassionate spirit - he would always speak up for those he felt were hard done by. A contemporary called him “one of the kindest Jesuits I have ever known”. He was a gentleman, with impeccable manners and easy social graces, a stickler for propriety, with total integrity; the soul of discretion, never gossiping about community life, telling no tales out of school; a man who worried, and tried to anticipate problems – the boot of his car held equipment to face almost any emergency from the Arctic to the Tropics. His nephews and nieces remember his sense of fun, the twinkle in his eye, and the educational tours he would give them as children. He was devoted to, and immensely proud of his extended family, and grieved over the loss of his only sister Mary, who herself had buried both her husband. Hugh and one of her children. Her son John McGeogh was to die in a rafting accident in Austria in 1999.

Ned faced the diminutions of age with courage: the loss of his car - a hard blow – and reduction to a walking frame, then a wheelchair, and finally a mandatory escort whenever he went outside the house. But to the end he was a real presence, felt both at community meetings in Milltown, and at the prayers of the faithful at Cherryfield Mass. May the Lord be good to his gentle soul.

O'Holohan, Colum J, 1919-1998, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/609
  • Person
  • 13 August 1919-23 April 1998

Born: 13 August 1919, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1938, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1953, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1956, Clongowes Wood College SJ
Died: 23 April 1998, St Joseph’s, Shankill, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death.

Brother of John O'Holohan - RIP 2018

O'Ferrall, Robert, 1803-1834, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1902
  • Person
  • 09 November 1803-07 August 1834

Born: 09 November 1803, Balyna, Moyvally , County Kildare
Entered: 19 September 1823, Amiens, France - Franciae Province (FRA)
Ordained: 22 September 1832, Clongowes Wood College, Naas, County Kildare
Died: 07 August 1834, Balyna, Moyvally , County Kildare

by 1829 in Clongowes

◆ Fr Edmund Hogan SJ “Catalogica Chronologica” :
Died a victim of charity from cholera, while attending the sick bed of Father John Shine, who died from the same disease, at Gardiner St.

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
According to Father Grene, he was a descendant of Rory O’More and brother of Richard O’Ferrall (Richard More O'Ferrall (1797 – 27 October 1880) was an Irish politician, a high level British government official and a Governor of Malta.)

Early education at Clongowes before Ent.
Ordained by Dr Cantwell, Bishop of Meath, who had given him Minor Orders and Diaconate.
1833 He was stationed in Dublin with Father Shine working in the Church and School. During the cholera epidemic he was sent to his father in Balyna hoping to escape it. he had been very affected by Father Shines death from cholera. He arrived at his father’s house, but died the next day. He is buried in the family vault. He was a man of sterling honour, high principle, strict observance and solid piety.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973
Father Robert O’Ferrell 1803-1834
Robert O’Ferrell was a descendent of Rory O’More and brother to Richard O’Ferrell, who was Governor of Malta in the critical years 1546-1850.

He was born in County Kildare on November 3rd 1803. He was educated at Clongowes where he also entered the Society in 1823, and his noviceship was carried out in France. He taught philosophy at Tullabeg where he was ordained priest by Dr Cantwell, Bishop of Meath.

In 1833 and 1834 he was stationed in Dublin where he worked in the Church and in the Hardwicke Street school. During the cholera epidemic there he was sent to his father’s house at Balyna County Kildare. Reaching his father’s residence in the evening, next day his remains were carried out for burial. He died on August 7th 1834 and is buried in the family vault.

He was a man of sterling honour, high principle, strict observance and solid piety.

◆ George Oliver Towards Illustrating the Biography of the Scotch, English and Irish Members SJ
O’FERRALL, ROBERT, son of Ambrose O Ferrall, Esq., of Bellina, County Kildare : born on the 4th of March, 1791 : ordained Priest on the 22nd of September, 1832 : was attacked with Cholera whilst attending his colleague, F. John Shine, of St. Francis Xavier’s Church, Gardiner street, Dublin. Removed to Ballina for a change of air, his constitution was still unable to resist the fatal attack, and on Friday morning, 8th of August, 1834, this promising young Jesuit surrendered his innocent soul to God. Soc. 13.

O'Brien, Thomas PA, 1932-1992, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/687
  • Person
  • 16 June 1932-06 August 1992

Born: 16 June 1932, Cliftonville, Ennis Road, Limerick City, County Limerick
Entered: 07 September 1950, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1964, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1967, Canisius College, Chikuni, Zambia
Died: 06 August 1992, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin - Zambiae Province (ZAM)

Transcribed HIB to ZAM: 03 December 1969

by 1959 at Chivuna, Monze, N Rhodesia - studying language Regency

◆ Companions in Mission 1880- Zambia-Malawi (ZAM) Obituaries :
Fr Tom's death was very sudden. He was acting Mission Procurator in Dublin and had just picked up his sister from the airport. He drove back to the Mission Office. While speaking to her there, he just fell from his chair, with a massive heart attack, and so he died. That was on 6 August 1992.

Tom was born in Limerick in 1932, attended the Jesuit school of the Crescent and then entered the Society in 1950 in Emo. He pursued the normal course of studies of the Society and came out to Zambia for his regency where he taught, prefected and was games master at Canisius Secondary School and Charles Lwanga Teacher Training College.

He was ordained priest at Milltown Park, Dublin on 31st July 1964 and returned to Zambia after his tertianship. He was in the Southern Province from 1966 to 1970 as minister and bursar at Chikuni, minister and assistant Parish Priest in Monze and minister/teacher at Charles Lwanga TTC. The rest of his life in Zambia was spent in Lusaka. Chaplaincy and teaching occupied his time and he also helped in the parish at St Ignatius. He taught at Munali Secondary and Chongwe Secondary. For the Advanced Primary Course at Chalimbana, he taught Religious Education as well as being involved in student counselling. Students at Evelyn Hone College also saw him for spiritual direction. Counselling was what he wished to do with third level students and so he studied at Loyola University in Chicago, USA, for his Masters in Education.

From 1978 to 1983 he became socius/secretary to the provincial, a job which took him to all the Jesuit houses. He became rector of Luwisha House in 1983 and worked as chaplain at the Christian Centre at UNZA. While there, he had a serious heart attack and left for Ireland when he was well enough to travel. It was while he was acting mission procurator, that he had the massive heart attack. As he wished, he was active to the end.

There was a history of heart sickness in the family. Tom himself had minor strokes as well as a by-pass. He was well aware that he would probably die from a heart attack but forged ahead with his life even with this in mind. He was so busy in Dublin – meetings of the Irish Missionary Union, interviewing possible volunteer teachers, traveling for Missionary Exhibitions, fund raising, bringing missionary awareness to the pupils of the Jesuit schools in Ireland – these all kept him on the go. Added to these were family functions such as weddings, baptisms and funerals.

His great talent was his ability to relate to other people, to share friendship with them. He had his own close circle of friends in the Society, yet this never interfered with his sharing his friendship with others. He was approachable and warm-hearted, person-centered. Being with others meant more to Tom than efficiency in planning and execution. On one occasion, he had three appointments in different places at the same time! He looked for the best side of others, accepting them as they were. In his own communities he would give himself as freely and as warmly to the shy and withdrawn as to the stronger members.

A 20-year friend of Tom wrote about him after his death: “He loved life; he loved people. And he did so from a base that was hidden and silent because he dreaded that anyone would think him ‘pious’. But over the years, I became more and more aware of that hidden rock in Tom – his love of Christ. It came through in his homilies to the students and his love of the Jesuits. I think he was at his most fulfilled and contented as a Jesuit during his years at Luwisha. He loved his brothers. I find myself also thinking of the contradictions in him. He was confident and proud; but he was also humble. He was contented, so contented – but he was questioning, sometimes startlingly so. He was above all compassionate but his compassion didn't let you off the hook”.

Note from Jean Indeku Entry
In 1955 he came to Northern Rhodesia with Fr. Tom O’Brien and scholastics Michael Kelly and Michael Tyrrell. They were among the first batch of missionaries to come by air and the journey from London took almost five days via Marseilles – Malta – Wadi Halfa (now under the Aswan Dam) – Mersa Matruh (north Egypt) – Nairobi – Ndola – and finally to Lusaka.

O'Brien, Terence, 1789-1832, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/1862
  • Person
  • 01 February 1789-02 July 1832

Born: 01 February 1789, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 12 November 1825, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Died: 02 July 1832, Sisters of Charity Hospital, Grangegorman, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin at the time of death

by 1829 in Clongowes

◆ Fr Edmund Hogan SJ “Catalogica Chronologica” :
He superintended in great part the building of St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin. He died of cholera while working there 02 July 1832.

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
A carpenter by trade. He spent three years Probation at Clongowes and then his Novitiate at Tullabeg.
He was stationed at Gardiner St while the Church was being erected.
Cholera had come to Dublin, and he contracted it. he was cared for by the Sisters of Charity in hospital and died 02 July 1832.

◆ George Oliver Towards Illustrating the Biography of the Scotch, English and Irish Members SJ
O’BRIEN, TERENCE. In this lay-brother were united superior talents, as a carpenter and builder, with singular modesty and humility. He superintended in great part the erection of the beautiful Church of St. Francis Xavier in Dublin, and was thus employed till, seized with Cholera, he was called on the 2nd of July, 1832, to the Tabernacles not made with hands, eternal in Heaven.

O'Brien, Desmond, 1936-2007, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/685
  • Person
  • 22 September 1936-17 July 2007

Born: 22 September 1936, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1954, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 20 July 1968, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 05 November 1977, Canisius College, Chikuni, Zambia
Died: 17 July 2007, Mater Hospital, Dublin - Zambia-Malawi Province (ZAM)

Part of the St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin community at the time of death

Transcribed HIB to ZAM : 15 August 1973

by 1963 at Chivuna, Monze, N Rhodesia - studying language Regency
by 1971 at Swansea, Wales (ANG) studying

◆ Companions in Mission1880- Zambia-Malawi (ZAM) Obituaries :
Des O’Brien was born on 22 September 1936 in Dublin. He did his early schooling with the Christian Brothers in Monkstown obtaining his leaving certificate in 1954. That same year, he began his life as a Jesuit in Emo Park. After his novitiate, he did his juniorate at Rathfarnham Castle, obtaining a BA degree in Arts from UCD Dublin in 1959. Philosophy studies followed at Milltown Park from which Des obtained a licentiate in 1962.

For his regency he was sent to the then Northern Rhodesia. He studied Chitonga for a year at Chikuni and other mission stations. In 1963 he taught at Canisius College and the following year at Munali Secondary School in Lusaka. Completing his regency, he returned to Milltown Park for theology studies and was ordained on 10 July 1968. Tertianship in Dublin followed and in 1970 he went to Swansea University in the UK and obtained a diploma in social policy and administration.

Returning to Zambia in 1971, Des was appointed parish priest in Monze where he served until 1975. Among his many pastoral activities he began a strong youth club called the Red Arrows which was well known for its football success. He was then appointed chaplain of the lay apostolate for the Monze Diocese, living in Kizito Pastoral Centre from 1976 to 1980 and then at Charles Lwanga Jesuit community from 1980-84. He initiated renewal programs for the laity and traveled throughout the diocese giving workshops. During this time he also became involved with the charismatic renewal and provided steady and balanced leadership.

Des had a sabbatical in the United States in 1981, working on spiritual direction. On his return he was appointed national chaplain of the YCS and took his national team around the country in a minibus offering workshops in all the dioceses. As rector of Xavier House, he was able to provide care for the older members of the community and offer support for the novice director without interfering in his work. The late Paul Lungu often commented on how much he depended on Des’ support in his work with the novices.

The Episcopal Conference asked him to be national secretary for the laity while the Provincial appointed him as delegate of formation. He moved to Matero for a year but then went to Luwisha House which was more central for his work. In 1998 he was made superior of Luwisha House. He was a great man in community with his ready wit and happy demeanour. He was an excellent mimic and often had his companions rolling around in laughter with a few well chosen words and a little gesture. Since his job as delegate and superior took up more and more of his time, he withdrew from his position with the laity. As a delegate for formation, the young men found in him a great listener. However he could be challenging, but he was always fair and supportive. During his years in Lusaka Des offered regular courses on prayer and spiritual direction to the novice groups at Kalemba Hall as well as to the sisters’ formation program at Kalundu Centre. He was a fine teacher, entertaining yet substantial in the material he offered. Many Church personnel came to him for counselling and direction.

In 2000 Des moved back to Monze and took over Kizito Pastoral Centre, offering retreats and seminars as well as renewing the physical structure of the plant. The Bishop asked him to take care of the young priests of the diocese with regular meetings and direction. He was the chairperson of the organising committees for the celebration of the Centenary of the Jesuit arrival in the Monze Diocese. He kept the different committees working together. However towards the time of the big celebration at Chikuni he was quite ill with constant bronchial problems. He did not want to take his home leave until after the big event. When he finally went home it was found that he had inoperable cancer in his left lung. He underwent chemo- and radio-therapy but he weakened with time and eventually lost his voice. He was accepting of his condition and at peace with it. In an email in May he wrote: ’The picture is not bright but, thank God, I am very deeply at peace (even joyful!) I have no doubt that this is all the fruit of the many prayers being offered for me. I am ready for anything and in the meantime enjoying all the leisure I have’.

He tells how a woman from the parish in St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St., came up to him after a Sunday Mass in which he concelebrated, grabbed his hand and said: ’Thanks, Father, for the words’. Des was surprised and said to her, ’but I didn’t say anything, my voice is too weak’. The lady whispered in response, ‘Being up there silent on the altar with us every day is a powerful homily’. He entered the fullness of life on 17 July 2007.

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 133 : Special Issue September 2007

Obituary

Fr Desmond Francis (Des) O’Brien (1936-2007) : Zambia-Malawi Province

Jim McGloin writes:
Des O'Brien was born on 22 September 1936 in Dublin. He did his early schooling with the Christian Brothers in Monkstown obtaining his leaving certificate in 1954. That same year, he began his life as a Jesuit in Emo Park. After his novitiate, he did his juniorate at Rathfarnham castle, obtaining a BA degree in arts from University College Dublin in 1959. Philosophy studies followed at Tullabeg from which Des obtained a licentiate in 1962.

For his regency Des was sent to then Northern Rhodesia. He studied Chitonga for a year at Chikuni and other mission stations. In 1963 he taught at Canisius College and the following year at Munali Secondary School in Lusaka. Completing his regency, he returned to Milltown Park for theology studies and was ordained a priest on 10 July 1968. Tertianship in Dublin followed his fourth year of theology. In 1970 he went to Swansea in the UK and studied at the University College there obtaining a diploma in social policy and administration.

Returning to Zambia in 1971, Des was appointed parish priest in Monze where he served until 1975. Among his many pastoral activities at the parish, he began a strong youth club called the Red Arrows which was well known for its football success. After his fruitful time in the parish, Des was appointed the chaplain of the lay apostolate for the Diocese of Monze, living in Kizito Pastoral Centre from 1976 to 1980 and then at the Charles Lwanga Jesuit Community from 1980 to 1984. As chaplain, Des initiated many different formation and renewal programmes for the laity and traveled throughout the diocese giving workshops. During this time, he also became involved with the charismatic renewal and provided steady and balanced leadership in the renewal.

Des had a sabbatical in the United States in 1984, working in the area of spiritual direction. On his return to Zambia he was appointed national chaplain of the YCS, living at Luwisha House. In 1986 he was appointed rector of Xavier House while continuing his work with YCS. Des was a dynamic powerhouse in dealing with young people. He would take his YCS national team around the country in the minibus, offering workshops in all the dioceses of the country. As rector of Xavier House, he was able to provide care for the older members of the community and offer support to the novice director without interfering in his work. The late Paul Lungu often commented on how much he depended on Des's support in carrying out his work with the novices.

In 1992 Des completed his term as rector and started winding up as chaplain of YCS. The Episcopal Conference asked him to serve as national secretary for the laity and the Provincial had appointed him delegate of formation. He moved to Matero and lived there for a year, later moving to Luwisha House which was more central for his work. In 1998 he was appointed superior of Luwisha House. Always doing the work assigned to him diligently, Des threw himself into the work of the lay apostolate and the work of formation. However, he found that he could not do both adequately; he withdrew from the work with the laity to spend more time as delegate of formation.

From the men in formation who experienced Des as their delegate, you often hear that he was a great listener, that he could be tough and challenging, but that he was always fair and supportive. He managed to blend a concern for the well being of the individual and a concern for the well being of the Society, both of which were important for the delegate's job.

During his years in Lusaka, Des also offered regular courses, mostly on prayer and spiritual direction, to the novice groups at Kalemba Hall and to the sisters' formation programme at Kalundu Centre. He was a fine teacher, entertaining yet substantial in the material he offered. During those years many sisters, priests and lay people came to him for counseling and spiritual direction. His welcoming attitude and compassionate listening provided many with new strength and direction.

In 2000 Des moved back to the Diocese of Monze where he had begun his apostolic work and took over as director of Kizito Pastoral Centre. Once again he took on the work with great enthusiasm, offering retreats and seminars, renewing the physical structure and adding new facilities to the centre. The Bishop of Monze found in him a wise counselor and would often seek advice from him. The Bishop also asked him to take care of the young priests of the diocese (the under-fives), offering them spiritual direction, regular meetings as a group and other care. Des was also chairperson of the organizing committees for the celebration of the centenary of the Jesuit arrival in the Monze Diocese. In his usual well-organized and efficient manner, Des kept the different committees at their tasks and was able to organization a wonderful celebration of the centenary. Towards the time of the big celebration at Chikuni, however, Des was quite ill with constant bronchial problems. He did not want to move up his home leave until after the celebrations.

Although Des worked hard and was very efficient, he also gave time and enjoyed his community. He was welcoming and hospitable. He spent time with the members of the community at prayer, meals and recreation. He had a way of engaging and a sense of humour that were much appreciated. He also an ability to mimic others in their way of talking and acting that was never hurtful, but very true to life. Father General in a letter written to Des for his golden jubilee in 2004 said, “They (his fellow Jesuits) better than I can witness to the inner life that you nourished in prayer, for you could not have lived and served as you have done without a close relationship with Jesus”. Des did have a close relationship with Jesus, nourished by prayer and the Eucharist, a relationship he deeply desired and was willing to share with others.

When Des did finally go on his home leave in September 2005, it was discovered that his health problems stemmed not from bronchial infection but from an inoperable malignant growth in the upper part of his left lung. He underwent chemo and later radiotherapy to reduce the tumour. The treatment left him weakened and caused him to lose most of his vocal functions, but he was accepting of his condition and at peace with it.

In an e-mail in May, Des wrote: “The picture is not too bright but, thank God, I am very deeply at peace (even joyful!). I have no doubt that this is all the fruit of the many prayers being offered for me. I am ready for anything and in the meantime enjoying all the leisure I have”.

He also reflected on his life as a priest with limited ability to function as a priest in a recent issue of Interfuse (Summer 2007, No.132), in which he expressed the frustration he had in not being able to exercise his priesthood in the active way he had been used to. He relates this incident:

“One Sunday morning, having concelebrated a parish Mass, I walked down the aisle with my companion to the end of the Church to greet the congregation as is the custom. As we shook hands and greeted people, an elderly lady made a beeline for me and grabbing my hand, said, ‘Thanks, Father, for those words”. Surprised by this comment, I replied, ‘But I didn't say anything, my voice is too weak’. Learning over, she whispered in my ear, ‘Being up there silent on the altar with us every day is a powerful homily’.”

Des was very consoled by this. He had made a pilgrimage to Lourdes in September 2006 seeking healing but there was no physical change in his condition. However, he wrote: “I was much more at peace and much more accepting of what had happened to me. I am still substantially at peace as I pray daily, 'O God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change”.

Des then reflected in his article, “These few simple words connected me in an extraordinary way with the deeper mystery underlying my present circumstances which I had begun to sense but was resisting, how to be a priest without any normal or visible ministry”. That deeper Mystery guided Des throughout his life, in his active priestly ministry and finally in his silent priestly ministry. Des entered the fullness of that Mystery on 17 July 2007.

From a homily delivered by Clive Dillon-Malone on 25th July, 2007, at St. Ignatius Church, Lusaka:
There's a popular saying that "good goods appear in small packages". Well, this is certainly true of Fr. Des O'Brien, He was small in stature but, like our founder, St. Ignatius, or St. Paul - who were also short in stature - Des was tall in spiritual riches.

Des was always conscious of his height. He once told me how embarrassed he was in having to go into the children's section of shoe shops as the shoes in the adult's section were all too large for him! The late Fr. Bill Lane was a very good friend of Des and they used to joke one another about their height as Bill was also quite short. There was an occasion when, on his 50+ birthday, Des approached Bill in a jovial mood and said proudly, “I'm 50 today”. Bill replied: “Is that in centimetres or in inches?” On another occasion for a concelebrated Mass, Bill took an impish delight in handing Des an alb which was about six feet long! However, Des learned to joke about his height and he was quite capable to giving back as much as he got in good humour. He always had a great sense of humour and a gift for turning the simplest of happenings into amusing incidents. His ability to mimic others contributed to this and he was always good fun in a group.

Des was born in 1936 and he entered the Jesuits in 1954 at the age of 18. After two years of novitiate at Emo in Portarlington, he went to University College Dublin where he spent three years doing a pass B.A. degree from 1956-1959. I mention "pass degree" because, although Des was always a very hard worker, he was not intellectually gifted in the way that so many of his fellow Jesuits in his year were, who were taking honours degrees. Although he never showed any sign of resenting others, his lack of high-powered academic potential accompanied by his small stature left him with an inferiority complex against which he struggled throughout his life. After his university degree, he spent three years in Tullabeg in Ireland from 1959-1962 studying philosophy which he also found difficult. But it was when he came to Zambia in 1962 that his real talents began to emerge and, from then on, he continued to grow in self-confidence and in pastoral achievements.

Des had a great way of relating with children and he would laugh and joke with them at his ease. When he began learning ciTonga in Chivuna on his arrival in Zambia, he quickly became proficient at speaking the language on account of his relating with children. Although they would make fun of mistakes he would make, he learned from them and he could laugh at himself. During vacations, he would enjoy joining Fr. Joe McDonald down in the valley in Fumbo where he increased his ability to speak ciTonga.

In 1963, he moved into Canisius College where he taught for a year and where his ability to relate with young people shone, and where, he was in charge of the medical needs of the pupils. He told me once an amusing incident. When a transfusion group came to Canisius to collect blood, the boys were very scared of giving blood. In order to put them at ease, he told them to come and watch as he gave blood. There were all crowded around the window looking in, but just after giving blood, he fainted. The boys just ran!

In 1964, he moved to Lusaka where he taught for a year at Munali Secondary School before returning to Ireland where he studied theology for four years from 1965-1969 at Milltown Park. He was ordained a priest in 1968. After finishing theology, he went to the University of Swansea in Wales where he obtained a diploma in social policy and administration. The topic of his dissertation was, “The Primary School Leaver Crisis in Zambia”.

On returning to Zambia in 1971, he was appointed as parish priest in Monze, a ministry which he continued for five years, and during which his ability to converse fluently in ciTonga grew. Then from 1976 to 1980, while living at Kizito Pastoral Centre, he was appointed as Director of the Lay Apostolate in the diocese of Monze, and was also involved with the on-going formation of Zambian priests there. A further item that needs to be mentioned is that Des played an important role in the charismatic renewal in Zambia. He had set in motion the Charismatic Movement in the diocese of Monze, at Musaka Secondary School in Choma, and later in Lusaka.

From Kizito, he moved to Charles Lwanga Teacher Trainer College, where he remained for four years from 1980 to 1984. He had already become diocesan lay apostolate chaplain in 1976 and he continued with this work while at Charles Lwanga. He then went on sabbatical for a year in 1984 to Berkeley in California and, on his return, he resided at Luwisha House for a year during which time he was appointed as National Chaplain to Zambian Young Christian Students (ZYCS), a position he held from 1985 to 1993.

After his sabbatical, Des told me of a rather frustrating experience he had. Before going on sabbatical, he had burnt all of his retreat notes so that he might have a clean start with new material when he returned. Just after returning, however, he was asked to give a retreat which he accepted - but then, he suddenly remembered that he had destroyed all his notes and hadn't yet produced new ones! Needless to say, he regretted his earlier action.

By this time, Des' many talents relating to pastoral concerns, spirituality, managerial skills, and ability to assume authoritative positions were noted. In 1986, he was appointed Rector of our Novitiate, a position he held until 1992, and which he fulfilled with great success. He then moved to Matero for a year where he acted as Secretary for the Laity Section of the Zambian Episcopal Conference (ZEC). He held this position for three years until 1995.

In 1993, he moved from Matero to Luwisha House where he remained for seven years during which time he was also appointed Delegate for Formation of Jesuit scholastics. This is not only a very important position to have but a very difficult one as well - as the current Delegate for Formation, Fr. Charles Chilinda, will tell you. Des came to this position at a time when much suspicion and distrust had developed among young scholastics from a previous era, and it took a lot of skill and prudence to do away with built up resentment and bitterness, and restore a feeling of trust and confidence. He managed to do this very successfully. Indeed, it was noted that departures from the Society diminished during this period. He also did a lot to open up more flexible opportunities for different kinds of studies which was much appreciated.

Des was appointed as Superior of the Luwisha House community from 1998 to 2000. After that, he was appointed as Director and Superior of Kizito Pastoral Centre outside Monze where he remained until 2005. While there, he was not only totally dedicated to the development of spirituality programmes but he did immense work in planning and overseeing renovation and building extensions. In this respect, he was very talented in getting funding for different projects. He was also noted for his care and concern for his workers, and more particularly for those affected by HIV and AIDS for whom he obtained ARVs. During this time, Bishop Patriarca gave him the task of visiting his priests throughout the year which he did willingly, although he found it quite burdensome.

Des had become well known as a capable spiritual director and retreat giver over the years and he gave spirituality courses each year for many years at Kalundu Study Centre in Lusaka. The material of these courses was later published in book form under the title, “Lord, Teach us to Pray”. He gave courses in spirituality for many years in Kalemba Hall to religious in formation.

Des had always made himself available when asked to do anything. He found it very difficult to say 'no' to any request. However, he later admitted that he had to learn to say 'no' at times, as he was burning himself out. He was very conscientious and he put great preparation into anything he was asked to do. The negative outcome of this was that he ended up becoming so tense at times that he became sick just before an event.

Des had smoked a lot during his early years and he was aware of lung problems which he had developed. However, although he knew that he should have paid more attention to seeking medical diagnosis and treatment earlier, he left it too late. In September 2005, he went into hospital in Ireland where his condition was diagnosed as “malignant growth in the upper part of the left lung” and “inoperable cancer” for which chemo and radiation treatment were administered. For almost two years, Des underwent this treatment which was very painful and weakening. His response to his suffering was acknowledged by all in Ireland as truly admirable. He never lost his sense of humour and expressed his readiness to die once it became clear that this was inevitable within a relatively short period of time. I had visited him on a number of occasions while in Ireland in 2005 and, like so many others, I was truly edified by his positive resignation to the possibility of an early death. He soon lost his hair and wore a head cap for heat. He also became quite bloated as a result of medication. Up the end, he was determined to keep as active as possible but his energy was becoming less and less, and his ability to speak was seriously affected.

He was finally moved into the Mater Hospital for more on-the spot observation with the intention of moving him to a hospice for the terminally ill. He died more quickly than expected on the 17th July, 2007.

I've been told that Des loved looking after pigeons or doves when he was a young boy. Is it too fanciful to suggest that the Holy Spirit might have been among them in choosing Des even at this early stage for the Lord's work! May the Lord now welcome him home and reward him for his priestly ministry, and for the manner in which he has touched so many lives with his love and service. Amen.

Interfuse No 134 : Christmas 2007

IN MEMORY OF FR DESMOND O’BRIEN

An obituary from Zambia was published in Interfuse, September 2007

As an exact contemporary of Des O'Brien, standing humbly and powerlessly at the door of Gardiner St church, as his coffin was being carried out, it seemed to me that an era had passed away. It was a very different situation from that when first we met in 1954. I have vivid memories of him, while we handed in our belongings to the Socius, smiling greatly as a half-smoked cigarette was being abandoned. From then on he was part of our lives, and was diligent and cheerful, in a period that Fr Bill Johnston describes as “remote, strict, austere”. I would add the word “demanding”. Some time in his 2nd year, Donal O'Sullivan told him that he would give him vows and this assured him.

Later, he proved bright enough, but without a strong line of interest or the personal freedom to be an academic. He liked the study of history, and in class he and Paul Cullen became very friendly with a then corpulent young lady, later to acquire fame, Maeve Binchy. I wonder has she forgotten them! He liked greatly being “bird man”, and learned much about these creatures.

I don't think philosophy was his line of country. He looked after the altar boys and was very kind to them. Amidst a busy life, he may have remembered these now and again, especially the young Cantwell who died. He liked working with young people and the marginalized. (His achievements in Africa have been noted elsewhere).

His humour and liveliness were always in our background - which was something we took for granted. He enlivened many a scene for us. He was witty, a great mimic at least of certain people, and had wonderful acting ability. But he was also very shrewd and sharp. I recall several observations he made to me about myself, and they were correct. Similar remarks made to at least one other caused me some strain, though they were beneficial to the other. His judgement was good, and he had a sharp eye for traits in others that I never averted to.

He was always very true to himself. He could readily banter and give as good as he got. Sometimes some minor plans of his did not work out, but he could laugh at his misfortune. He could be serious and demanding with others, and behind the scenes smile at it all.

He developed an open, liberal train of thought, and some years ago swept me off my feet with his progressive thinking. How deep this was I don't know - it wasn't tested in any discussion. But then, people's attitudes come very much from their reading - from the people they rely on -, from their background and inclinations.

Some years ago, I said to him, “You never come to see us”, and he answered, “You never invited me”. Perhaps we are not as welcoming, as we should! We may feel too much that people like to be left alone.

I don't know what personal difficulties he had to cope with, as he tried to discover his deepest self. However there was a firm, unwavering core to his priestly commitment. His life could simply and profoundly be summed up by saying, “He served the Lord”. He was committed to Jesus, which was very evident in his final illness.

Since his return sick to Ireland, I met him fairly frequently. He was very friendly and we were at great ease - with a mutual looking up to each other. I admired his missionary experience and his ability to give. Whenever I said - many times - to him, “You've a severe blow to face up to”, he agreed, and added that he was ready for all. He added: “I never complained, and I'm not going to do so now”. Physically he resisted his cancer as long as he could, but eventually had to yield and nobly went away.

It is good for the rest of us that he has departed - to hopefully help prepare a place for us. It will be hard to find his leithéid arís.

James Kelly

O'Brien, Daniel E, 1865-1915, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/310
  • Person
  • 31 July 1865-03 July 1915

Born: 31 July 1865, Borrisokane, County Tipperary
Entered: 26 October 1882, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 02 August 1896, St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 September 1902
Died: 03 July 1915, St Ignatius College, Manresa, Norwood, Adelaide, Australia

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

by 1893 at Cannes France (FRA) for health
by 1898 in Collège Sainte Famille, Cairo, Egypt (LUGD) working
by 1900 at Castres France (TOLO) making Tertianship
Came to Australia 1900

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Early education was at Tullabeg.

1897 After Ordination he was in delicate health and so he was sent to Cairo for some years.
He later did Tertianship at Castres.
1901 He was in Australia and stationed at Riverview.
He spent most of his time at the Parish in Norwood, where he was Superior in 1905 for five years, and again in 1913. He died in Office somewhat suddenly 03 July 1915.

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Daniel O'Brien entered the Society at Milltown Park, 26 October 1882, was a junior and philosopher there, and then did regency at Clongowes, 1888-92. Ill health, presumably consumption, caused him to spent time in Cairo and Cannes, and he completed theology at Milltown Park, 1893-97. Tertianship was at Castres, Toulouse province, 1899-1900.
He was sent to Australia in 1900, and after a few years living at Riverview, went to the parish of Norwood where he lived for the rest of his life. He was superior and parish priest twice, 1905-10 and 1913-15. He was still superior when he died.

◆ The Clongownian, 1916

Obituary

Father Daniel O’Brien SJ

The news of the death of the Very Rev D E O'Brien SJ, Superior of the Jesuits at Norwood, early on Saturday morning, July 3rd, 1915, came as a great shock not only to the people of that extensive parish, but to the Catholic community generally. Few priests were better known or more be loved than Fr Dan O'Brien of Norwood, and the crowded congregation at the Requiem Office and Mass at Norwood on Monday morning and the large attendance at the funeral, were evidence of the sincere sorrow felt at his too early demise. It had been known to his friends for a long time that Fr O'Brien suffered from heart disease and asthma, and that his death might occur suddenly, though he was usually active and able to attend to his duties. He took to his bed only on the Thursday. On Friday night the symptoms became alarming, and he expired in the early hours of Saturday morning, at “Manresa”, the Jesuit house at Norwood.

The late Fr. O'Brien was born in Tipperary in 1865. He studied at Tullabeg College, Ireland, and entered the Society of Jesus in 1882. He taught in Clongowes College, and spent some time in the South of France. After finishing his philosophy and theology studies at Milltown Park, Dublin, he was ordained in 1897, and was for some years chaplain to troops in Cairo. He afterwards came to Australia and, with the exception of a short time he spent in the eastern States, he spent all his time in Norwood, where he laboured for upwards of 14 years. During that time he held the position of Superior, with the exception of the term during which Fr Roney SJ acted in that capacity. He was practically the priest in charge at Norwood during the whole of that time. His kindly, genial, and charitable disposition endeared him to all, and his death is very keenly felt.

“Southern Cross” (Adelaide), July gtb, 1915.

Norton, John, 1821-1898, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/352
  • Person
  • 01 August 1821-23 March 1898

Born: 01 August 1821, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 14 September 1838, Hodder, Stonyhurst, England - Angliae Province (ANG)
Ordained: 1855
Final Vows: 02 February 1862
Died: 23 March 1898, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin.

by 1854 at Laval France (FRA) studying Theology 3
by 1856 at College in Havana Cuba
by 1861 at Tournai Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Early in his Scholastic career he was sent to Calcutta (cf ANG Catalogue 1847).
1851 He is in Belgium
1852 He begins four years of Theology at Laval.
1856-1858 He was sent to work in Cuba.
1858-1860 He was sent to Tullabeg teaching Grammar.
1860-1861 He was sent to teach Grammar at Belvedere.
1861-1862 Sent to Drongen for Tertianship.
1862-1869 he returned to teaching at Belvedere, except in 1866-1867 when he was an Operarius at Gardiner St.
1869-1885 He returned to work as an Operarius at Gardiner St. He was also Minister there for twelve years.
1885-1886 He was sent as Minister to Milltown.
1886-1888 He was sent to Galway, first as Operarius, then as Teacher and lastly as Minister.
1888-1890 He was sent as Spiritual Father to Belvedere.
1890 He returned to Gardiner St as Operarius, and remained there until his death 23 March 1898.

He was almost 77 when he died and had spent sixty years in the Society, and twenty-five of those at Gardiner Street.

Nolan, Patrick, 1874-1948, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/305
  • Person
  • 25 March 1874-08 March 1948

Born: 25 March 1874, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 23 September 1891, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 28 July 1907, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1909, Coláiste Iognáid, Galway
Died: 08 March 1948, Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin

Educated at belvedere College SJ

by 1895 at Valkenburg Netherlands (GER) studying
by 1903 at Stonyhurst England (ANG) studying
by 1908 at Drongen Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship

◆ Irish Province News 23rd Year No 3 1948 & ◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1948

Obituary

Fr. Patrick Nolan (1874-1891-1948)

Fr. Patrick Nolan, whose tragic death occurred on the 8th March as the result of an accident on Rathgar Road, was born in Dublin in 1874. Educated at Belvedere College, he entered the Society at Tullamore in 1891. He studied philosophy at Valkenburg, Holland and at St. Mary's College, Stonyhurst, and before proceeding to theology, taught at Belvedere and Clongowes for six years. He was ordained a priest at Milltown Park in 1907 and had among his Ordination companions, the late Fathers Willie Doyle and John Sullivan.
Fr. Nolan's life as a priest may be comprised under three main headings : teacher, preacher, confessor and Director of souls.
As a teacher for fifteen years (1910-1925) in St. Ignatius' College, Galway, his principal subject was History and Geography. Many of his old pupils can bear testimony to the skill with which he reconstructed ancient battlefields, mapped out the exact position of the opposing forces and made the dead pages of history live again. His interest in historical research, especially concerning Old Dublin, remained with him during his whole life and there were very few of the ancient streets and landmarks of his native city with which he was not familiar.
During his five years (1925-1930) on the Mission Staff, he was particularly conspicuous for his forceful and telling sermons and, but for a serious breakdown in health, would certainly have continued much longer at the arduous work of conducting Missions and Retreats.
But it is as a Confessor and Director of Souls, especially during his sixteen years (1930-1946) at Gardiner Street, that he will be best remembered. The many regrets expressed on his departure from Gardiner Street some eighteen months ago, and the many messages of sympathy that followed on his untimely death bear witness to the large and devoted clientele which he had established at St. Francis Xavier's. As a confessor, his ‘patient angling for souls’ was reflected in his patient angling for fish on the rare occasions when he found an opportunity to indulge in his favourite hobby. There were very few fish, great or small, in the box or in the lake, that he missed, for he always knew exactly when. to strike. As a Director of souls, too, he was singularly successful and knew the pitfalls to avoid, as well as he knew the rocks and shoals that might wreck an outrigger on Lough Corrib, of which, in his Galway days, he was reckoned one of the best navigators.
Above and beyond all his external work, however, Fr. Nolan was a man of deep religious fervour, known only to his intimate friends, He was never appointed Superior, but the fact that he was asked for by his brethren and appointed to undertake the office of ‘Master of the Villa’ for several consecutive years is sufficient indication of the esteem in which his affability was held by all. Charity and cheerfulness were the outward expression of his inward life, a great forbearance with others and toleration of their opinions and a very deep love of the Society. With such genuine traits of Christian and Religious Perfection, this contemporary of Fr. Willie Doyle and Fr. John Sullivan was well prepared to meet his death and hear from the lips of his Master : ‘Well done, good and faithful servant, as often as you did it to the least of these my brethren, you did it unto Me’. R.I.P.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Patrick Nolan SJ 1874-1948
Father Patrick Nolan was an expert fisher of souls. From 1930 to 1946 as Confessor in Gardiner Street he plied his skill, and thanks to his zeal and patience he made many a kill of of inconsiderable size.

He was born in Dublin in 1874 and educated at Belvedere and entered the Society in 1891.

He taught for fifteen years in Galway, then spent 5 years on the Mission Staff, and then the rest of his life practically as an Operarius in Gardiner Street.

He met his death tragically, being killed in an accident on March 8th 1948. A truly zealous man with a kindly heart and amusing tongue which won him many friends.

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Community

Father Patrick Nolan (1874-1948)

Born in Dublin and educated at Belvedere College, entered the Society in 1891. He made his higher studies in Valkenburg and Milltown Park where he was ordained in 1907. With the exception of his last year, 1923-24, at the Crescent, as master in the colleges, Father Nolan's teaching career since his ordination was passed in Galway. Failing eyesight forced him to relinquish this work to which he brought enthusiasm and zeal. On leaving the Crescent, Father Nolan joined the mission staff for some five years when he was appointed to the church staff at Gardiner St, where he worked zealously for the next sixteen years (1930-46). He retired to Rathfarnham where he continued as a spiritual director to the end. He was killed in a street accident on 8 March, 1948.

Nolan, Gerard P, 1912-1972, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/304
  • Person
  • 21 November 1912-08 June 1972

Born: 21 November 1912, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1931, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1944, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 03 February 1947, Belvedere College SJ, Dublin
Died: 08 June 1972, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Brother of Tony Nolan - LEFT 1938

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 47th Year No 3 1972
Obituary :
Fr Gerard Nolan SJ (1912-1972)

Gerard Paul Nolan was born on 21st November, 1912, one of the younger members of a fairly large Dublin family. He and the other three boys were educated at Belvedere, and Tony preceded him into the Society, but left shortly before ordination. Two, at least, of his sisters became Loreto nuns.
He came to Emo in 1931 at a time when there were about 50 novices in the house, which had been opened the year before. Fr John Coyne was our master of novices, and Fr Robert Tyndall the socius. The regime then was exacting, but a fair and basically humane one. “Particular friendships” were conventionally taboo, but in fact deep friendships began in Emo and lasted through the forty years since. It did not take long to see that Gerry had a wide, dangerously wide, range of emotions and moods. He had an exhilarating taste for the fantastic and ludicrous, (I suppose we all remember him stalking the puzzled bullocks behind leafy branches during the Long Retreat). He also had a terrible capacity for distress, desperation and suffering.
During his period as a junior in Rathfarnham there began, I think, a certain feeling of frustration that dogged him, and mildly. exasperated his friends, for the rest of his life. He was a perfectionist, he felt that the Society demanded even more than he was capable of, strove to accommodate and yet always believed that he fell short. Being a complicated character he evoked uncertain attitudes in superiors. He often quoted one as asking the question “Is Nolan an angel or a devil?”
A further three years in the rarefied atmosphere of "the Bog" accentuated characteristics bred of an introspective temperament. Yet there were times of expansive freedom -- like the Villas in Roundstone. Times too when Gerry came into his own as an entertainer. No one, rather to Gerry's embarrassment, over forgot his performance as conductor of the fabulous McNamara's band that did the round one Christmas. He had an exquisite stage sense and vein of comedy which could bring the house down when he let himself go. But he was suspicious of his talent and repressed it. He thought that in later life he was appointed director to the Catholic Stage Guild partly as a result of his reputation among his contemporaries as an actor. He deprecated this. During these first eight years in the Society we were fortunate to have benign regimes in Emo, in Rathfarnham and in Tullabeg. Gerry would, perhaps, with his hyper-sensitive nature, have wilted under harsher or cruder treatment at that stage. I did not see him in action during his period in Belvedere as a scholastic or later as a priest. He was an effective teacher with a flair for unearthing and stimulating potential talent in his charges, and, more precious, a capacity to exert influence, not merely pedagogic, that persisted advantageously into adult years. He acted as director of fringe activities such as debating society and musical performances with éclat. After ordination in 1944 and tertianship in Rathfarnham came his second period in Belvedere. By all accounts it was the time when Gerry himself felt he was doing his best work; it gave him at once the opportunity to do well-regulated, exact work, and scope for his generous, enterprising temperament. The adventure of his climb along the foot board of the French train while it swept through the countryside near Paris was one of the episodes that enlivened this period.

Then came his transfer to Gardiner Street and his years as director of the Catholic Stage Guild, and the Theatre and Cinema Workers' Sodality. These were in a way difficult years when an instinctive and withal thoughtful generosity made him most appreciated, but without giving him any sense of achievement along the lines he thought he should be working.
While remaining in Gardiner Street Gerry took up teaching in Bolton Street in 1962. He was well informed in modern “apologetics” and theology and in literature, yet he had here again, to my mind, an excessive diffidence and so his work and its obligations weighed heavily on him. He had a great grasp of life's essential values, a tremendous flow of language; could tell or concoct a story well, and make an exploit out of the humdrum. But most of the time he thought he should be doing something else and doing it perfectly. This inhibited him from retreat giving, lecturing etc., and made even ordinary preaching a discomfort. He was extremely adverse to any theoretical criticism of established structures and over-suspicions of innovation in Church and State. He was a man, then, tumultuously inclined, who ultimately attained an enviable degree of calm and serenity. Always capable of the most lavish and tactful generosity, he had towards the end also become immune to the need for equally generous response. All his life he was the kind of man who would “give you the shirt off his back”, always he remained at his most resourceful in times of crisis. Perhaps, partly as a result of a great deal of suffering from arthritis and other ailments, he developed a spirit that seemed . emancipated from self-interest and requiring no reward. This - I am sure I can say without any improper breach of confidence - became clear to us who did the group course with him in Clongowes last year. He spoke of being “finished” in a cheerfully pessimistic way; he was in fact finished in another sense, he was completed to a rich maturity that came from a penetrating love of Christ and faith in Him and in His people. He had style in everything he did: in the deepest things he had the style of a fully christian man. We in Gardiner Street suddenly lost a loved companion and a stalwart of the community; many other hearts were wrenched at his going. May all his hopes be now fulfilled and may we come to share his life with him again. His obit. Occurred June 8th.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1972
Obituary
Father Gerard Nolan (’31)
Fr Nolan taught in Belvedere for two years as a scholastic and returned as a priest in ‘47 to teach until he moved to Gardiner St in ‘54. The rest of his life was spent doing church work. As the numbers at his funeral made clear he possessed the gift of making friends and of keeping them. During the last two years he had been suffering acutely from arthritis and God alone knows the suffering a visit to the parlour entailed yet he would not disappoint a friend. His death through sudden was a merciful release.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1973
Obituary
Father Gerard Paul Nolan (OB 1925-1931)

Gerry Nolan came to Belvedere, one of a family of several Belvederian brothers, at the age of twelve and after six years in the school entered the Jesuit noviceship at Emo Park: in 1931. His companions here fell into two groups : those who knew him vaguely as a reserved, quiet, polite boy not very prominent in games or studies, and the small number who even then saw something of the richness and depth of his character and his most remarkable artistic, musical and dramatic gifts. Among the latter were a privileged few who were fortunate to win the real friendship of a very affectionate but exceedingly diffident boy, Two in particular became his constant companions and it was not long before the trio was nick-named, by the insensitive schoolboy mob, “He, she and it”. Gerry was the “He” of the little band.

During his schooldays the great era of Gilbert and Sullivan operas began under the direction of Father Mortimer Glynn. Gerry came of a family which possessed very remarkable musical talents and Father Glynn's most exacting standards and constant struggle for perfection appealed to all the perfectionist in him. Thus began a quest for the highest in everything that was to lead to much inspiring work, but which also became a considerable handicap to him. If ever the saying, “Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien” was verified, it was in Gerry's case.

After the usual studies in the Society he returned to Belvedere in 1939 and spent two years as a scholastic here. Next came Theology and the Tertianship and 1946 saw him return for a further nine years of teaching.

These years brought him into contact with many boys and his capacity for friendship widened with the formal relations in class and many informal ones outside. La Fontaine's remark about schoolboys is only too true : “Cet age est sans pitié”. But their merciless characteristics are balanced by an extraordinary perception and recognition of real goodness. Here they had an outstanding example of that before them, and they could also divine his ceaseless industry on their behalf and the deep original sense of humour and the humourous devilment that balanced his diffidence and the moods of black depression that overcame him when he thought he was failing to achieve the impossibly high standards he set for himself. Once again however, these standards were a disadvantage. His Latin classes would have been more successful had he not overwhelmed indifferent pupils with a wealth of detailed erudition that would have stimulated university students. But in teaching English he did communicate to gifted boys his enthusiasm for the best and left a permanent mark upon them.

In 1952 he left Belvedere to become, at the request of the Archbishop, Dr McQuaid, chaplain of the Catholic Stage Guild. Again his diffidence was a handicap, but he made numerous friends and helped many people. To this work was later added that of the Theatre and Cinema Workers' Sodality. After some years in this apostolate he became, while still living in Gardiner St, chaplain and teacher of Religion in the Technical Institution in Bolton St.

The good he did in his life is known to God alone. By pure chance the writer has heard of one or two of his acts of heroic generosity and self-sacrifice. His closer friends are perhaps aware of more. But he did good by stealth and never let his left hand know what his right was doing or about to do. The very antithesis of that obnoxious modern phenomenon, the headline hunter, he was most Christian in this. At his funeral on 10th June, 1972, numerous people unknown to his everyday friends and unknown to each other, were overwhelmed with grief.

Obituaries are always difficult and unsatisfactory. A few bald and conventional paragraphs can never recall a bright and loving spirit. When one comes to a man like Gerry, an amalgam of Jimmy O'Dea and Jack Point, of St Vincent de Paul and St John of the Cross, the task is one of despair. But he was a very holy man, and like all saints, an original. May his noble soul rest in peace with God.

Neary, John J, 1889-1983, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/303
  • Person
  • 20 August 1889-24 October 1983

Born: 20 August 1889, Rathgar, Dublin
Entered: 05 October 1908, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 15 August 1922, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1927, Shiuhing, China
Died: 24 October 1983, Our Lady's Hospice, Harold's Cross, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin at the time of death

by 1917 at St Aloysius, Jersey Channel Islands (FRA) studying
by 1927 first Hong Kong Missioner with George Byrne
by 1950 at St Beuno’s, St Asaph, Wales (ANG) Tertian Instructor

◆ Hong Kong Catholic Archives :
R.I.P.
Father Neary

Only a few septuagenarians and octogenarians in the Hong Kong public can have even faint memories of Father John Neary, who died in Ireland last week, aged 94. He has nevertheless his little niche in our history. He was one of the two Jesuits - Father George Byrne was the other - who came here on 2 December 1926, to start Jesuit work in Hong Kong. Their early decisions have influenced all later Jesuit work here.

He stayed here only five years. In 1931 his health broke down and he had to return to Ireland, where, as Master of Novices or as Instructor of Tertians, he played a large part in the formation of most of the Jesuits now in Hong Kong.

Memory of him lasted long even in this city of short memories. In my earlier years here, I was amazed to find a variety of people still asking for news about him many years after his departure. The late Father Andrew Granelli, P.I.M.E., spoke more and more of Father Neary as his own life neared its end. Their friendship had outlasted forty years of separation.

Father Neary never forgot Hong Kong. When I visited him two years ago he was already 92, but he was full of eager and probing questions about developments here. Streets and buildings and people were still fresh in his memory. He had shortly before been greatly cheered by a visit from Archbishop Tang, whom he remembered as a young Jesuit Student. His thoughts were with us to the end. He deserves a few inches of space in a Hong Kong Catholic Paper.
Sunday Examiner Hong Kong - 4 November 1983

◆ Biographical Notes of the Jesuits in Hong Kong 1926-2000, by Frederick Hok-ming Cheung PhD, Wonder Press Company 2013 ISBN 978 9881223814 :
Born in Dublin in 1889, his early education was at Mount Saint Mary’s in England.

In 1926 Fr John Fahy appointed him and George Byrne to respond to the request from Bishop Valtora of Hong Kong for Jesuit help.

He visited the Jesuits in Macau and Shiuhing as well as Shanghai. Their first project was Ricci Hall at Hong Kong University together with work at Canton Cathedral. he held Wah Yan in great esteem.

By 1931 he had health issues. He was sent back to Ireland where he had an outstanding period at Belvedere College SJ, and became Novice Master

Note from Paddy Finneran Entry
With the encouragement of Michael Murphy he then entered the Novitiate at St Mary’s, Emo under the newly appointed Novice Master John Neary.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 2nd Year No 2 1927

Fr Pigot attended the Pan-Pacific Science Congress in Tokyo as a delegate representing the Australian Commonwealth Government. He was Secretary to the Seismological Section, and read two important papers. On the journey home he spent some time in hospital in Shanghai, and later touched at Hong Kong where he met Frs. Byrne and Neary.

Irish Province News 59th Year No 1 1984

Obituary

Fr John Neary (1889-1908-1983)

In this age of questionnaires and surveys it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that we might at some time be pondering as to which Irish Jesuit could claim to be most mimicked. I'm pretty sure that one contestant, namely John Neary, would far outstrip the others. He would have a head-start for two reasons: first, his mannerisms were easy to copy even by those not particularly gifted at mimicry; and secondly he guided into the Irish Province of the Society a greater number of candidates than any other known Master of Novices. He held that formative position for eleven years and indeed had contact with novices for a further nine years while he was Spiritual Father in Emo.
Mimicry can be cruel, of course, but it can also be harmless, and in this case I think it was a measure of the affection which he generated. His tones, his manual and facial gestures, his some what quaint turns of phrase, were prime targets for his would be copiers; but there was never any hint of malice or ill-feeling in the imitation. I'm sure he cannot have avoided hearing the echo at odd times: and I'm equally sure that he would not have felt any resentment. He would probably have merely chuckled to himself.
My acquaintance with him (to which this account is naturally restricted; let others tell the rest of the story) was confined to the noviceship period, a brief month or so in the Tertianship, when he filled in for Fr Hugh Kelly and finally the last seven years of his life at Gardiner street and Our Lady's Hospice. Opinions differ as to his value as a Master of Novices. Others are better qualified to judge; I found him kindly and discerning. He could harden and raise his voice at times, he could give virtue', but it was always to those who could take it; it was never crushing or ridiculous, in the full sense. Incidentally, I never did discover whether the “honking” which preceded his appearance around the corner was necessary throat-clearing or an early warning signal – and likewise with the slipper-dragging routine (this certainly was no “pussyfooting”, by any count!).
Though he was a firm believer in de more he used to illustrate the good use of creatures by changing routine to fit in with exceptional weather. During both our years in Emo the lake froze hard (enough to allow horses with padded hooves to pull tree-trunks from one side of the lake to the other) and we were all herded out to learn to skate, willy-nilly. As everyone knows. he had a great interest in bee-keeping, too, but it was only the chosen few, the “discreets”, who were allowed to assist him and involve themselves in this speciality. His appreciation of the health-giving properties of honey (and, later on of half bananas!) was to last to the end of his days. A spoonful, given semi-secretly in his room, was considered an infallible cure for anything from the blues' to a heavy cold.
There was never any doubt about his zeal. Fr Tom Ryan wrote of him: “Zeal for conversion was always characteristic of him. During his theology in Milltown Park he had Protestant converts continually on hand”. Altogether he spent twenty years in Emo and was in Gardiner street for about the same length of time. There he continued, unobtrusively, this work of finding and instructing those who were interested in the faith. I think his special interest in converts and in ecumenism may have stemmed originally from his enormous devotion to Cardinal Newman and his writings. Many were the cuttings from newspapers and the Tablet concerning Newman that he left behind. (He had apparently one of those love-hate relationships with the Tablet - castigating it vigorously for its anti-Irish attitude, yet waiting breathlessly for the next issue. Indeed, one of the few naughty memories about him is the image of the hand appearing suddenly around the reading room door, casting deftly on to the table that missing copy of the Tablet. I think it must have been his greatest crime, the nearest thing to an inordinate attachment!).
He lived a frugal style of life and showed a practical sympathy with the poor, as evidenced by his devotion to an respect for the St Vincent de Paul Society. A little incident he related illustrates this fact, and, as å by-product, his type of humour (faintly wicked at times). On one occasion the conference members he directed were discussing the amount of assistance they should give to what is now called a “single parent” of several children from different stock. He told me that he dissuaded the brothers from providing the double-bed requested by the lady in question!
His greatest achievement of all was, without the slightest shadow of doubt, our mission to China. Fr Ryan wrote: “He may to a very great extent be said to have been the originator of the Irish Province mission to China. It is almost certain that it would not have been undertaken at the time it was, but for him”. Some time before he had to retire to Our Lady's Hospice I thought it would be worthwhile recording his memories of the start of that mission. So I interviewed him in his room, with the aid of a cheap tape-recorder and found him surprisingly co-operative. (He adapted to modern inventions, customs and changes extremely well). It was only afterwards that I discovered a similar account written by him for the 1933 Jesuit Year Book. A comparison of the two versions proved how accurate his memory was. Moreover, after his death I read some of the correspondence he had with Fr Fahy. This not only proved his great power of almost total recall about this period of his life but also revealed his humility while confirming what Fr Ryan wrote. Before that, even from his own account, I had not realised how much he had manoeuvred Fr Fahy into beginning the mission, and how much the Provincial was guided by him. He gave the impression, of course that he was only doing the bidding of his superior!
Although he spent less than five years in Hong Kong, his heart remained there for as long as it beat. As he said himself, he was always interested in the mission and listened avidly to the reports of those who came back home on visits. The ultimate proof of his intense interest was to be given at the very end of his life. During the last few months before he died there were long periods when he obviously thought he was in Hong Kong or that the conversation of his visitors referred to the colony as he knew it
In his notes on the history of the Jesuit Mission in Hong Kong, the late Fr Tom Ryan, one of the earliest superiors of that Mission, wrote at considerable length about Fr Neary and I think he is worth quoting yet again. Many of the qualities he spotted in “Pa Neary” will be easily recognised:
“Fr John Neary, a Dublin man. educated at Mount St Mary's in England, was ... absolutely matter-of fact and down to earth. He was of great precision of thought and speech, and even of movement. He had not much imagination, but he had an excellent sense of humour and had great natural kindness. As he suffered seriously from asthma, he never would have been sent to a foreign mission except for the great interest which he had in missionary work ... He had absolutely no ear for music and could distinguish ‘tones’ with difficulty, so the study for him was doubly hard, but he recognised the difficulty and practised the tones for hours on end every day, to the dismay at first of his teacher, since he compelled him to listen to him until he got them right. The result was that even though there was always something artificial in the way in which he spoke Chinese, his absolute accuracy was commented upon by all”.
He died as he had lived, unobtrusively - almost secretly. For two nights he appeared to be on the point of departure ... but, as usual, he refused to be hurried. His great faith and serene piety were marked by the fact that his lips were moving continuously in prayer. On the second night, before we left the bed side, his nephew, Fr Peter Lemass, recited the prayer for the dying composed by his beloved John Henry Newman. Early next morning, as though in a final demonstration of his sleight of hand, he slipped away in our absence. He could not quite fool the nuns, however. A large group of the community, including their provincial, had gathered around and they were praying with and for him as he breathed his last light breath. It was not, of course, the end for him, but, as more than one Jesuit which many came to see and admire; remarked, it was the end of an era for the Irish Province.
DC

Naughton, John, 1835-1911, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/301
  • Person
  • 15 January 1835-09 June 1911

Born: 15 January 1835, County Limerick
Entered: 16 April 1864, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: - pre Entry
Final Vows: 15 August 1876
Died: 09 June 1911, Miss Quinn’s Hospital, Mountjoy Square, Dublin

Part of St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin at time of his death.

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He entered as a Priest, having been in the Limerick Diocese, and having been lent to All Hallows as professor of the Aspirants to various Foreign Missions.
He was a Novice under Luigi Sturzo at Milltown.

1866-1867 After First Vows he was sent to Louvain for further studies - Ad Grad.
1867-1871 He was sent to Galway as a Teacher of Rudiments and Mathematics, and also prefect of the Church. He was also Director of the Sacred Heart Confraternity and Operarius. For his last two years here he also was involved in the Missionary Band.
1871-1888 He was sent to Gardiner St as Operarius
1888-1890 He was sent to Milltown to direct Retreats and Missions.
1890-1894 He was sent back to Gardiner St as Operarius and Missions.
1894-1896 He was again sent to Milltown as part of the Missions group.
1896 He finally returned to Gardiner St again, and was President of the BVM Sodality for girls, being succeeded by William Butler and Martin Maher in this role. He remained in Gardiner St until his death 09/06/1911.
He was for many years one of the best Preachers at Gardiner St, and also a favourite Catechist on the Missions. Professional men especially liked his sermons, they were so well thought out, persuasive and elegant in expression, and full of quiet humour and funny stories. He was shy and retiring in style, very quiet, gentle and kind, fond of children, fishing and the sea.
For the last year of his life he was in failing health, and about 10 days before death he was moved to Miss Quinn’s Hospital, Mountjoy Square, where he died peacefully. Fathers Matthew Russell and Timothy O’Keeffe were with him at the time.

Note from John Bannon Entry :
On the evening of his death the Telegraph published an article on him headed “A Famous Irish Jesuit - Chaplain in American War” :
“The Community of the Jesuit Fathers in Gardiner St have lost within a comparatively short time some of their best known and most distinguished members. They had to deplore the deaths of Nicholas Walsh, John Naughton, John Hughes and Matthew Russell, four men of great eminence and distinction, each in his own sphere, who added lustre to their Order, and whose services to the Church and their country in their varied lines of apostolic activity cannot son be forgotten. And now another name as illustrious is added to the list. The Rev John Bannon....

Nash, Robert, 1902-1989, Jesuit priest and writer

  • IE IJA J/300
  • Person
  • 23 April 1902-21 August 1989

Born: 23 April 1902, Cork City, County Cork
Entered: 01 September 1919, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1931, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1934, Clongowes Wood College SJ
Died: 21 August 1989, Our Lady’s Hospice, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death

by 1927 in Australia - Regency at Xavier College, Kew
by 1933 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) making Tertianship

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online :
Nash, Robert
by Patrick Maume

Nash, Robert (1902–89), Jesuit priest and apologist, was born 23 April 1902 at Cork, third and only surviving child of Robert Nash (d. Southampton, 21 November 1901) and his wife Delia (née Kearney). He was brought up in Limerick by his mother and maternal uncle Joseph Kearney, a shop worker, and was educated at St Mary's convent school, St Munchin's day school, and Mount St Alphonsus College, Limerick, a minor seminary for the Redemptorist order. Nash was heavily influenced by his mother's fervent catholicism, which had been reinforced by her unhappy childhood and adult bereavement. He subsequently thought she was over-protective but that she did not exert any undue influence on his choice of vocation; he made the priesthood his life's ambition. After the Redemptorists decided that his health was too weak for the religious life, Nash approached the Jesuit order and entered the Jesuit novitiate at Tullabeg, near Tullamore, on 1 September 1919.

Nash took his vows as a Jesuit in 1921. After three years in the Jesuit training house at Milltown Park, Dublin, he was sent on the Australian mission, 1925–8, then returned to Milltown Park for four years’ theological study. He was ordained to the priesthood on 31 July 1931. He subsequently spent ten months’ tertianship at St Beuno's College in north Wales. His superiors retained him in Ireland out of consideration for his mother, who died in 1949. He soon became well known as a preacher and leader of retreats.

Nash's first article on spiritual matters appeared during his scholasticate, when his superior asked him to write up his trial sermon; he eventually published at least twenty-eight books, one of which (Is life worth while? (1949)) sold 100,000 copies, and more than 300 pamphlets. He had the gift of expressing himself in simple and direct language. Nash's world view was uncompromising: he preached a popularised version of Ignatian spirituality, with its emphasis on total commitment. Every moment was seen as participating in the fateful choice between heaven and hell; his compulsive writing reflected fear of wasting time. Even the mildest worldly pleasures came under suspicion as distractions from eternity or occasions of sin. This view lay behind his most notorious pamphlet, The devil at dances, which appeared during the clerically inspired campaign against unsupervised dance venues in the 1930s. Its opening description of a young woman at a dance hall, who notices that the attractive stranger with whom she is dancing has cloven hooves, was read literally by naive readers, producing widespread fear and scrupulosity. One of Nash's books was an annotated edition of St Ignatius Loyola's Spiritual exercises, which formed the basis for his extensive activities as a retreat master; his guides to prayer, such as The priest at his prie-dieu (1949), drew on Ignatian techniques of visualisation and were widely used in the formation of seminarians.

From 1951 to 1985 Nash wrote a weekly column on religious matters for the Sunday Press, the first of its kind in an Irish newspaper; in 1954–85 he also published daily ‘Phone calls’ (brief sixty-word reflections) in the Evening Press. During lengthy visits to Australia in 1956–7 and America in 1964 he provided the editor with a year's columns in advance – an indication of his professionalism, his fluency, and the extent to which he saw himself as preaching a timeless and unchanging message independent of day-to-day events. He calculated that he had written more than a million words for his column; in its latter years he was often accused of manipulating readers through fear of hellfire, but this discounts his utter conviction of the reality of the danger and his own duty to warn against it. He asked much of his readers, but no more than he demanded of himself; his life was so focused on its central objective that all other pursuits seemed trivial to him.

Nash's greatest popularity occurred during the 1950s, when readers could see themselves as part of a triumphant worldwide church battling uncompromisingly for the faith delivered to the saints. He was ill at ease with many developments after the second Vatican council; he acknowledged that the new relaxed approach was helpful in winning souls who might previously have been antagonised, but feared that excessive toleration of heterodoxies within the church and downplaying formal ritual might blind people to their spiritual needs. He never appeared on television: ‘the typewriter was the instrument I knew best so I stuck with it’ (Irish Times, 22 Aug. 1989). In 1980 Nash was a founder member of the third world aid group Action from Ireland (AfrI).

Nash retained a faithful, ageing readership until he ceased to write his column in 1985, declaring that it was time to say ‘What I have written I have written.’ He intended My last book (1983), a combination of autobiographical recollections and advice on prayer, to live up to its title (it concludes with meditations on death and heaven). He was lured back into print by admirers urging that if another book saved one soul it would be worth while; in 1986 he published My last phone call. Nash spent his last years in the Jesuit community at Gardiner Street, Dublin, where he continued to hear confessions until a year before his death. Early in 1989 deteriorating health led to his transfer to Our Lady's Hospice, Harold's Cross, Dublin, where he died 21 August 1989.

The vast contemporary popularity of Nash's writings, whose structured and fervent certainties contrast with the colloquial soothings of later Irish religious columnists, says much about the enthusiasms and restrictions of late Tridentine Irish Catholicism. Nash lived to see the aspirations he embodied condemned, ridiculed, or forgotten by a generation with less restrictive lives, new horizons, and different aspirations; he himself was virtually forgotten within a few years of his death.

Robert Nash, My last book (1983); Evening Press, 22 Aug. 1989; Irish Press, 22 Aug. 1989; Ir. Times, 22 Aug. 1989; Irish Catholic, 24 Aug. 1989; Sunday Press, 27 Aug. 1989; Monsignor James Horan: memoirs 1911–1986, ed. Micheál MacGréil (1992)

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Robert Nash joined the Society in 1919, and after initial Jesuit studies came to Australia and Burke Hall in 1925 as prefect of discipline and teacher. He loved his time there and was sorry to be recalled for theology in 1928.
He was later famous for his popular books on prayer, such as “Priest at his Pre-Dieu”, “Nun at her Pre-Dieu”, which caused a good deal of frustration among the intellectual professors who could not get their learned works published. His many pamphlets led Nash to being in considerable demand as a missioner and retreat director.
He returned to Australia, 1962-64, trying to start the popular Irish Mission, but it did not work. Nash gave house retreats at Watsonia, and amongst his points on one occasion he encouraged the scholastics to imagine the number of mortal sins being committed that night within a mile of the college. This taxed the imagination of the scholastics somewhat as the area within a mile of the college was still largely bush and farms. He must have considered the few farmers to be a sinful lot! Robert Nash remained productive in writing and preaching until almost the end of his life.
He was not lacking in confidence!

Murray, Brendan P, 1934-2002, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/476
  • Person
  • 28 October 1934-14 March 2002

Born: 28 October 1934, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 06 September 1952, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 28 July 1966, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1971, Clongowes Wood College SJ
Died: 14 March 2002, Mater Hospital, Dublin

Part of the St Ignatius, Lower Leeson Street, Dublin community at the time of death

by 1986 at Regis Toronto, Canada (CAN S) on sabbatical

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 112 : Special Edition 2002

Obituary
Fr Brendan Murray (1934-2002)
28th Oct. 1934: Born in Dublin
Early education at St. Joseph's, Terenure and CBS, Synge Street.
6th Sept. 1952: Entered the Society at Emo
7th Sept. 1954: First Vows at Emo
1954 - 1957: Rathfarnham - Studied Arts at UCD
1957 - 1960: Tullabeg- Studied Philosophy
1960 - 1962: Mungret College - Regency
1962 - 1963: Clongowes - Regency; Clongowes Cert. in Education
1963 - 1967: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
28th July, 1966: Ordained at Milltown Park
1967 - 1968 Tertianship at Rathfamham
1968 - 1974: University Hall - Principal, Bursar
15" Aug. 1971: Final Vows at Clongowes
1974 - 1978 John Austin House - Chaplain, D.I.T. Kevin St; Bursar
1978 - 1985: Campion House - Chaplain, D.I.T. Kevin Street; Bursar, Co-ordinator, Communications
1985: Vice-Superior.
1985 - 1986: Toronto - Sabbatical year
1986 - 1991: Tullabeg - Superior; Minister; Pastoral Delegate
1991 - 1993: Gardiner Street - Vice-Superior, Minister; Pastoral Delegate
1993 - 1997: Superior; Editor, Messenger; National Secretary Apostleship of Prayer; Pastoral Delegate
1997 - 2002: Leeson Street - Superior; Editor, Messenger; National Secretary of Apostleship of Prayer 14th Mar.
2002: Died at Mater Hospital, Dublin.

Brendan was taken ill at the end of February, 2002. In St. Vincent's Hospital it was diagnosed that he had had a heart attack. He suffered a second heart attack in the hospital. His condition worsened a week later. He was taken to Mater Hospital, where they performed a double by-pass operation. The doctors gave his chances of recovery as 50/50. He was kept on a life support system, but did not respond. From the early hours of March 14th his condition deteriorated rapidly, and he died peacefully in the morning of the same day, surrounded by members of his family.

Michael Drennan writes....
One could wonder what Brendan might have done, had he not joined the Jesuits. With his keen intelligence, great sense of humour and his ability to mimic, many avenues could have opened up for him. He might have outdone Gay Byrne, who also did the Leaving in 1952 at Synge Street CBS. Brendan could have attained fame in many fields, but his desire was not for earthly treasure. God's fidelity and commitment met a faithful response in a life that was a nice blend of the serious and the light-hearted. Brendan had a gentle hold on life. Yet, in his life he achieved much, left us a lot to cherish and be grateful for, as he had a depth and wisdom that was too good to be forgotten.

We gathered for his funeral on the Feast of St. Joseph, who is described as a “man of honour”. The same words might be used of Brendan. There was a deep sadness evident as we bade him farewell; he was taken so quickly that we had little opportunity to say goodbye.

The Gospel of the Emmaus journey seemed relevant as a way of giving a brief summary of Brendan's life. It is a good story. Brendan was a man of story having a great abundance of them; and he could tell them well. He had the capacity to embellish and make them richer, even giving the more elaborate version back to the person who had shared it with him, originally - unknowingly? In talks and retreats, he used stories to illustrate aspects of God's story from Scripture; many appeared in his well-written editorials in the Sacred Heart Messenger. A good story can have many levels of meaning.

It is a story of good companionship, which shortens a journey and leaves lasting memories. Brendan was a good companion to many people, especially, to his own family, whose loss was great; he kept in contact with them, wherever they were, sharing their joys and sorrows. In community he could brighten up a dull day with his witty interventions. He was a companion to many people whose lives he touched in ministry, whether that was in Kevin Street DIT, or to people who came to see him, or in talks or retreats he gave, or to those he worked with. Through the Sacred Heart Messenger, he reached many who felt they knew him through his writing.

He was a good companion because he had depth as well as humour. Discussions on theology, scripture, religious life, or art, engaged him. He loved fun, also, though some of his pranks did not work out as envisaged and recovery tactics were required on occasion. His sense of humour was endearing and had the lovely ability to laugh at himself. He told me the story not so long ago, about someone overhearing two people at another table in a restaurant talking about religious magazines. Finally they came to the Messenger; one said she loved the Messenger and she particularly liked Fr Murray whose photo was inside the front cover; he had a lovely smile, but then she added, “Of course, I don't believe a word of what he says”. A phone call to him was enough to raise one's heart and bring to the fore the lighter side of life.

The journey to Emmaus was made in the company of Jesus. Being a Jesuit, being in the Company of Jesus, walking the journey of life with Him was of central importance to Brendan. He was a good companion to all of us who walked with him. He contributed much, with most of his Jesuit life spent in leadership roles, often taking on difficult tasks and carrying them through. He was a dedicated worker, who had a bright, analytic, and perceptive mind, being a good judge of people and situations. While he could make the hard decision, he had a compassionate nature. He was loyal and faithful, with a generous heart, making his many talents available to others, whether it was taking on a new project, refurbishing a house, or closing one down. He had the flexibility to adapt to new situations and was at this best when under pressure. While he could get impatient at times, and sometimes he was not especially tolerant of lesser mortals, it tended to blow over quickly and it was soon forgotten.

In the Emmaus story, the opening of the word of God is significant. Brendan had a great love and appreciation for the word of God and opened it out to many. Most of his talks were based on Scripture, with a helpful story or two to lead into them. It was a living word for him; what he shared came from his own reflection and prayer and it spoke to many who heard him.

God's story of love, lived out in Jesus, met Brendan's story; he was generous in response. The gifts that God offered were those that Brendan, behind the mischievous smile and often subtle humour, wanted. Those latter years in the Messenger gave more scope to his creative side, to write, to edit, to design, and to help continue the updating of the magazine and its organisation. He relished the task and loved it, but he was good at it. The redoing and relocating so beautifully of the Evie Hone windows in Manresa also owed much to him. His attention to detail, ensuring that were placed where they would get maximum light, was carefully thought out. It could be said that in other areas, such as ordering a meal, he tended to be less creative and adventurous, there was a consistency there as he stayed with the tested and reliable. I suppose he could not be flexible on everything! Yet, there was something more than ordinary about him. He was forty-five when he learned to drive; he is the only person I know, who, on the successful completion of his driving test, came away with a Mass intention from his examiner!

He had the openness and freedom to walk with and accept the call of the Lord, letting the Lord enter his story in a new way. In that story there is a deepening of the call, as it moved towards the final part of it. He invited the Lord in, so that the Lord could reveal himself more intimately and break bread with him. Now the Lord has issued a new invitation; the journey is completed; the story has been told, the messenger's work is done, the banquet is ready. But we are to remember that story, interwoven with God's story; we are to live in its spirit, as we continue to walk on in faith.

We weep for his untimely passing, we will miss his gentle presence, but we are the richer for knowing him. His life is a good story, narrated by a very competent messenger. We pray that God will be merciful to him for any failings and give him the rewards of life that is eternal love, which is God's desire for him and for all of us. May he rest in peace.

-oOo-

Noel Barber wrote the following “Appreciation” for THE IRISH TIMES...
Fr. Brendan Murray, who died on March 14", aged 67, ploughed what many would consider infertile soil. For the past 10 years he edited a devotional religious magazine, The Sacred Heart Messenger. Many will be surprised, however, to learn that the circulation of The Messenger is well into six figures; surprised, too, to learn the range of its readership - from the very simple to the highly sophisticated. This magazine, an extraordinary survival, bears testimony to the fact that a religious monthly can still command a place in the market.

Its standard was high when he took over; the previous editors had adapted it to the needs and tastes of changing times without sacrificing its religious thrust. Building on the work of his predecessors, he brought to his task an exceptional attention to detail, an immense care with its artistic production, and a keen financial eye. His editorials, beautifully written with wit, verve and wisdom, touched a large and devoted readership; some have already expressed their sense of loss at the prospect of The Messenger without him.

He was born in Dublin on October 28th, 1934, to Frank Murray, a Civil Servant, and Lucy Dunne, one of nine children, of whom his brothers Frank and Declan and his sisters Colette Nolan, Maureen Flanagan and Carmel Murray survive him. He was educated by the Christian Brothers, Synge Street, and entered the Jesuit Novitiate at Emo Park, Portarlington, in 1952, He was an able and serious student, obtaining a good degree in Latin and Irish, and Licentiates in Philosophy and Theology. He had the capacity to become a specialist in any one of these disciplines. His character was a quixotic mix of high seriousness and earthy frivolity. There were few who could discuss better serious matters of literature, theology, philosophy - or art, in which he had a particular interest and a discriminating taste. On the other hand, he was a joker and prankster, a raconteur and mimic, who brightened many a dark afternoon for his fellow students. His stories grew in the telling in which his mentors, academic and religious, assumed a second existence.

After his Ordination in 1966, he held a variety of positions in all of which he used his considerable ability, charm and, when necessary, his formidable determination to achieve his purpose, be it in closing down a Retreat House, as Principal of a University Residence, as Chaplain to the Dublin Institute of Technology, or as a Superior of Jesuit Communities. He had outstanding pastoral skills as so many will testify: the priests who followed his retreats, the religious whom he counselled and people of all walks of life who came to receive his shrewd, kindly and practical advice. As a preacher and retreat giver he used his talents as a storyteller to great effect but his story telling was always at the service of a deep spirituality and sound common sense. These in turn reflected his warm, rich personality. In his case, the person was very much the message.

His friends were surprised that his fatal heart attack had not happened earlier. Despite his intelligence, wisdom, understanding of others and the advice of his brethren, his style of life was almost self-destructive. He worked impossibly long hours, took no exercise, rarely, if ever, had a holiday, and sustained himself on great quantities of nicotine and caffeine. He was a man of great goodness with an inexplicable disregard of himself. He will be greatly missed and it will take an exceptional person to fill his shoes.

Murphy, David, 1944-1982, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/19
  • Person
  • 15 May 1944-21 May 1982

Born: 15 May 1944, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1962, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 21 June 1974, Gonzaga College SJ, Dublin
Final Vows 29 December 1980, Tabor House, Milltown Park, Dublin
Died: 21 May 1982, St Luke's Hospital, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death

by 1968 at Chantilly France (GAL S) studying
by 1975 at Grenelle Paris (GAL) teaching
by 1979 at Copenhagen Denmark (GER S) working

◆ Companions in Mission 1880- Zambia-Malawi (ZAM) Obituaries :
‘A tall, determined young man’ is what first comes to mind when David's name is mentioned. He was born in Dublin on 15 May 1944 and attended Gonzaga College for his secondary schooling. He was one of the school's first vocations and entered the Society at Emo in 1962. At the University he took English and French for his degree and French culture had a special appeal for him, so he went to Chantilly, France, for his philosophy in 1967. For regency he came to Zambia in August 1969 and after six months working at the ciTonga language, he moved into Canisius Secondary School as a teacher. ‘A certain intolerance for what he saw as the merely conventional began to emerge. There was something a little wooden and naive in his own attitude but his indignation at another man's apparent failure in charity or common sense for the sake of conventional propriety never led to a lessening regard for those he disagreed with’. He took on a number of 'causes': prisoners' rights (Dublin, Copenhagen, Northern Ireland), opposition to apartheid in South Africa, Third World problems (which increased that intolerance), and a distaste for injustice of any kind.

He was ordained in Milltown Park on 21st June 1974 and went to America for a few months. It was while there that the brain tumour which finally killed him came to light. That settled the question of whether he should return to Zambia where he had so enjoyed teaching. Still, though slowed down by his illness and treatment, he went to Paris for two years to study pastoral theology. After a year in Gardiner Street parish, he returned to Paris for another year 1977.

In 1978 he undertook what was perhaps the most amazing adventure of all, he became prison chaplain in Copenhagen (Denmark) to those non-Danish prisoners who neither spoke nor understood either English or French. His sense of outrage at what he saw as the callous mistreatment of a fairly wretched group by a reputedly sophisticated society was quick to surface and he did not hesitate to communicate it to others’. The last two years of his life he spent in Dublin receiving treatment for his tumour. He did a little parish work and prison visiting at Mountjoy prison.

His final illness as he moved in and out of comas and became increasingly paralysed and humiliatingly dependent was a deeply harrowing time, above all for David himself but also for his community and brave family. He died on 21 May 1982 in his 38th year of life.

People who knew David found him to be gentle, humorous, kindly, while at the same time determined and single minded. He was angered by humbug and pretence. On these occasions he could be rigidly uncompromising. His strong character showed a deep personal honesty and integrity. To the end, he was very appreciative of the dedicated help he received from those who were looking after him, both at St Luke's Cancer hospital and from his own religious community.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 57th Year No 3 1982
Obituary
Fr David Murphy (1944-1962-1982)

David Murphy came to the Society in the middle of the brief boom at the start of the sixties. Son of Michael, an active and well-loved Old Clongownian and related, through his mother, to Fr Paddy O’Kelly, he had spent his schooldays in Gonzaga and was one of the school's first vocations. We were 24 in the class of ‘62, reduced to 15 by vow-day two years later and now, with David’s course already completed, numbering just eight. But in those days the cameratas bulged on the seams, we had enough to play two soccer matches on a Sunday afternoon and Fr Socius Timoney’s eyes gleamed at the prospect of a huge workforce to be unleashed on the unsuspecting “clochar”, come the Long Retreat.
From the beginning David stood out. He was a big man, both in body and spirit. The monastic style of Emo in those preconciliar days required just the qualities of generosity and inwardness which David abundantly possessed. He was a very diligent, reliable novice but never lacking in a sense of humour to keep things in proportion. He was a good athlete - who can forget him, then and later, putting in those disconcertingly long-legged tackles at centre-half and rising above everybody to head clear? On the tennis-court, where a novice's spirit of charity could be tested, David was a tough but always impeccably courteous opponent.
He was in Rathfarnham from 1964-67 and enjoyed the university years. He was a solid student and got a solid degree in English and French. But for David there was much more to life in UCD than study or the narrow constraints of the set curriculum. It was from him that we all first heard of Merleau-Ponty and we used to be aghast at his facility for persuading the likes of Monsieur Cognon and Dr Denis Donoghue to take him down to the Shelbourne between lectures for coffee and earnest discussion. These encounters were neither engineered to curry favour with his teachers nor narrated afterwards to impress his companions in the Juniorate. I have rarely known anyone so free of human respect or fear of what others might think.
French culture had a special appeal for David - he was to spend five of his 20 years as a Jesuit in France - and in 1967 he went to Chantilly for philosophy. He became interested in Freud, an interest he never lost, and was reputed to have managed an interview with the reclusive Samuel Beckett by the simplest of stratagems - going along and knocking on the great man's door.
He volunteered for the missions after philosophy and went to Zambia with Colm Brophy in 1969. That David should have wanted to be a missionary was wholly in character and exemplified his courage, generosity, independence and spirit of adventure. It was in France and in Zambia, I think, that something else began to emerge - a certain intolerance of what he saw as the merely conventional. There was possibly something a little wooden and naïve in his own attitude but his indignation at another man's apparent failure in charity or commonsense for the sake of conventional propriety never led to a lessening of respect for those he disagreed with. He was not inclined to judge motives; he simply could not understand their behaviour. In later years, when he was ill and when his causes had become prisoners' rights (whether in Dublin, in Northern Ireland, or in Denmark) and opposition to apartheid, the intolerance increased and the interpretation of some situations could seem a little lopsided. But behind it was always David's own utter decency and his extreme distaste for injustice of any kind.
After three years in Milltown Park at theology, he was ordained by Archbishop Ryan on 21st June, 1974 and, that summer, while he was in America, the brain tumour which finally killed him first came to light. After that there could be no question of returning to Zambia. But, although slowed down by his illness and the treatment, David was not prepared to make major concessions to it or to opt for the life of an invalid. He went to Paris for two years and did his best to study pastoral theology. After that there was a year in Gardiner street, where he did some work in the parish and even began to teach himself Spanish. Typically, he visited the headquarters of Sinn Féin in Gardiner Place (now the Workers' Party) and, despite their known Marxist leanings and presumed hostility to the Church, coolly informed them that they were in his area and that he was available, should they require him in his capacity as a priest. History does not record what they said; they were probably too surprised to say anything.
In 1977 he went back to Paris for another year and then, in 1978, undertook what was perhaps the most amazing adventure of all, becoming prison chaplain in Copenhagen to those non-Danish prisoners who spoke or could understand either English or French. Without Danish or German (the native language of most of the Jesuits in Scandinavia) and not well enough to try to learn either, most others would have been daunted by such an assignment. But not David. His sense of outrage at what hę saw as the callous mistreatment of a fairly wretched group by a reputedly sophisticated society was quick to surface and he did not hesitate to communicate it to others. At that time he was full of hopeful and touchingly zealous schemes for other Jesuits to come from Ireland and join him. But of his own ministry he told us little or nothing. It appears that he and his Mexican colleague were awarded a substantial humanitarian prize in Denmark for a report they drew up on the sufferings of prisoners in solitary confinement. How typical of David that we should learn of this only now, after his death.
The last two years of his life were spent between Tabor, Milltown Park, Sherrard street and St Luke's, under the darkening cloud of his illness. He did not cease to work for as long as he could, among other things involving himself in prison visitation at Mountjoy. Although formally assigned to tertianship in the autumn of 1980, he never went. Instead, he made his solemn profession, in the presence of his family, his Jesuit friends and a few others, in Milltown on 29th December. It was not a sombre or despairing ceremony but serious, courageous, trusting. The readings were David's own choice, beginning with the vocation of Abraham narrated in the Book of Genesis: “Leave your country, your family and your father's house, for the land I will show you ....” It seemed to express not only his history as a missionary but also a constant quality of detachment in his own life and his mysterious and painful destiny to leave all things in death a few days after his 38th birthday.
After that the visits to St Luke’s became more frequent and more prolonged. His final illness, as he moved in and out of comas and became increasingly paralysed and humiliatingly dependent, was a deeply harrowing time, above all for David himself but also for his community and his brave family. He (and they) bore it with courage and with a dignity that was always distinctive of him, a sense of inwardness and understatement noticeable in him from the beginning. He died early in the morning of 21st May and was buried the next day, after a moving funeral Mass in Gardiner street.

Many of us who knew David found him to be gentle, humorous, kindly: while at the same time, determined and single- minded. In his last years of failing health these qualities were very much to the fore. Determination and single-minded ness marked his struggle to cope with his illness. Not a moment was wasted. He was constantly planning, even against the odds, for future work and leisure. He vibrated enthusiasm in his own unique way, living a very full and varied life, never giving in to the pressures and limitations of deteriorating health.
One of the most remarkable features of the past seven years of David's life has been that they were years of solid achievement despite the burden of ill-health.
As a prison chaplain he was outstanding. His strong character was shown at its best in recent years in the lively and sincere concern he shared with those who were suffering or oppressed. Only those who were closest to him know of the active and priestly work which consumed so much of his little energy. Typical of such activity was his work in the prisons at Copenhagen and Mountjoy. One of his fellow-chaplains remarked recently that what impressed the prisoners deeply was 'the driving interest David had in their welfare - when it was perfectly obvious to even the most casual observer, that he was gravely ill. Yet his major concern seemed to be with their problems rather than his own. Here, as in everything else, he gave himself unstintingly to the needs of others.
His influence was pervasive. He made many friends in widely differing walks of life and, as always, once he made friends they became friends for life. He had the respect and affection of those who were close to him. Not surprisingly, he is sorely missed.
David was at his best when faced with challenge. When the serious nature of his illness first became apparent the immediate future looked extremely gloomy. It seemed evident at the time that David's highly active life was going to be greatly restricted. Yet, after initial hospital treatment, he was off on his travels once again - this time back to Paris where he continued to take his English classes at Franklin. His dogged determination to live as normal a life for as long as possible was remarkably obvious. He had great difficulty at this time in adapting to the fact that his resources of energy were much diminished. He tried so very hard to continue as before but it was clear that changes would have to be made.
When David returned from France many of us expected him to slow down the pace – at least a little! But he had hardly settled back before he was off again: this time to Copenhagen as prison chaplain to the English-speaking prisoners. He spent two years in Denmark. While he found his work very satisfying and invigorating he found certain aspects of community life very difficult.
His qualities of gentleness and concern for those who were oppressed were predominant at this time. He was particularly prominent in speaking out on behalf of those whom he considered were being treated unfairly or unjustly. His major concern was for the dignity of the individual which he considered to be sacred. He was angered by humbug or pretence. On these occasions he could be rigidly uncompromising. There are many stories and anecdotes he used recount of his experiences in Copenhagen. But even when he spoke of the setbacks they were usually related with a touch of humour And yet he was very appreciative of rather than bitterness.
So many of these experiences reveal his questioning mind which refused to be browbeaten. His strong character showed a deep degree of personal honesty and integrity.
David felt very strongly on certain matters. His stand on such issues as anti-apartheid, prisoners' rights, Northern Ireland, the Third World etc. left no room for ambiguity. While many in the Province may not always have synchronised with his views there was never any doubting his personal integrity and dedication. David advocated his cause fearlessly and enthusiastically, always seeking to implement his vision. Even when time for active involvement was obviously getting shorter, his lively spirit did not diminish. To the end he was alert to the issues which gave him so much of his inner fire.
He was gifted with an active and enquiring mind. The adventure and mystery of life provided him with a never-ending search into the deeper questions of the world which surrounds us. This search, for him, could never be satisfied by dallying on the surface. Before his illness, David had a deep-rooted fascination with the power of the written word as an instrument for research and as a means of expression. One of his greatest frustrations in recent years was the incapacity to express himself clearly in writing. And yet his enquiring mind remained unbowed: always the active lively interest in so of his causes célèbres'. In the closing weeks of his life he was gathering his thoughts on the dignity that is due to the 'incurable patient in hospital. He was adamant that patients in hospital should never be made feel that they are in danger of being reduced to the category of prisoner' with no control over the ordinary decisions that affect their lives. His own reaction to hospitalisation was a clear indication of his feelings on this matter.
And yet he was very appreciative of the dedicated help he received from those who were looking after him. He had respect and admiration for the staff of St Luke's whom he considered to be “good listeners and who did not make you feel that there were two types of person, the sick and the non-sick”. He was also very much aware of the fact that without the devotion and selfless generosity of Br Joe Cleary he could never have managed to have the degree of independence that marked his time at Milltown.
To say that David had a zest for living would surely be a gross understatement!, He had an insatiable appetite for travel and new discovery. It was reflected in his great enthusiasm for life. He loved people and he loved living. Despite the difficulties with which he struggled during the past seven years the bedrock of his enthusiasm remained undimmed.
So many of his friends remember, maybe even with a touch of humour, how the suggestion of foreign travel could revive David's spirits in recent times. Shortly before his death he was already preparing for the possibility of another trip to the Holy Land. It was fitting. Many of those who knew him intimately will remember him as a citizen of the world', always preparing for new Voyages of discovery and . meeting new people.
He went to God on the day following: the Ascension. We can only imagine how enthusiastically he is revelling in this new! to the world of discovery. It is difficult to visualise David resting in peace with many such a brave new world to be explored!
It is only the annals of eternity that will reveal to the full the outstanding and selfless dedication of this remarkable priest. His deep faith and trust in God was an inspiration. It was typical of the man that self-pity and self-concern were never his major preoccupations. The heavy burden of ill-health he accepted as part of the mysterious plan of redemption for a suffering world. His faith was solid and shown in his apostolic enthusiasm. He was constantly preoccupied in trying to bring the peace of God to those whop were suffering in any way. Much of this work is hidden in the God whom he served faithfully. he comforted many who wept the tears of life, and gave new hope and encouragement to those threatened by difficulty and despair.
He was truly what Ignatius would like us all to be: a man for others.
CH

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 66 : September 1991

JUNE 1991 - 1491 TO 1991

Jim O’Higgins

A memorial, sent to the host of the Province Day, by Jim O'Higgins, brother-in-law of the late David Murphy, S.J.

This is the best day of my life he said
Dougie in the dining hall
Where sacerdotal homburg hat had just been
recorded as a rarity
Yet welcomed by the sweaters and the jeans
All synthesising with the greys, the garbs
The collars of the brothers
Vested in the clothes
of ordinary people
As Inigo on the path to Monserrat

First Salmeron and Brouet from Romes perspective
Strove to understand the lapsing unbelief of chiefs
Of Northern Donegal
And the Celts invective almost quenched
Their spirit but for the epistle from
the Basque
Now from Northwest of Ireland the Companions
They have sent their own emissary
To Rome to reach to unbelievers with good news

This is 'effective effective as the infiltration
Of Peter Kenny and his confreres
To prepare a people for emancipation
Through Castle Browne and Galway

Urging and creating a new “energy”
And support for ancient classicists and young feminists

For Arrupe, Peter-Hans G.C. 32
For Kostka and Columbiere

In 1991 in June they gathered
A great day in my life said Dougie
Quincentennial day for comrades
For the men for others.

◆ The Gonzaga Record 1986

David Murphy SJ

David was born in 1944 in Dublin, and spent his school days at Gonzaga Col lege. On leaving school he entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1962. The monastic style of Emo Park in those days re quired just the qualities of generosity and inwardness which David abund antly possessed.

He was in Rathfarnham Castle from 1964 to 1967 and enjoyed his years at university. He took his degree in English and French. French culture had a special appeal for David, and he spent five of his twenty years as a Jesuit in France. He went to Chantilly for philosophy. He became interested in Freud, an interest he never lost, and was reputed to have managed an inter view with the reclusive Samuel Beckett by the simplest of stratagems – going along and knocking on the great man's door. After philosophy he did his regency in Zambia. He returned to Milltown Park for theology and was ordained by Archbishop Ryan on 21 June 1974.

While he was in America that sum mer the brain tumour which finally killed him first came to light. Typically, David was not prepared to make major concessions to it or opt for the life of an invalid.

In 1977 he went back for a third time to Paris for pastoral theology. In 1978 he undertook what was perhaps the most amazing adventure of all: he became prison chaplain in Copenhagen to those non-Danish prisoners who spoke or could understand either English or French. His sense of outrage at what he saw as the callous treatment of a fairly wretched group by a reputedly sophisticated society was quick to surface and he did not hesitate to communicate it to others. He and a Mexican colleague were awarded a substantial humanitarian prize in Denmark for a report they drew up on the sufferings of prisoners in solitary confinement. It was so like David that we learned of this only after his death.

The last two years of his life were spent between Tabor, Sherrard Street, and St Luke's Hospital. He was too weak to undertake the Tertianship. Instead, he made his solemn profes
sion in the presence of his family and some friends in Milltown Park, on 29 December. It was not a sombre cere mony, but serious, courageous, and trusting. The readings were David's own choice, beginning with the voc ation of Abraham: 'Leave your coun try, your family, and your father's house, for the land I will show you? It seemed to express not only his history as a missionary, but also a constant quality of detachment in his own life, and his mysterious and painful destiny to leave all things in death a few days after his thirty-eighth birthday.

Murphy, Alfred, 1827-1902, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/565
  • Person
  • 17 April 1827-28 October 1902

Born: 17 April 1827, Youghal, County Cork
Entered: 05 September 1844, St Acheul, Amiens France - Franciae Province (FRA)
Ordained: 1856
Final Vows: 02 February 1864
Died: 28 October 1902, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

by 1847 in Namur (BELG) studying
by 1856 Studying at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG)
by 1863 at St Beuno’s, Wales (ANG) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Early education was at Clongowes, where he even studied Philosophy under Henry Lynch. Always popular with students and Staff his nickname was “Steamer” largely attributed to his commanding stature and energetic gait, and it was intended as a compliment. Less complimentary was a later nickname of “The Handsome Scholastic” given him by the pupils of Belvedere!

After First Vows he remained in France for some studies.
He made his Theology studies at St Beuno’s, and a year in Dublin at the Theologate at Nth Frederick St which had Michael O’Ferrall as Rector, and William Kelly, Edmund O’Reilly and Daniel Jones as Professors.
He then made his tertianship in Rome.
He worked as a teacher for ten years, 2 at Belvedere and 8 at Clongowes. He was known to be teaching Rhetoric at Clongowes in 1859.
He was also Minister at Belvedere for a period.
1865-1870 He was Rector at Tullabeg. During his term, the tower of the Church was erected.
1870-1876 he was sent to Galway as Vice-Rector, and in 1872-1876 he became Rector.
1876 He was sent to Gardiner St, and remained there until his death. He worked very hard there, and exercised an apostolate of kindness and unwavering perseverance, especially in the Confessional. In the latter stages of his life it was noticed that his health was failing, and he gave great edification in his final illness. When his mind began to wander, he was focused on the work he had given a lot of his life to - and so he was found in the Confessional when the Church was empty, and he was still trying to arrange some convent Retreats for the Fathers. He received the Last Rites from Edward Kelly, who had just returned from the Procurators meeting in Rome. He died a happy death in Gardiner St 28 October 1902. His funeral was one of the first for many years in which he was not the celebrant. It was attended by the Archbishop of Dublin, and Dr Matthew Gaffney the Bishop of Meath, and a large number of Priests and Lay People.
He was a good organiser, and for many years was responsible for coordinating the many Retreats give by Ours in Convents. He required great diplomacy to manage the vagaries of ours and many Mothers Superior. He was a good writer, and this stood him well in the number of letters this task required of him.
He also occasionally contributed some musical verses to the “Irish Monthly”.
He served as Provincial Socius for several years up to 1884, and for six months was Vice-Provincial (1889-1890) while the Provincial Timothy Kenny was on Visitation in Australia.
On one occasion he was invited by a brilliant young Professor, who later became Dean Henry Neville of Cork, and accompanied by Robert Carbery, who was a Prefect of Juniors at Maynooth and a future Jesuit Peter Foley, to dine with the Professors at Maynooth, where he made a great impression on the Juniors there.
His Golden Jubilee was celebrated at Gardiner St, and at this celebration, a member of the community tried to capture his life in verse to the great amusement of the gathering. The poem was entitles “Alfredus Magnus”!
He was a good community man and loved conversation, taking a large - though not too large - share of it himself. He was invariably good-natures, good-humoured, friendly and truly charitable. he like a bit of news or gossip, especially if he was the one telling it.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Alfred Murphy 1827-1902
Fr Alfred Murphy was born in Youghal on April 17th 1827. Educated at Clongowes, he entered the Society in 1844, doing his noviceship and early higher studies in France. He was one of those Jesuits who studied Theology at our house in North Frederick Street Dublin, where Fr Michael O’Ferrall was Rector, and Frs William Kelly, Edmund O’reilly and Daniel Jones were Professors.

In 1870, Fr Murphy, while Rector of Tullabeg, erected the tower on the Church and added the fine wing parallel to the front building. After a term of office as Rector in Galway, he spent the remaining years of his priestly life as an Operarius at Gardiner Street, in the course of which he acted as Socius to the Provincial, and also acted as Vice-Provincial in the absence of Fr Timothy Kenny when he was a Visitor to Australia.

He died a very happy and edifying death on October 28th 1902, in his 75th year.

◆ The Clongownian, 1897

Father Alfred Murphy SJ

The Last of the Munster Geraldines

Delivered by Patrick Mathews of the class of Rhetoric

Mononia, thy plains yet thrill with gladness,
As Minstrels sweep thy harps of fire;
Thy beauties still, though veiled in sadness,
Full many a song of pride inspire.
Thy hills, where Morning sits enthroned,
On mists that wreaths of glory twine,
Thy fairy.lakes with forests crowned,
Where the lingering ray,
Of pensive evening loves to play,
And brighten with hues of purple and gold,
The ballowed slirines and towers of old,
Mononia, ny country ! No land like thine.

So thought when first the Emerald Isle
Beamed on his gaze, the lordly Geraldine ;
His sires had basked in the radiant smile
Of fair Italia ; his Norman lance
Had flashed on the plainis of sunny France,
Yet he loved thee more, fair land of mine!
More true than many a purer vein,
He clung to the home he fought to gain;
His heart its bravest impulse gave,
For the faith and land he died to save;
And thy Minstrel's harp, will ever tell,
As with strings all steeped in sorrow's tears,
It thrills with the voice of byegone years,
How the last brave Desmond fell.

Night veils in storm MacCaura's hills,
And darkly broods o'er wood and glen;
The heaving air with terror thrills,
As sweeps in fury o'er the plain
The wild tempestuous swell. Alone
Mid the tempest's fearful moan,
An aged hero wenda his weary way.
His steps are tottering, his form
Bends in its weakness with the storm;
His hand is raised, his long loose hair,
Streams wild upon the midnight air,
And fiercely round his head the raging whirlwinds play.

Not thus of old when more than King,
The noble Desmond trod in pride,
These his own hills then wont to ring,
With shouts of thousands by his side;
Not thus, when the love of all the land,
Crowned the great Earl with truer praise,
Than kingly despots can command,
Or slave's reluctant homage raise.
But the wayward fate of the sad green Isle,
Had clouded the light of fortune's smile ; .
He scorned to crouch at a tyrant's nod,
And basely live a woman's slave;
His heart refused to forget his God,
And spurn the charms the old religion gave.
For this all mercy is denied
The humbled hero in his woe,
For this fell hate and vengeance guide
O'er the wild waste the ruthless foe,
And all the terrors tempest gives
Are braved while hated Desmond lives,
Save thee, ny Prince, for worse than Nature's wrath,.
Traitors and foes beset thy path;
E'en now shrill sounds the larum cry,
And shouts are heard and lights are seen along the sky.

An hour is past. Yon hut is won,
The last sad refuge from despair,
The storm still shrieks through the forest lone,
And swells upon the troubled air.
But Desmond sunk in calm repose,
In dreams forgets awhile his woes;
Blest sleep of peace that only virtue knows!
But hark! What spirit yoice of wail,
Mingles its moaning with the gale!
Now in plaintive breathings low,
Now swelling dire in notes of woe,
“Sleep on, last hero of a noble line,
Sleep on, while yet you may ;
Ah! soon will change that sleep of thine,
To one that knows not day.
My voice has warned thy Sires in their decline,
'Tis heard in thy decay”.

Hark! that piercing cry,
The murderer's shout, the victim's sigh;
“Spare, oh! spare” he cries in vain,
The noble Desmond never breathes again.
But his spirit all bright with virtue fies,
As angels wreaths of triumph wave,
To that home of the blest beyond the skies,
Where glory enshrines the good and brave.
Weep not for him ; 'tis a noble pride,
For country and creed to bave lived and died.

◆ The Clongownian, 1903

Obituary

Father Alfred Murphy SJ

We regret to announce the death of the Rev Alfred Murphy SJ, who was for many years as boy or master or priest connected with Clongowes and Tullabeg. For a year or so it was noticed that his health was failing, and the end came last October, when he was half way through his 76th year.

Father Murphy was born at Youghal, April 17th, 1827. In his thirteenth year he went to Congowes, 'Where he was always popular, both with his comrades and his masters. His schoolboy nickname of “Steamer: was a very covert compliment to his commanding stature and his energetic gait and deportment. At school, he went through the full course of studies, even the class of Philosophy, under Father Henry Lynch.

In 1844 he left Clongowes and entered the Society of Jesus, beginning his noviceship at St Acheul, near Amiens. In France also he went through some of his highest studies. Returning to Ireland he worked as a master for ten years, two at Belvedere and eight at Clongowes. He certainly had charge of the Rhetoric Class of his Alma Mater in July, 1859 - the only Clongowes Academy Day ever enjoyed by the present chronicler, who also remembers the very favourable impression made by Father Murphy on the Junior students of Maynooth, when he came over a few years earlier to the great Ecclesiastical College to dine with the Professors, on the invitation of the brilliant young Professor, who was afterwards Dean Neville of Cork.

Between 1852 and 1859, Father Murphy had made his Theological studies and became a priest. He studied at St Beuno's in North Wales, and for one year in Dublin, after which he spent a year in Rome. In 1863 he became Minister in Belvedere, from which he was changed after two years to Tullabeg, of which he was Rector till 1870. During his term of office the tower of the People's Church was erected, and the fine wing parallel to the front of the College was added. The same month in which he ceased to be Rector of Tullabeg saw him Rector of St Ignatius College, Galway, which office he filled till March, 1876. From that day till the day of his death he was a member of the Community of St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, where his kindness and prudence and unwearying perseverance met with marvellous success.

The Requiem Mass of Fr Murphy's obsequies was the first for many years in St Francis Xavier's of which he was not himself the celebrant. It was attended by the Archbishop of Dublin, and Dr Gaffney, Bishop of Meath, and by a very large number of priests and laity. His remains await the Resurrection beneath the shadow of the noble Celtic Cross that marks the burial-place of the Society of Jesus, in the Cemetery of Glasnevin. RIP

Mulcahy, Timothy J, 1898-1962, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/744
  • Person
  • 18 April 1898-21 May 1962

Born: 18 April 1898, Cork City, County Cork
Entered: 09 October 1916, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1931, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1934, Belvedere College SJ
Died: 21 May 1962, Mungret College, Mungret, County Limerick

Part of the St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.

Educated at Mungret College S

BA 1st Class at UCD

by 1923 at Leuven, Belgium (BELG) studying
by 1933 at St Beuno’s, Wales (ANG) making Tertianship

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 37th Year No 3 1962
St. Francis Xavier's, Gardiner St.
The community was profoundly shocked by the news received on the afternoon of Monday, May 21st, of Fr. Tim Mulcahy's sudden death at Mungret. He had given the annual Triduum for the Sick, broadcast by Radio Éireann from the Ignatian chapel, towards the end of April. It was known that recurrent pains in the head had made him consult his doctor, but x-rays and cardiograph examination did not reveal anything more than usually untoward before he went to Mungret on May 14th for the rest which he regarded as his Major Villa. But the last of his typically charming letters, posted on the 21st, had not reached its destination before the fatal thrombosis struck him. One of those letters read "I shall be back on Wednesday". But he was not to return to Gardiner Street. May he rest in peace, in the shade of the ancient Mungret Abbey, near to the remains of those monks of an earlier Ireland whose faith he held so firmly and which he did so much to spread in another age.
Earlier issues of the Province News have recorded the many material benefits which Fr. Mulcahy brought to Gardiner Street while he was Superior here. His charming charity had perhaps too often been taken for granted: but he is lovingly, sorely, missed.
The Bishop of Limerick, Most Rev. Dr. Henry Murphy, presided at the Solemn Office and Requiem Mass for Fr. Mulcahy at the Crescent, on May 23rd. The Mass was sung by Fr. Andrews, Rector, and Frs. Quigley and Guinane were deacon and sub-deacon. Fr. Visitor and Fr. Provincial were present, as well as many of the Gardiner St. community and representatives of most of the Province Houses. The boys of the Crescent walked behind the funeral procession as far as the city boundary, and those of Mungret lined the avenue and cemetery there. The prayers at the graveside at Mungret were recited by Fr. Provincial. The Gardiner St. Sodalities were represented by Mr. John Monahan, President of the Ignatian Sodality, and Mr. L. S. Ó Riordáin, Secretary, and by Mr. A. Ralph, President and five members of the Evening Office Confraternity.

The Sacred Heart College and Church, Limerick

Fr. T. I. Mulcahy, R.I.P.
The community was deeply shocked when the sad news was announced of Fr. Mulcahy's sudden death at Mungret. Everyone, not only in the Crescent community, where he had been Rector, but in the city of Limerick, seemed to look on Fr. Mulcahy as a personal friend, and only the week previously, having finished his retreat, he came in from Mungret to dine with us. Fr. Rector and the community deemed it a signal honour to have the Requiem Mass in the Crescent Church, and the many priests who attended, both from the Society itself and from outside, bore testimony to the great personality of the deceased. Very many Mass Cards, letters and messages of sympathy were sent to the Crescent, and His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin wired: “Rector, Crescent. ... Deepest sympathy on death of Fr. Mulcahy - a worthy priest”. His Lordship the Bishop of Limerick presided at the obsequies and Mgr. Moloney chanted a Lesson in the Office. Together with Very Rev. Fr. Visitor and Fr. Provincial, representatives from almost all our houses were present at the funeral, The Mass was celebrated by Fr. Rector and Frs. Quigley and Guinane were deacon and sub-deacon. Fr. Provincial officiated at the burial in the Mungret cemetery.

Obituary :

Fr Timothy I Mulcahy (1898-1962)

Born: Cork, 1898; education: C.B.S., Our Lady's Mount, Cork, and Mungret College; entered Society, Tullabeg, 1916; studied, Rathfarnham and U.C.D., 1918-1922, Louvain, 1922-1925; teaching staff, Belvedere, 1925-1928; theology, Milltown Park, 1928-1932; ordination, 1931, and tertianship, St. Beuno's, N. Wales, 1932-1933.
Stationed Irish Messenger Office, Belvedere College, 1933-1947, as National Director, Sodality of Our Lady, Editor Madonna, Irish Monthly and Irish Jesuit Directory. Rector, Sacred Heart College, Crescent, 1947 1950. Superior, St. Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, 1950-1957. Director, Ignatian Sodality there, 1950-1959. Rector, St. Mary's, Emo, 1959-1961. At Gardiner Street to death (at Mungret College), May 21st, 1962.
On a May afternoon in 1962, while talking to a friend in the parlour of Mungret College, Fr. Tim Mulcahy was struck by the heart-attack which he survived only long enough to receive the Last Sacraments. He had been a boy in the College fifty years before. Fifty years bring big changes and to Mungret not less than elsewhere. Fr. Tim seldom spoke of his schooldays, but through those fifty years he was a constant visitor to his old school, making his annual retreat there and when ill-health came choosing that rather out of the way spot for a brief holiday or an unavoidable rest. He kept his interest in the Past as anyone who saw him welcome successive Mungret Annuals will agree, and though away from home he died among friends who had the best of reason to be proud of a distinguished pupil.
Good noviceships have as little history as happy nations. That to which Fr. Tim came had scarcely been stirred by a ripple of the Easter Rising, known only through letters from home and the very rare newspaper cuttings read aloud by the Socius. It cannot have been difficult in the lull that followed it to forget the outside world. His “angelus” was his life long friend, Fr. Tom Perrott. It was a friendship thirty years' separation by half a world never weakened and one may be forgiven if one imagines they sometimes forgot the custom-book to rendezvous as they had often done as boys under the clock” in their well-loved Cork City, to which each in his own way was to do honour,
The abolition in 1918 of a home juniorate enabled Fr. Tim to catch up, as it were, and more than one generation were his contemporaries. In Rathfarnham Castle he quickly showed what he was always to remain - he was the perfect community man. There was a triumvirate who talked a “little language” (Fr. Tim's stage-name was “factorial five”) and brightened life by their original pranks, for he had and retained a charming playfulness. Alas, Fr. Gallagher, Fr. Little and Fr. Tim are all gone, but they lived to delight in their maturity an extraordinarily wide circle and to win and hold a unique place in the affection of the Province as well as in the hearts of the innumerable souls they helped.
Rathfarnham was already proving old; the honeymoon of Fr. Jimmie Brennan's reign almost over; and Fr. Tim's university career is perhaps chiefly memorable in that he was the last young Jesuit for over ten years to conduct the affairs of the English Society in College, which - founded a decade before by Thomas McDonagh, one of the immortal sixteen of Easter Week, and the brilliant Australian student, Fr. Peterson, happily still with us - had been almost a Jesuit pocket-borough in the days when Violet Connolly, Kate O'Brien, Fr. Paddy O'Connor and Professor Gerard Murphy starred its eager assemblies.
English was Fr. Tim's subject, and though he wrote little he put his training and critical judgment to good use later. But now it was time for Philosophy, in the great university of Louvain, still staggering from the unexpected shock of its demolition in the First World War. It was not in fact a congenial posting and some were to see its influence in deepening the natural intellectual tolerance of his mind into something like indecision in speculative studies. Happily, his “colleges” were spent in Belvedere, the house in which he passed the greatest part of his working life and which he loved and which loved him. Fr. Tim was before all things urbane in the best sense of that word. A city man, the great city school found him reserved, dignified, friendly and wise. His influence would always be the result of personality and not propaganda. Indeed he seldom urged a case, never raised his voice, rarely argued, and held clear, firm, tenacious opinions without dogmatism or contradiction. A born teacher.
Perhaps in Theology at Milltown or Tertianship at Beuno's it is pardonable for a contemporary to remember chiefly the way he sweetened the last years of formation: his conversation round a fire at Glencree, the way he and Fr. Perrott would burst into their own version of the Volga boat-song to carry a weary group up the steep, stony avenue of St. Beuno's.
His work in the Society fell into two parts. For twenty years he was editor of The Irish Monthly and The Madonna. A big school is very much a closed shop, but Belvedere was well aware of what it gained by the presence of Fr. Mulcahy and his friends and co-workers in the Messenger Office, Fr. Scantlebury and Fr. McCarthy. Though his only official contact with the school was as confessor, he became in a very real sense a Belvederian whom even Fr. John Mary O'Connor would have ranked as one hundred per cent.
His editorship of The Irish Monthly was not an altogether happy story. He had not perhaps the genius of its founder, Fr. Matt Russell, to make it a nest of singing birds, but it was in that great tradition he would have liked to work and was fitted to work. Policy in an emergent nation wanted economics, civics and social theory. He did his best but the medium was a poor one. With the sodality it was different. There, too, winds of change were blowing. A long and somewhat inactive tradition had to be remodelled in a society which greeted the “Age of Mary” with fresh enthusiasm and, incidentally, a sheaf of Marian magazines. He was the perfect uncontroversial leader, never disillusioned, never unwilling to be content with less than absolute perfection, if only he could foster genuine holiness under Mary's banner.
It seemed surprising to many who knew him well that his obvious talent and graces for government were not used earlier. But the chance came and in three full, rich years as Superior of the Crescent, in as many in the delicate task of Superior of a noviceship, and above all in a never-to be-forgotten period in Gardiner Street, he did work for God, the country and the Province only he could do.
His Gardiner Street activity will be remembered for three notable elements. He was, as may be imagined, a devoted confessor with devoted penitents. It is a role upon which he would not have tolerated any comments, His predecessor as Superior, Fr. Tyndall, had incorporated in the remarkable celebrations of the Novena of Grace a special feature by which the vast and growing congregations who assembled long before the devotions were led from the pulpit in prayers, hymn-singing and a real effort to bring to the exercises that confidence and fervour which the Novena calls for. Fr. Tyndall carried through his admirable plan so well that many feared an anti-climax when his term of office came to an end. They need not have. Fr. Tim made his own unique personal contact with those great crowds and he will be remembered by them till all the generation is gone, and his is only a legend.
For a long time there the need for a renovation of the church had been admitted, but only piecemeal work was done. Fr. Mulcahy made the Gardiner Street of today, transforming an old and, it must be admitted, rather grimy church, thickly hung with inartistic pictures and meaningless decoration, into a lightsome, joyous church which seemed to blossom into a new and fundamental beauty. To execute the task he called in Michael Scott, whom he had known in Belvedere, and his namesake and co-worker, Patrick Scott. It needed courage to approve a scheme which - apart from the few last-ditch traditionalists who loved every fold of the robes of the Indian and Chinese watchers in the painting of Francis's death-bed-might not be acceptable to the great body of loyal friends who are Gardiner Street's pride and glory. Fr. Tim did not compromise. The great panels of undecorated scarlet damask stood out from white and grey walls which some would have thought more suitable to a garden city than to the faded glories of the north side of Dublin. But they filled the house of God with light and on the side-altars were statues that could not be passed with a casual glance, and if the splendid scagliola pillars of the high altar had to be painted white it was to give its lapis-lazuli tabernacle the true focal value which its Inhabitant deserves, One could stand at the lower rail of Gardiner Street and, asked for an obituary of Fr, Tim, say “Circumspice”. He has another monument to his memory in the new St. Francis Xavier Hall in Sherrard Street, for hardly had he completed the decoration of the church when he was called on to replace Fr. Cullen's famous “Pioneer Hall”, more than worn out by its forty eight years of varied activity. Despite the ill-health which was already making itself felt, he carried the new and more solid hall through its planning and building stages, leaving only the formal opening to his successor.
But a friend cannot leave monuments to speak for Fr. Tim - and how many and how good friends he had! It is sometimes said that a man who has no enemies is a poor creature. Fr. Tim was the living proof of the falsehood of this saying. He had none. His friendship was essentially that of a giver : he asked for nothing but he concealed this, and it was easy to think and indeed perhaps true that the friends meant as much to him as he to them. He fostered friendship with a long memory and a recurrent refreshment of its precious times. Separation was a minimal interference with this intercourse, as we have seen in the case of Fr. Perrott. From Mungret on the last Easter the sick man sent a charming little letter of greeting to a Dublin lady whom he had not met in many years, and by the same post to one of the community he had just left a gay anecdote of his own special brand. It is commonplace to say no one will fill his place, but perhaps it should be added that he filled it so perfectly that he can never lose it,
A handsome tribute to Fr. Mulcahy from His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin:

Archbishop's House,
Dublin 9.
23-5-1962.

My Dear Fr. Provincial,
I am very sorry--but not surprised to learn of Fr. Mulcahy's death, May be rest in peace! He was a great priest. From the year 1941 I. knew his zeal and patience and very courteous charity. I believe that I shall have in him a strong friend before God.
With kind wishes.
I remain,
Yours very sincerely,
+John C. McQuaid

◆ The Mungret Annual, 1963

Obituary

Father Timothy Mulcahy SJ

On a May afternoon in 1962, while talking to a friend in the parlour of Mungret College, Father Tim Mulcahy was struck by the heart-attack which he survived only long enough to receive the Last Sacraments. He had been a boy in the College fifty years before. Fifty years bring big changes and to Mungret not less than elsewhere. Father Tim seldom spoke of his schooldays, but through those fifty years he was a constant visitor to his old school, making his annual retreat there and when ill-health came choosing it for a brief holiday or an unavoidable rest. He kept his interest in the Past as anyone who saw him welcome successive Mungret Annuals will agree, and though away from home he died among friends who had the best of reason to be proud of a
distinguished pupil.

His work in the Society fell into two parts. For twenty years he was editor of “The Irish Monthly” and “The Madonna”. A big school is very much a closed shop, but Belvedere was well aware of what it gained by the presence of Father Mulcahy and his friends and co-workers in the Messenger Office, Father Scantlebury and Father McCarthy. Though his only official contact with the school was as confessor, he became in a very real sense a Belvederian whom even Father John Mary O'Connor would have ranked as one hundred per cent.

His Gardiner Street activity will be remembered for three notable elements. He was, as may be imagined, a devoted confessor with devoted penitents. It is a role upon which he would not have tolerated any comments. His predecessor as Superior, Father Tyndall, had incorporated in the remarkable celebrations of the Novena of Grace a special feature by which the vast and growing congregations who assembled long before the devotions were led from the pulpit in prayers, hymn-singing and a real effort to bring to the exercises that confidence and fervour which the Novena calls for. Father Tyndall carried through his admirable plan so well that many feared an anti-climax when his term of office came to an end. They need not have. Father Tim made his own unique personal contact with those great crowds and he will be remembered by them till all the generation is gone, and his is only a legend.

For a long time there the need for a renovation of the church had been admitted, but only piece meal work was done. Father Mulcahy made the Gardiner Street of today, transforming an old and, it must be admitted, rather grimy church, thickly hung with inartistic pictures and meaning less decoration, into a lightsome, joyous church which seemed to blossom into a new and fundamental beauty. To execute the task he called in Michael Scott, whom he had known in Belvedere, and his namesake and co-worker, Patrick Scott. It needed courage to approve a scheme which apart from the few last-ditch traditionalists who loved every fold of the robes of the Indian and Chinese watchers in the painting of Francis's death-bed-might not be acceptable to the great body of loyal friends who are Gardiner Street's pride and glory. Father Tim did not comprornise. The great panels of undecorated scarlet damask stood out from white and grey walls which some would have thought more suitable to a garden city than to the faded glories of the north side of Dublin. But they filled the house of God with light and on the side-altars were statues that could not be passed with a casual glance, and if the splendid scagliola pillars of the high altas had to be painted white it was to give its lapis-lazuli tabernacle the true focal value which its Inhabitant deserves. One could stand at the lower rail of Gardiner Street and, asked for an obituary of Father Tim, say “Circumspice”. He has another monument to his memory in the new St Francis Xavier Hall in Sherrard Street, for hardly had he completed the decoration of the church when he was called on to replace Father Cullen's famous “Pioneer Hall”, more than worn out by its forty eight years of varied activity. Despite the ill-health which was already making itself felt, be carried the new and more solid ball through its planning and building stages, leaving only the formal opening to his successor.

But a friend cannot leave monuments to speak for Father Tim - and how many and how good friends he bad! It is sometimes said that a man who has no enemies is a poor creature. Father Tim was the living proof of the falsehood of this saying. He had none. His friendship was essentially that of a giver: he asked for nothing but he concealed this, and it was easy to think and indeed perhaps true that the friends meant as much to him as he to them. He fostered friendship with a long memory and a recurrent refreshment of its precious times. Separation was a minimal interference with this intercourse. From Mungret the last Easter the sick man sent a charming little letter of greeting to a Dublin lady whom be had not met in many years, and by the same post to one of the community he had just left a gay anecdote of his own special brand. It is common place to say no one will fill his place, but perhaps it should be added that he filled it so perfectly that he can never lose it.

Molony, Charles W, 1894-1978, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/249
  • Person
  • 12 October 1894-19 December 1978

Born: 12 October 1894, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1912, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1926, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1929, Belvedere College SJ, Dublin
Died: 19 December 1978, Bon Secours Hospital, Dublin

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death

by 1921 at St Aloysius Jersey Channel Islands (FRA) studying
by 1928 at Paray-le-Monial France (LUGD) making Tertianship

◆ Irish Province News 54th Year No 2 1979 & ◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1979

Obituary :
Fr Charles Molony (1894-1978)

On December 19th, 1978, at Bon Secours Hospital, died Father Charles Molony, SJ.
Father Charles Molony was born in Dublin on October 12th, 1894. He was baptised in the Pro-Cathedral, Marlboro Street, where he was also confirmed. His education before entering the Noviceship was received at Loreto College and Belvedere College
Father Charles Molony entered the Noviceship at Tullabeg on September 7th, 1912 where he pronounced his first Vows on September 8th 1914. After one year “home” juniorate at Rathfarnham (1914-1915) he spent five years teaching at Belvedere College. The years 1920-1923 were spent in Jersey studying Philosophy (and French). During his course of Theology at Milltown Park (1923-1927) he was ordained priest at Milltown Park on July 31st 1926 by the Archbishop of Dublin. After Theology he spent his Tertianship at Paray-le-Monial, 1927-1928. He pronounced his Final Vows in Belvedere College Chapel, in the presence of the Provincial, Father John Fahy, SJ, on February 2nd 1929.
After his return from his Tertianship he spent three years (1928 1931) in Belvedere College; from 1931-1934 he was on the Mission Staff, and stationed at Emo. From there in 1934, he was sent to Gardiner Street.
In Saint Francis Xavier's Gardiner Street, therefore, in 1934, Father Charlie Molony began the chief work of his life: he was operarius' in Gardiner Street for 42 years and “Assistant Operatius” for two years: in all from 1934 to 1978.

The following “Obituary” tributes to a devoted and zealous priest are from Father Dan Dargan SJ and Father Michael Sweetman SJ, - both fellow members of the same Community as Father Charlie Molony: Saint Francis Xavier’s, Gardiner Street, Dublin.

“That's where I was born”, he would say when the Belvedere Hotel was mentioned. Fr. Charlie Molony - he was always very insistent that his surname be spelled without an “e” - was born in 1894. For him going to school was to entail the shortest possible of journeys, merely crossing the street, first to Loreto Convent, North Great George's St., and then to Belvedere for his secondary education.
He left Belvedere in 1912 and entered the novitiate in Tullabeg, where his contemporaries included Frs Aubrey Gwynn and Eddie Bourke. From Tullabeg he went on to Rathfarnham where he spent one year before being transferred to Belvedere for a five-year stint. His three years of philosophy he spent in Jersey and from there he went to Milltown Park for theology and was ordained in 1926. He did his Tertianship in Paray-Le-Monial and then returned to Belvedere for a period of three years. He then joined the Mission and Retreat staff and was stationed in Emo for three years 1932 and 1933. From Emo he went to Gardiner St. where he was to spend the remaining forty four years of a very active life.
In the course of those years he held the positions of Director of the Men's Sodality, Director of the Children of Mary Sodality, founder Director of the Boys’ Club, founder-Director of the Girls’ Club, Director of the Pioneer club, Chaplain to a St Vincent de Paul Conference, and Chaplain to a Legion of Mary Praesidium. In addition he was most devoted to the full pastoral work of Gardiner St. Church.
He worked with enthusiasm at whatever post was assigned to him. He was deeply interested in people, prayed for them, and gave himself generously to them, attending their weddings, visiting them when they were ill, bringing them the sacraments, and going to their funerals. he was always doing things for them, especially those whose need seemed great, trying to find jobs or houses. A large family of fine girls residing in Gardiner St. had great difficulty, presumably because of the address at which they lived, in getting suitable jobs. In turn they all sought Fr Charlie’s help, and using his influence he succeeded where they had failed. Several former members of his Children of Mary Sodality tell, some gratefully, some jocosely, of his efforts at unobtrusive matchmaking on their behalf. He was a man of loyalties, and his loyalty to the Society and to Belvedere was very evident. A founder member of Old Belvedere Rugby Club he loved to talk about the Club's players and games.
He was very humble about his intellectual attainments and once when as a priest he was invited to speak to the Juniors in Rathfarnham he commenced by saying: “I have been asked to read a paper on the Sodality. But the only paper I read is the Evening Herald!” In fact this was not true. He frequently read religious magazines, and in the last years of his life was often quite distressed by articles of an avant-garde nature.
He kept going, right up to April 1978 when he underwent a serious operation, and from that on his health deteriorated steadily. In December he was admitted to the Bon Secours Hospital. He knew the end was near and was well prepared for it. Shortly before he died a nurse came into his room and said: :Is there anything you want, Fr Molony?” He was able to force an answer of just one word. “Heaven”, he replied. That word came straight from his heart.

Fr. Charles Molony – An Impression

“If your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light” (Mt. 622)
Charlie’s eye seems to me to have been sound, to a remarkable degree. His vision was simple, direct, clear and wholesome; he was a man totally dedicated and unconditionally vowed. The paradox is that, on occasion, he could confuse a simple issue inextricably! But even when in his dogged, uncompromising way, he obviously had the wrong end of the stick, he was quite incapable of anything vindictive or grudging afterwards. He was really the soul of kindness and a forgiver; it might be impossible to push him into anything, but he would gladly and cheerfully give everything. He signally lacked vanity or egocentricity.
I did not know him intimately, so this is the impression of an outsider. I’m inclined to think, but may certainly be wrong, that he did not fully disclose his feelings to anyone. He seemed to me the kind of man that neither needed, nor understood that another might need, to share his inner self with anyone but God.
As a younger priest here in St Francis Xavier’s, Gardiner Street, he was a great initiation. He started the boys’ club and girls’ club and many sections and activities with both of the main sodalities. He was an unashamed devotee of Our Lady and took an active part in the Legion of Mary. An athlete as a youth, he maintained an enthusiastic and detailed interest in sport to the end of his life. His particular interest was of course, the activities of the old Belvedere clubs. He had an immense and again - detailed knowledge of the people in the area, their marriages, employment, wanderings and deaths. He sought prayers almost daily for someone who had died. Scores of people loved and relied upon him.
It was a consolation to all of us here in St Francis Xavier’s that his mind remained lucid through the sharp decline of his last months. He was unwaveringly himself. When anyone asked did he want anything he used to reply “Yes, everything” or just “Yes heaven”.
When he almost lost the use of his voice it was quite hard to make out what he was trying to say; so Fr. Kieran Hanley chanced a “Yes” and a “No” fairly indiscriminately to his efforts. Finally leaning close to Charlie he made out that he was saying: “You are saying ‘Yes’? when it should be ‘No’ and ‘No’ when it should be ‘Yes’!
He has left behind him the image and memory of a man who kept his hand firmly on the plough for 66 years in the Society, ploughed a straight furrow, and was happy in the process.
Michael Sweetman SJ

Merritt, William B, 1914-1973, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/247
  • Person
  • 04 September 1914-25 April 1973

Born: 04 September 1914, Limerick City, County Limerick
Entered: 09 September 1932, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1946, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1949, Holy Spirit Seminary, Aberdeen, Hong Kong
Died: 25 April 1973, Coláiste Iognáid, Galway

Part of the Mungret College, Limerick community at the time of death

Educated at Mungret College SJ

by 1939 in Vals France (LUGD) studying

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 23rd Year No 3 1948

Frs. Casey G., Grogan and Sullivan leave England for Hong Kong on 2nd July on the ‘Canton’. On the following day Fr. Kevin O'Dwyer hopes to sail with Fr. Albert Cooney from San Francisco on the ‘General Gordon’ for the same destination.
The following will be going to Hong Kong in August : Frs. Joseph Mallin and Merritt, Messrs. James Kelly, McGaley, Michael McLoughlin and Geoffrey Murphy.

Irish Province News 48th Year No 2 1973

Obituary :
Fr William Benedict Merritt (1914-1973)
Fr Willie Merritt was born in Limerick Sept. 4th 1914. After schooling with the Christian Brothers at Sexton St, he concluded his secondary course at Mungret and entered the noviceship in 1932, was ordained at Milltown Park 1946 and died in Galway while on a short visit to his younger brother during the Easter break on April 25th, 1973. For his years in the Society he had a very full life. As a junior at Rathfarnham his success at UCD led to his being allotted another year during which he secured an MA in History and the Higher Diploma in Education. He likewise had a bent for Mathematics and had musical talent, vocal and instrumental, which committed him to directing the choirs, coaching troupes of carol singers at later as a priest officiating at Missa Cantata and High Mass.
He made his Philosophy at Vals and after two years of Colleges at Belvedere he began his Theology at Milltown Park 1943; Ordination 1946; Tertianship 1947. In 1949 he was assigned to the Hong Kong Mission where he was engaged in the strenuous work of the Colleges. During this period he prepared and produced a text-book in History which is still esteemed and used in the schools of the colony.
Ill health now intervened and he was compelled to return to Ireland seriously indisposed. After some months of anxious convalescence he was again able to resume work and with congenial occupation soon became fully active.
He was appointed to assist Fr Martin in the Mission offices which was being set up in Gardiner St. in 1953. He worked very hard and for long hours at the new chores. Much of the method in the office, the setting up of the card index system, the schemes for collecting funds, were devised by Fr “Gully”. He was never happier than when he was organising a Sale of Work or a Garden Fete. In 1957 Fr Gully was asked to help Fr Dargan the Province Procurator, and went to live at Loyola. Later he became Bursar and Minister at CIR and taught Trade Union History there. His last status was back to Mungret in 1968 where he again acted as Bursar, answering to a variety of other calls likewise.
During the latter years Fr Merritt’s health again began to cause anxiety; he suffered several heart attacks from which he rallied and recovered but which compelled him to acquiesce to a quieter tempo than what had been his wont, in following a team, verbi gratia.
During the few days in Galway in April be suffered an attack which was followed in a few hours by a repetition from which he didn't survive.
The Requiem Mass in Mungret in April 27th was concelebrated by 36 priests among whom Fr Provincial was the principal con celebrant. There was a large attendance of personal friends from Limerick. His two younger brothers, Denis and Michael were the chief mourners together with his Aunt, Mrs Clohessey, who had been his second mother since his own mother had died during Willie's Juniorate and his father had died before he entered.
Those who new him will remember him with affection; his loss will be severely felt. If we could summarise his life briefly we would say that he loved the Society, that he was kind and good humoured towards all who came his way, and that he was a devoted priest. He was always good company and even though he had his leg pulled on innumerable occasions he never bore resentment. He was known affectionately as “Gully” and it is a measure of the affection with which he was regarded that even when he was “in foreign parts” it was sufficient (and habitual), to refer to him as Gully.
As he realised the condition of his health he was fearful that he would be compelled to abandon his work. He was a man of prayer and his daily Mass was a source of strength and consolation to him; he was a community man essentially, in whose company gaiety and a bantering good-humour spontaneously generated. He had his foibles, one of which particularly, his meticulous accuracy in his professional work of accountancy, was a source, on occasion, of annoyance but overall of fun at least in later narration.
This meticulousness was not captious or officious; it came from scrupulosity which affected his whole life and which at times caused him much mental distress.
He had a great love for his native city; he was catholic in his interest in games and the fortunes of the city soccer team he followed with zest.
He was buried as he would desire at Mungret which he loved. As I stood at the grave-side listening to the final prayers being recited by Fr Provincial I couldn't help feeling he had gone to the Lord with full hands. RIP

◆ The Mungret Annual, 1974

Obituary

Father William B Merritt SJ

Fr Willie was a Limerickman. He was born in Limerick and he is buried in Mungret. He was the eldest of three children, all boys and all three completed their school days at Mungret College.

In his younger years three influences played a part in his vocation to the Society of Jesus, family life, his participation as an altarboy in St John's Cathedral and his training in self-discipline and habits of study begun under the direction of the Christian Brothers. Mungret and later the Society of Jesus reaped where others had sown.

He entered the Society of Jesus in September 1932 and after two years novitiate, where he is still affectionately remembered as an enthusiastic “outdoor works” man he spent four years in Rathfarnham where he attended lectures in UCD. After finishing his course in UCD he left for France in September 1938 with a BA and an honours MA under his already ample belt. His philosophical studies in Vals were cut short by world war two and he finished his philosophy at St Stanislaus College, Tullamore. He then went on to teach with success at Belvedere and at that time trained some of the best junior cup teams of those years. His interest in and enthusiasm for rugby and soccer remained with him all his life; the fortunes or misfortunes of Limerick AFC were clearly read on his Monday morning face for he was the most honest and transparent of men, totally unlike the caricature of the wily Jesuit of fiction!

His ordination to the priesthood in July 1946 brought out in him that more serious side of his character which impelled him to seek “perfection” in all things. He could never be satisfied with “second-rate work” of any kind in himself or in others. He gave the next ten years of his life to the missions, working as a teacher in our college in Hong Kong. His history notes - which were clear, succinct and easily learned were published there in book form. Teachers also profited from them and a reputation for good history teaching often rested on the envied possession of Bill's notes!

Without his realising it, he made very great demands on himself. Eventually the strain of his work and the pressures of the political situation in Hong Kong under mined his health. He returned to Ireland in the early 1950s far from well, He never fully recovered his health frorn that time. Despite that, he held various posts in the Order, in St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, the Provincial's Residence, and the College of Industrial Relations, before he finally returned to Mungret College in 1967. Like the Master, whom he sought to follow, he did all things well and as a bonus was a good “community man” to boot! Serious by nature with a deep sense of responsibility which sometimes weighed upon him, he achieved a balance by his sense of humour, his deep faith and unostentatious acts of piety (he was a regular visitor to Our Lady's Shrine at Knock) and his interest in people and in sport. He loved Mungret and there is no denying that the decision to close his old school saddened his last years. May his generous soul rest in peace.

EK

McParland, Terence, 1914-1934, Jesuit novice

  • IE IJA J/807
  • Person
  • 11 December 1914-08 October 1934

Born: 11 December 1914, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 07 September 1933, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Died: 08 October 1934, St Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin

Part of the St Mary’s, Emo, County Laois community at the time of death..

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 10th Year No 1 1935

Brother Terence McParland

Brother Terence McParland died at St. Vincent's on Monday 8th October, 1954.
He was born in Dublin, 11th December 1914, and educated by the Christian Brothers at Synge St.
In 1933 he passed the Leaving Certificate Exam., securing Honours in seven subjects, and won first place for a University Scholarship offered by the Dublin Corporation. The 7th Sept that same year saw him a Novice at Emo. Here he quickly endeared himself to his companions, who were not slow to appreciate a character of exceptional excellence. He was ever bright and cheerful. “Recreation with him”
writes one of his companions “was never dull, and his rather quaint and poetic mode of speech added a charm to his easy manner. Scrupulous in the observance of rules and customs he edified us all : “' The Mass is the one big thing in my life, It means a deal to me”. Little peeps like this gave us an occasional insight into our Brother's beautiful soul.
Nor was it his companions alone who learned to appreciate Brother Terence. Those who were responsible for his training knew that great as he was in intellectual gifts, he was far greater in soul and character.
The end came unexpectedly. A sudden haemorrhage necessitated his removal to hospital. There, for some days, he seemed to be making satisfactory progress, but a second attack supervened, and although recourse was had to a transfusion of blood he never rallied, and died on Monday the 8th October.
The Requiem Mass Xmas said by Father John Coyne in the Ignatian Chapel. Father Provincial and a great many Fathers and Scholastics from the various houses were present.
A thoughtful kindness, which was much appreciated, was the presence of Rev. Brother Bourke. Superior of Synge St., with his senior boys, who joined in the Mass and prayers, and
stood by, as a last tribute to their former pupil and comrade, while the remains were laid to rest in the Jesuit plot in Glasnevin. RIP

McGrath, Fergal P, 1895-1988, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/453
  • Person
  • 18 November 1895-02 January 1988

Born: 18 November 1895, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 06 October St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1927, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1931, Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin
Died: 02 January 1988, St Ignatius, Lower Leeson Street, Dublin

Early education at Belvedere College & Clongowes Wood College SJ

Studied for a BA in French and German as a Junior

by 1918 at Stonyhurst, England (ANG) studying
by 1929 at Valkenburg, Limburg, Netherlands (GER I) making Tertianship
by 1945 at Campion Hall, Oxford (ANG) studying
by 1949 Fordham, NY USA (NEB) making Tertianship

Irish Province News 1st Year No 1 1925
We may mention here a school story recently published – “The Last Lap.” Its author is Mr. Fergal McGrath, SJ. The book, which was mostly written while the author was a scholastic in Clongowes, has had an enthusiastic reception. The Reviewer in the " Ecclesiastical Review " writes of it : “It is a splendid boys' story. Probably neither Fr. Finn, or Fr. Spalding nor Fr. Boylan has told any better”.

Irish Province News 1st Year No 3 1926
Mr Fergal McGrath's “Last Lap” has been translated into Spanish. Much difficulty was experienced in finding Spanish equivalent for such phrases as : “getting his eye in”, “the calculating pig”, etc,

Irish Province News 10th Year No 2 1935
Works by Father Fergal McGrath SJ :

  1. “The Last Lap” - Pub. Benziger Bros., N. York and the Talbot
  2. “L'Ultima Tappa” - Italian translation of the above by Father Celestine Testore, S.]., , pub. Marietta, Rome, 1929
  3. “Adventure Island” - Pub. Benziger Bros., N. York and the Talbot Press, Dublin, 1952. School edition pub by Talbot Press, 1954, sanctioned by Board of Education for Higher Standards of Primary Schools.
  4. “Un Drama en Irelande” - French translation of above by M du Bourg. Pub. Editions du Closer, Tours, 1934
  5. “Christ in the World of To-day” - Pub. Gill & Son, 1933 (Lenten Lectures on the Sacred Heart)
  6. “Mother Catherine McAuley” - (Biographical sketch contributed to The Irish Way) Pub. Sheed & Ward, 1932
  7. “The Beefy Saint” - Pub. Irish Catholic Truth Society (a story for boys)
    Pamphlets
  8. “Canon Hannigan’s Martyrdom: - Pub. Irish Messenger Series, (A story of Irish clerical life)
  9. “The Catholic Church in Sweden” - (Edited) English C.T.S
  10. “Stories of the Twelve Promises of the Sacred Heart” - (In collaboration) Irish Messenger Series, “Tenement Angel”.

Irish Province News 23rd Year No 4 1948
Fr. Fergal McGrath sailed from Cobh on 24th September for New York ; he will be lecturing in Fordham University in the coming year.

Irish Province News 63rd Year No 2 1988

Obituary

Fr Fergal McGrath (1895-1913-1988)

Born in Dublin [on 18th November 1895) and educated in Clongowes (1908 12], Fergal McGrath was so dedicated to the Society, which he joined in 1913 on 6th October, after taking First Arts in UCD), that it is impossible to imagine him in any other way of life. He was very proud of his family, particularly of the involvement of his father, Sir Joseph McGrath, in the development of Irish university education, and as he became in his turn the patriarch, his love for the younger generations was evident in the quiet, almost shy, allusions which he made to his nephews and nieces.
Having taken a BA at University College, Dublin [1917], and studied philosophy in both Stonyhurst (1917-'8] and Milltown Park (1920-'2], he taught in Belvedere (1918-'20] and Clongowes [1922-24] before beginning theology at Milltown in 1924. [He was ordained a priest on 31st July 1927.] Fr Fergal's tertianship was made at 's Heerenberg in the Netherlands, which was then a house of the Lower German Jesuit province. He found that tertianship dragged a bit towards the end and he was happy to return to Ireland and to Rathfarnham as Minister of Juniors in 1929. Fr Fergal became Rector of Clongowes in 1933, at a very important phase in the growth of the school, and remained in office until 1941, when he went to Gardiner street as Superior. Four years of study in Oxford, where he took a D. Phil., Occupied his years until 1948 and he spent a further year studying education at Fordham university in New York, Returning to Ireland, Fr Fergal was made Rector of St Ignatius, Galway, where he remained until 1953. Leaving the West, he moved to Leeson street as a writer and spiritual father, until he began his last superiorship as Rector of Rathfarnham in 1961. From 1967 to 1972, he lived at Loyola House. Leeson street was his final Jesuit home. Fr Fergal was Province Archivist from 1975 until 1986, but remained Custodian of the strongroom, dealing with researchers and with many written queries until he went to hospital early in December 1987. He died on 2nd January 1988.
Fergal McGrath was a writer, a Jesuit superior, a good friend to many people all over Ireland, with a vast correspondence and with an interest in everything. He could write scholarly books, short stories, novels of school life and many pamphlets and newspaper articles. He wrote with the same care and precision which he brought to everything he did.
There was no haste, but much prudence. He once said, rather unnecessarily, to somebody who knew him very well '”s you know, I'm a cautious man'” He gave himself heart and soul to any task assigned to him.
Blessed with a very strong constitution and with what seemed to be an inherent ability to avoid stress, Fr Fergal was remarkable in his adherence to a personal daily routine. He had great respect for his fellow Jesuits and found it hard to say anything even remotely harsh about anybody. Most of his experiences as a superior seemed to have been happy, but he never discussed any of the difficulties which must have cropped up in those years, such as the hardships incur red while building at Clongowes and the unease at being a superior in formation during what are known as the 'turbulent' 1960s. In a life which lasted for 92 years, there were obviously disappointments and 'might-have-beens', but Fr Fergal never referred to them. He was quite free from resentment and never wasted time by cultivating hurts. He recognised that the past had not been perfect and, with complete trust in the Lord, got on with the task in hand. This attitude made him a surprisingly free person, because first impressions could be of a man bound by many self-imposed rules.
It was this inner freedom, combined with his respect for others, which drew so many people to him. The person to whom he probably felt closest all his life was a man who died almost fifty-five years before he himself did - Fr John Sullivan. A biography was one sign of his devotion to Fr John's cause; another was his slide-show, of which there were both long and short versions. I remember a conversation in which he made an unconscious slip by referring to “St John Sullivan” and went on talking, unaware of how much he had revealed in that brief anticipation of the Church's judgement. He also did tremendous work for the Cause of Mother Mary Aikenhead.
Despite the long and very slow decline in his energies, Fr Fergal's last years in Leeson street were undoubtedly some of his happiest. As his long daily walk along the Stillorgan road was gradually reduced to a stroll in the back garden, as he became more and more grateful for the lift in the house, he gave the impression of great happiness, because he felt himself among a group of brothers in the Lord, who both cared for him and esteemed him. He lived to become the longest-serving member of the Province.
There were many changes in the Society which Fr Fergal accepted, but which he hardly understood and of which he did not fully approve, but here, once again, his obedience and his deep sense of commitment as a religious took him across hurdles at which he might have fallen. Fr Fergal was intelligent and was a liberal in the Edwardian sense of the word. Patience was one of his strongest suits and stood him in good stead on many an occasion when he might have been driven wild with exasperation, as when unpunctual scholars kept him waiting for hours after they were due to examine documents in the archives.
His radio was a prized and well-used object. Even at 92, Fr Fergal found that a session with his clarinet was a good way to relax and he never felt called to make major adjustments for the television era. His devotions took up an increasingly large part of his day and it was obvious that he was very close to the Lord. In somebody so accomplished, so well known that he received an honorary doctorate from UCD as recently as 1982, there was a profound vein of humility, as I discovered one morning when he amazed me by asking for my advice about some point in the Divine Office.
We worked together in the archives for several years. Having known many of the men whose papers are preserved in the Leeson Street strong-room, he was an invaluable source of advice. No question from me was made to seem silly, no letter from any enquirer was too demanding to merit his full attention.
I treasure casual remarks Fr Fergal made, such as “I don't remember Fr X, but I do recall the old men talking about him” or his stories about mishaps during a juniorate villa at Monkstown, Co Dublin, during the first world war. He spoke little about his own accomplishments, such as his classical learning and his good command of Irish, but he did pass on jocular pieces of advice, such as a piece of consolation he had been given in 1933, when somebody told him that “being a rector isn't too bad - there are even whole days when you'll forget that you're a rector at all”.
A quick glance around his room told the story of Fr Fergal's life better than any biography. His chimneypiece was lined with photographs of his family, of fellow Jesuits and of the present Pope. There was one small bookshelf and, piled beside it, boxes of papers relating to Fr John Sullivan. His wardrobe contained a few, well-worn clothes and his Jesuit gown hung on the back of his door. The attention of any visitor would be drawn to the most prominent object in the room: a desk, laden with letters from all over Ireland and abroad, with books which he was reading as possible material for the refectory and with a Latin Office-book placed close to his armchair.
Fr Fergal's last illness was mercifully brief. His sense of humour showed itself to the end, as he responded to a plea not to die in 1987 and thereby destroy the Province's death-free record for that year. When I last saw him, the day before his death, he was sleeping peace fully, his face serene. A well-lived life was drawing to its earthly close. It was a life in which many people were blessed with his friendship and I am very grateful for having been one of them.
Fergus O'Donoghue, SJ

Fr Fergal McGrath: Incomplete bibliography of his works
Fiction:
“Adventure Island “(Dublin and New York, 1932). “Tenement Angel and Other Stories “(Dublin, 1934). “The Last Lap “(Dublin, 1925; Italian translation “L'ultima Tappa”, Turin "and Rome, 1929; French translation “Au Dernier Tour”, Paris, (no date).
Education:
“The Consecration of Learning”: lectures on Newman's Idea of a university (Dublin and New York, 1962). “Education in Ancient and Mediaeval Ireland” (Dublin, 1979). “Newman's University: Idea and Reality” (Dublin, 1951). “The university question” in “A History of Irish Catholicism”, vol. V, pp. 84-142 (Dublin, 1971).
Christian doctrine: Christ in the world of today (Dublin, 1933). Life in Christ (Dublin, 1957).
Biography: Father John Sullivan, S.J. (Dublin, 1941).
Biographical articles:
“Catherine McAuley” in “The Irish Way”, edited by F.J. Sheed, pp. 244-'62 (London, 1932). “The conversion” in “A Tribute to Newman”, edited by Michael Tierney, pp. 57 83 (Dublin, 1945). “The Background to Newman's Idea of a University” in “The Month”, July-August 1945, vol. 181, no. 946, pp. 247-'58.
Pamphlets:
“Father John Sullivan SJ” (Dublin, 1942). “Newman in Dublin” (Dublin, 1969). “Youth Guidance” (Dublin, 1944). “James A Cullen SJ : A modern Apostle of the Sacred Heart” (Dublin, 1980).

◆ The Clongownian, 1988

Obituary

Father Fergal McGrath SJ

A life-span of ninety-two years, almost all of it in active life, would fill a long chronicle. Fergal McGrath’s was particularly full, not just because of his health and longevity, but more because of his talents and fidelity to his Jesuit priesthood.. His associations with Clongowes are especially strong, and the most important of them are almost impossible to chronicle, because they consist of friendships with hundreds of Clongownians, scattered across Ireland, Europe and beyond, who will remember this large, kindly, courteous and always interested friend as an important part of their lives.

A photograph of Fergal's father used to hang in the Rogues Gallery in Clongowes, a respectable Victorian figure: Sir Joseph McGrath. He had been a teacher in the old Tullabeg College, later became co-secretary with Sir James Creed Merridith of the Royal University of Ireland and subsequently of the National University of Ireland, and in this latter capacity he was knighted by what in retrospect can be seen as a dying British administration. Fergal did not often talk about his father, but his own identity was different. He was a strongly patriotic Irishman, committed to his country and its language, and without the animosities that could have marred another son of a knighted father. He took pains to learn Irish well, and used it when he could; so he was at his ease as Rector of an Irish-speaking school, Galway's Coláiste Iognáid, in the early 1950s.

He was educated at Belvedere and, from the age of 14, at Clongowes; after First Arts in University College, Dublin, he entered the Jesuit noviceship, and later studied modern languages, then philosophy, then theology. As soon as he finished his Jesuit training, with a tertianship in Germany, he was loaded with responsibility: the charge of Jesuit scholastics in Rathfarnham, then Rector of Clongowes, Superior of Gardiner Street Church and community, Rector of Coláiste Iognáid in Galway, and later of Rathfarnham Castle.

Fergal carried these burdens with a genial ease, but paid a price for them. He worried about his charges and spent endless energy preparing, planning and providing. It was as a prudent and promising young man that he was appointed to succeed Fr George Roche. The Clongowes he took over in 1933, and ruled for eight years, carried what then seemed a crippling debt. In the climate of the Economic War, money was short to a degree we can hardly imagine. Pupils, the main source of revenue, were scarce, and with World War II became scarcer. The contractor of the New Building had gone bankrupt. The college was not insured against this contingency, and had to take over the management of construction, and all through the thirties and early forties, suffered from a pressing and sometimes mounting debt to the banks which coloured all administrative decisions.

His last two years in Clongowes were overshadowed by the war in Europe, with all the fears and uncertainties it brought. Fergal organised (through the scholastics) a fire brigade for contingencies. He saw a tide of refugees from England rise and ebb, leaving him with many empty beds and financial worries.

He once remarked that he went to Clongowes full of enthusiasm as an educator, loving the scope that the job seemed to offer; but soon found that all his energies were used in surviving. He was a slim man of 37 when he went to Clongowes, but the burdens of responsibility and a sedentary job turned him into the portly figure we later knew. He tried in vain to reduce it. He was a modest eater, and well into his eighties he walked, and swam, and on holidays played consistent golf. His two splendid schoolboy stories, “The Last Lap” and “Adventure Island” show what an active, dreaming boy there was inside the adult frame. He wrote them in odd moments of enforced leisure, one in a convalescence from a long flu in the twenties, the other in spare moments when in charge of the Jesuit juniors. He relished the memory of a happy and carefree youth with its limited anxieties. Adult life as a Jesuit had for him few carefree moments.

Despite his worries, he was much appreciated in Clongowes, especially by the ten scholastics who constituted the most active and talented part of the teaching staff, and whom he supported and fathered in the kindest way. To the parents he was always accessible and understanding, generous in remitting fees in cases of bereavement or hardship, energetic in helping past pupils on their first steps in life. He never forgot Clongowes, though his last residence there ended nearly fifty years before his death. He would never miss a Clongownian funeral, and maintained an enormous correspondence with past pupils and parents who became his warm
friends.

Fergal's friendships were in many ways his greatest achievement - and he was a man of considerable achievements. He kept his friendships in good repair by visits and correspondence. They were planned, as every thing in his life was planned. He would delicately invite a fellow Jesuit to chaperone him on visits to widows or spinsters. He would bring his clarinet to play duets with an aging bachelor, a former colleague. When, in Galway, Bishop Michael Browne's mother died, Fergal agonised over whether it would be appropriate for him to approach the formidable old prelate with his sympathies. He made the move, and found that he was almost the only one to have ventured near the isolated and sorrowing bishop, who was deeply moved by Fergal's humanity. Here as elsewhere, Fergal's moves were for other people's sake, not for his own.

The others whom he befriended were from every part and condition in the country. Fergal knew the taste of poverty from his experiences of the thirties, and he responded positively, not just in individual acts of kindness, but interested himself too in the structures of society. He initiated the Social Study weekends which brought all sections of industrial and agricultural society to Clongowes for seminars of a high quality in the mid-thirties. He gave much energy to the Clongowes Housing Project, providing flats for the needy in Blackhall Place; and also to the Clongowes Boys' Club.

Apart from these concerns, Fergal gave innumerable retreats and lectures, many of the latter focussed on Fr John Sullivan, of whom he wrote the biography as well as a popular pamphlet. On coming to Clongowes he inherited the aura of John Sullivan, and he did more than perhaps any other man to convey to the public the impact of John's saintliness.

The public obituaries of Fergal spoke of him in that most ambiguous phrase, as “a distinguished educator”. He was indeed a sound scholar, well equipped for the task with languages, patience, a broad educational background in his youth, and an extraordinarily methodical approach to work. His study of Newman's University was a major work of lasting value, the fruit of four happy years of research in Champion Hall, Oxford, then in its palmiest days.

When Fr Tim Corcoran vacated the Chair of Education in UCD, Fergal's wide educational experience and high reputation made him a likely candidate for the position, It is said that Chancellor Eamonn De Valera, at the meeting to appoint the new professor, asked: “Is Father McGrath not interested?” But Fergal had withdrawn his interest rather than contest the chair with Tim Corcoran's assistant, W Williams, who he felt had prior claim on it, and whose late application was unexpected. Instead he spent a year as visiting professor in Fordham University, his only transatlantic excursion, but one that he remembered with warmth and happiness.

Fergal was a conservative and cautious man to the end. In 1987 he wrote to a friend marvelling at her word-processor, but preferring still to tap away at a typewriter he had bought secondhand in 1933. He did not enjoy the major changes in the Church and in Irish Jesuits in the last two decades. The disruption of traditions and the loss of vocations disturbed him - he was quite upset when the present writer grew a beard in the early seventies, and correspondingly relieved when the growth was shaved off. But he never became angry, bitter or vociferous. He reflected beautifully his master Newman's definition of a gentleman; one who never willingly inflicts pain. He was trusted to the end by all his brethren, whom he served to his ninety-third year as keeper of the Province archives. May one conjecture that what he must particularly enjoy in the Beatific Vision is “Deus Immutabilis”, in whom there is no shadow of change, who wipes all tears from our eyes, and has lifted all burdens and anxieties off Fergal's broad back.

PA

McDonald, John, 1913-2006, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/632
  • Person
  • 16 April 1913-09 July 2006

Born: 16 April 1913, Dalkey, County Dublin
Entered: 12 November 1932, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1945, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1948, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Died: 09 July 2006, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death.

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 133 : Special Issue September 2007
Obituary
Fr John (Jack) McDonald (1913-2006)

16th April 1913: Born in Dublin
Early education in Belvedere College
12th November 1932: Entered the Society at Emo
13th November 1934: First Vows at Emo
1934 - 1937: Rathfarnham - Studied Arts at UCD
1937 - 1940: Tullabeg -Studied Philosophy
1940 - 1942: Belvedere - Regency, HDip in Ed
1942 - 1946: Milltown Park - Studied Theology
31st July 1945: Ordained at Milltown Park
1946 - 1947: Tertianship at Rathfarnham Castle
1947 - 1950: Tullabeg - Minister; Prefect of the Church; President of B.V.M. Sodality
2nd February 1948: Final Vows at Tullabeg
1950 - 1961: Rathfarnham -
1950 - 1955: Minister; Assistant Teacher
1955 - 1961: Rector; Treasurer
1961 - 1962: Crescent College - Treasurer; Ministered in the Church
1962 - 1964: Gardiner St. - Minister; Prefect of the Church
1964 - 2006: Milltown Park -
1964 - 1965: Treasurer, Sub-Minister; Milltown Institute Treasurer
1965 - 1987: Bursar
1987 - 1988: Cherryfield Lodge - Bursar; Assistant Bursar, Milltown Park
1988 - 2001: Assistant Bursar, Milltown Park
2001 - 2006: Cherryfield Lodge - Praying for the Church and the Society
9th July 2006: Died at Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin.

From the homily preached by Fr. Michael Hurley:
“Well Done, Well Done”, Good and Faithful Servant. Enter into the Joy of Your Lord' (Mt 25: 14-17, 19-23)

We're all here this morning, you will agree, to praise and thank. God for the life and work of Fr. Jack McDonald, for the blessing he has been in our lives; we're here too to ask forgiveness from God and from Jack himself for our failure to appreciate him sufficiently, to love him as much as he deserved; and we're here to pray that he may rest in peace and use his influence in the heavenly places to get us a replacement for himself and also many others of his stature to carry on the work of the Irish Jesuit Province, the work to which he devoted himself so wholeheartedly, for so long.

My name is Michael Hurley. But why am I the one to be giving the homily this morning, trying to put into words some of the thoughts in our minds, the feelings in our hearts? I'm no contemporary of Jack's: I'm only 83: he was 93: he was ten years senior to me. But I am a fellow Jesuit and I lived amicably here in Milltown Park with Jack for many years. However the main reason, I think, why it has fallen to me to give the homily this morning is this: some years ago Jack approached me and asked a favour: his nephew, Arthur, knowing he didn't have long more to live, was putting all his affairs in order and had asked to see a priest: would I oblige? Of course, I would and did and did so very gladly. In asking me Jack was doing me an honour; it was a gesture of trust. as unexpected as it was undeserved, and in giving the homily this morning I am once again saying thanks to Jack and also to the family: on the occasion of Arthur's funeral I was privileged to get a glimpse of the veneration in which Jack was held and how devoted all were to him.

For our Gospel reading this morning I chose the parable of the talents (Mt 25: 14-17, 19-23) because those great, glorious words I wanted as my text occur in it not just once but twice and I can think of no words more appropriate for the occasion. 'Well Done, Well Done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your Lord'. These were surely the words which the choirs of angels and the whole court of heaven were singing on Sunday morning when Jack made his entry. As we'll be reminded once again at the end of Mass, the funeral liturgy explicitly invites us to imagine the angels and saints leading and escorting and welcoming Jack into paradise, into the holy city, to the bosom of Abraham, to meet our Lord and his mother, to sit down at table with them at the banquet feast which is heaven.

But who else was in that welcoming party? Surely his patron Saint John but Jack was such an intensely private person that we can't be sure whether this is the aggressive John the Baptist or the amiable John the Evangelist. Also present will have been all those who have gone before him to prepare a place for him: his father, John J. founder of the now well-known law firm, his mother, Maud Flannery of Ballaghadreen; Jack's eight sisters and brothers, four of each, especially Joe who followed him to the Jesuit noviceship; all the fifteen who entered Emo with him in 1932 (except Joe Mallin who was home from Hong Kong recently to take part in the 1916 celebrations); all the ten who were ordained with him in this chapel in 1945, all the fellow residents of Cherryfield who have gone before him, not least perhaps Joe Gill who was ordained with him in 1945.

Jack entered Emo in November 1932, the year of the eucharistic congress. His novice master was Fr John Coyne who subsequently exerted an enormous influence on the life of the Province. After Rathfarnham from where the studied Arts in UCD and Tullabeg where he studied philosophy he went to Belvedere to teach from 1940-42 and one of the first tributes which we have to Jack's characteristic personal kindness comes from these years.

The tribute occurs in an autobiographical sketch written by one of the boys he taught who is still alive, and Fr John Guiney has kindly shared a copy of this document with me. Jack is here referred to as “a special friend”, with “a heart of solid gold”; mention is made of his “courtesy and superb manners” and of “the myriad of good deeds that he performed”. Other such tributes would follow in the course of Jack's life.

After ordination and tertianship, Jack became involved in administration and this was to continue for the rest of his active life. In 1947 he went to Tullabeg as Minister, as second in command and in charge of all practical matters in the house. After three years in Tullabeg he went to Rathfarnham - for five years as Minister and then for six as Rector. The Crescent in Limerick came next, but only for one year in which he was Treasurer; then Gardiner Street for two years where he was Minister, and finally, in 1964. Milltown Park where he acted as Bursar until his retirement to Cherryfield in 1999.

Administration can be difficult. Ever since the disobedience of Adam those subject to authority resist it. Administration can be particularly difficult in a period of rapid social change, when attitudes all round are changing but without as yet the sanction of law. Law is slow to catch up with life even in non-controversial matters and this time-lag can be very troublesome for those in positions of responsibility. Jack could not escape from this dilemma. Here in Ireland we had no experience of the horror and turmoil of the second world war, but neither did we experience much of the changes and experimentation to which it led in church as well as in society. Some changes did take place here (Zambia, Gonzaga, Manresa), but, in general, the winds of change were not altogether welcome and one sign of this can possibly be seen in the fact that for almost quarter of a century from 1935 until well after the war, until 1959, the important position of Socius to the Provincial, Assistant Provincial, was held by the same person. The Vatican Council and the Jesuit Congregations eventually helped but before these took place it was extremely difficult to be a superior of any sort, specially if you were a perfectionist as Jack was. So Jack's years in administration cannot have been easy. But he enjoyed figures and was an excellent bursar and bookkeeper, fully deserving of a Well Done Well Done.

He also enjoyed gardening -- the greenhouse in our quadrangle is a monument to his interest in gardening -- and fishing in Mayo in the summer time, and, of course. family visits. His reputation for personal kindness continued to grow. Br John Adams recalls with much appreciation and thanks how in 1961 when he himself was away in London on tertianship and his father in Limerick was dying, Jack was wonderfully kind to his mother.

Those who make the Spiritual Exercises hear Christ in the meditation on the Kingdom addressing them in these words: “It is my will to conquer the whole world and all my enemies. Therefore whoever wishes to join me in this enterprise must be willing to labour with me, that by following me in suffering, he may follow me in glory”. Jack made the Exercises and that meditation. He heard that call and answered it with great generosity, wishing indeed with God's help to distinguish himself in the service of Christ his Lord and King.

So the angelic chorus which sang Jack into heaven on Sunday were simply indicating the fulfilment of the promise made to him by Christ the King: Jack having followed him in labours and in suffering as a Jesuit for seventy four years would now follow him in glory; would now share his joy, his peace: “Well Done, Well Done, good and faithful servant. Come take possession of the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world”. (Mt 25:34).

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 2002

Farewell Companions : Dermot S Harte

Fr John J McDonald SJ

He was a Scholastic during my early schooldays. He was a gentle and shy person and is, I believe, the only one of the masters who still graces our presence. He is no longer a young man and has lived in retirement for many years.

A member of a family of distinguished Belvederians, he had three brothers, two of whom entered the family law firm. I didn't really know his third brother, Fr Joe McDonald SJ - also a Jesuit - who served for most of his working life as a Missionary in Zambia. Joe died in Dublin some years ago. His only sister, Sheila, was a Dominican Nun and she was one of the most vibrant, genuine, sincere, kind, and loving people that I ever had the extraordinary pleasure of knowing.

Jack follows quietly in the footsteps of Christ spreading the Light of Christ wherever he goes and beneath that quiet exterior there beats a heart of solid gold. It will probably never be known how many people he helped to cope with various traumas that beset them, and he would be most embarrassed if anyone were to remind him of the myriad of good deeds which he performed. He is a welcome friend and advisor to many people and is able by his words, deeds and example to lift even the lowliest Spirit

I visit him whenever I can and it is so apparent that the courtesy and superb manners that he displays and which are the very hallmarks of a gentleman, are still alive and well. Jack will be with us, God willing, for a long time to come and will continue to remain a Special Friend of mine and of my family. Thank you for everything, old friend. I salute you.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 2006

Obituary
Father Jack McDonald SJ (OB 1932)

A Tribute : A Man for Others

It was with a heart filled with sadness that I learned of the “going home” of Fr John J McDonald SJ. He was in the ninety-fourth year of his life and in the fifty-first year of his ministry. Jack had been in declining health for a number of years but he continued to remain bright and cheerful.

It is a long time ago since a young Scholastic entered the Classroom of his, and my, old school, Belvedere, and announced “My name is Mr McDonald and I am your Latin teacher”. He was, I believe, the last surviving teacher from our schooldays.

A gentle and shy person, he was born in 1913 into a family of distinguished Belvederians, one of a large family. A brother, Fr Joe, was also a Jesuit. Joe died in Dublin some years ago.

Throughout the many years that I knew him he epitomised all that was good in this now “creaky” world following quietly, as he did, in the footsteps of Christ and spreading the Light of Christ wherever he went, for beneath that quiet exterior there beat a heart of solid gold. It will probably never be known how many people he helped to cope with the various traumas that beset them and he would be most embarrassed if someone were to remind him. A welcome friend and advisor to many people he was always able by his words, deeds and example to lift the lowliest spirit.

The College Motto “A Man for Others” might well have been composed with Jack in mind.

Over the last years I visited him in Cherryfield Lodge whenever I was able and the courtesy and superb manners, which are the hallmarks of a gentleman, were always fresh and well.

And so we take our earthly leave of this saintly friend as he begins his sojourn in Heaven; a man whose memory will forever be crystal clear in our minds. Each one of us has his or her special memories of this extraordinary priest that will remain with us all the days of our lives.

He will be greatly missed by all who were privileged to call him “friend”.
For you, I know, will walk the streets of Paradise, head high.

DH

John ] McDonald SJ
Born April 16th 1913
Ordained July 31st 1945
Died July 9th 2006

McCartney, William, 1857-1926, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/1694
  • Person
  • 17 January 1857-01 June 1926

Born: 17 January 1857, Cork City, County Cork
Entered: 23 January 1880, Milltown Park
Final Vows: 15 August 1893, Milltown Park, Dublin
Died: 01 June 1926, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
His Master of Novices was Charles McKenna at Milltown.
1886 He was now at Milltown as Cook, and he also served as Cook in Cork, Limerick, Clongowes, Galway and Tullabeg.
1925 He was sent to Gardiner St and not long afterwards he suffered a stroke. He recovered from this sufficiently to be able to walk in the garden with the aid of a stick. His second stroke was more severe and he survived only a couple of days, and died 01 June 1926.
He was at least six feet tall and was apparently a powerful man.

◆ Irish Province News
Irish Province News 1st Year No 4 1926
Obituary
Brother William McCartney
Br McCartney . died at Gardiner Street on June 1st, 1926

He entered the Society in 1880, and two years later was appointed cook at Milltown Park. For the next forty years he was cook in one or other of our Irish houses. In his case “cook” was no mere honorary title. He spent his working day in the kitchen, and while there his coat was always off. And he had a very clear idea why he worked so hard. It may be news to many that he was known to his intimate friends as “Propter Te”. During the greater part of these forty years the words were constantly on his lips-he had learned them during a Retreat. When his work was well-nigh overwhelming - such as four villas in Galway - during the war, one after another in quick succession, he never shirked : “Propter Te”. When difficulties gathered round him he stood his ground, and faced them like a man It can be said with truth of him, “he died in harness.” Retreats were started in Rathfarnham in 1922. It meant double work for him, and he had no help except a lad to wash the dishes. He was advised to ask for assistance.
But no, he would do the best he could “Propter Te”. It was too much for him. In course of time he began to feel out of sorts, the old energy was ebbing fast, and he was sent to the doctor, who put him in his own motor and drove him straight to hospital. The heart had given way, and Br McCartney was in well nigh a dying condition. He He lingered on for two years, and IS now with that generous Father Who rewards the cup of water given for His sake. He won't forget those forty years of hard, continuous work ever and always generously done for him. Propter Te.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Brother William McCartney 1857-1926
“Propter te” was the motto and guiding principle of Br William McCartney, who died at Gardiner Street on June 1st 1926.

Having entered the Society in 1880, he spent the next 40 years of his life as cook in one or other of our houses. During all those years the words “Propter te” were ever on his lips, so that he became known to his intimate friends as “Propter te”.

When the Retreats stared at Rathfarnham, his work doubled, yet he never asked for help. Finally his health broke down and his heart became affected. He lingered for two years before passing to Him who had heard so oft those words “Propter te”.

McCarron, Seán J, 1907-1975, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/275
  • Person
  • 01 October 1907-16 July 1975

Born: 01 October 1907, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 01 September 1925, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1938, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1942, Clongowes Wood College SJ
Died: 16 July 1975, Mungret College, County Limerick

Part of the Sacred Heart, Crescent, Limerick community at the time of death

Early education at O’Connell’s School Dublin

◆ Companions in Mission 1880- Zambia-Malawi (ZAM) Obituaries :
John McCarron was known as Sean. Even as a novice, his qualities of leadership and practical common sense were recognised. He was self-confident, sure of his judgment and, on occasion, forthright in urging his point of view. His self-confidence stood to him in counselling and directing the large number of people, both clerical and lay, who sought his advice.
He was born in Dublin on 1 October 1907 and entered the Society in 1925. After the normal course of studies, juniorate, philosophy, regency and theology, he was ordained at Milltown Park in 1938.

For 15 years (1942 to 1957) Fr Sean was the Central Director of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association (PTAA) with the exception of the first year when he was the assistant. He possessed tremendous drive and was demanding of others both as to the quality and quantity of their work. Some within the Society said he was too demanding. However he had the knack or ability to draw around him people of talent and dedication who would give of their best.

He had a genius for organisation and administration which showed itself in the restructuring of the Pioneer office, in the conducting of Pioneer affairs and also in the overall direction of the memorable Golden Jubilee of the Association in 1949 which entailed a huge parade through the centre of Dublin and a massive meeting in Croke Park. He founded and launched the Pioneer Magazine in 1948 which quickly built up a good circulation in spite of the pundits who said that such a magazine would not be a practical proposition. He even procured a car for his work of promoting the Association - a very progressive action at the time. Until the late 40s, the only cars permitted in the Province were the four official cars for the country houses - Emo, Clongowes, Tullabeg and Mungret. The annual Pioneer Rally at Dublin's Theatre Royal was certainly the biggest annual rally of any group in Ireland. Because of the Association, he became one of the best known priests in Ireland.

An amusing incident took place when he was Director of the Pioneers. One afternoon seeing a poor woman pushing a pram up the hill in Gardiner Street, he went to assist her and found himself pushing a pram, not with a baby, but one full of bottles of beer!

He left the Association to be posted to Zambia (then Northern Rhodesia) for the express purpose of building and setting up Charles Lwanga Teacher Training College. His right hand man was Br Pat McElduff. It was quite a showpiece with even a fountain on the campus. He was a tremendous worker but at the same time he had great kindness towards the workers and foremen. The firms he dealt with had great respect for him as he was always so straight and clear about what he wanted. He lived where he worked, in a small house, the inside of which was littered with plans everywhere – on the floor, on the table, on his bed. Zambia was a very happy episode in his life which revealed his charm and affability.

Back in Ireland he founded Manresa Retreat House and was the first Superior of Loyola House, the provincial’s new residence. His health had not been good for a number of years though he always made light of this. The end came suddenly early in the morning of 16 July 1975 in Limerick where he had been living.

Note from Arthur J Clarke Entry
During his six years as rector, he was blessed with such outstanding heads of Canisius as Dick Cremins and Michael J Kelly. Arthur's vision for Canisius as a leading secondary school was influenced by his experience of Clongowes Wood College in Ireland. First, he wanted a proper house for the community. Though the actual building was the responsibility of Fr McCarron and Br Pat McElduff, the siting and design of the spacious community house are largely Arthur’s.

Note from Pat McElduff Entry
For the construction of the Teachers Training College Charles Lwanga across the river from Chikuni, Br Pat was the obvious man for the building together with Fr McCarron just out from Ireland.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 23rd Year No 4 1948

Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin.
We moved in on Saturday morning, 14th August. Fr, Superior (Fr. McCarron), Fr. Minister (Fr. Kearns), and Bro. E. Foley constituted the occupying force, and Fr. T. Martin not only placed his van at our disposal, but gave generously of his time and labour for the heavy work of the first day.
A long procession of vans unloaded until noon, when the men broke off for their half-day, leaving a mountain of assorted hardware and soft goods to be unpacked and stowed. By nightfall we had a chapel installed, the kitchen working, dining-room in passable order, and beds set up, so we said litanies, Fr. Superior blessed the house and consecrated it to the Sacred Heart.
Next morning Fr. Superior said the first Mass ever offered in the building. It was the Feast of the Assumption and a Sunday, so we. placed the house and the work under the Patronage of Our Lady and paused to review the scene. Fr. Provincial came to lunch.
The building is soundly constructed from basement to roof, but needs considerable modification before it can be used as a temporary Retreat House. The permanent Retreat House has yet to be built on the existing stables about 130 yards from the principal structure, but. we hope to take about twenty exercitants as soon as builders, plumbers, electricians, carpenters and decorators have done their work.
Fr. C. Doyle is equipping and furnishing the domestic chapel as a memorial to Fr. Willie, who worked so tirelessly for the establishment of workingmen's retreats in Ireland. A mantelpiece of this room has been removed, and thermostatically controlled electric heating is being installed. Lighting is to be by means of fluorescent tubes of the latest type.
With all due respects to the expert gardeners of the Province, we modestly assert that our garden is superb. Fr. Provincial was so impressed by the work done there that he presented us with a Fordson 8 H.P. van to bring the surplus produce to market. Under the personal supervision of Fr. Superior, our two professional gardeners took nine first prizes and four seconds with fourteen exhibits at the Drimnagh show. Twelve of their potatoes filled a bucket, and were sold for one shilling each. The garden extends over 2 of our 17 acres and will, please God, provide abundant fruit and vegetables.
From the beginning we have been overwhelmed with kindness: by our houses and by individual Fathers. Fr. Provincial has been a fairy-godmother to us all the time. As well as the van, he has given us a radio to keep us in touch with the outside world. We have bene fitted by the wise advice of Frs. Doyle and Kenny in buying equipment and supplies, while both of them, together with Fr. Rector of Belvedere and Fr. Superior of Gardiner Street, have given and lent furniture for our temporary chapel Fr. Scantlebury sacrificed two fine mahogany bookcases, while Frs. Doherty and D. Dargan travelled by rail and bus so that we might have the use of the Pioneer car for three weeks. Milltown sent a roll-top desk for Fr, Superior's use. To all who helped both houses and individuals we offer our warmest thanks, and we include in this acknowledgement the many others whom we have not mentioned by name.
Our man-power problem was acute until the Theologians came to the rescue. Two servants were engaged consecutively, but called off without beginning work. An appeal to Fr. Smyth at Milltown brought us Messrs. Doris and Kelly for a week of gruelling labour in the house. They scrubbed and waxed and carpentered without respite until Saturday when Mr. Kelly had to leave us. Mr. Hornedo of the Toledo Province came to replace him, and Mr. Barry arrived for work in the grounds. Thanks to their zeal and skill, the refectory, library and several bedrooms were made ready and we welcomed our first guest on Monday, 30th August. Under the influence of the sea air, Fr. Quinlan is regaining his strength after his long and severe illness.
If anyone has old furniture, books, bedclothes, pictures, or, in fact anything which he considers superfluous, we should be very glad to hear of it, as we are faced with the task of organizing accommodation for 60 men and are trying to keep the financial load as light as possible in these times of high cost. The maintenance of the house depends on alms and whatever the garden may bring. What may look like junk to an established house may be very useful to us, starting from bare essentials. Most of all, we want the prayers of the brethren for the success of the whole venture, which is judged to be a great act of trust in the Providence of God.
Our postal address is : Manresa House, Dollymount, Dublin.

Irish Province News 50th Year No 3 and 4 1975

Obituary :

Fr Seán McCarron (1907-1975)

Fr Kevin O'Donnell writes:
“I went to Tullabeg in September 1925, a few days after Seán McCarron. We were together from that date until the end of our Tertianship in 1940, moving on from the Noviceship to the Juniorate, then to Philosophy, to Clongowes, to Milltown Park and finally to Rathfarnham.
Father Paddy Kenny was in constant attendance during our years of formation, being Socius and Minister during our noviceship and coming with us to Rathfarnham. He was appointed Minister in Clongowes at the same time as we were sent there as scholastics. We had, therefore, the benefit of the guidance and example of an outstanding Jesuit - a practical and deeply spiritual man.
Seán would be astonished if he heard anyone attempting to draw a comparison between himself and ‘PK’, and I don't intend to try it. His long and constant association with ‘PK’ undoubtedly influenced Seán.
Even in the Noviceship, Seán's qualities of leadership and practical common sense were recognised. At ‘outdoor works’, when Seán was in charge of a group, we all knew whom to obey, Seán was aware of his gifts - he was self-confident, sure of his judgement and, on occasion, forthright in urging his point. This self confidence stood to him in later life in counselling and directing the very large number of people - clerical and lay - who sought his advice.
In addition to a very practical mind and his gift of leadership, Seán had a deep and genuine spirituality, zealous and generous in giving the Spiritual Exercises, and a great worker on a Mission.
He gave devoted and distinguished service to the Society which he joined fifty years ago. God grant him his reward”.

Fr Dan Dargan writes about Seán as Director of the Pioneers :
“In 1942 Fr Seán McCarron was appointed assistant to the Director of the Pioneer Association, Fr Joe Flinn. The following year Fr Flinn died and Seán succeeded him as Central Director. He remained in that office until 1957 when he left Ireland to work on the Zambian mission.
For nine years I was his assistant, and during that time I grew to look on him as one of the most able men I have met in the Society. He was highly intelligent, practical and forceful, he commanded widespread respect throughout the country and became one of the best-known priests in Ireland. Himself possessing tremendous drive, he was demanding of others, both as to the quality and quantity of their work. In the Society some said that he was too demanding. Outside the Society I have known several people who were ready to work themselves to the bone for Fr McCarron and glad to be able to do it. Indeed a secret of his success in whatever he undertook was his ability to draw around him people of talent and dedication who would give of their best.
I was often struck by his handling of a thorny issue. He would study it, would get right to the kernel and would evaluate reasons for and against. Then, where others might hesitate, he would make a decision and would fearlessly execute it. He had a genius for organisation and administration, as he showed in his efficient re structuring of the Pioneer Association office, in his overall direction of the memorable Golden Jubilee celebrations of the Association in 1949, and in his conducting of Pioneer affairs. He was much sought after as a spiritual adviser, especially during his years at Manresa Retreat House. I have heard people speak of the valuable direction he gave them with his commonsense approach and generous kindness to them.
Until recently it fell to the lot of few Jesuits to be assigned to more than one totally new work in the course of their lives. Within ten years Seán McCarron was given three such assignments: he was appointed founder of Manresa Retreat House, first superior of Loyola, and was sent to Zambia for the express purpose of building and setting up the Charles Lwanga College. One reason for these appointments was his great initiative, to which any house where he was in charge bears witness. In the Pioneer Association, before his coming on the scene, it was the official viewpoint that a special magazine for the Association would not be a practical proposition. In 1948 Seán blew this theory to bits when he founded and launched the Pioneer magazine, which quickly built up a good circulation. After the Second World War, as soon as motor cars began to appear freely on the roads, Seán procured a car for his work of promoting the Association - an action which at the time was considered very progressive! (It may come as a surprise to younger Jesuits to learn that until the late 1940s the only cars permitted in the Province were the four official house cars allowed to our country houses, one each to Emo, Tullabeg, Clongowes and Mungret).
For him a favourite occasion was the annual Pioneer meeting in Dublin's Theatre Royal. This was quite a remarkable meeting, certainly the biggest annual rally of any group in Ireland. The theatre, which held three and a half thousand people, was always packed. No sooner had Seán risen and said a few words than you could see that he held his audience in the palm of his hand. He would begin in a relaxed, humorous vein, often referring jocosely to his personal proportions - at that time he weighed 18 stone - and he would have his listeners chuckling away merrily. Then he would grow serious, would speak with impassioned eloquence, often lifting his listeners to heights of enthusiasm. On many occasions he hit out hard at drink abuses, including breaches of the licensing laws. He was sometimes criticised by members of the Province for this, but he was convinced that he was justified in making strong protests against abuses which produced such damaging effects on the moral and social life of our people.
Those of us who worked with him often marvelled at his powers of persuasion in bringing people around to accept his viewpoint. On the occasion of the Golden Jubilee of the Association, he pro posed to archbishop McQuaid his intended programme involving a huge parade through the centre of Dublin and an open-air meet ing in Croke Park. The archbishop was anything but encouraging. Undaunted Seán explained to the archbishop the spiritual motivation of the Pioneer Association, and said that the rally would afford a unique opportunity to put this motivation before the general public. The archbishop withdrew his disapproval and gave his sanction to Seán's plans.
Almost on the eve of a national Pioneer pilgrimage to Knock in the Marian Year (1954), the men in the GNR company in the Drogheda area became involved in a dispute with the management, and decided that until they got satisfaction they would not operate any trains on Sundays. Realising the disappointment this would bring to people in Meath and Louth, Seán went up to Drogheda, met the men and appealed to them to run the trains for the Pioneer pilgrimage. To do so, he told them, would not adversely prejudice their case, but rather would win admiration from the public. The men were impressed, responded to his appeal, and - the Pioneers got to Knock!
It came as a surprise to many outside the Society to learn after his death that he experienced bad health in many forms for many years. He himself always made light of this, would even joke about it, but throughout his ill-health and suffering he showed remark able courage, never giving way to self-pity and showing a deep spirit of faith. He knew that the end might come suddenly at any time, and so it did, early in the morning of the 16th July, 1975, May his great soul enjoy happiness with God whom he served so cheerfully and courageously”.

Mary Purcell has a 3-page illustrated article on Seán in the Pioneer (September 1975).

Fr Charlie O'Connor writes about Seán in Zambia :
“I have a very clear picture of Seán in Zambia. I think he was in his element there. He had a job to do and he was complete boss in that job - and I think Seán needed to be completely in charge. He made a great job of the building of Charles Lwanga Teacher Training College: it was quite a showpiece - who in Africa had ever thought before of including a fountain in a campus?
The word I find coming to mind for the McCarron of those days (1956-'63) is genial. There was great affability towards workers and foremen - but the affable face could set in serious lines when problems arose. The firms he dealt with had great respect for him - I suppose because he was so straight and so clear about what he wanted.
Another picture comes to mind: he lived on his own in one of the teachers' houses he had erected. You'd go in and find him in a room littered with plans on the floor, table, bed, plans everywhere.
Another picture: You'd meet him making his way very purposefully towards one of the sites, his huge wide-brimmed hat on his head - that was quite a characteristic feature of Seán in those days - in shirt and trousers - and with a rolled plan under his arm.
I'm certain Zambia was a very happy episode in his life - and perhaps revealed more than other periods his great charm and affability. Before that I had thought of him as autocratic and not very warm.

McDonnell, Joseph, 1858-1928, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/572
  • Person
  • 28 March 1858-28 December 1928

Born: 28 March 1858, Rathmines, Dublin
Entered: 15 February 1877, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 26 July 1891, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1897, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin
Died: 28 December 1928, Belvedere College SJ, Dublin

Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

Cousin of Robert I - RIP 1929 T Patrick - RIP 1918 and William Kane - RIP 1945

by 1896 at Chieri Italy (TAUR) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :

Early education was at Clongowes.

After his Noviceship Joseph remained at Milltown for a further five years doing Juniorate and Philosophy, and then spent five years Regency at Clongowes Prefecting and Teaching.
He began his Theology at Mold, Wales (FRA), but the new Theologate opened at Milltown in 1889, so he moved there.
After Ordination he was sent to Mungret as Assistant Moderator of the Apostolic School, and the following year Moderator and Minister.
He was then sent to Chieri, Italy for Tertianship.
1898 On return to Ireland, he was sent to Belvedere for two years as Assistant Director to James Cullen at the Messenger.
1900 He was sent to Tullabeg as Minister of Juniors for two years, and then back to Mungret as Moderator of the Apostolics for four years. All during these years he continued to act as Assistant Director of the Messenger, and by 1900 he had begun to edit “Madonna”.
1906 He was sent to Gardiner St as Operarius for a year, then another year in Clongowes as Spiritual Father.
1908 He was sent to Belvedere, and he remained there until his death 28 December 1928. During his time at Belvedere he continued to edit the Messenger and Madonna publications, and continued as Assistant Director until 1914 when he was appointed Director. He was also Spiritual Father at Belvedere 1913-1921. The end came quickly and found him perfectly resigned.

As well as his formal work, he also wrote a number of spiritual books which were well received in Ireland and other parts of the world. However, it was his work as Editor of the Messenger that he had his biggest impact. He possessed all the qualities which suited him for this work, especially his own devotion to the Sacred Heart. Under his care the Messenger became the most popular publication in Ireland, and amongst the Irish abroad. He had a reals sense of the taste and needs of his readers, and so made the Messenger very attractive to a wide circle of readers. He also believed that the real soil for evangelisation was among the ordinary people, and so he catered chiefly for them. He tried to ensure that in the contents there was something that might appeal to the interests of each reader, and often someone who read only the article on natural history as their interest, ended up reading the whole issue. So there were readers across a wide spectrum of society. It was told that an English protestant bought several dozens of copies for hiw workers due to articles on farming! His own writings showed a keen literary taste. he was also an excellent community man, and he thoroughly enjoyed friendly banter on maters arising out of his work. He was considerate in his dealings with others, and despite his increasing blindness he was also very patient.

Father General, in his letter (p825) “de Cotedianis Pietatis Exercitis” of July 2nd 1934 refers thus to Father MacDonnell : “Anno 1925 in parvo nostro conventu Redactorum Nuntiorum SS Cordis Jesu et Apostolicus Orationis, P Josephus MacDonnell, Redactor Nuntii Hibernici ......”

Note from Edward Kelly Entry :
He was ill for a very short time, and died peacefully and happily at Gardiner St 07 February 1905. The Minister Father Bannon and Father Joe McDonnell were present at his death.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 2nd Year No 3 1927

Jubilee :

On February 15th Fr Joseph McDonnell completed his 50 years' work in the Society. He received numerous letters and telegrams from all parts of the world, the most valued being one from the General, commending him for the good example he had given, and for his 50 years' work. A week later a large gathering assembled at Belvedere to wish the Jubilarian many more years of devoted service.
Fr. McDonnell was Master and Prefect at Clongowes, he was Moderator of the Apostolics in Mungret, Superior of the Juniors in Tullabeg, Operarius in Gardiner Street ; but it is as Editor of the Messenger that his best work has been done. Under this personal care for the last 21 years the progress made and the good done by the Messenger is simply marvellous And the work was accomplished in spite of grave difficulties. For some years his sight has been Much impaired. But he is holding on and to-day takes as much interest in the work as he did 20 years ago. Fr McDonnell has written quite a number of devotional works that compare very favorably with the best of our day. He still edits the Madonna.
For many years he was Confessor at the Christian Brothers Novitiate, Marius. Lately the novitiate was changed to a place a considerable distance from Belvedere. But the Brother-General asked him to continue, and, at considerable inconvenience to himself, he consented.

Irish Province News 4th Year No 2 1929

Obituary :

Fr Joseph McDonnell

Fr. Joseph McDonnell died in Dublin on Friday, December 28th in his 70th year. For some years back he had been in very bad health, but, with characteristic energy and determination, he remained at his post in the Messenger office until a few days before his death.

He was born at Dublin on the 28th March 1858, educated at Clongowes, and on February 15th 1877 began his novitiate at Milltown. There he remained for seven years - novitiate, juniorate, philosophy, and was then sent to Clongowes, where, as prefect or master, he spent the next five years. He began his theology at Mold, but in 1889 the new theologate was opened at Milltown, and Fr McDonnell joined it. Theology over he went to Mungret as Assistant Moderator of the Apostolic School. Next year he become full Moderator as well as Minister of Mungret, and at its close went to Chieri for tertianship. In 1896 he began at Belvedere his long and most fruitful connection with the Messenger as Assistant Director, Fr J. Cullen being Director. Two years at Belvedere were succeeded by two others in Tullabeg, where he had charge of the Juniors, and then Mungret once more as Moderator of the Apostolics. He held this important office for four years. From 1898 to 1906 he continued at different periods to act, at a distance, as Assistant Director of the Messenger, and in 1900 began to edit the Madonna. On leaving Mungret he spent a year in Gardiner St. as Operarius, another in Clongowes as Spiritual Father, and in 1906 returned to Belvedere, not to leave it until his holy death. During the years that followed he continued to edit the Messenger and Madonna, but did not become full Director and Editor of the Messenger until 1914. From 1913 to 1921 he was Spiritual Father at Belvedere. In addition to his other occupations Fr McDonnell wrote a number of excellent spiritual books that are doing a great amount of good in Ireland, and many other countries, but it was as Editor of the “Irish Messenger” that his great work was done. He possessed to a marked degree those qualities which fitted him for this important post, and especially a great devotion to the Sacred Heart, and zeal for souls. Under his care the Messenger became the most popular publication in Ireland, and amongst the Irish abroad. He had a wonderful flair for the tastes and needs of his readers, and he made the pages of the Messenger attractive to a very varied circle. He realised that the most fertile soil for religion is the mass of the people. He therefore catered chiefly for them. Amongst the varied contents there was sure to be some item to appeal to every reader, and those who began to read because they took interest in natural history or astronomy ended up by reading the whole through. In every rank of life one found readers of the Messenger. For the simple people the little red book was a monthly library, and supplied matter for piety and for observation and discussion of the wholesome things of life. He was proud, for example, that an English protestant bought several dozen copies for his work-people on account of a series of articles on farming. He knew that it is possible to be “too good”!
In his own writings Fr. McDonald had a fine, forcible style, and showed excellent literary taste in “Meditations on the Sacred Heart” and other books. He was an excellent community man, and thoroughly enjoyed friendly banter on matters arising out of his work. He was considerate and gentlemanly in his dealings with others, and in spite of his blindness and
feeble health was most patient. The end came quietly and found him perfectly resigned. His hope was that on account of his affliction he would go straight to Heaven, and those who know how saintly was his life feel confident that his prayer has been heard.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Joe McDonnell 1858-1928
Fr Joe McDonnell will always be remembered in the Irish Province as the man who made the “Irish Messenger” what it is. He possessed to an eminent degree, those qualities which fitted him for this important post, reinforced by and rooted in an all pervading devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and zeal for souls. He catered for the mass of the people, and under his direction, the Messenger increased in circulation under the Irish abroad.

He was also the author of a number of excellent spiritual books, the chief of which is his “Meditations n the Sacred Heart”.

He became the full editor of the Messenger in 1914 and remained at his post until a few days before his death, December 28th 1928

Towards the end of his life he was blind, and he expressed the hope that on account of this affliction, gladly borne, he would go straight to heaven on his death. Those who lived close to him and knew the saintlines of the man, had no doubt but that his hope would be translated into reality.

◆ The Belvederian, Dublin, 1929

Obituary

Father Joseph McDonnell SJ

The “Irish Messenger” is the only national periodical of Ireland at home and overseas, reminding the wanderer of the Faith of the homeland, reminding those at home of sons and daughters on Canadian farms and in American cities, to whom they send the little red book month by month: it achieves thus a kind of Irish Communion of Saints and so has become a national institution worthy of a jest in a Sean O'Casey play.

Belvedere has the honour of being the home of this institution, and thus, although its late guide and genius was not himself a Belvederian, it is but fitting that Belvederians should mourn his loss as a personal one. Old Belvederians will remember him as a kindly confessor, at one time director of the Sodality of the Blessed Virgin; past and present Belvederians will remember his generosity to the College Conference of St Vincent de Paul; even diminutive Belvederians will remember the free-day they celebrated two years ago in honour of Fr. McDonnell's golden jubilee as a Jesuit.

Father McDonnell was born in Dublin on the 28th March, 1858, educated at Clongowes, and on February 15th, 1877, entered the Jesuit Novitiate, which was at that time at Milltown Park. He studied philosophy at Milltown and pursued his theological studies at Mold and at Milltown. At two different periods he was Moderator of the Apostolic School of Mungret. From 1896 dates his connection with the “Irish Messenger”. He was at Belvedere from 1896-1898 as assistant director. Father Cullen being the director; from 1898-1906 be continued to act in this capacity, although occupying posts at Tullabeg, Mungret, Clongowes, Gardiner Street. In 1906 he began to edit. the “Madonna”. In 1906 be returned to Belvedere and there he spent his days until December 28th, 1928, in the achieving of his life's work, first as assistant-editor, then as editor of the “Irish Messenger” and director of the Messenger Office Publications. If one glances at a list of his published devotional works and pamphlets one will see that his was not an idle pen; if one studies the development of the “Irish Messenger” itself, of the “Madonna”, the coming into being of the “Gaelic Messenger”, the long list of books and pamphlets by distinguished authors published by the Messenger Office, one will get some idea of the gift of organisation, of the shrewd sense of needs and values that he possessed.

Fr. McDonnell was blessed with length of days, but these were not unclouded by sorrow. To a man of his keen interests his partial blindness must have meant many hopes unfulfilled, the narrowing in of experience and the limiting of friendships; to a man of his position one would have thought it an insurmountable obstacle. His character, however was unsoured by this severe decree of Providence, and, buoyed up with an edifying courage, he worked on till the end. He was not petulant, he liked social intercourse, charmed many by his courtesy and a sympathy born of experience, liked to be “chaffed”, liked better still to pretend that he did not know that he was being “chaffed”. He was never a shirker. Although in the last few years of his life he suffered much from bronchial troubles during the winter months, he nevertheless kept to his task, was punctilious in attendance at religious duties, said Mass often in pain, and was cheerful always. Even when in hospital he used transact business with his secretary; and on the evening before his death sent for the assistant-director, Father T Ryan, to discuss the great business of his life. If by their fruits shall men be recompensed, Father McDonnell merits a reward exceeding great.

Mr. G. K. Chesterton, in an introduction to the recent translation of Henri Ghéon's study of the Curé d'Ars, points out that each nation contributes a characteristic outlook on Christianity and on Christian action, and adds that the Irish contribution is a purity in love and in hate which seems to be capable of reducing things to their simplest expression Now I think that this is a quality that might be remembered in estimating Father McDonnell's character and in explaining, too. how he made the “Irish Messenger” a national institution. He was deeply and simply everything. He was sincerely and unsophistically devout. He was wholeheartedly and undividedly absorbed in the “Irish Messenger” and in its interests, He was stoutly and, at times, singularly convinced of his ideas and policies. His devotion to his Alma Mater was unassailable and child-like. He had thus the two qualities necessary to the make-up of a good editor - thoroughness and simplicity: simplicity, in order to feel with the people; thoroughness, in order to be able to supply their needs.

But I prefer to remember him as one who had to bear a cross which, of all others, seemed too heavy to bear and yet bore it cheerfully and with courage. RIP

T I M

◆ The Mungret Annual, 1929

Obituary

Father Joseph McDonnell SJ

(Mungret, 1892-1895 & 1900-1904)

On the last day of the year 1928, the mortal remains of a devoted friend of Mungret and its students were laid to rest in Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin. Past Mungret students, especially those of the early nineties and of the first years of the present century will remember with affection and veneration Father Joseph McDonnell SJ.

Father McDonnell was born in Dublin seventy-one years ago, and spent over fifty years in the Society of Jesus. He was a first cousin of Father William Kane SJ, who is so well known as a teacher, a friend and a lovable personality to the Mungret students of the past thirty years.

Father McDonnell first came to Mungret in 1892 as a young priest, and for three years had charge of the Apostolic School, fulfilling besides in 1894-5 the additional office of Minister of the College. In 1895 he went to Chieri (in Piedmont), a beautifully situated town in the South-Eastern slopes of the Alps, for his Tertianship, or third year's noviceship. Returning to Ireland in 1896, he was appointed to the duty of assisting the late Father James Cullen SJ, in editing the Messenger of the Sacred Heart, and two years later was placed in charge of the Junior Scholastics of the Society of Jesus in Tullabeg College. In 1900 he was again transferred to Mungret College as Director of the Apostolic School, where he remained till 1904. After a few years he was again sent to Belvedere College, Dublin, to resume his former role of Assistant Editor of the “Messenger”. In this position he soon made himself indispensable, and when, in 1914, Father Cullen, then very old, had to relinquish finally the post of Editor, Father McDonnell took over the complete charge, which he retained till his holy death, in December, 1928.

Father McDonnell's work as Editor of the “Messenger” is well known. In the short sketch of his life which appears in the March number of the Messenger, we read :

Owing to his secluded life and dislike of appearing in public, Father McDonnell was personally known to only a small fraction of those who were familiar with his name, but by hundreds of thousands not merely in Ireland but also in foreign lands, he was regarded with love and respect for the comfort and courage which he had brought to them through his writings.

During his second term in Mungret, in the moments which he managed to spare from his regular work (besides being Director of the Apostolic School, he was also Spiritual Father of the Lay Boys, and taught several hours a day), he edited the “Madonna”, which he had founded in 1900, about the time of his coming to Mungret. This has gradually attained a circulation which is now probably as large as that which the “Messenger” had when Father McDonnell first took over the editorship.

In the work connected with the “Messenger” and the “Madonna”, Father McDonnell laboured unceasingly during the last twenty five years of his busy and fruitful life. His health was never robust, and he always worked up to the full measure of his strength. During the years he spent in Mungret it was a well-known and regular occurrence for Father McDonnell, after any short period of extra work or unusual strain, to become completely exhausted, and to be confined to bed, taking little or no food. He had, however, great recuperative power, on which he seemed rather to pride himself, and was usually at work again in full vigour after a day or two. During the last two years of his life his health gradually declined, and his sight, never good, failed so much that he was quite unable to read. Hence, for many years before his death he transacted all his editorial work with the aid of a secretary, who read letters, manuscripts, and proofs to him and put in writing his replies and criticisms. Yet, notwithstanding weakened health and failing sight, he worked unceasingly up to a week before his saintly death.

Father McDonnell never lost his courageous and hopeful spirit, his rare gentleness and courtesy of manner, his genial cheerfulness or his keen sense of humour. The spread of the devotion to the Sacred Heart was the passion of his life. “Few”, says the writer already quoted, “have spent themselves so unsparingly to make this devotion more known and appreciated, and few have done as much as he did to diffuse it through Ireland”. His apostleship was exercised mainly through the pages of the “Messenger” and the numerous pious publications of all kinds that gradually grew up around it as well as by his own numerous and excellent devotional books through which his name is principally known. Father McDonnell left his impress deeply in the customs and traditions of the Apostolic School. It was owing in no small part to his example and teaching that the spirit of piety and especially the devotion to the Sacred Heart, which has, since his time, been traditional among the Apostolic students, took such firm root in the College. Those who were privileged to be under his charge in Mungret will remember his fatherly kindness and patience, his gentleness of disposition, and the never-failing courtesy and respect with which he treated even the youngest and most thoughtless of the lads of whom he had charge. His zeal for souls communicated itself to the boys ; and there can be no doubt that his spirit and example have had a very important influence upon the lives of many who are now priests in different parts of the world. Although without skill in athletic exercises, and having little knowledge of boys' games, he entered into all the interests of the boys of whom he had charge, and it was amusing sometimes to see his excitement over a football match or an athletic contest in which his boys were competing against some other section of the College. He showed the same zeal in organising excursions, concerts and debates, and in the strenuous work of the College theatricals, all of which he regarded as important factors in the training and formation of the boys.

It was under Father McDonnell's direction that the “Rules and Customs of the Apostolic School” were first drawn up. It was for the students of the Apostolic School, too, that he wrote the excellent little handbook for young ecclesiastical students, called “Daily Duties”, which breathes such a spirit of solid piety, and inculcates so well the practice of prayer, self-denial and zeal, which must be at the foundation of the character of the truly apostolic priest. When leaving Mungret, Father McDonnell confessed to an intimate friend that he “felt broken-hearted” at parting from his lads and the work he loved so well. He would not trust himself to take leave of the boys, or even to drive off by the avenue in the usual way. He went round by the “Black Walk” a quarter of an hour before the appointed time, and waited for the car at the College gate.

To the end, even amid the absorbing work of his editorship and writings, he never relaxed in his love for all his own past pupils nor in his interest in the Apostolic School. He was always ready to utilise his position as editor in favour of Mungret and the work it is doing. By very many of his old pupils as by many of the readers of his works, his death will be felt as a personal loss; and though his life was blameless and spent in the service of the Master whom he loved, his many friends will not omit to pray for his speedy admittance to his eternal reward. RIP)

E Cahill SJ

MacDonnell, James, 1805-1866, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1624
  • Person
  • 09 March 1805-26 October 1866

Born: 09 March 1805, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 19 October 1822, St Andrea, Rome - Romanae Province (ROM)
Ordained: 13 June1835, St Patrick's College, Maynooth, County Kildare
Final Vows: 02 February 1846
Died: 26 October 1866, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublinn

James McDonnell
Ordained at St Patrick’s College Maynooth, 13 June 1826, having studied Theology at Clongowes.

by 1829 in Clongowes
by 1839 doing Tertianship in Stonyhurst (ANG)

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Early education was at Clongowes.

After First Vows he was sent for studies to Rome and France. he was said at this time to be a model of candour and innocence.
After studies he was sent for Regency to teach at Clongowes, and was a great success.
1830 He went to Rome again for Dogmatic Theology, and finished his Theology in England, where he was Ordained.
After Ordination he was sent again to Clongowes, where he taught Modern Languages and had charge of the Choir.
Later he was sent to Gardiner St, where he suffered a good deal during the remainder of his life. he suffered from a nervous debility as well as other physical problems, and this rendered him unfit for work. He died there, greatly regretted by his many friends 26 October 1866.

He was a man with an exceedingly quick mind, with a remarkable taste for musical knowledge, and was gifted with a very good voice. His zeal, lively faith and charity won him much admiration from the community in which he lived.

MacAmhlaoibh, Séamus, 1912-1995, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/520
  • Person
  • 19 February 1912-09 July 1995

Born: 19 February 1912, Sunday’s Well, Cork City, County Cork
Entered: 01 September 1928, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 13 May 1942, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1945, Belvedere College SJ, Dublin
Died: 09 July 1995, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the University Hall, Hatch St, Dublin community at the time of death.

Early education at Presentation Brothers College Cork

◆ Interfuse
Interfuse No 86 : July 1996

Obituary
An t-Ath Séamus Mac Amhlaoibh (1912-1995)

19th Feb. 1912: Born in Cork
Education: Presentation College, Cork
1st Sept. 1928: Entered Society at Tullabeg
2nd Sept. 1930: First Vows at Emo
1930 - 1933: Rathfarnham, Arts at UCD
1933 - 1936: Philosophy at Tuilabeg, Co. Offaly
1936 - 1938; Crescent College, Limerick, Teacher
1938 - 1939; Clongowes Wood College, Teacher
1939 - 1943; Theology at Milltown Park
13th May 1942: Ordained Priest at Milltown Park by Bishop J.C. McQuaid
1943 - 1944: Tertianship at Rathfarnham
1944 - 1945; Belvedere College, Teacher
1945 - 1969: St. Francis Xavier's, Ministering in the Church; Director, soldality for Irish Speakers and Night Workers
1969 - 1972: St. Ignatius College, Galway, Spiritual Father.
1972-1975: Sacred Heart Church, Limerick, Ministering in the Church
1975 - 1985: Rathfarnham, Giving Missions and the Spiritual Exercises
1985-1995: University Hall, Giving Missions and the Spiritual Exercises
Dec. 1994: Séamus had a recurrence of cancer shortly before Christmas. He suffered severe pain and was taken to the Meath where he spent Christmas. He moved to Cherryfield shortly afterwards and with the help of the Cancer Unit from Harold's Cross, which got his pain under control, he soon began to show an improvement. However, he knew his life was drawing to a close and he accepted that fact with wonderful equanimity and gratitude. He was always very happy to receive visitors right to the very end.
9th July 1995: Died at Cherryfield Lodge

I, and many more, loved, and love an t-Ath Séamus. It was clear after he died that his gentle touch would be missed by many. No more loyal friend ever existed. Happily Fr. Ted McAsey had taken a lovely, smiling photograph of Fr. Séamus in the garden of University Hall last summer. Now A4 copies are framed in many a room and convent. The feed-back on the joy and inspiration this has given is tangible.

Fr. Séamus MacAmhlaoibh left us on the 9th of July after seven long patient months on his bed, in full acceptance of God's will. He was ready to practise what he had preached. During the last six months of his life in Cherryfield his constant prayer was 'Yes', 'yes' to whatever God was sending him at that moment - whether it was something pleasant, like gifts of flowers, which really delighted him, or something painful and difficult, like the pain he experienced, or some visitor who stayed too long and drained his energy. At least twice he spoke of this form of praying and it seems it was the root of his very placid disposition that so impressed both the staff in Cherryfield and Séamus's visitors.

There is no more fitting place in which he should be remembered than in Timire an Chroí Naofa, for there was his heart - in the permanent message of the Heart of Christ, as we say in homely fashion “I agra Dé agus na comharsan” - in the love of God and the neighbour. Washing himself every morning he had pinned up before him the Intentions of the Apostleship of Prayer, so that he could know exactly what he was praying for in his Morning Offering. This exactitude was in all he did, all he planned, all his preparation of retreats, of sermons. No doubt of his belief in the well-known adage, “Is maith le Dia cabhair” - God likes help.

He was ever intent on promoting An Timire, so that the message of Christ and the illimitable and incredible love of his Heart might be spread everywhere. I think we can look to the famous promises given through St. Margaret Mary to those who foster that devotion, for an explanation of the great fruit of Fr. Séamus' work in Cuallacht Mhuire in Gardiner Street - so many of the Sodalists became priests and religious. These included the Dublin diocese, the Cistercians, Loreto, the Visitation, the Poor Clares, the Little Sisters of Charles de Foucauld. There would also be a long list of happily married couples who looked back to their days in the Cuallacht with affection and gratitude. For the same twenty four years he directed the Nightworkers sodality whose members showed the same warm and appreciative sentiments.

He was a gifted soulfriend, anamchara, with his wisdom, his patience and his sense of humour. These traits were notable in him as a preacher, but above all, as a director of retreats, long and short.

He had a caring way with people, available and generous with time. Sensitive, discerning, friendly, he was always ready to give a helping hand. Nevertheless, as he told a close friend, he somehow could sense if a person coming to him was a fraud. He surely met an odd one coming into the parlour in SFX!

He was an Irish priest. For him our Faith and our tradition were one, and it saddened him that so many, lay and clerical, were indifferent to the power in that tradition of holiness that has come down to us through our native language; for him it embodied our Christian 'dúchas', a word he loved.

He was always ready to help out when he could. On a number of Occasions he was asked to help out with the weekend retreats of the LRA. The response from the retreatants was striking. All experienced him as very encouraging, simple, very spiritual and sympathetic. A number asked to have him back again - 'Where have you been hiding?'

At Spanish Point, when a number of older Jesuits came together for a short holiday, Séamus joined them with his car. He was a delight, with a gift and a readiness to organise a wee outing or a game of cards. He was always thinking of others. He will be missed.

He was born in Cork on the 19th February, 1912, he died in Cherryfield on the 9th July, 1995. He entered the Society, aged 16, at Tullabeg, and was part of the move to Emo, where he took his first vows. He did Regency in the Crescent and Clongowes. Christmas cards still came to him in Cherryfield from friends made in those days. He spent twenty-four years in SFX, Gardiner Street, a few years in Galway, and then began his great work of giving Missions and Retreats, ten years based in Rathfarnham (1975-1985) and ten years in University Hall (1985-1995).
Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dílis.

Jack Brennan SJ

Lynch, John, 1796-1867, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1601
  • Person
  • 10 October 1796-26 November 1867

Born: 10 October 1796, Dublin City County Dublin
Entered: 03 October 1821, Montrouge, Paris, France - Angliae Province (ANG) / St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 20/05/1826, St Patrick's College, Maynooth, County Kildare
Final Vows: 08 September 1841
Died: 26 November 1867, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin

Ordained at St Patrick’s College Maynooth, within an octave of Pentecost 1826, having studied Theology at Clongowes. (Given as “James” Lynch, but in previous lists at St Patrick’s he is called “John”

by 1829 in Clongowes
by 1839 doing Tertianship in Amiens France (FRA)
by 1851 at St Joseph’s Church Philadelphia, PA

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He had studied some years at Maynooth before Entry.

His Novitiate was spent partly at Montrouge and partly at Tullabeg.
After Ordination 20 May 1826 at Clongowes, where he spent many years as a Prefect and Teacher, he was sent for Tertianship in France.
Before 1850 he was sent to the Maryland Mission, returning to Ireland in 1854. he sent many novices from Ireland and France to the Maryland Mission.
The final years of his life were spent at the Dublin Residence, Gardiner St. He suffered from a most painful cancer of the stomach, and enduring this with patience and fortitude, he died 27 November 1867.
He was a man of great piety, observing the rules, active, zealous and charitable. He was a good mathematician, and had a keen interest in architecture. He had planned many houses in both Ireland and the US. he also translated many books from Italian and French into English. he was a very zealous promoter of the Apostleship of Prayer. He was distinguished for his great constancy in faith in God.

Lentaigne, Joseph, 1805-1884, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/232
  • Person
  • 27 July 1805-23 December 1884

Born: 27 July 1805, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 25 November 1843, Avignon, France - Lugdunensis Province (LUGD)
Ordained: 17 June 1849, Cathédrale Notre-Dame-du-Puy, Le Puy-en-Velay, Auvergne, France
Final Vows: 02 February 1858
Died: 23 December 1884, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Uncle of Victor Lentaigne - RIP 1922

First Provincial of the Irish Province of the Society of Jesus: 8 December 1860 - [ ] 1863;
Vice Provincial: 11 February 1858-1860
Superior of the Irish Jesuit Mission to Australia Mission: 1865-1866;

by 1847 at Vals (LUGD) studying
1st Missioner to Australia with William Kelly 1865

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Brother of Sir John Lentaigne (Lawyer and Privy Counsellor and one of the first Clongowes students); Uncle of Joseph Lentaigne - RIP 1922

1849 Ordained at Vals France, by Dr Morlhaer (?) 17 June 1849
1850-1858 Arrived at Clongowes, and was Prefect of Studies and Teacher until his appointment as Rector in November 1855.
1858-1863 He was appointed Vice-Provincial, and then on 08 September 1860 the First HIB Provincial, in which office he served until 1863.
1863-1865 Appointed Rector and Master of Novices at Milltown.
1865-1866 He sailed with William Kelly to Australia to found the Irish Australian Mission.
1866-1871 He returned to Ireland and Gardiner St.
1871-1872 he was sent to Clongowes as Spiritual Father.
1872-1873 Appointed Rector of Belvedere.
1873 He went back to Gardiner St, and remained there until his death 23 December 1884.
During the last years of his life he suffered a lot from bronchial trouble, and it ended up rendering him a complete invalid. The July before his death he was sent by the Provincial Thomas Browne to Milltown, but this never came to pass. Interestingly, that same summer, John Gaffney was sent to Limerick, William Fortescue to Galway, John Norton to Milltown and John Keogh to Tullabeg. (not sure why this is recorded, perhaps because none of them moved??)

Note from Peter Freeman Entry
By a strange coincidence, Fr Joseph Lentaigne, who had received him as Provincial, died in the same community the day before. Both coffins were laid on the High Altar on 26 December 1884.

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/commemorating-the-sesquicentenary-of-the-arrival-of-irish-jesuits-in-australia/

Commemorating the sesquicentenary of the arrival of Irish Jesuits in Australia
This year the Australian Province of the Jesuits are commemorating the sesquicentenary of the arrival of Irish Jesuits in Australia. Australia became the first overseas mission of the Irish Jesuit Province. To mark the occasion the Archdiocese of Melbourne are organising a special thanksgiving Mass in St Patrick’s Cathedral, Melbourne 27 September. On 20 June Damien Burke, Assistant Archivist, Irish Jesuit Archives gave a talk at the 21st Australasian Irish Studies conference, Maynooth University, titled “The archives of the Irish Jesuit Mission to Australia, 1865-1931”. In his address Damien described the work of this mission with reference to a number of documents and photographs concerning it that are held at the Irish Jesuit Archives.
Irish Jesuits worked mainly as missionaries, and educators in the urban communities of eastern Australia. The mission began when two Irish Jesuits Frs. William Lentaigne and William Kelly, arrived in Melbourne in 1865 at the invitation of Bishop James Alipius Goold, the first Catholic bishop of Melbourne. They were invited by the Bishop to re-open St. Patrick’s College, Melbourne, a secondary school, and to undertake the Richmond mission. From 1865 onwards, the Irish Jesuits formed parishes and established schools while working as missionaries, writers, chaplains, theologians, scientists and directors of retreats, mainly in the urban communities of eastern Australia. By 1890, 30% of the Irish Province resided in Australia.
By 1931, this resulted in five schools, eight residences, a regional seminary in Melbourne and a novitiate in Sydney. Dr Daniel Mannix, archbishop of Melbourne, showed a special predication for the Jesuits and requested that they be involved with Newman College, University of Melbourne in 1918. Six Jesuits (five were Irish-born) served as chaplains with the Australian Forces in the First World War and two died, Frs Michael Bergin and Edwards Sydes. Both Michael Bergin and 62 year-old Joe Hearn, earned the Military Cross. Bergin was the only Catholic chaplain serving with the Australian Imperial Force to have died as a result of enemy action in the First World War.

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Joseph Lentaigne, after studying law at Trinity College and serving at the Irish bar, entered the Society at Lyons in his 38th year on 25 November 1843. He studied at Vals, and was ordained priest, 17 June 1849. He arrived at Clongowes about the year 1850, where he acted as prefect of studies and taught until his appointment as rector in November 1855. In 1858 he became the first Vice-Provincial, an office he held until 1863. From 1863-65 he was rector and master of novices at Milltown Park, and during 1865 sailed to Australia with Father William Kelly to found the Irish Australian Mission.
On 21 September 1865, after 58 days at sea, Lentaigne and Kelly disembarked at Melbourne. They had been fortunate to secure a passage on the “Great Britain”, Brunel's steamship which four years earlier had carried the first all England cricket eleven to tour Australia. Compared with the sailing vessels that sometimes took up to or over 100 days to reach Australia, it had been luxury travel. There were 100 Catholics on board, and the two priests administered to their spiritual and sacramental needs.
On the evening of their arrival Kelly preached at St Francis' Church in the city centre where Bishop Gould was conducting a mission. The climate, Lentaigne reported, was like that of the south of France, but food, clothing and housing were expensive, perhaps twice as much as in Ireland.
The arrival of the Jesuits appears to have caused little comment from the people of Melbourne. “We have never met any incivility, our being Jesuits has not excited any attacks”, wrote Lentaigne.
He was not slow to comment on Australian society. He believed that Melbourne was particularly corrupt, with heretics, Jews and idolatrous Chinese. In addition, he was concerned that the Protestant colleges flourished in Melbourne, and Catholics needed to retain the faith, so great need existed for a boarding school. He found it difficult to raise funds, as the Catholics were generally poor, small business people.
Lentaigne praised the Catholic boys as “affectionate, manly but wild creatures. Great liberty has been allowed them by their parents. The mixture with Protestants, Jews and infidels is most dangerous to them”. Furthermore, he believed that Melbourne Catholics suffered from mixing with these people and they were not good at approaching the Sacraments, or hearing Mass. He was concerned about much drunkenness and immorality in Melbourne society.
In March 1868 Lentaigne was recalled to Ireland, as he suffered from bronchial trouble.
During his time in Melbourne he had been responsible for making the original agreement with Bishop Goold, and in fact laid the juridical foundation of the Irish Mission for both missionary and educational work.
He spent the rest of his life, except for two years as rector of Belvedere College, 1872-73, at Gardiner Street, where he died. He was a member of a famous, old Anglo-Norman family, a real gentlman, and a prominent Jesuit.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 1st Year No 1 1925

St Patrick’s College, Melbourne has just celebrated its Diamond Jubilee as a Jesuit College. It is the mother house of the Australian Mission.
On September 21st 1865, Fathers Joseph Lentaigne and William Kelly, the pioneer Missioners of the Society in Victoria, landed in Melbourne and took over the College.
On September 17th, 1866 , the second contingent of Irish priests arrived - Fr. Joseph Dalton, Fr. Edmund Nolan, Fr. David McKiniry and two lay brothers - Br. Michael Scully and Br. Michael Goodwin.

Lennon, Sydney C, 1906-1979, Jesuit priest and chaplain

  • IE IJA J/231
  • Person
  • 31 January 1906-10 October 1979

Born: 31 January 1906, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 01 September 1924, St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, County Offaly
Ordained: 31 July 1939, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 07 February 1942, Craighead, Bothwell, Lanarkshire, Scotland
Died: 10 October 1979, Holy Cross Hospital, Myers Street, Geelong, Victoria, Australia

Part of the St Joseph’s, Geelong, Victoria, Melbourne, Australia community at the time of death

Early education at CBS Synge Street

by 1952 in Australia

Second World War Chaplain

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Sydney Lennon received his secondary education with the Christian Brothers, Dublin, and entered the Society at St Stanislaus College, Tullabeg, 1 September 1924. During his juniorate at Rathfarnharm, 1926-31, he studied at University College, Dublin, and also gained a diploma in Gregorian chant from Solesmes Abbey. Philosophy studies were at Tullamore, 1931-34, and theology at Milltown Park, 1936-39. Tertianship was completed in 1940.
Lennon's Erst priestly ministry was as a chaplain with the British army, 1941-46, followed by a few years in the parish of Gardiner Street, Dublin. He was then sent to Australia, and after a few years teaching, went to Corpus Christi College, Werribee, 1949, to profess liturgy, elocution, voice training and chant. He was at various times minister, dean of students and bursar. He remained there until 1969, when he did parish work at Norwood, SA. His final appointment was as a chaplain to St Joseph's Mercy Hospital, Aphrasia Street, Newton, Geelong, Vic., 1978-79.

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 16th Year No 4 1941

General :
Seven more chaplains to the forces in England were appointed in July : Frs Burden, Donnelly, J Hayes, Lennon and C Murphy, who left on 1st September to report in Northern Ireland, and Fr Guinane who left on 9th September.
Fr. M. Dowling owing to the serious accident he unfortunately met when travelling by bus from Limerick to Dublin in August will not be able to report for active duty for some weeks to come. He is, as reported by Fr. Lennon of the Scottish Command in Midlothian expected in that area.
Of the chaplains who left us on 26th May last, at least three have been back already on leave. Fr. Hayes reports from Redcar Yorks that he is completely at home and experiences no sense of strangeness. Fr. Murphy is working' with the Second Lancashire Fusiliers and reports having met Fr. Shields when passing through Salisbury - the latter is very satisfied and is doing well. Fr. Burden reports from Catterick Camp, Yorks, that he is living with Fr. Burrows, S.J., and has a Church of his own, “so I am a sort of PP”.
Fr. Lennon was impressed very much by the kindness already shown him on all hands at Belfast, Glasgow, Edinburgh and in his Parish. He has found the officers in the different camps very kind and pleased that he had come. This brigade has been without a R.C. Chaplain for many months and has never yet had any R.C. Chaplain for any decent length of time. I am a brigade-chaplain like Fr Kennedy and Fr. Naughton down south. He says Mass on weekdays in a local Church served by our Fathers from Dalkeith but only open on Sundays. This is the first time the Catholics have had Mass in week-days

Irish Province News 17th Year No 1 1942

Chaplains :
Our twelve chaplains are widely scattered, as appears from the following (incomplete) addresses : Frs. Burden, Catterick Camp, Yorks; Donnelly, Gt. Yarmouth, Norfolk; Dowling, Peebles Scotland; Guinane, Aylesbury, Bucks; Hayes, Newark, Notts; Lennon, Clackmannanshire, Scotland; Morrison, Weymouth, Dorset; Murphy, Aldershot, Hants; Naughton, Chichester, Sussex; Perrott, Palmer's Green, London; Shields, Larkhill, Hants.
Fr. Maurice Dowling left Dublin for-Lisburn and active service on 29 December fully recovered from the effects of his accident 18 August.

Irish Province News 21st Year No 4 1946

Australia :
Frs. Fleming and Mansfield (who is a member of the Australian Vice-Province) were able to leave for Australia via America in July.
Frs. Lennon and Morrison are still awaiting travel facilities.

Irish Province News 48th Year No 1 1973

Fr Sydney Lennon to whom we are indebted for the details of the tragic accident in Australia reported later, is an Operarius in our parish at Adelaide. He is engaged, with, other activities, in giving retreats, talks and conferences and participated in the recent Lombardi retreat which was attended by some 65 Australian brethren ranging in age from 91 to 20.

Irish Province News 55th Year No 1 1980
Obituary :

Fr Sydney Lennon (1906-1924-1979)
Sydney Lennon was always interested in music. Even while still a schoolboy in CBS, Synge Street, he acted as organist in his local church. From his noviceship onwards, he was choirmaster in every Jesuit house where he was stationed. For four years in University College, Dublin, he studied music under Dr John Larchet. On many occasions he visited Quarr Abbey, Isle of Wight, for courses in Gregorian chant given there by the Benedictines: he himself became an authority on gregorian or plain chant. These were the days when Frs John Bourke and Bertie O’Connell combined to bring gregorian chant and the liturgical movement to a high point of perfection in Dublin.
His choirs both at Rathfarnham and later at Milltown Park were in frequent demand by Radio Éireann for items such as the Lamentations and Passion music of Holy Week; also for the requiem Office and Mass on such occasions as the death of a Pope or Archbishop. At the requiem liturgy for Ours at Gardiner Street and Glasnevin Cemetery, the choirmaster was nearly always Sydney.
Even when he was in Tullabeg, doing philosophy, on the occasion of the Eucharistic Congress, he and his choir were called upon to sing the Russian texts for the Divine Liturgy in the Eastern rite which was celebrated in Gardiner Street. On a lighter note, he organised Gilbert and Sullivan operas in every house to which he was assigned. In Milltown Park, these were performed during the Christmas vacation for the inmates of the Royal Hospital, Donnybrook (popularly known as the “Incurables”); the Blind asylum, Merrion Road and the Magdalen asylum, Gloucester Street (now Seán McDermott Street).
Sydney was a perfectionist in all that he did

Fr. Syd Lennon died at 7 o'clock on Wednesday morning, 10th October, in Holy Cross Hospital, Geelong, Victoria, Australia. He had been admitted the previous morning following a bout of acute abdominal pain. This had been controlled but he remained somewhat confused during the day. Though his condition was not good he was not expected to die. There was a vigil Mass on Thursday at the Immaculate Conception Church, Hawthorn, celebrated by Fr Ambrose Byrne and 30 concelebrants. Fr Paul Keenan in his homily spoke of Syd's complete absorption in whatever work he was doing and of his deep interest in people.
The funeral Mass next day drew a very large number of clergy, the fruit of Syd’s 20 years at Corpus Christi College, Werribee. Archbishop Frank Little was principal celebrant, joined by Bishops Fox, Mulkearns, O'Connell, Perkins and Daly, together with 90 concelebrating priests. At the beginning of the Mass the Archbishop linked the name of Syd Lennon with that of Fr Albert Power, the 31st anniversary of whose death was 12th October.
Fr Provincial centred his homily on Syd Lennon the man for priests. In the congregation were Sisters from several congregations with whom Syd had worked over the years. Present also was a small group of people from Maryknoll where Syd had spent so many Christmas vacations during his time at Werribee. Some time ago he expressed the hope that he might be the first chaplain at St. Joseph's hospital, Geelong, to be buried in the little cemetery along with those he had ministered to over the past eighteen months.
Ambrose Byrne, John Monahan and Bill Daniel accompanied the hearse to Geelong where another Mass was celebrated by Monsignor Jim Murray and 23 priests in the chapel of the Mercy convent at Newtown. Jim Murray paid a worthy tribute to Syd in a ceremony which was a great act of thanks from Sisters and patients alike. Six of the priests carried the coffin from the sanctuary to the cemetery in the hospital grounds. There is to be a Mass in St Ignatius, Norwood, on Thursday, 18th October, with Archbishop Gleeson as the principal celebrant.
(Australian Province Fortnightly Report, no. 256)

The Australian newspaper, The Advocate, fills in some of the back ground to his Werribee and later years (acknowledgments to Fr PJ Stephenson, who sent a copy of this and the above extract):
Fr Lennon arrived in Sydney early in 1947 to teach at St Aloysius College, Milson's Point. He spent 1948 teaching at Burke Hall, Kew, before joining the staff at Corpus Christi College, Werribee. He worked there for twenty years, the first ten as dean of discipline. He held the post of minister twice for short spells, and when he relinquished the post of dean, he became a popular spiritual director for many of the students. During his time in the seminary, he was responsible for teaching gregorian chant, liturgy and public speaking. He also lectured in Scripture. Music played a large part in his life, both in choir work and directing orchestras In 1970 he ended his long association with the seminary and on medical advice moved to South Australia, where he worked in St. Ignatius parish, Norwood. He also gave papers on liturgical topics to the Senate of Priests and other groups in the archdiocese of Adelaide. For the last eighteen months of his life Fr Lennon was resident chaplain at St Joseph’s hospital of the Sisters of Mercy for their sick and aged sisters at Newtown, Geelong.

Keogh, John, 1828-1888, Jesuit brother

  • IE IJA J/1532
  • Person
  • 28 August 1828-06 March 1888

Born: 28 August 1828, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 09 September 1860, Milltown Park
Final Vows: 15 August 1871
Died: 06 March 1888, Tullabeg, Co Offaly

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He had been in the Metropolitan Police before Entry.

He worked as refectorian at Milltown, Ad Dom at Gardiner St, and died in Tullabeg 06 March 1888.
◆ Fr Francis Finegan : Admissions 1859-1948 - Policeman before entry

Kenney, Peter J, 1779-1841, Jesuit priest and educator

  • IE IJA J/474
  • Person
  • 07 July 1779-19 November 1841

Born: 07 July 1779, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 20 September 1804, Hodder, Stonyhurst, England - Angliae Province (ANG)
Ordained: 04 December 1808, Palermo, Sicily, Italy
Final Vows: 16 June 1819
Died: 19 November 1841, Professed House, Rome, Italy

Superior of the Jesuit Mission in Ireland : 30 September 1812- 28 September 1817; 29 September 1821- May 1830;
Visitor to Maryland Mission : 1819 - 1822; 14 November 1830 - 1833;
Vice-Provincial: April 1834 - May 1836;
Vice-President Maynooth College : 1813 - 1814;

Peter Kenney was an Irish Jesuit credited with restoring the Society of Jesus in Ireland after their suppression, as well as with establishing several colleges and devoting much of his life to the education of youth.
There were seventeen Jesuits at the time of the suppression in Ireland. No longer members of the Society, they were forced to act as diocesan priests. One of these last remaining Jesuits, Fr Thomas Betagh, taught children of poor families in Dublin. One of his students was Peter Kenney, the son of a coachmaker. Sponsored by Betagh, Kenney entered Maynooth College. From here he travelled to Palermo in Sicily to continue his religious training, as Sicily was allowed to maintain its branch of the Society of Jesus. Here in 1808 he was ordained as a priest.
Kenney travelled back to Ireland in 1811, the same year that Fr Betagh, the last remaining Jesuit in Ireland, died. Kenney arrived intent on re-establishing the Jesuits in his home country. Using money that had been put aside by the previous Jesuits, he bought Castle Brown in 1813. This would become the site of a new Jesuit school, Clongowes Wood College, which opened the following year. In 1818 a further school was opened in Tullabeg, Offaly. Tullabeg College was originally planned as a noviciate for the Society but became in time a proper college.
In 1822 Kenney travelled to America to visit the missions. In Missouri he met Jesuit farmers and was appalled that they owned slaves, ordering them to set their slaves free. Back in Ireland, Kenney and three others founded the Jesuit Church of St. Francis Xavier in Dublin after the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 was passed. For his remaining years, he continued his work across Ireland, both as a preacher and as an educator, until he passed away in 1841, worn down by constant toil and travel.

◆ Fr Edmund Hogan SJ “Catalogica Chronologica” : :
Early education in Humanities at Carlow and Stonyhurst. Father Betagh was the first to discover his abilities. Priests used to go listen to him teaching Catechism while he was an apprentice coach-builder. Betagh and O’Callaghan, ex-Jesuits, sent him to Carlow College, and he was loudly applauded by fellow students, and even the venerable President. In the Novitiate - as per fellow Novice Father Postlethwaite - he was asked to leave the Refectory pulpit by Father Charles Plowden, as the Novices interrupted their meal as they were spellbound and astounded by his exordium. At Stonyhurst, he distinguished himself in Mathematics and Natural Philosophy.
He completed his Higher Studies and Theology at Palermo, where he defended his theses of Divinity with applause, and was Ordained there. In a letter from the Procurator General to Father General, he calls him “l’incomparabile Kenny”. Father Angolini writes to Father Plowden from Palermo in 1809 “in the public disputations vel maxime excelluit P Kenny”. In 1810 he says “P Kenny excellit supra omnes; dona habet ingenii, virium, zeli animarum, activitas et efficaciae in agendo simulet prudentiae vere insignia. Deus illum ad sui gloriam Hibernorumsque Missionis incrementum conservit”. Father Provincial writes in 1810 “P Kenny ingenio pollet prompto et acri”, and again in 1811 “P Kenny acerrimi et ingenii, studiique amans, ut optimam de se spem faciat. Tum religiosum colit disciplinam, ingenio ipse nimis vivido, quandoque judicii, sui tenacior apparet”.
1811 Sent to Ireland in November, and served at the Chapel of St Michan, Dublin, the ancient Residence of the Society. He was vice-President of Maynooth for a short while at the request of Archbishop Murray, and his portrait is preserved there.
1815-1817 Destined by Providence as an instrument to revive the ancient Irish Mission SJ, he was joined by four Fathers and several Scholastics from Stonyhurst, and was Superior until 1817. He bought Castle Brown, or Clongowes Wood Co Kildare, and took possession 04/03/1814 and opened it as a school on 15 May 1816, himself being the Rector.
1819 He was sent as Visitor to the American Mission SJ, and returning again to Ireland, was declared Superior of the Mission, 27/08/1822, and its first Vice-Provincial, in its being erected into a Vice-Province in 1829. He remained Vice-Provincial until 1836.
1830-1833 He was again sent as Visitor to the American Mission SJ, where he rendered signal services, and in July 1833, published the General’s Decree for constituting the American Mission into a Province, installing Fr William McSherry as its first Provincial. During his years in America, he was constantly Preaching and Confessing, kept diaries of his travels, and had a very extensive correspondence with people of all ranks and conditions. His Retreats and Sermons were spoke of by Priests fifty and sixty years later, and long eloquent passages quoted with enthusiasm.
Tullabeg, and St Francis Xavier’s Residence Dublin are principally indebted to him for their foundation and erection.
Recommended by medical men to winter in warmer climates, he made his way to Rome with great difficulty, and died at the Gesù of an attack of apoplexy aged 62. He is buried at the Gesù. (Oliver, Stonyhurst MSS). Archbishop Murray of Dublin was overwhelmed with grief at his passing, and considered him a national loss. He and the other Bishops celebrated High Mass and said the Office for the repose of his soul.
He tried several times to write the history of the Irish Mission. Of his own life, short sketches have been written in Oliver, Stonyhurst MSS and Foley’s Collectanea, as well as Mgr Meagher in his “Life of Dr Murray” and by Father Hogan in some numbers of the Limerick Reporter.

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
His mother was said to have been a woman of remarkable piety and high intellect. She trained him in piety. he soon proved himself an apt scholar of virtue. Even as a young boy, he joined one of the sodalities for young men, which, in spite of Penal times, were flourishing in Dublin at the time. Their custom was to gather after nightfall, say prayers together and listen to a pious reading. It was Peter’s custom to regularly give ferverinos to his young companions which moved them so much, and even the priests - encouraged by Father Betagh - would stop to listen to him. This was a forerunner perhaps of his reputation later on as one of the foremost English speaking pulpit orators of his day.
1802 he was at Carlow College studying Logic and Metaphysics, and here too, his oratory was highly thought of, as it was usual for the students to preach in turn to each other. A famous talk he gave was on “The Dignity of the Priesthood” which was met with applause, even from the Superior.
1804 He went to Stonyhurst and completed his Noviceship. After First Vows he remained and studied Mathematics and Physics. His health troubled him, especially his eyes, and his Superiors decided to send him to a milder climate in Sicily for Theology. He duly completed his Theology to much acclaim and graduating DD (document of record of achievement from the University of Palermo preserved at Clongowes).
After Ordination he offered some support to Irish and English soldiers stationed at Sicily. At the same time, the King of Sicily was anxious to give refuge to Pope Pius VII, and Cajetan Angiolini SJ was commissioned to negotiate the matter with the Pope. He chose Peter Kenney as his assistant. The Pope refused to leave Rome.
1811 he left Sicily for Ireland. On the way he spent some time at Malta, ministering to English soldiers there. His name remained for a long time in fond memory.
1812 He arrived in Ireland to begin his long and fruitful career. The timing saw a Catholic Church beginning to emerge from the strictures of Penal Laws, though they were still in force.
He is described as the “foundation stone” of the Restored Society in Ireland. Father Betagh had just died the previous year, and since he was so beloved, Kenney was received with open arms by the Archbishop and priesthood in Dublin. He quickly earned a reputation as a great Preacher, and on all the great occasions, was called upon, including the funeral of the Archbishop and the Jubilee of 1825. He was then asked by Maynooth College, supported by the Archbishop to become the President. He accepted, only on condition that the Archbishop should be declared President, and he the Vice-President, but only for one year. His real desire was to found a Jesuit College.
1814 He purchased Clongowes. The money used to purchase it had been carefully handed down from the time of the Suppression. The College opened that year, and students flocked from all parts of the country. Due to overcrowding, a fever broke out at the College, and it had to be disbanded for a while.
1817 He left Clongowes to Bartholomew Esmonde, and took his place in Hardwicke St, Dublin, and he remained working there until 1819.
1819 Fr General Thaddeus Brzodowski entrusted the task of Visitor to the new Maryland Mission to Peter Kenney. It was a difficult task, but his work was approved of by all.
1821 He returned to Ireland, and initially back at Hardwicke St, but was then appointed Rector of Clongowes again, and later Mission Superior. This was a difficult period for the Church in the country, and some focus was on the Jesuits, with the old accusations of intrigue etc, being spoken of to the point where a petition was sent to Parliament by a group of zealous Irish Protestants asking that measures be taken to check the dangerous machinations of the Jesuits. Kenney’s diplomatic skills, particularly among influential Protestants in the Kildare area resulted in Lord Leinster moving a counter petition, suggesting the opposite, and this position was supported in the Irish press. Nonetheless, the Government set up an inquiry on the influence of the Jesuits, and Peter Kenney was summoned before the Chief Secretary and Privy Council. Again his skills won the day and the admiration of the Council which had summoned him.
1829 He went to a General Congregation, and there it was announced that Ireland would become a Vice-Province, and he the first Vice-Provincial. He was again sent as Visitor to American Provinces, and achieved much in that position, to the point where there were efforts to keep him in the US.
1833 On his return, his health was beginning to suffer, to the point that he found it difficult to be about, but he nonetheless stuck to his task to the end. He ran a Provincial Congregation in 1841 and he was even elected himself as Procurator of the Vice-Province to go to Rome. In spite of appalling weather conditions which made travel very difficult, especially for one in such health, he made the journey, but once in Rome succumbed to a fever. He is buried in the Gesù in Rome.
News of his death was issued at Gardiner St, and vast crowds assembled there in sorrow. The Archbishop wrote of the great loss to the Society and Church, in a letter of condolence. Many clergy and bishops attended his funeral, and a similar memorial event at Maynooth.
He was a man of exceptional powers as an administrator and Superior. In addition, he was known as a remarkable Preacher.
Note on excerpts from Mgr MacCaffrey, President Maynooth, “The Holy Eucharist in Modern Ireland” at the International Eucharistic Congress, Dublin 1932 - Book of Congress p 160 :
“There is not wanting evidence to indicate that even in the lifetime of St Margaret Mary (Alacocque) devotion to the Sacred Heart found many warm adherents in Ireland, and amongst them ...Blessed Oliver Plunkett. But whatever about individuals, the first Sodality of the Sacred Heart in Ireland of which we have an authentic record was founded at Maynooth College in the year 1813 by the eminent Jesuit Father Peter Kenney, Vice-President of Maynooth and founder of Clongowes. This new Society was regarded as important and so dangerous that it was denounced in English newspapers and reviews, was warmly debated in the House of Commons, and was even deemed worthy of investigation by a Royal Commission. But that Father Kenney’s work bore fruit in spite of much hostile criticism is proved by the fact that when years later Pope Gregory XVI granted an extension of the Mass of the Sacred Heart to Ireland, he did so, as he says, in consequence of the great devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus that prevails in that Kingdom.”

◆ Fr Joseph McDonnell SJ Past and Present Notes :
16th February 1811 At the advance ages of 73, Father Betagh, PP of the St Michael Rosemary Lane Parish Dublin, Vicar General of the Dublin Archdiocese died. His death was looked upon as almost a national calamity. Shops and businesses were closed on the day of his funeral. His name and qualities were on the lips of everyone. He was an ex-Jesuit, the link between the Old and New Society in Ireland.

Among his many works was the foundation of two schools for boys : one a Classical school in Sall’s Court, the other a Night School in Skinner’s Row. One pupil received particular care - Peter Kenney - as he believed there might be great things to come from him in the future. “I have not long to be with you, but never fear, I’m rearing up a cock that will crow louder and sweeter for you than I ever did” he told his parishioners. Peter Kenney was to be “founder” of the restored Society in Ireland.

There were seventeen Jesuits in Ireland at the Suppression : John Ward, Clement Kelly, Edward Keating, John St Leger, Nicholas Barron, John Austin, Peter Berrill, James Moroney, Michael Cawood, Michael Fitzgerald, John Fullam, Paul Power, John Barron, Joseph O'Halloran, James Mulcaile, Richard O'Callaghan and Thomas Betagh. These men believed in the future restoration, and they husbanded their resources and succeeded in handing down to their successors a considerable sum of money, which had been saved by them.

A letter from the Acting General Father Thaddeus Brezozowski, dated St Petersburg 14 June 1806 was addressed to the only two survivors, Betagh and O’Callaghan. He thanked them for their work and their union with those in Russia, and suggested that the restoration was close at hand.

A letter from Nicholas Sewell, dated Stonyhurst 07 July 1809 to Betagh gives details of Irishmen being sent to Sicily for studies : Bartholomew Esmonde, Paul Ferley, Charles Aylmer, Robert St Leger, Edmund Cogan and James Butler. Peter Kenney and Matthew Gahan had preceded them. These were the foundation stones of the Restored Society.

Returning to Ireland, Kenney, Gahan and John Ryan took residence at No3 George’s Hill. Two years later, with the monies saved for them, Kenney bought Clongowes as a College for boys and a House of Studies for Jesuits. From a diary fragment of Aylmer, we learn that Kenney was Superior of the Irish Mission and Prefect of Studies, Aylmer was Minister, Claude Jautard, a survivor of the old Society in France was Spiritual Father, Butler was Professor of Moral and Dogmatic Theology, Ferley was professor of Logic and Metaphysics, Esmonde was Superior of Scholastics and they were joined by St Leger and William Dinan. Gahan was described as a Missioner at Francis St Dublin and Confessor to the Poor Clares and Irish Sisters of Charity at Harold’s Cross and Summerhill. Ryan was a Missioner in St Paul’s, Arran Quay, Dublin. Among the Scholastics, Brothers and Masters were : Brothers Fraser, Levins, Connor, Bracken, Sherlock, Moran, Mullen and McGlade.

Trouble was not long coming. Protestants were upset that the Jesuits were in Ireland and sent a petition was sent to Parliament, suggesting that the Vow of Obedience to the Pope meant they could not have an Oath of Allegiance to the King. In addition, the expulsion of Jesuits from all of Europe had been a good thing. Kenney’s influence and diplomatic skills resulted in gaining support from Protestants in the locality of Clongowes, and a counter petition was presented by the Duke of Leinster on behalf of the Jesuits. This moment passed, but anti Jesuit feelings were mounting, such as in the Orange faction, and they managed to get an enquiry into the Jesuits and Peter Kenney and they appeared before the Irish Chief Secretary and Privy Council. Peter Kenney’s persuasive and oratorical skills won the day and the enquiry group said they were satisfied and impressed.

Over the years the Mission grew into a Province with Joseph Lentaigne as first Provincial in 1860. In 1885 the first outward undertaking was the setting up of an Irish Mission to Australia by Lentaigne and William Kelly, and this Mission grew exponentially from very humble beginnings.

Later the performance of the Jesuits in managing UCD with little or no money, and then outperforming what were known as the “Queen’s Colleges” forced the issue of injustice against Catholics in Ireland in the matter of University education. It is William Delaney who headed up the effort and create the National University of Ireland under endowment from the Government.

◆ Royal Irish Academy : Dictionary of Irish Biography, Cambridge University Press online :
Kenney, Peter
by Patrick Maume

Kenney, Peter (1779–1841), Jesuit priest and educationist, was born in Dublin, probably at 28 Drogheda Street, on 7 July 1779, the son of Peter Kenney, a businessman, and his wife, Ellen (née Molloy). He had one sister (who became a nun) and a much older brother (possibly a half-brother by a previous marriage of his father). Kenney attended schools conducted by the former Jesuit Thomas Betagh (qv), who became his principal mentor, at Saul's Court and Skinner's Row; after being briefly apprenticed to a coach-maker, he became Betagh's assistant in his schools. In 1799 Kenney took a leading role in the foundation of the first Young Men's Confraternity in Dublin.

On 6 June 1801 Kenney entered St Patrick's College, Carlow, to study for the priesthood. He was one of a group of young men who had their fees paid from the residual funds of the Irish Jesuit mission (administered by Irish former Jesuits) in return for a commitment to enter a revived Society of Jesus. The Jesuit order had been suppressed by the papacy in 1773, but survived unofficially in Russia. In 1801 the holy see granted official recognition to the Russian province of the order and allowed Jesuits elsewhere to attach themselves to it. Former Jesuits in England took advantage of this dispensation to reestablish the English province of the society under the jurisdiction of the vicar general in Russia, but the legality of this remained uncertain until the formal restoration of the society in 1814.

In September 1804 Kenney went to Stonyhurst College, Lancashire (founded 1794), to undertake his novitiate. He was recognised as an outstanding student, particularly in theology and philosophy. After developing asthma and eye problems he was sent to Palermo in April 1808 to complete his studies. This also allowed him to take his vows with the surety of being recognised as a Jesuit by church law, since the society had been formally reestablished in the kingdom of Naples in 1804. Shortly after his arrival Kenney served as interpreter on a secret and unsuccessful mission to persuade Pope Pius VII to leave French-occupied Rome and place himself under the protection of British forces in Sicily. Kenney received his tonsure and minor orders in June 1808, was ordained deacon and subdeacon in November, and received priestly orders on 4 December 1808. He carried on his studies at the Jesuit college in Palermo (completing them in April 1811, though he did not receive a degree for technical reasons), while ministering to catholics in the British garrison, despite obstruction from their superior officers.

Kenney returned to Ireland in August 1811 as acting superior of the Jesuits’ Irish mission (whose independence from the English province he successfully asserted). He ministered in Dublin with three other newly admitted Jesuits, and rapidly acquired a reputation as a calmly eloquent preacher. For the rest of his life he was much in demand as a preacher of charity sermons and as principal speaker on major ecclesiastical occasions; the Maynooth professor Patrick Murray (qv) compared his style and eminence as a pulpit orator to those of Daniel O'Connell (qv) as a public speaker. Between August 1812 and 1813 Kenney acted as vice-president of Maynooth at the insistence of Daniel Murray (qv), co-adjutor archbishop of Dublin, who had been asked to serve as temporary president. Kenney appears to have undertaken most of the administrative duties because of Murray's other commitments, but his principal impact was as a spiritual guide and retreat leader to the seminarians.

In 1813 Kenney used much of the money inherited from the former Irish Jesuit funds to purchase Castle Browne House, Clane, Co. Kildare; in summer 1814 this opened as Clongowes Wood College, which became the most celebrated school run by Irish Jesuits. In managing the new school and overseeing the implementation of the traditional Jesuit curriculum, Kenney showed himself a capable organiser. At the same time he lobbied against calls by ultra-protestant politicians for the passage of new anti-Jesuit legislation, acquired a chapel in Hardwicke Street, Dublin (from which Gardiner Street church and Belvedere College later developed), and negotiated the purchase of the site of the future Jesuit novitiate at Tullabeg, near Tullamore, King's County (Offaly).

In September 1817 Kenney (whose career was punctuated by lamentations over the burdens of leadership and expressions of desire to devote himself to pastoral work) resigned as rector of Clongowes and superior of the mission. The acceptance of his resignation was encouraged by tensions among the Irish Jesuits, which were aggravated by his frequent absences owing to other commitments. He spent the next year and a half at the Jesuit chapel in Hardwicke Street, adding to his lifelong reputation as a skilled (though perhaps somewhat strict) confessor to all classes of penitents and a leader of retreats.

In April 1819 Kenney was appointed visitor to the North American Jesuits. As a preliminary, he took his four solemn vows as a fully professed Jesuit on 16 June 1819 and sailed on 31 July, thereby avoiding an attempt by the secular clergy of Kerry to secure him for their vacant bishopric. During his first mission to America (September 1819 to August 1820) Kenney reorganised the struggling Jesuit college at Georgetown, and reported on the financial and pastoral problems created by the American Jesuits’ badly managed slave plantations in Maryland. His Irish and continental experience enabled him to mediate effectively between older European-born Jesuits and their native American confreres (who combined ignorance of Europe with pride in republican institutions). Evading efforts to nominate him for the sees of Philadelphia and New York, Kenney returned to Europe in August 1820 to participate in the election of a new Jesuit general and report to the general congregation on the state of the order in America.

Kenney returned to Ireland in 1821 and in 1822 was reappointed to the rectorship of Clongowes and the leadership of the Irish Jesuits (whose status had been raised to that of a vice-province in 1819) [This is incorrect Vice-Province 1830; . In this period he experienced tensions with Bishop James Warren Doyle (qv) on such issues as Jesuit social aspirations and the perceived desertion of parish clergy by penitents seeking lenient Jesuit confessors. He testified before a royal commission on Irish education and advised Edmund Ignatius Rice (qv), Mother Mary Teresa (Frances) Ball (qv), and Mary Aikenhead (qv) on drawing up the constitutions of their nascent religious orders. He later experienced tensions with Aikenhead and Rice over disputes within the Irish Sisters of Charity and the Christian Brothers.

In 1830 Kenney was relieved of his offices at his own request and thereafter the positions of Clongowes rector and vice-provincial were separated. But this respite was brief as he was promptly sent on a second mission to America as temporary Jesuit superior as well as visitor. On this visit, which concluded with his receipt and formal promulgation of the Vatican decree constituting the Maryland Jesuits a full province, covering much of the eastern United States, he implemented further reforms in Georgetown, reclaimed a church formerly run by the Jesuits in Philadelphia, and visited the Jesuit mission in Missouri, which had been founded by Belgian Jesuits in 1823 with the intention of evangelising the indigenous population. In Missouri he greatly raised the standing of the Jesuit college at St Louis, which became the first university west of the Mississippi, and attempted to diminish the harsh discipline exercised by the local superiors. His support for the continuing independence of the Missouri mission from the Maryland province was one of the achievements that mark his two visitations as a watershed in the development of the American Jesuits and, by extension, of the whole catholic church in America. His memory was revered among his American brethren for decades.

After his return to Ireland in September 1833 (having refused the bishopric of Cincinnati on health grounds) Kenney was reappointed vice-provincial in 1834, but stepped down in 1836 as he was no longer able to combine this role with his pastoral duties as superior of the Gardiner Street community, where the Dublin Jesuits had moved when their new church was constructed in the early 1830s; the Hardwicke Street chapel became the site of a school, which later moved to Belvedere House. Kenney remained superior at Gardiner Street until 1840, though he was now suffering from heart problems complicated by asthma, overwork, and obesity. In this period he strongly supported Archbishop Murray's acceptance of the national schools, writing to Rome in rebuttal of the position of Archbishop MacHale (qv).

In 1840 Kenney was relieved of his superiorship, having asked permission to spend some time in southern Italy for the good of his health and to undertake historical research on the history of the Irish Jesuits. He reached Rome in October 1841 but died on 19 November 1841 of a stroke, his condition exacerbated by poor medical treatment; he was buried at the Jesuit church of the Gesù in Rome. Kenney was a significant force in the nineteenth-century revival of institutional Irish catholicism, the key figure in the revival of the Irish Jesuits, and an important presence in the American church; but perhaps his greatest influence was wielded through his labours in pulpit and confessional, which led Archbishop Murray's eulogist to call Kenney ‘the apostle of modern Dublin’.

Louis McRedmond, To the greater glory: a history of the Irish Jesuits (1991); Patrick J. Corish, Maynooth College, 1795–1995 (1995); Thomas Morrissey, As one sent: Peter Kenney SJ 1779–1841, his mission in Ireland and North America (1996); ODNB

◆ Jesuits in Ireland : https://www.jesuit.ie/news/jesuitica-going-multi-denominational/

JESUITICA: Going multi-denominational
In founding Clongowes, Fr Peter Kenney told Sir Robert Peel that he intended to establish a lay school for education of Protestants as well as Catholics. Jesuits had made such moves before. In 1687, with royal sponsorship, they opened a school in the Chancellor’s House in the Royal Palace of Holyrood House, Edinburgh. It lasted only a year, but its prospectus is an object lesson in the virtues of religious tolerance and educational opportunity. Its book of rules begins with the welcome news that the scholars shall be taught gratis; nor shall they be at any farther charges or expenses than the buying of their own pens, ink, paper and books. The prospectus was copied in founding other Jesuit schools, and remains instructive today. Read more “Although youths of different professions, whether Catholics or Protestants, come to these schools, yet in teaching all, there shall be no distinction made, but all shall be taught with equal diligence and care, and every one shall be promoted according to his deserts. There shall not be, either by masters or scholars, any tampering or meddling to persuade any one from the profession of his own religion; but there shall be all freedom for every one to practise what religion he shall please, and none shall be less esteemed or favoured for being of a different religion from others. None shall upbraid or reproach any one on the account of religion; and when the exercise of religion shall be practised, as hearing Mass, catechising, or preaching, or any other, it shall be lawful for any Protestant, without any molestation or trouble to absent himself from such public exercise, if he please.”
Behind this were agreed moral norms: “All shall be taught to keep God’s Commandments, and therefore none shall be permitted to lie, swear or curse, or talk uncivil discourse. None shall fight or quarrel with one another.”

◆ Irish Province News

Irish Province News 7th Year No 3 1932

Father Peter Kenney Saves the Scholastic Method

On the occasion of the Congregation of 1829 the Fathers had to deal with the question of the direction of studies, and with the means of bringing the old Ratio Studiorum into line with the requirements of modern times. The principal matter under discussion was the use of the scientific method in dealing with sacred studies. The majority, having completed their studies in seminaries or in lay universities, according to the system then in vogue, showed themselves hostile to the “metodo scolastico” and favored the “metodo dissertivo”.
But Father Kenny, a gifted orator, at that time Superior of the Irish mission, addressing the Fathers, made a spirited and vigorous defence of the Scholastic method. He recalled
how deeply the Church and the Society were indebted to it, how the most distinguished men had been trained on that system, and how the enemies of religion had belittled and assailed it precisely because of its force and perfection. He concluded by affirming that by rejecting the Scholastic method they should not have carried out a work of construction but one of destruction.
All were carried away by the eloquent words of Father Kenny so much so that the Congregation declared unanimously that as in the past, the Scholastic method should remain as a sacred patrimony of the Society, and that the questions of “scientist media” and others commonly held by the theologians of the Society, should be considered as anything but useless and obsolete.
It were difficult to describe with what warmth Father Roothan applauded the eloquent words of the orator, He entertained for Father Kenny such affection and gratitude that he declared him to be a signal benefactor of the Society, and attributed to him the merit of having replaced the Society's true method and, true doctrine in its honoured position. He concluded by saying that were it not contrary to the practices of the Society a monument should be erected to him as a mark of that Society's everlasting gratitude.
The above is taken from a “Life of Very Rev. J. Roothan General of the Society”, written in Italian by Father P. Pirri.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ The Irish Jesuits Vol 1 1962

A MODERN APOSTLE OF DUBLIN
FR PETER KENNEY SJ (1779-1841)
Just a hundred years ago, on 19th November 1841, Father Peter Kenney, S.J., the founder of the Irish Province of the restored Society of Jesus, died in Rome. Few men played so large a part in the Catholic Renaissance which marked the opening half of the nineteenth century in Ireland. On his death Dr. Murray, then Archbishop of Dublin, said that Rome alone was worthy to be the scene of Fr. Kenney's death; some ten years later Mgr. Meagher, in a sketch of the dead Archbishop's life, called Fr. Peter Kenney the Apostle of Dublin.(1) To-day, one hundred years after his death, Dublin has forgotten almost all but the name of her great Apostle.

I.
Peter Kenney was born a Dubliner on 7th July, 1779, just six years after the Suppression of the Society of Jesus. Of his early years we have no very full record; he was already a young man of twenty-three when he entered Carlow College to begin his philosophy in 1802. While quite a boy he was apprenticed to a coach-builder and spent his days in the work-shop. Like many another ambitious lad he profited by Dr. Betagh's evening school in Saul's Court, off Fishamble Street, and every evening when his work was done he took his place in the old cellar where Dr. Betagh taught his free school, and where, as Dr. Blake, Bishop of Dromore, tells us “three hundred boys, poor in everything but genius and spirit, receive their education every evening, and where more than 3,000 have been already educated”. Dr. Betagh, carrying on the work of his confrère, Fr. John Austin, S.J., rewarded the more diligent of his pupils with a full classical education ; his school in fact did duty for a Diocesan Seminary for Dublin and Meath, and besides Peter Kenney numbered among its pupils Dr. Murray, Dr. Blake, Mgr. Yore and many others who did so much for the Church in the early nineteenth century.
The future Apostle of Dublin early showed his marked talent for preaching. While still an apprentice he used to treat his fellow-workers to versions of the sermon he had heard the previous Sunday. One day his master entered the work-shop and found young Kenney, mounted on a chair, preaching a sermon to his fellows who were gathered round him. “This will never do”, cried the master in a rage, “idling the apprentices! You'll be sure to be at it again. Walk off now; and never show your face here again”. Thus a sudden end was brought to his youthful apostolate and poor Peter's zeal had lost him his job. Much put out by his dismissal he stayed away from the evening school. But Dr. Betagh soon missed him and decided to find out what had happened to him. He feared that there had been some trouble at home, but when he questioned Peter the young lad admitted that he had been trying to preach to his fellow-workers and had been dismissed for his pains. From that day Peter and Dr. Betagh became fast friends. Realising the great zeal and ability of the boy he decided to give him every chance to become a real preacher, and, perhaps if God willed it, he might yet become a worker for Christ in Dr. Betagh's old Society now slowly rising from the tomb. (2)
In 1802 Dr. Betagh sent him to Carlow College to begin his higher studies. Here his powers as a preacher were more appreciated. It was customary for the students to preach in turn before their professors and companions. Young Kenney was chosen to preach On “The Dignity of the Priesthood” and so well did he grip his audience that at the end of the sermon they greeted him with rounds of applause in which the President joined heartily.
On 20th September 1804, he entered the novitiate of the Society of Jesus at Hodder near Stonyhurst. Of his noviceship we have little record; his future life seems to point to the thoroughness with which he made it. But once again his powers as an orator proved troublesome. On the authority of Fr, Postlewhite, a fellow-novice of his, we know that he was told to leave the refectory pulpit by Fr. Charles Plowden, his novice-master, as the novices were spell-bound by his sermon and listened to him intently at the expense of their dinner. After his noviceship he studied mathematics and natural philosophy at Stonyhurst with much success. His health, however, became poor, and he suffered a great deal from his eyes. His Superiors thought a change of climate would prove beneficial and so he was sent to Palermo in Sicily to read his course in theology.
In Palermo he quickly made his mark; in a letter of the Procurator General of the Society of Jesus to Fr. Plowden he is referred to as “l'incomparabile Kenney” and even in his first year's theology he is said to have spoken “da maestro”. At the end of his course he defended his theology in a public disputation with great distinction. And yet while working at his theology he found time also for apostolic work. Ordained in 1808 he was shortly afterwards appointed chaplain to the British soldiers in Sicily. The Governor of Malta objected to this and asked him to give up his work among the soldiers. Fr. Kenney replied that as he was ordered by his General to act as chaplain he could not abandon his work unless he received a written order from the Governor to do so. As the Governor was determined to force him to give up his ministry he wrote the necessary order forbidding him to act as chaplain to the troops. Later Grattan raised the question at Westminster; the Prime Minister, Perceval, denied that any such order was ever given. Fortunately, however, the document had been preserved and was forwarded to the Prime Minister by Dr. Troy. As a result Catholic soldiers were from that time given liberty of conscience.
Sicily at this period was occupied by British troops who were defending it for the King of Naples against the French who had already driven the King out of his kingdom of Naples. The Pope, Pius VII, was a prisoner of the French in Rome and a daring attempt to free him was determined upon in which Fr. Kenney was invited to play a leading part. He was told by his Superior to be ready to set sail within an hour's time on a British man-of-war, bound for Civita Vecchia. When the frigate, which was commanded by Captain (afterwards Admiral) Cockburn, reached the Papal port Fr. Kenney remained aboard while his companion Fr. Angiolini went on to Rome to propose to the Pope that he should leave Rome, come aboard the man-of War and sail for England where the British Government were willing to put a residence at his disposal until the French were driven out of Rome. However, the Pope preferred to remain with his stricken flock and so the project fell through. Captain Cockburn was charmed with his two Jesuit guests and was afterwards fond of recounting that he alone of His Majesty's Navy could boast of the honour of being ordered to hold himself and his ship at the disposal of two Jesuits with a view of bringing the Pope to England.

II
Dr. Betagh died on the 16th February, 1811; he was the last surviving Irish member of the old Society of Jesus. Towards the close of his life his friends often used to say to him: “Oh! Dr. Betagh, what will become of us all when you go to heaven?” To such questionings Dr. Betagh, it is said, always answered : “No matter; I am old and stupid ; but there is a young cock coming from Sicily that will crow ten times as loudly as ever I could”.
Just ten months after his death in November 1811, Fr. Peter Kenney, accompanied by ty. Dinan and Fr. Gahan, arrived in Dublin from Palermo to prepare the way for the new Irish mission of the restored Society of Jesus. He took a house on George's Hill, beside the Presentation Convent which his old friend and former master in Dr. Betagh's classical Academy, Fr. James Philip Mulcaile S.J., had helped to found ; thus the first Residence of the restored Society was in the middle of St. Michan's parish which had been so faithfully served by the Jesuits of earlier times.
Dr. Betagh had succeeded Fr. Mulcaile as Vicar-General of the Diocese and by his great sanctity, learning and zeal had become one of the greatest figures of the Irish Church. Dr. Troy and his clergy were, therefore, doubly warm in their welcome of Fr. Kenney to whom they looked to carry on the Venerable Betagh's work. On his arrival in Dublin in 1811 Fr. Kenney was a young man of thirty-two. Between 5 foot 7 inches and 5 foot 8 inches in height he looked a good deal taller because of his large build and his majestic bearing. His face was not regular, though some of his features were very fine; his forehead noble, his eyebrows massive, his eyes most brilliant and piercing, though winning, his mouth and the under portion of his face full of strength, it up at times with a sweet smile. Though his limbs were irregularly formed yet few seem to have noticed this so carried away were they by the sweeping effect of his strong personality. Richard Lalor Sheil wrote this description of him ; “His rectilinear forehead is strongly indented, satire sits upon his thin lips, and a livid hue is spread over a quadrangular face the sunken cheeks of which exhibit the united effects of monastic abstinence and meditation”. (3)
Fr. Kenney lost no time in getting to work; preaching, hearing confessions, giving missions, all these he undertook and with great fruit. He was not long in Dublin, however, before the Archbishop, Dr. Troy, and his co-adjutor, Dr. Murray, began to beg of him to take on the Presidency of Maynooth. For many reasons Fr. Kenney was slow to accept this responsible position, in the end he consented to act as Vice-President for one year during which time Dr Murray was to act as President. Writing to the Archbishop in October, 1812, Fr. Kenney pointed out : “Nothing could be more foreign to my intention and to the wishes of my religious brethren than a situation in Maynooth College. I, however, yield to your Grace's desire and opinion that in my actual circumstances, the greater glory of God may be more effectually procured there than in my present situation, Your Grace's anxiety on this head is now removed, since I promise to go for the ensuing year, provided a duty more directly mine does not necessarily call me thence before the expiration of that time. I must, however, earnestly request that if your Grace meet in the interim with a person who would accept the proposed situation I may be allowed to spend in the humble domestic library of George's Hill, not as yet arranged, the hours that I can spare from missionary labours”. (4)
The Archbishop was glad to have Fr. Kenney's services even for a year and he had every reason to be delighted with his prudent and skilful rule which was most fruitful in the fervent spirit of piety and study and in the exact observance of discipline which he instilled into the students. His memory has long been held in grateful and kindly memory in Maynooth where his portrait hangs in the Students' Refectory. Besides his year of office he had frequent contacts with the College in later years giving retreats to the Students and to the Priests from time to time. While Vice-President he proposed points for meditation to the students regularly and these were eagerly copied down and continued to circulate in Maynooth for many years afterwards. I have one copy-book of these meditations before me as I write these lines. Dr. Patrick Murray, the great Maynooth theologian, in some MSS. reminiscences of Fr. Kenney, published after his death, in 1869, states : “The first trace of his (Fr. Kenney's) luminous and powerful mind I saw was in some MSS, meditations which he composed during the short period of his holding the office of Vice-President in Maynooth November, 1812 November, 1813), and copies of which were handed down through some of the College officials. It was in the second or third year of my course (I entered College at the end of August, 1829) that I was fortunate enough to obtain the loan of a copy of some of these meditations - how I now utterly forget. But I remember well that I was quite enchanted with them; they were so different from any thing I had up to that time seen. I transcribed as many of them as I could—they were given me only for a short time-into a blank paper-book which I still have in my possession”. (5)
Fr. Kenney's reluctance to remain longer than a year in Maynooth was due to his anxiety to establish as soon as possible a Jesuit College for boys. The Fathers of the old Society had always believed that the day would come when the Society would once more flourish. To provide for this new dawn they had carefully husbanded the resources of the old mission and these with some legacies and the accumulated interest now amounted to the goodly sum of £32,000. With this capital behind him Fr. Kenney began to look about for a suitable home for his new College. The Jesuit tradition had been to have their schools in the cities or near them, and from this point of view Rathfarnham Castle seemed a good site. However, it was thought that it would be more prudent not to open a Jesuit school so near Dublin Castle. Fr. Kenney wrote to Dr. Plunkett, the Bishop of Meath, about his plans and the difficulties in the way; the following is part of Dr. Plunkett's reply, dated 25th January, 1813 :
"My dear and Rev. Vice-President,
Having been so long honoured with the very obliging letter you were so good as to write to me, I cannot suffer the bearer, Mr. Rourke, who is going to place himself under your care, to withdraw from us without a line of thanks for your late communication. I have been educated in this kingdom by the pious and amiable Mr. Austin. afterwards in a seminary ever attached to your Society, the seminary in Paris which gave you the venerable Mr. Mulcaile. I naturally feel a most sincere desire of seeing your revival commence amongst us in one shape or other, as soon as circumstances will allow. That a combination of such favourable circumstances approaches rather slowly I am not surprised. Few great undertakings advance fast to maturity ; obstacles of various kinds stand in the way. Active zeal is a powerful instrument well calculated to remove them, but must be accompanied with patience, prudence, caution and foresight. Dunboyne Castle, for the reason you mention, cannot be thought of at present; it is perhaps, also, too near Maynooth. Balbriggan, as to situation, would suit you better, not however, without considerable expense. I mean the house at Inch. I saw it some years ago. No striking idea of it remains in my mind. A convenient extensive building would appear there to great advantage. To the price or rent asked for the ground I should not very much object; we pay here higher for chosen spots of land. I should prefer purchasing if it could be done. Building, whatever advantages might attend it, would be tedious. There are in this county a few ancient mansions, some one of which your cordial friend Mr. Grainger, my most excellent neighbour, thinks ere long may be disposed of. It would afford you every thing desirable. Divine Providence is perhaps preparing a place of this sort for you. Your friends in England are, perhaps, waiting to be informed that such a place is attainable. It would, I humbly imagine, be worth waiting for. In the meantime your actual highly respectable occupations do not estrange you from your vocation ; out of your own sphere scarcely could they be more conformable to it. I am inclined to think that the esteem and respect entertained for you in the College, and the reputation you there and throughout the kingdom enjoy, have a closer connection than is apprehended with the designs of the Divine Founder of our holy religion. It has at times occurred to me that the Capital would be the situation most advantageous for your principal residence; because the means of cultivating learning, and kindling the fire of the true religion, which the Saviour of the world came to spread on earth, abound chiefly in great cities. ...” (6)
Towards the close of the same year, Fr. Kenney decided that the Wogan Browne's family seat, Castle Browne, formerly known as Clongowes Wood, would provide a suitable home for the first College of the Society. Details of the purchase were hardly fixed before the alarm that the Jesuits were plotting against the Government went abroad. Fr. Kenney was summoned before Peel, the Chief Secretary for Ireland, to explain his position. Dr. Corcoran, S.J., has printed an account of part of this interview in The Clongowes Record to which we also refer the reader for a full account of the early years of Clongowes, whose history is inseparably linked with that of Fr. Kenney. The following less well-known account of the interview from Lord Colechester's Diary will show how good a match Fr. Kenney was for Peel.
“May 29th, 1814 : Peel called by appointment. Talked over the Church fermentation about Quarantotti's letter and Dr. Kenney's foundation of the school of Clongowes Wood, late Castle Browne. Kenney's conversation with him asserting the £16,000 to be his own funds, though how obtained he refused to disclose and that when his vow of poverty was objected to him in bar of his being the proprietor of such funds he said that his vow was simple not solemn. (7) To all questions he generally answered by putting some other question instead of giving an affirmative or negative. He admitted that he was in early expectation of two Jesuits from Sicily, Wolfe and Esmonde, whose fathers and brothers respectively had been hanged in Ireland as traitors, and that he proposed to employ these two men as Professors in the College. (8)
Despite the refusal of the Protestant Bishop of Kildare to grant a licence for the new school and the lively interest of Dublin Castle in all his proceedings, Fr. Kenney opened Clongowes in May, 1814; by December, 1816, there were 200 pupils in the house. Fr. Plowden, S.J., of Stonyhurst wrote in October of that year: “I must tell you that the most heartfelt comfort which I have enjoyed these many years comes from Mr. Simpson's report (which fills Stonyhurst) of the excellent arrangements, order, progress, and success of your new establishment. It shows what one intelligent and active man can achieve”. (9)
The boys in Clongowes both then and later always called him "”he great Kenney”; his Sunday instructions were indescribably impressive, according to some of his pupils; he seems to have been able to grip their attention completely and to have won their confidence as the kindest of fathers. He loved talking to boys and engaging them in discussions. On one occasion probably after his return from America, “he was heard to give a brilliant exposition of the American constitution, which he very much admired, and he unconsciously delivered for twenty minutes before a large company what might be called a masterly statement that would have carried the admiration of any Senate - all were amazed and enchanted”.
Besides being Rector of Clongowes he was also Superior of the Irish Mission. Plans for a Residence in Dublin and for a novitiate occupied his attention but did not prevent him from satisfying the constant demand from Bishops and priests for retreats, missions, sermons and advice. In a short account like this his varied activities can only be barely indicated, but the reader will easily gather from their mere mention how closely Fr. Kenney was bound up with the life and development of the Irish Church. In February, 1815, Mary Aikenhead and her companion Mother Catherine Walsh returned from the Bar Convent in York to begin, under Dr. Murray's direction, the founding of the Irish Sisters of Charity. In all his plans for this new institute Dr. Murray constantly consulted Fr. Kenney, and when in September 1815, he had to return to Rome to give the opinion of the Irish Bishops on the Veto question he entrusted the care of the infant Congregation to Fr. Kenney. In September, 1817, Fr. Kenney preached on the occasion of the first public clothing of novices of the new Congregation; taking as his text the words of St. Paul : Caritas Christi urget nos (2 Cor. 7 v14) - “The Charity of Christ urgeth us”. From that day to this the text of that sermon has been used as the motto of the Irish Sisters of Charity. Later on Fr. Kenney introduced Fr. Robert St. Leger, the first Rector of the College of St. Stanislaus, Tullabeg, to Mother Aikenhead; in Fr. St. Leger, Fr. Kenney gave to the new Congregation a staunch and learned friend, to whom the Sisters owe their Rules and Constitutions which he modelled on those of St. Ignatius. (10)
The only criticism levelled against Fr. Kenney was that he was inclined to take on too much work. And yet in this matter of accepting extra work, though Superior of the Mission, he consulted his brethren. Fr. Aylmer records in his diary : “The letter from Mr. Kenney on the 3rd was to desire the opinions of Frs. Ferley, Butler and Aylmer with regard to his preaching a charity sermon in Cork at the request of the Bishop, Dr. Murphy, and, consequent to his accepting that of Cork, another in Limerick. The two former were of opinion that both ought to be accepted; the latter said that he did not entirely agree with them, because he thought that Fr. Kenney's frequent absence from the College, where he had so often declared that all were too young and not to be depended upon, was highly injurious. As to the propriety of preaching both sermons, Mr. Kenney himself could alone determine, as he alone knew the circumstances and situation of affairs”. (11)
Fr. Kenney seems to have followed Fr. Aylmer's opinion and to have declined the sermons but in so gracious a way as to win this reply from Cork : “Your apology (for not preaching for the Poor Schools) was calculated to produce a different effect from what you intended, for the more the Committee heard of it, the more they seemed eager to hear yourself”. However his over-activity was soon forgiven him for, if we may anticipate a little, Fr. Plowden wrote to him when on visitation in America in 1820 :
“The General, or rather Fr. Rosaven remarks as an inconsistency, that while you governed Clongowes complaints used to arrive of your conduct, and that now all Clongowes re-demands you loudly, as indispensably necessary for the support of the Irish mission”. (12)
Before Fr. Kenney left Ireland to make his first Visitation of the Maryland Mission in July, 1819, he had founded besides Clongowes, the Jesuit Residence attached to Hardwicke St. Church and the College at Tullabeg, but we shall have to reserve details of these foundations for some other occasion.

III
The new Mission in Maryland needed help in its difficult task of reorganisation and Fr. Kenney's great skill as an administrator, coupled with his prudence and discretion, made him ideally suited for the difficult position of Visitor. During the few months he remained in the United States he did excellent work the full fruits of which he was to witness ten years later when Fr. John Roothaan sent him to make a second visitation of the Mission in 1830. Though absent from Ireland for less than a year on this first visitation he was greatly missed. Fr. Plowden writes to him on September 24th, 1819 : “You are much missed and wanted in Ireland. As soon as I heard of your being elected by the diocesan clergy Co-adjutor to Dr. Sughrue (Bishop of Kerry), I wrote to Rome to engage our friends to frustrate the measure by every means in their power. We know now that the Lord Lieutenant has publicly notified that the election of Mr. Kenney to a bishopric is disapproved of by the Government. What a dreadful man you are! It seems your conference with Mr. Peel terrified the Ministers. All this makes me smile....” (13)
But the bishopric of Kerry was not the only honour which Fr. Kenney had to take steps to avoid; later on we shall see how anxious the American bishops were to have him as a confrère. Even now on his first visit to the States many influential people were anxious to keep him there. He wrote to Fr. Aylmer from Georgetown on October 5th, 1819 :
“I arrived at New York on the 9th ult. Matters are not so bad as they were made to appear. The General has been more plagued than he ought to have been.
All parties seem glad that a visitation has been instituted by the General.
I assure you that I have not the least intention or wish that you should take any measure to prevent the success of the Archbishop's efforts. In strict impartiality, after contrasting the wants of this country with my obligations to the Irish Mission, I have resolved to guard cautiously that religious indifference that leaves the subject sicut baculum in manu senis. Were I at my own disposal, I should think it almost a crime to return from any motive of affection or attachment to those comforts and sympathies which I shall never enjoy outside Ireland.
Were a man fit to do no more than catechize the children and slaves he ought to consider his being on the spot, by the will of God, a proof that it is most pleasing to God to remain amongst them, and so sacrifice every gratification under heaven to the existing wants of Catholicity, I shall not even lift my hand to influence the General one way or the other, because I am unwilling and unable to decide between the claims of the Irish Mission and the wants of this, when I am myself the subject of discussion”. (14)
However Ireland was not to be deprived of so valued a son and in the following August (1820) he returned to Dublin. On his arrival he took up duties as Superior of Hardwicke Street; in the next year he was reappointed Superior of the Mission and Rector of Clongowes. His work in Clongowes has been treated of elsewhere, and so here we shall give it scant mention; there were many worrying moments when the old outcry against the Jesuits was raised again, and it took all Fr. Kenney's influence and tact to avert the storm.
It was during this period between his American visitations that Fr. Kenney's greatest work as a preacher was done. On almost every big occasion he was invited to fill the pulpit. Thus he preached the panegyric of Dr. Troy in 1823, the consecration sermon of Dr. Crolly in 1825, the first appeal for the Propagation of the Faith ever preached in Dublin, and the great Jubilee of 1826. Dr. Murray opened the Jubilee on 8th March, 1826, in the new Church of the Immaculate Conception (the Pro Cathedral). Every day for a month Fr. Kenney addressed the faithful with commanding eloquence which achieved the most astonishing conversions. Mgr. Meagher tells us that the confessionals were crowded almost without interruption by unprecedented multitudes. On the first morning of General Communion the Pro-Cathedral presented a spectacle such as Dublin had never before witnessed. The Church was packed to overflowing and every member of the vast congregation received Holy Communion. At the conclusion of the ceremonies Fr. Kenney led the people in a renovation of their Baptismal vows. Beholding the sight that met him as he ascended the pulpit he“burst forth into such strains of jubilation and thanksgiving, as made his overflowing audience almost beside themselves, while with uplifted hands and streaming eyes they literally shouted aloud their eternal renunciation of Satan and his works”. (15)
Dr. Patrick Murray, the Maynooth Professor, has left us his opinions of Fr. Kenney's powers :

“Fr. Kenney aimed not at the ear or the fancy but through the understanding at the heart. Not to steal it; he seized it at once and in his firm grasp held it beating quick in its rapt and willing captivity. ... The only other orator to whom I thought of comparing him was Daniel O'Connell. I recollect that while both were yet living I remarked in a conversation with a very intelligent friend on Fr. Kenney's great powers that he was ‘the O'Connell of the pulpit’. My friend not only agreed with me but expressed his surprise that the resemblance had never occurred to himself. The reason it did not occur to him was, no doubt, that ordinarily men do not think of searching for such comparisons out of the species; but set off pulpit orators against pulpit orators as they set bar orators against bar orators, and parliamentary against parliamentary.
Overwhelming strength and all-subduing pathos were the leading, as they were the common, characteristics of these two extraordinary men. I say nothing of clearness, precision, and those other conditions which must be found in all good composition, whether written or spoken, and especially in oratory addressed to the many; without which all seeming or so-called eloquence is mere hurdy gurdy clattering. Also I say nothing of O'Connell's inimitable and irresistible humour. There are undoubtedly certain occasions on which this talent may be exercised in the pulpit. But Fr. Kenney, if he possessed it, never in the least degree displayed it. I never saw a more serious countenance than his was on every occasion of my hearing him. Not solemn, not severe, but serious and attractively and winningly so. There he stood - or sat as the case might be - as if he had a special commission direct from heaven on the due discharge of which might depend his own salvation and that of every soul present. Indeed so deeply did he seem to be penetrated with the importance of his sacred theme, so entirely did the persuasion of that importance display itself in his whole manner that his discourses appeared to be the simple utterances of what his heart and soul had learned and digested in a long and absorbing meditation before the crucifix. That they were often in fact such utterances I have no doubt whatever ; one instance of this I once, by mere accident, happened to witness with my own eyes.
In another point he also strikingly resembled O'Connell. He never indulged in those poetic flights of mere fancy which delight only or mainly for their own sake. Imagination, of course, he had and of a high order, too; otherwise he could never have been a true orator. But it was imagination subservient not dominant; penetrating the main idea as a kindling spark of life, not glittering idly round about it; the woof interwoven with the warp not the gaudy fringe dangling at the end of the texture. You will find none of these poetic flights to which I allude, in Demosthenes, or Cicero in Chrysostome or Bourdaloue; and where they are found in modern orators of high name they are blemishes not beauties. Of course, too, he had great felicity of diction, which is equally essential - using the very words and phrases which above all others exactly suited the thought and set it off in its best light, so that the substitution of any words would be at once felt as an injury like the touch of an inferior artist covering the delicate lines of a master....
Fr. Kenney, like O'Connell, attained the highest perfection of his art which consists in so appearing that no. one ever dreams of any culture or art having been used at all, according to the hackneyed phrase summae artis autem celare artem. So perfect was O'Connell in this respect that though I heard him very often in the winter of 1837-8 and the following years it never once entered my mind to suspect that he had ever given any great attention to oratory as an art; his delivery always appearing to me spontaneous and unstudied as are the movements and prattle of a child. It was only after his death that I learned from some published memorials of him, and was at the time surprised to learn, that in early life he had taken great pains in forming his manner, and in particular that he had marked and studied with care the tones and modulations of voice for which the younger Pitt was so famous. Fr. Kenney, like O'Connell, hardly used any gestures. His voice was powerful and at the same time pleasing, but I I do not ever remember to have heard from him any of those soft pathetic tones sometimes used by O'Connell which winged his words to the heart and the sound of which even at this distant period still seems to vibrate in my ears.
Fr. Kenney was eminently a theological preacher, and this too without the slightest tinge of that pedantry and affectation always so offensive to good taste, but particularly so in the pulpit. Indeed he was the only preacher I ever heard who possessed the marvellous power of fusing the hardest and most abstruse scholasticisms into forms that.at once imparted to them clearness and simplicity and beauty without in the least degree lessening their weight and dignity.....” (16)

Dr. Murray was not alone in thinking Fr. Kenney an outstanding orator. One old bishop used to recall the over mastering tenderness and vehemence of his apostrophes to the crucifix, which he delivered with streaming eyes on some occasions ; this same bishop declared that his vivid recollection of Fr. Kenney's preaching had made him unable to relish any other preacher however eminent, even Fr. Tom Burke himself. Fr. Aylmer, who was an effective preacher, used to say that his greatest humiliation was to have to preach from the same altar steps from which Fr. Kenney had electrified the congregation on the previous Sunday, So packed was the church when he preached that the congregation overflowed out on to the street; his following numbered all classes. It is said that Grattan used to admire his eloquence greatly and used to attend his sermons at Hardwicke Street.
As this account of Fr. Kenney's career has already grown too long we can make no mention of Fr. Kenney's close connection with the Presentation Convent on George's Hill. We must, however

Kelly, Thomas, 1829-1898, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/211
  • Person
  • 04 July 1829-20 April 1898

Born: 04 July 1829, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 23 September 1846, Dôle France - Lugdunensis Province (LUGD)
Ordained: 1859, Maynooth, County Kildare
Final Vows: 02 February 1865
Died: 20 April 1898, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Younger brother of William E - RIP 1909 and Edward - RIP 1905 who both survived him.

by 1857 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) Studying Theology
by 1859 in Laval France (FRA) studying Theology
by 1864 at Rome Italy (ROM) making Tertianship

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Younger brother of William - RIP 1909 and Edward - RIP 1905 who both survived him.
His early education was at Hardwicke St, under the influence of Peter Kenney. Belvedere was soon established, and so he went there. He was very proud of the fact that he was one of the first boys to enter Belvedere. He then went to Clongowes, which was a fairly natural transition at the time.

Immediately after his Secondary schooling he decided to join the Jesuits, and he entered at Dôle. He later went to Avignon for studies. There he became a victim of the “troubles of ‘48” and all Jesuits were expelled from that locality. He found refuge in England at Hodder, where he said to have finished his Novitiate.
He was then sent for Regency first at Tullabeg for a short time and then to his alma mater, Belvedere. He taught there for eight years with great success, earning a reputation of brilliance in two diverse subjects, Classics and Science.
He was then sent to St Beuno’s and then Laval for Theological studies. He returned to Ireland and was Ordained at Maynooth in 1859.
The next couple of years were spent in Limerick for eight years, achieving great things in education and religion, and then later to Rome.
1864 He was appointed Rector of Limerick, in succession to his brother Edward, who was appointed Rector of Belvedere. While in Limerick he built the Church of the Sacred Heart, which was considered architecturally and aesthetically one of the best in the country. As well as working in the Church and teaching, he was known to have had special devotion to the afflicted and sorrowful.
His last mission was at Gardiner St, and he remained there until his death 20/04/1898. His death was seen as a dreadful blow to the people of Dublin, especially the poor in the Gardiner St neighbourhood. He was know here to to have a special devotion to this group of people, and was considered saintly in his kindness. He was also loved by his Community.

He had been one of the most popular Jesuits in Dublin, as a Preacher, a Priest and Dubliner. He was a profound Theologian and a keen observer of human nature, he also had a natural eloquence, and spoke in very simple language, to make sure all his listeners could understand. It was thought that no Preacher of his day understood human frailty better, which drew kindness and understanding from him rather than trenchant bitterness. Though occasionally he could appear sarcastic, it was of a kind that drew a smile. He had a wonderful capacity to take the most ordinary of human behaviours to illustrate the moral or point he wished to impart, and which many could recognise as true of themselves.
He was a man of great judgement and sound common sense, but above and beyond all, extraordinary sympathy, whose chief delight was lifting the burdens of others, especially the misery of poverty.
His death was greatly regretted by all who came in contact with him.
(Taken from ‘Daily Nation’)

◆ The Clongownian, 1898

Obituary

Father Thomas Kelly SJ

On Wednesday, April 20th, there passed away one who will long be remembered by the poor of Dublin for his loving charity towards them. With all those with whom he came in contact, Father Kelly was ever courteous and affable, but to the poor he was more than a friend, and as one gazed on the crowds that filled every inch of the large church at Gardiner Street on the morning of his funeral, and saw on those faces the marks of genuine sorrow, one could not help but feel that Father Kelly's death had left a gap which it would not be easy to fill.

Born in Dublin in 1829, he began his education. at the old Jesuit day-school in Hardwicke Street. Thence he went to Belvedere, being one of the first batch of boys that entered its walls. The last years of his school life were spent in the study of rhetoric and philosophy at Clongowes, after which he entered the Society of Jesus, being then in his seventeenth year. His novitiate was spent first at, Dôle and afterwards at Avignon, whence, in the troubled days of '48, the Jesuits were expelled and he had to fly to England. He came to Tullabeg, 1848, and later to Belvedere, where he taught with great brilliancy and success for eight years. After a course of theology in St. Beuno's, North Wales, and Laval, he was ordained in Maynooth in 1859. He subsequently taught in Limerick, and after a year spent in Rome was appointed to succeed is brother, Father Edward Kelly, as Rector of the Jesuit College in Limerick. He held this important position for eight years, during which he built the eautiful Church of the Sacred Heart, and left such a record of work done, not only in the school; the pulpit and the confessional; but also in relief of suffering and distress, that Father Kelly's name and memory are still held in benediction by those that knew him then. He returned to Gardiner Street in 1872, and remained there 'till his appointment as Rector of Belvedere, where he displayed for some years the same talent, energy and kindness that narked his government in Limerick, Failing health compelled him to retire from this office in 1883, and thenceforward he lived and laboured at Gardiner Street till his death.

This bare outline gives but an inadequate idea of what Father Thomas Kelly was to his friends and contemporaries, A man of great intellectual grasp, of wide and varied reading, and of a rare breadth of view and fairness of judgment, he was still more remarkable for the modesty and diffidence that marked his use of such powers. To those who knew him well it was clear he could have gained an easy eminence in almost any department of scholarship. In classical learning, in physics, in mental science he was deeply and accurately read. But he nyuch preferred to place his experience and his talent at the disposal of the distressful, and his genial, frank, and sunny nature made him a welcome as well as a helpful friend and adviser. Among the poor “who had seen better days” he seemed to have a special mission, and the unselfish and unobtrusive work he had done amongst them for many a day is beyond the power of any chronicler to detail. With the death of Father Thomas Kelly a well-beloved friend has disappeared from many a household.

A solemn Requiem High Mass was sung in presence of His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin in St Francis Xavier's Church. An immense funeral cortege accompanied the body to Glasnevin, and the numerous costly wreaths which covered the coffin testified to the respect in which the dis tinguished Jesuit was held. RIP

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Thomal Kelly (1829-1898)

Brother of Father Edward Kelly (supra) and second rector of the Crescent, was, like his brother, educated in the old school at Hardwicke St, Belvedere College and Clongowes. He entered the Society in 1846 and began his noviceship at Dôle, in Burgundy. Troubled days were beginning for the Jesuits in France and young Thomas Kelly soon found himself transferred to Avignon. But, before his noviceship was ended, he found himself with his companions on the road to exile again. He found refuge in England, at Hodder, near Stonyhurst. Later, when more peaceful days had returned, he was able to pursue his higher studies in the English Province and France, where he was ordained at Laval. Father Kelly had finished his studies only a short time when he was appointed to replace his brother as rector of the Crescent. The great monument to his memory is the church of the Sacred Heart which was built during his term of office. With the exception of his period of office as rector of Belvedere College, Father Kelly spent the years 1872-1898 as member of the Gardiner St community. Of his sojourn in Limerick, the late Archdeacon Begley, historian of the diocese of Limerick writes: “... Rev. Thomas Kelly, a man long remembered by the old priests of the diocese and mentioned with reverence for the high ideals he instilled into their youthful minds, ideals which were the guiding lights of after years”.

Kelly, Robert, 1828-1876, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/574
  • Person
  • 23 August 1828-15 June 1876

Born: 23 August 1828, Mullingar, County Westmeath
Entered: 30 October 1854, Lyons, France - Lugdunensis Province (LUGD)
Ordained: 11 November 1851, Mullingar, County Westmeath - pre Entry
Final Vows: 02 February 1868
Died: 15 June 1876, Mullingar, County Westmeath

Part of the St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin community at the time of death.

in 1856 at Lyon France (LUGD) for Tertianship
by 1857 at St Joseph’s, Springhill AL (LUGD) teaching
by 1867 at Laval France (FRA) studying

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
He had studied at Maynooth for the Meath Diocese, being Ordained by Dr Cantwell at Mullingar 11 November 1851. He had then worked as a Curate in Meath before Ent.

He joined the LUGD Province wishing to be on the USA Mission. After First Vows he went teaching to Spring Hill College, Alabama.
1863 He was sent to Ireland and Teaching in Galway.
1864 Sent as Minister to Joseph Dalton in Tullabeg.
1865-1866 Sent to teach at Clongowes.
1867 He was sent to Laval in France for further studies.
1868 He was sent back teaching at Tullabeg.
1869 he was sent to Gardiner St as Operarius. Here he proved a most zealous Priest, a great temperance advocate and Director of the Confraternity for the Sacred Heart for the repression of intemperance. he did great good, especially among working class and artisans. He was also editor of a very successful little paper called “Monitor” which had a wonderfully large circulation.
In failing health he went to his father’s house in Mullingar, and he died there peacefully 15 June 1876. His remains were brought to Dublin, and he is buried in the Jesuit plot at Glasnevin.
His “last act” was an attempt to sing the “Gloria”!

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Robert Kelly 1828-1876
Fr Robert Kelly, a secular priest of the Meath diocese, where he worked for four years, was born in Mullingar on August 27th 1828.

He entered the Society at Lyons in 1854 and was engaged as Master at Spring Hill College, New Orleans Province, for some years. In 1863 he was recalled to Ireland, and filled various posts in Galway, Tullabeg and Clongowes. He spent the last eight years of his life as Operarius in Gardiner Street, where he was Director of the Confraternity of the Sacred Heart.

He was very zealous in the cause of temperance, did great good among the working classes, and edited a very successful little paper called “The Monitor”.

His death was very peaceful, taking place at the home of his father, Dr Kelly, in Mullingar in 1875. His last act was an effort to sing the “Gloria in Excelsis” of High Mass.

Kelly, Patrick, 1920-2012, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/779
  • Person
  • 21 February 1920-04 May 2012

Born: 21 February 1920, Limerick City, County Limerick
Entered: 07 September 1937, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1950, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 15 August 1953
Died: 04 May 2012, Cherryfield Lodge, Dublin

Part of the Milltown Park, Dublin community at the time of death.

by 1953 at Chikuni, Chisekesi, N Rhodesia (POL Mi) working - fifth wave of Zambian Missioners
by 1986 at Chicago (CHG) studying
by 1987 at Roosevelt NY, USA (NEB) working
by 1989 at Sunland-Tujunga CA, USA (CAL) working

Kelly, Michael, 1802-1844, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1518
  • Person
  • 27 May 1802-16 November 1844

Born: 27 May 1802, Edermine, County Wexford
Entered: 31 August 1822, Montrouge, Paris, France - Angliae Province (ANG)
Ordained: 24 September 1836, Stonyhurst College, Lancashire England
Died: 16 November 1844, St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St, Dublin

Part of the Tullabeg community at the time of death

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Early education was at Clongowes before Ent.

Did Noviceship in France. The sent on Regency to Clongowes and made a Prefect there in 1835. He later became Minister there.
He was Ordained at Sonyhurst 24 September 1836 by Dr Briggs.
1843 he was appointed Minister at Tullabeg and died in that office. He was sent by the Superior to Dublin for medical attention, but he died at Gardiner St after a short stay there. He is buried in Glasnevin. He was a pious, observant, zealous and energetic man.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Michael Kelly 1802-1844
Fr Michael Kelly was born in Wexford in 1802 and educated at Clongowes.
He was ordained at Stonyhurst as a Jesuit, and in 1843 he was appointed Minister in Tullabeg, where he died during his period of office. As he was not feeling too well, Superiors sent him to Dublin to consult a doctor, but he died in Gardiner Street on November 15th 1844, and was buried in Glasnevin.

Kelly, Edward, 1824-1905, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/202
  • Person
  • 03 December 1824-07 February 1905

Born: 03 December 1824, Dublin City, County Dublin
Entered: 23 October 1842, Drongen, Belgium - Belgicae Province (BELG)
Ordained: 1855
Final Vows: 02 February 1860
Died: 07 February 1905, St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin

Middle brother of William - RIP 1909 and Thomas - RIP 1898

by 1854 Studying at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG)

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Middle brother of William - RIP 1909 and Thomas - RIP 1898

Edward was a distinguished Preacher and Teacher, and taught with great distinction at Clongowes.
he was the First Rector of Crescent.
1889 He was appointed Superior at Gardiner St where he worked until his much lamented death 07 February 1905. He was loved by all, poor and rich. A man of rare quality.

(cf “Irish Monthly”, Vol 34, 1906, pp1, 162, 218, 264 and 320) (cf “Irish Catholic” 07 February 1905)
“Father Kelly was one of the great men of our Province. He sat in the General Congregation that elected Father Anton Maria Anderley, as Swiss Jesuit as General, and was to have gone to the Congregation which elected Father Luis Martin of Spain, but bad health kept him away, and Robert Carbery replaced him as 1st Substitute. He was frequently sent to Congregations of Procurators.

A most scholarly man, very kind and generous. He was ill for a very short time, and died peacefully and happily at Gardiner St 07 February 1905. The Minister Father Bannon and Father Joe McDonnell were present at his death.

◆ The Clongownian, 1905

Obituary

Father Edwad Kelly SJ

by Father Matthew Russell SJ

One of the holiest and most amiable, one of the most admirable and most gifted, one of the most widely and most warmly loved of Irish priests has finished his course on earth. Father Edward Kelly SJ, died in the Presbytery attached to St Francis Xavier's Church, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin, about 10 pm on Tuesday; February 7th. He died in his native city, almost in the street in which he was born December 3rd, 1824. He had thus quite lately completed his 80th year. His birthday was the feast of the most famous of Jesuit saints, under whose invocation was soon to be erected hard by the well-known church in which Father Kelly did the chief-part of his life's work.

The Jesuit Fathers indeed were already teaching and preaching still nearer, in Hardwicke Street, but Edward Kelly seems not to have attended their day school, as his younger brother did, just before the school was removed to its present home, Belvedere House, 6. Great Denmark Street, whither Thomas Kelly followed it. But Edward Kelly also was a pupil of the Society in which he became so efficient a master, for he finished his early education at Clongowes, where he was the pride and boast of his Professor, Father Henry James Rorke, afterwards so well known at St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street. In his eighteenth year he became a novice of the Society of Jesus, the first of the three brothers, who might have adopted as their own the dedication of Miss May Probyn's “Pansies”:

“Three; we learned together
At our mother's knee
Three, through altered weather
The highway travel we
God send, in heaven's gold ether,
We stand before Him, three”.

The first of this remarkable family, William Kelly, older than Edward by a year only, did not enter the Society till 1850, some years after even his brother Thomas, who was eight years his junior, having meanwhile passed through a course of theology at Maynooth, with a brilliant reputation which was one of the cherished traditions of the place many years later. The only sister of these brothers became a Sister of Mercy in the mother-house of the Order, in Lower Baggot Street, Dublin; but before her novitiate was finished she bravely volunteered to be one of a band of Sisters who founded the first Australian convent in Perth, Western Australia, some fifty years ago. This separation must have been an immense sacrifice for the heroic maiden, as it certainly was an abiding sorrow for the affectionate hearts that she left at home. No family could possibly be more tenderly united to one another.

Edward Kelly began his noviceship in Belgium, on the 23rd of October; 1842. After taking the Vows of religion towards the end of 1844, he began a long term of work on the staff of Clongowes College, where for some years he really filled the place of several professors, joining to the rhetoric class the class of natural and experimental philosophy, in which Father Edward Kernan succeeded him, devoting himself exclusively to what had been only one of the other Father Edward's many activities. Father Kelly was eminently successful in all his work, gaining the admiration and affection and un bounded confidence of his scholars. When he became a scholar again himself, he passed through his four years of theological studies with great distinction at St Beuno's, North Wales. After his ordination, he was employed again in teaching at Belvedere till he was chosen to be the first Rector of St Munchin's College, Limerick, which was entrusted to the Society of Jesus by the Most Rev Dr Ryan, Bishop of Limerick, in March, 1859. The old Bishop, a shrewd judge of character, had a great esteem for the young Rector, and his successor, the Most Rev Dr Butler, honoured him with his confidence and friendship. In the difficulty and anxiety of the new foundation he received support that no other could have given him from his younger brother, not yet a priest, but ordained at Maynooth the following Pentecost. The sacred text about the strength of a brother helped by a brother was verified very emphatically in this ..fraternal partnership. Beside the wearing, worrying labours involved in establishing the school, of which the most distinguished pupil was one of the very first generation, Edward Thomas O'Dwyer, the present Bishop of Limerick, they prepared for the beautiful Church of the Sacred Heart by devoted priestly work in a temporary oratory in the “corner house” the house in the right-hand corner of the Crescent, as you face Hogan's statue of O'Connell, for Crescent House was not acquired till some years later. The church, however, was not built till the first Rector had yielded the place to his fittest successor, his brother. During all his Limerick life Father Edward's devotedness to duty, his unwearying kindness, and all his noble qualities of heart and head, had won the affectionate esteem of all classes of the citizens of Limerick, who have never forgotten him. His remembrance of them was vivid and tender to the last.

One of the two survivors of the original Limerick community was happily inspired to write a letter of loving allegiance to his first Rector in St Edward's Day, October 13, 1904, not thinking that it was his last opportunity of paying such a homage. Father Edward wrote in reply “Your kind and faithful letter was very, very welcome. The remembrances, out of which it came, are to me very dear and very sweet, though they have their ingredient of sadness. I find myself thinking sometimes that here were not many happier families in the Compagnie at home or abroad than that little group in the corner house ‘were not then nor have been since. It is all a very long way back. We were all very young and very bright. God bless you”. That was the last word that passed between the Rector of the corner house and the youngest of his subjects.

In 1864 Father Edward Kelly. was appointed Rector of St Francis Xavier's College, Belvedere House, Dublin. After a long term in this office he was transferred to the Church of St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, where his duties as a priest, confessor, and preacher engrossed the rest of his life, except five or six years in the eighties, when he was Rector of his old Alma Mater, Clongowes Wood, There and everywhere he was beloved by all for his unselfish devotion to duty, his kindness and considerateness for everyone under his charge, and bis even sweetness of disposition, which was certainly not incompatible with a quiet dignity and firmness of discipline. I think it is Tacitus who describes some great general as “dux consilio, manu miles” - guiding the host by his skill and knowledge, and yet doing the work of a brave private soldier. Such was Father Edward Kelly as a Superior - like the King in St Ignatius's famous Meditation, not asking from his followers any labour or sacrifice of which he had not first himself given a bright example.

The rest of his life, as I have said, was spent in St Francis Xavier's, Gardiner Street, in which community he filled the office of Superior in succession to Father Bannon for some years before and after 1890. The altar, the pulpit, the confessional, the bedside of the sick, the recreation-room of his community, his own simple chamber for prayer and study - his errands of charity, listening patiently to the varied story of troubles, making himself the medium of those who wished. to bestow judiciously some of the means that God had placed in their hands; these broken phrases will recall to those who knew Father Edward Kelly, some of the exercises of his tranquil, but unresting energy and zeal. He was the truest of friends. To have seen better days, to be in trouble, to be down in the world, these were additional recommendations in his eyes. God alone, whose bumble minister he was, knows the comfort that he gave, the good that he did; the souls that he rescued from sin; the holy souls that he sanctified more and more, by all his ministries of mercy, day by day, through so many years of his gently strenuous life - which, by the way, was kept up with a frame never robust, and that nourished always very sparingly. His holy toils were not even relaxed after the death of his brother, Father Thomas Keily, seven years ago, though this separation must have torn the very fibres of his heart. Happily, Father William Kelly had, some time before, been recalled from Australia after many years of eminently useful labours in that young Church; and now he, in turn, receives the affectionate sympathy of all who know him.

Father Edward Kelly had always been very remarkable for his assiduity in paying the last tribute of respect to the dead by attending Requiem Offices and accompanying funerals to Glasnevin. Perhaps this was not forgotten when his own turn came; and certainly one who could judge accurately of such things says that he never saw the funeral of a priest more numerously attended. The Archbishop of Dublin presided at the obsequies, and the coffin of the holy priest, before the altar at which he had so long ministered, was surrounded by an immense concourse of the priests of the city, and numerous representatives of all the religious Orders, includ ing, of course, as many of his own as circumstances allowed to be present.

O'Connell inscribed on the tomb of the kinsman from whom he inherited Derrynane: “They loved him most who knew him best”. There will be no inscription over Father Edward Kelly's grave in Glasnevin, but only his name on the large Celtic cross that rises above the Jesuit plot of that vast garden of the dead. But his name is written in many hearts, in many grateful memories. Many a kind word will be spoken of him for years to come by those who have had the happiness of knowing him, and many a fervent prayer will be offered up for Father Edward Kelly's soul.

◆ The Clongownian, 1931

“The Snows of Yesteryear”

IV The Kings

I now give my own recollectioris of another great man.. The name of Fr Edward Kelly is one to conjure up a host of memories - subjective and objective - of the early eighties in Clongowes Wood. Of the youngster, fresh from his mother's apron-strings, at that age, when, as little Third-liners we “were as lads.. that thought that no more lay behind, but such a day to-morrow as to-day, and the boys eternal”, when all was a strange new life to us - the clangour of the playroom, or the class, the silences of compulsion whether in the chapel or study, the ecstacies of the freedom of the half-day or the play-day.

At the threshold of the entrance of all this life stood the figure of the Rector, Fr Edward Kelly, of slight build and medium height, something past the meridian of life, in person spotlessly clean, with silvery grey hair, and deep-lined face, his voice, always of energy and emphasis, yet like a well tuned instrument touched by a masterful will, capable at times of tenderness, at once firm and affectionate, all combined to give to our minds, impressionable and trialleable as wax, the inipression of a personality girt around with an atmosphere that left no vacuum for the intrusion of another figure.

Most of all was this made vivid to our minds on those occasions whether of feast or mourning, in the Calendar of the Church, when the sermon, the Benediction, or the Mass, was preached or celebrated by Fr Rector. The old chapel, in architecture expressive of the Penal times, something akin to the Quaker Meeting House in internal design; its gallery reaching round the entire of the long plain hall supported by its wooden pillars with Corinthian capitals, to relieve the simplicity of design, and all its wealth of religious art thrown with the one expression; the sanctuary in which stood the Altar of God, with its multiple lights and exquisite flowers and then from the sacristy, slowly and with soft steps, the advancing lines of acolytes, and behind them the figure in surplice and alb of Fr Rector. A moment's prayer of recollection before the Altar, and he turns to where we sat, and making aloud the Sign of the Cross, Fr Edward Kelly commenced his sermon. Wrapt in prayer his eyes closed to all that passed before him, for the first three or four minutes all that we could see was the movement of his lips and hear only the murmurings that came from his lips and tongue. With youth, reverence is quick to fly, when humour enters, and oftentimes have I seen the furtive glance and heard the titter go round the chapel, bench by bench, until the Holy Spirit shaped and formed the utterance of the preacher's word, and then the vibrant voice, the apt word, the homely language, and the ardour of his soul captured our affections, and once again sunk with reverence and silence we left, our souls uplifted with the consolation of religion.

At first Thou gav'st me milk and sweetness;
I had my wish and way:
My dayes were strew'd with flowers and happiness :
There was no moneth but May.

Edward J Little

◆ The Crescent : Limerick Jesuit Centenary Record 1859-1959

Bonum Certamen ... A Biographical Index of Former Members of the Limerick Jesuit Commnnity

Father Edward Kelly (1824-1905)

The first Rector of Crescent College, was a native of Dublin and received his early education at the old Jesuit School in Hardwicke St, Belvedere College and Clongowes. He entered the Society in 1842 and received all his higher education abroad. He was summoned from his tertianship in France in the early spring of 1859 to become rector of the newly founded St Munchin's College. The correspondence between the Provincial at Gardiner St and the General of the Society at Rome shows that Father Kelly had been designated previously as next rector of Clongowes. His term of office came to an end in 1864 when he was appointed rector of Belvedere College. His next post of responsibility was the rectorship of Clongowes which he held from 1881 to 1885. The remainder of Father Kelly's life was passed at the church of St Francis Xavier, Gardiner St where he held the position of superior from 1889 to 1895.

Keating, Patrick, 1846-1913, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/201
  • Person
  • 17 March 1846-15 May 1913

Born: 17 March 1846, Tipperary Town, County Tipperary
Entered: 28 August 1865, Milltown Park, Dublin
Ordained: 21 September 1880, St Beuno’s, St Asaph, Wales
Final Vows: 15 August 1890, Australia
Died: 15 May 1913, Lewisham Hospital, Sydney, Australia

Part of St Ignatius College community, Riverview, Sydney, Australia at the time of death.

Younger brother of Thomas - RIP 1887
Early education at Clongowes Wood College SJ

Father Provincial of the Irish Province of the Society of Jesus: 3 December 1894-11 November 1900.
Superior of the Irish Jesuit Mission to Australia Mission: 05 April 1890-1894

by 1868 at Amiens France (CAMP) studying
by 1869 at Rome Italy (ROM) studying Theology
by 1871 at Maria Laach College Germany (GER) Studying
by 1878 at Innsbruck Austria (ASR-HUN) studying
by 1879 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) studying
Early Irish Australia Mission 1884; Mission Superior 05 April 1890
PROVINCIAL 03/12/1894

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Younger brother of Thomas - RIP 1887. They were very close.
Early education was in America and then Clongowes.

After First Vows he did his studies at Amiens and Rome, later at Maria Laach and Innsbruck, and in the end at St Beuno’s. Wherever he went, the same spirit of kindness and good humour went with him, and this was true throughout his life. On Australian who went to visit him in Rome was greeted warmly at first, but when he mentioned that he was to see Father Keating, the courtesy was unbridled.
1870 He was living in Rome at the same time as the “Robber King of Sardinia” Victor Emmanuel laid siege to and conquered the city. he was a student at the time, and not inactive in the siege, going here and there to tend to the injured and dying. He was truly a martyr in desire. The conquerors drove the Jesuits from the Roman College. By 1872 the Jesuits were banished from Maria Laach and Amiens, and he was in these places.
1877 He was sent for studies to Innsbruck where he joined Thomas Browne and Francis Carroll.
1880 He joined Joseph Dalton in Australia, and succeeded him as Rector of Riverview.
1890 He was appointed Mission Superior in Australia.
1894 He was recalled to Ireland as provincial of HIB, and he remained there for six years.
1901 He returned to Australia as Rector of Xavier College, Kew. He then moved to North Sydney, for a time at St Mary’s, then Lavender Bay, succeeding John Gately. While working in these Parishes, his gentleness, friendliness and care for every man, woman and child, won the hearts of all. When he left Lavender Bay for a second stint as Rector of Riverview in place of Thomas Gartlan who had been sent to Melbourne, the people gave him a wonderful send off.
His death took place at Lewisham Hospital (run by the Nuns of the Little Company of Mary) 14 May 1913. The funeral was hugely attended and the Archbishop of Sydney, Michael Kelly, both presided and Preached. The Jesuits at Riverview received countless letters and telegrams from all parts of Australia condoling with them on the death of Father Keating.

Catholic Press, Sydney :
Rev W A Purves, Headmaster of the North Sydney Church of England Grammar School wrote : “I am sure everyone who knew Father Keating feels an individual loss. For myself I never knew quite so courteous and kindly and entirely charming a gentleman; and for you who knew well his other great and endearing qualities, the blow must indeed be heavy. I think sch personalities as his have a strong influence in maintaining friendliest relations among us all, and whilst in a sense one cannot mourn the second and better birthday of a good man, one cannot but miss him sorely.”

Rev Arthur Ashworth Aspinall, headmaster of the Scots College, in conveying his sympathy to the Acting Rector, the Staff and Pupils of Riverview, wrote :
“It was my privilege to meet Father Keating years go and more recently, I realised the charm of his cultured personality, and can thus in some degree realise the loss which the College and your Church has sustained. The State has too few men of culture not to deplore the removal of one so much honoured in the teaching profession.”

Note from Thomas P Brown Entry
1877 He was sent to Innsbruck for Theology with W (sic) Patrick Keating and Vincent Byrne

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Although born in Ireland, Patrick Keating received much of his early education in the USA. His secondary education began at Clongowes Wood College, Kildare, Ireland, where he had a reputation as a fine athlete and was a good rifle shot. He entered the noviciate at Milltown Park Dublin, 2, August 1865. His juniorate studies were at the College of St Acheul, France, his philosophy at the Roman College, and theology at Innsbruck and St Beuno's, Wales, 1877-81. Regency was undertaken after philosophy at St Stanislaus College Tullabeg, 1871-77, where he was assistant prefect of studies and taught university students.
Keating was living in Rome in 1870. On 20 September the troops of Victor Emmanuel laid siege to the city of Rome. He risked his life by helping the wounded on the streets. The Jesuits were driven from the Roman College. So Keating finished his third year philosophy at Maria Laach during the Franco-Prussian War.
After his ordination in 1880, he taught religion, French and Italian for a short time, 1881-82, at Clongowes Wood, and the following year was socius to the master of novices at Milltown Park, during which time he completed his tertianship.
In 1883 Keating arrived in Australia, joined Joseph Dalton at St Ignatius' College, Riverview, and succeeded him as rector in 1888. He was appointed mission superior in 1890 and resided at Riverview. In 1894 he returned to Ireland as provincial, residing at Gardiner Street.
He returned to Australia in 1901 and was appointed rector of Xavier College, Kew, and taught for the public examinations. From 1908-11, he performed parish ministry at North Sydney and at Lavender Bay, Sydney, and in 1912 was appointed rector of Sr Ignatius' College, Riverview. He died in office the following year following a cerebral haemorrhage.
Patrick Keating was one of the most accomplished Irish Jesuits to come to Australia. He was spiritually, intellectually and athletically gifted, and respected for his administrative skills. People spoke of “his urbanity his culture, his charm, his good looks, his human insight and his ability to inspire affection”.
Christopher Brennan, the Australian poet and former student of Keating, paid him an outstanding tribute. He believed him to be “the most distinguished personality that I have ever met, a standard whereby to test and judge all others. To come into his hands ... was to be initiated to a quite new range of human possibilities”. He praised Keating for his 'rare qualities of gentleness and sympathetic comprehension.
His Jesuit community praised his great spirit of exactness and neatness, the kindness he extended to all, his strong sense of duty, a tender devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, and his work in adorning the chapel. Under his direction, Brother Girschik made a line cedar vesting press for the sacristy at Riverview, which still stands.
Writing to Ireland in 1894, Dalton, at Riverview, believed that Keating's students had great confidence in him and “liked him well”. John Ryan, mission superior, did not lavish praise upon him. He believed him to be good at administration, but not with finances, not overly strict in discipline; firm and decisive, but easily influenced by anyone of strong mind, cool of temper, but not fatherly or sympathetic, somewhat superficial, cold and at times sarcastic, discouraging more than encouraging. The Irish provincial, Timothy Kenny, while visiting Australia in 1890 believed Keating to be “the most admirable man I ever met”. That being the opinion that counted, Keating became the next Irish provincial.
In his speeches as rector of the various colleges, Keating showed his openness, appeal to reason and genuine belief in the goodness of human nature. He was truly a cultured humanist. He kept well informed about contemporary ideas in education and gave critiques of them, continually stressing the traditional classical education of the Jesuits. He was concerned at Riverview by the rather poor quality of Jesuit teachers, men “rather broken in health”, who were not helping the boys achieve good examination results.
At the time of his death, Keating was one of the most significant Jesuits in Australia, much loved and most appreciated by those who experienced him, both as a kind and courteous gentleman, and as a cultured scholar.

◆ James B Stephenson SJ Menologies 1973

Father Patrick Keating SJ 1846-1913
Fr Patrick Keating was born in Tipperary on March 17th 1846. Although born in Ireland he received his early education in America, then completing his secondary course at Clongowes Wood.

As a Jesuit, he was present in Rome when it was captured by Victor Emmanuel of Sardinia. In the midst of the bombardment, he went here, there and everywhere, assisting the wounded civilians and soldiers. He, with his companions, were driven from Rome and proceeded to Maria Laach in Germany and then to Innsbruck.

Fr Keating went to Australia where he became the first Rector of St Ignatius Riverview, and then Superior of the Mission.

He was recalled to Ireland to become Provincial in 1894. After his term as Provincial, he returned once more to Australia, where he filled many administrative posts and became a widely-known and popular figure in public life. He figures largely in the long and brilliant school-story of Fr Eustace Boylan”The Heart of the School”. Fr Keating (Keeling of the story) is a winning and lovable Rector of Xavier.

At his death in Sydney on March 15th 1913 there were many generous tributes to his work and character, not only from Catholics, but from persons of all religious denomination.

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 42 : Easter 1986

Portrait from the Past

PATRICK KEATING : 1846-1913

Province Archives

The following appreciation of a former Irish Provincial appeared in the CATHOLIC PRESS of Sydney on 22nd May 1913.

Born in Tipperary on 17th March, 1846, Fr. Keating occupied almost every position a Jesuit can occupy except that of General. His last sickness was brief. It was only a few days before his death that he became ill. His medical attendants pronounced his case serious - cerebral hemorrhage - and the last Sacraments were administered to him at once by the Rev. Father C. Nulty, S.J. He was taken to hospital the following day, and had been a patient only twelve hours when he died.

Of Father Keating, as boy and man, as student and teacher, as pastor of souls and Provincial of the Irish branch of his Order, it may be safely said that his whole life was one well-sustained effort to be ready for the final sunmons of the Sovereign Master who has called him home so suddenly. He was Superior of the Australian Mission of the Society of Jesus in 1894. At a later date he governed the Irish Province. He was for some years Rector of St. Francis Xavier's College at Kew, and before he went to Riverview as Rector for a second time, he had been zealously labouring as pastor of souls among the people of North Sydney.

Although he was born in Ireland, Father Keating imbibed the rudiments of knowledge in America. His high-school studies began at Clongowes Wood College, Co. Kildare. He entered the Novitiate at Milltown Park, near Dublin in 1865. His later studies were made at the College of St. Acheul, in France; at the Roman College of Maria-Laach, in Germany; at the University of Innsbruck, in the Tyrol; and at St. Beuno's College, in Wales Wherever he went, the same spirit of genuine kindness and genial good-humour that we ourselves witnessed invariably went with him, An Irish-Australian who visited Rome a few years ago called at one of the principal colleges there. The Professor who showed him over the place was kind and courteous; but when the name of Father Keating was mentioned to him, then to kindness and courtesy were added all manner of friendly offices. The Professor had been an old class-fellow of Father Keating, about 40 years before, and his face glowed with pleasure at the very mention of his name.

Father Keating was living in Rome in 1870. On September 20th of that year the troops of the robber King of Sardinia, Victor Emmanuel, laid siege to the city of the Popes, bombarded the walls of Rome, and entered into its streets as conquerors. While all this was going on, Mr. Keating, as he then was, was not inactive. In the midst of balls and bombs, in the midst of whizzing bullets and falling masonry, at the risk of his own life, he went here, there and everywhere on his mission of assisting to the best of his power the wounded and dying soldiers and civilians. He was truly a martyr in desire. The same bandits that deprived the Pope of his dominions deprived the Society of their college. They were driven from the Roman college in 1870. In July, 1872, they were banished by the German government from Maria-Laach, a college they had acquired only ten years before. If Father Keating had remained only a little longer, at Maria-Laach and St. Acheul, he would doubtless have driven out of house and home like so many of his brethren, at the point of the bayonet.

In 1877, Father Keating was sent to Innsbruck, where he studied for a time with Father T. Browne and Father Carroll, of North Sydney.

Three years after his ordination, which took place in 1880, Father Keating came to Australia. He joined the late Father Dalton, founder of the college, at St. Ignatius', Riverview, and succeeded him as Rector. He held the position for six years, and was then appointed Superior of the Jesuits in Australia. He was recalled to Ireland in 1894 to be Provincial of the Irish Province, an office he filled with distinction for six years. He returned to Australia in 1901, having been appointed Rector of Xavier's College, Kew. He was transferred to North Sydney some years ago, and for a time was on the staff at St. Mary's, Ridge Street. Thence he was placed in charge of St. Francis Xavier's, Lavender Bay, succeeding the late Father Gately. While working amongst the people of the parish, Father Keating's gentleness, geniality, zeal and solicitude for the welfare of every man, woman and child in his flock, won the hearts of all, as they did everywhere he laboured throughout his career.

When he left Lavender Bay in January 1912 to assume the Rectorship of Riverview for the second time, in the place of Father Gartlan, who was transferred to Melbourne, the people entertained him, and demonstrated their affection for hin in no unmistakable way.

The late Father Keating belonged to an old Tipperary family. An elder brother, Father Thomas Keating, S.J., came to this country two years before him. In Ireland he had been Rector of Clongowes Wood College. In Australia he joined the teaching staff of St. Aloysius' College, then in Sydney. He died many years ago in St. Francis Xavier's College, Kew. The deepest affection existed between the two brothers. Both were excellent religious and most saintly men. Their immediate relatives reside in a fine place close to Chicago, USA.

Father Keating's death took place as described at Lewisham Hospital on May 14th, 1913. The obsequies were largely attended and were presided over by His Grace, the Archbishop of Sydney, who, after Mass, preached the panegyric, basing his discourse on the inspired words of St. Luke:- “Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when He cometh, shall find watching. Amen, I say to you, that He will gird Himself, and make them sit down to meat, and passing will minister unto them, and if He shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants. But this know ye, that if the householder did know at what hour the thief would come, he would surely watch, and would not suffer his house to be broken open. Be you then also ready; for at what hour you think not, the Son of Man will come”. His Grace said the Divine Redeemer spoke these words tacitly for circumstances like those in which they were now assembled. One of their number had been called away, his soul had gone to eternity, and the earthly tenement of that soul lay on the catafalque before them like a house broken through, the spirit gone. This fact shocked them, but Holy Faith told them that blessed was the soul that was found watching, as Father Keating's was.

Now that they were gathered together according to the traditions of the Church, to mourn together, they must attend to the spiritual profits to be derived from the occasion, and first of all heap up powerful supplications for the soul that had been called away that it might speedily, if not immediately, enter into the joy of the Lord. The sacred liturgy which guided them to that bier to send forth their last prayers, and to accompany those mortal remains to the grave, wished that they would first of all derive consolation from the solemnities, and secondly, edification. The good man would be encouraged to greater perseverance, the tepid would be made fervid, and those who might be asleep in the sleep of sin, induced by the concupiscence of the flesh, would be wakened up. Father Keating served God and guided youth in the paths of learning and holiness which were characteristic of himself when his soul inhabited that human frame, with its vital organs stilled in death, and like a house abandoned. The earth would go back to the earth until the Last Day, but the soul was at that moment in the strange land from which no traveller returned. What did they think had been its lot? A week ago Father Keating had been with them in the flesh as a brother, as a fellow-worker, but suddenly he was caught up and taken from their midst. Well for his friends to know what a life Father Keating had led, happy for them that the record he wrote upon their memories was ripe in personal sanctification and spiritual victory. Therefore, he was found watching in the observance of the rules of his Order, watching at his post of duty, Father Keating had triumphed, he had fought the good fight, and kept the faith. But though they looked upon him as one already saved, he might be crying out for their suffrages from the fires of Purgatory. Sinners though they be, they could help him, for in the economy of God's Providence prayer was the Key of Heaven. God would hear their supplications on behalf of the faithful departed, but he would be dear to their prayers when they themselves were bring purged. Hence, let them studiously avail themselves of the period during which the recollection of Father Keating would be living amongst them to send up this prayer from the bottom of their hearts: “Eternal rest grant him, O Lord, and let perpatual light shine upon him. From his iniquities cleanse him, for all human frailties forgive him. What is man taken from this vale of tears that he shall be justified in the sight of God? Purify, O Lord, all this is to be purified, and take the soul of your servant and our brother, and peruit him to pass quickly, if not at once, into the joys of your heavenly abode”.

The Archbishop then vested in cope and mitre, and pronounced the Last Absolutions. As the strains of the “Dead March in Saul” throbbed through the church, the coffin was raised on the shoulders of the bearers and carried to the main entrance, the Archbishops and priests accompanying the remains to the hearse, where the Benedictus was chanted.

The Jesuit Fathers at Riverview received countless letters and telegrams from all parts of Australia condoling with them on the death of Father Keating.

In the course of his letter, the Rev. WA Parves, head-master of the North Sydney Church of England Grammar School, wrote: “I am sure everyone who knew Father Keating feels an individual loss. For myself, I never knew quite so courteous and kindly and entirely charming a gentleman; and for you who knew well his other great and endearing qualities, the blow must indeed be heavy. I think such personalities as his have a strong influence in maintaining friendliest relations among us all, and while in a sense one cannot mourn the second and better birthday of a good man, one cannot but miss him sorely”.

The Rev. A. Ashworth Aspinall, head-master of the Scots College, Bellevue Hill, in conveying his sympathy to the acting-Rector, the staff, and pupils of Riverview College, wrote:- “It was my privilege to meet Father Keating years ago and more recently, and I realised the charm of his cultured personality, and can thus in some degree realise the loss which the college and your Church has sustained. The State has too, few men of culture not to deplore the removal of one so much honoured in the teaching profession.

◆ The Xaverian, Xavier College, Melbourne, Australia, 1913

Obituary

Father Patrick Keating SJ

The news of the death of Fr. Keating came as a shock to us in Kew. Schools change fast, and there are few of the boys of his time amongst us this year, but his passing stirred up again in many of us the very kindly feeling that accompanied his presence when he was amongst us before.

Fr Keating was born in Tipperary, in 1846. He left his native land for the United States when still young, and found his home for a time in Illinois; but he returned to Ireland as a student of Clongowes, of which his brother at that time was Rector. Some old Xaverians will remember Fr Thomas Keating as he came to Australia later, and was on the staff of Xavier for a few months of 1887, teaching classics in the Honour Class till within a couple of days of his death.

According to contemporary accounts, Fr Keating was very prominent in school life at Clongowes, leading in class and sports. He was a good all round athlete, and to his early training must have been due the fine physical development which he retained to his later years. He was a good rifle shot, and kept up his interest in everything touching on school life to the end.

His studies took him to France, Germany, Austria and Rome, and he had many interesting recollections of life in those places. He was present in Rome during its bombardment by the Garibaldians, which resulted in the breach of the Porta Pia and the spoliation of the States of the Church. In 1883 he came to Australia, and was a master in Riverview till 1990, when he was appointed Superior of the Society of Jesus in Victoria and New South Wales. In 1894 he was transferred to Ireland, as head of the Irish and Australian Province, and after seven years spent in that office he returned to Australia to be Rector of Xavier in 1901. In 1908 he was sent to North Sydney to take up parish work at Lavender Bay, wliere he had as his assistant Fr Corish, who had been minister here with him for some years. The good work done by these two old Xaverians there was such as those who knew them both could expect. The same' kindly spirit accompanied Fr Keating. always, finding everywhere the same return. He liked his work, and him self was liked by young and old. So it was with a feeling of distress that he received the cabled order to return to Riverview as Rector. But the buoyancy of his spirit soon showed itself, and, as was his way, he entered heart and soul into his work there. During the illness of Fr Brown he was called upon to take up again the burden of Superior, until he was relieved after a few months by the appointment of Fr Ryan.

As he was settling down now to work, as he hoped, undisturbed, he was taken ill on May 12, and died early on the morning of the 15th. His death was the occasion of most generous expressions of a kindly feeling on all sides, induced as was evident, not so much by his position as by his personal qualities.

Fr Keating was a man of many parts as we knew him. His unfailing kindliness and courtesy made everyone feel at home with him; and, what is" after all perhaps the best test of a character, those who lived on closer terms with him, felt that in parting with him they had lost a friend.

May his soul rest in peace.

◆ Our Alma Mater, St Ignatius Riverview, Sydney, Australia, 1913

Father Patrick Keating SJ

At the last Old Boys' dinner I promised to say something about Father Keating in this “Alma Mater”. At that time his death was too poignantly near to allow (so it seemed) of any direct emotional expression in English verse or of elaborated and transposed elegy in one of the classic tongues; and I stipulated for mere personal reminiscence. in pedestrian phrase. And then, as I came to carry out my promise, I felt a certain disgust with what I was trying; it was not worthy of the dead man, and all that I owed him, and who was I to utter my school-boyish reminiscences: among others so better called to speak? So, at. the risk of exhausting all the editors' kindness - and patience, I destroyed what was beguin, and I waited and waited, until at last I have, perhaps, fallen between two stools - the Pindaric ode and the Boswellian note-book - missing both.

I first came under Father Pat Keating in the year 1885. It was my happy chance to spend the five best years of my boyhood under two Keating brothers. At old St Kilda and St. Aloysius', in Bourke Street, I had for two years sat under Father Tom, that gentle ascetic with the full head of silvery hair, and beneath it a face like that of a kindly Moltke, and the shrewd fold of the eyelids; Father Pat had the same, but whereas his eyes never missed anything (I remember well!), Father Tom's often seemed to be gazing within. But how could there be two Fathers Keating? I wondered and wondered - for a boy is slow to catch such a likeness: he knows father and uncle, but has no idea or fancy of how they were boys and brothers together, how much less then will he imagine his masters as standing in human kindship to each other or anyone at all? - and it was months before some better-informed schoolmate, who had preceded me from St Aloysius', amazed me with the truth. My amaze was further excusable in as much as there was twenty years between the brothers, and Father Tom had seemned such a very old man. How different Father Pat!

To live at a boarding school has this advantage, that one meets one's masters outside the class-room, adi comes into touch with their personality. I was probably just at the right age to undergo the influence, and absorb the charm of a personality when I met Father Keating and that, perhaps, has helped to make ineffaceable the impression I received from him. But time and favouring occasion are of no avail unless the personality, unless the man is there. And Father Keating was unique.

Distinction is a subtle thing: unmistakable to perception, intangible to analysis and definition. Everyone, I think, who uses and understands the word must have, in his mind's eye, some persons, and pre-eminently one, to make his idea of distinction palpable to his thought and fancy. For me, Father Keating always was and shall be that man; easily the most distinguished personality that I have ever met, a standard whereby to test and judge all others. To come into his hands, at that age and at that conjunction of things, was to be initiated to a quite new range of human possibilities. It is not always nor altogether an easy and flattering thing, such initiation. One feels oneself rebuked, by the unspoken contrast between what the other is and one's own crudeness; so at least it was with me, and it is another proof of Father Keating's rare qualities of gentleness and sympathetic comprehension that he bore for a long time with the wily discourtesies of what was, after all, only a distorted admiration. At last he had it out with me, man to man, and that made me his friend for ever. It showed me, behind all that perfection of word and manner and bearing that might have been the envy of any diplomat or man of the world, the simple and affectionate humanity that was always there, in Father Keating, for those who wanted it or appealed to it.

It is curious how, when one reflects upon one's impressions of Father Keating, one never thinks of him in terms of this or that; it is always the man and the personality that lives before one. Not that one abstracts from the things he was, but they do not force themselves to the front. Thus, Father Keating was of course Father Keating, and a priest of the Society, and one never knew him otherwise and yet even that seems, as it were, absorbed into the nature of the man that one remembers. And so with the rest. He was a fine athlete, and it was a sight, regularly expected, regularly recurring, to see him lift a leg-ball right out of the cricket-ground; but it seemed all to be done by the way. Just so, for all his fine knowledge of the classics (and how much else!) one hesitates to call him a scholar; that name seems to be better reserved for smaller men who have chosen the one-sided development of a single faculty. And yet the classics will help me to express, to some degree, what I feel. I remember how he enjoyed doing Horace; and there was a certain Horatian felicity and perfection of style about everything he did. I think he was aware of it, and it was a pleasure to him; but the thought never came and never can come to one that he tried after it; it was all so natural, so himself, Even so, the word “gentlemanly”, would be all too common, in fact all too shoddy for Father Keating's exquisite ways. It was just that: he was unique, he was hirrself.

When I first knew him, Father Keating was in his early prime, only just forty. I had three years with him; then during my University years I saw him continually. Then we went our ways in life (and his took him far), and after 1894 many a year went by without our meeting; when, one day, a letter arrived, in his well-known hand, telling me that he had discovered my whereabouts and asking me round to St. Xavier's. I found him there, just a little stooped and his hair whitening, but otherwise the same as ever. I was looking at the bookshelves as he came into the room, and he asked me what had caught my notice. It was the life of Coventry Patmore, and I remarked what a great poet he was: “But not as great as Homer, surely”! said Father Pat. He showed me where his old copies of Homer and Horace stood, but regretted that parish work left him but little time for such reading, Then, I remember, some incident of his morning's round led him to remark on the lack of politeness in our youth: “I remember I had a lot of trouble with you”, he said, turning to me with a smile. I confessed that I had been something of a cub and that I had deserved to catch more than I did catch.

I was Father Keating's guest twice after his return to Riverview. One noticed, just now and then, a little sign of approaching age: a slight uncertainty of vision, where the eyes had once been so keen; a slight uncertainty of movement, where the hands had once been so precise. But old age had not yet overtaken him, and it seemed as if he yet had many a happy year before him. I was thinking to myself: “It's too bad, you haven't been up to Riverview for some time now”, and planning to get a day free in a fortnight or so, when, one morning, the paper opened on his portrait and I knew that I should not see him in this life again.

We were a small class in those days at Riverview, Steve Burke and myself; Harry Fitzgerald was with us for a while, but I think we always regarded him as an outsider; we had gone through St Kilda and St Aloysius' side by side, and come up to Riverview together. Our little class was tended by three teachers, Father O'Malley, Father O'Connell, and especially Father Keating. And now they are all gone: Steve is dead and Father O'Connell and Father O'Malley, and now, at last, Father Keating. Life begins to get lonely when one thinks of the best days of one's boyhood and finds none of those who were an intimate part of them to share or stimulate one's memories. And for me a great part of what is dear and precious in life was carried away as I saw his coffin borne out of the church, and whispered to myself just the simple farewell, “Good-bye, Father Pat”.

-oOo-

The Late Father Keating

In setting out to write this little sketch of Father Keating, we are fortunate in having his autobiography at hạnd. It was begun at Xavier College, Kew, Melbourne, during his rectorship of that College, on a piece of notepaper, and on the last sheet we find the last entry, recording, his entrance into office as Rector of Riverview, in January, 1912. A feeling that it was perhaps too intimate to expose to the gaze of all who may read has prevented its inclusion; its substance is our guide in what will follow. Father Keating often used to say, in his characteristic way, that one should leave one's things in order and not cause people unnecessary trouble, even at the end; and we have no doubt that it was sheer good nature that urged him to leave us his life in miniature.

Father Patrick Keating was born at Tipperary, in Ireland, on the 17th March, 1846; of an excellent Catholic family which had the distinction of giving three of its members to the service of God, in religion. His elder brother, Thomas, like himself, became a Jesuit; a sister is a Sacred Heart nun in America. In 1850, a little boy of four years old, he went to America with his parents, to live at Elgin, Kane County, Illinois. His first education was obtained at a private school at Elgin; in 1861 he was sent by his parents to the Jesuit College, at Clongowes Wood, Co. Kildare, Ireland. After four years at Clongowes, in 1865, being then nineteen years of age, he entered the Irish Jesuit novitiate, taking his vows two years later, in 1867. He spent the next two years studying thetoric at St. Acheul, Amiens, and in 1868 went to Rome to study philosophy at the Roman College. He was in Rome during the Session of the Vatican Council at which the dogma of Papal Infallibility was declared, and in the same year, 1870, the Italian army entered Rome through the breach in the Porta Pia, after the famous siege.

It must have been a stirring time! We have heard Father Keating describe the walks the philosophers would take in the city during the siege. There was one poor fellow who had both legs blown off by a shell. Father Keating and his companions took pity on him, and told him he should resign himself to the misfortune God had sent him. “But how can I?”. he cried, “what can I do without legs?” Then they carried him to his home. There must have been many such scenes, and one can easily imagine the charitable “Mr” Keating of those days, often rendering such assistance.

The Roman College was appropriated by the government - it is still in use as a caserna, or military barracks and the philosophers moved to Maria-Laach, in Rhein Preussen. Here Father Keating completed his third year of philosophy. During his stay at Maria Laach the Franco-Prussian War was going on, and we have been told some interesting stories of the community at the German house, where Frenchmen and German would fraternise, forgetting or trying to forget national animnosities, while their compatriots were killing each other almost within view of the College. In 1871 he returned to Ireland to act as Prefect of the Lower Line at St Stanislaus' College, Tullamore, and to teach the classes of rhetoric and poetry till 1877. In this year he went to study theology at Innsbrück, in the Tyrol. After two years at Innsbrück, he was sent to complete his theology course at St Beuno's College, North Wales, and here he was ordained, in 1880, on September 21st. He next returned to Clongowes and taught for a year, going to his tertianship ini 1882.

During most of his “third year:, he acted as Socius to the Master of Novices in Milltown Park, Dublin. He spent the last three months of the year of the tertianship at Hadzor House, near Worcester. In 1883 he came to Australia with Fathers Sturzo and Edward Murphy, and taught at Riverview for seven years. In 1889 he was appointed Rector of Riverview, and in 1890 Superior of the Australian Mission. In 1899 he was recalled to Ireland to act as Provincial of the Irish Province. In 1901 he returned to Australia as Rector of Xavier College, Kew, Melbourne. In 1908 he took charge of St Francis Xavier's Parish, Lavender Bay, North Sydney. In 1912 he succeeded Father Gartlan as Rector of Riverview, entering on his office early in January.

During this, his second rectorship of Riverview, he again won the respect of all. The boys thought him a little strict at first, but his sterling character soon won their admiration and affection. We who lived intimately with him then had an opportunity of noticing more closely his salient characteristics. There was a great spirit of exactness and neatness; a kindness extended to all; a strong sense of duty; a tender devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, and a great desire to beautify and adorn the chapel, and all connected directly with it. There was renovation and improvement in many quarters, but the chapel got most of it, and nothing seemed too good for God's own house. Under his orders, Brother Girschik made a fine cedar vesting press for the Sacristy, and we know that it was his intention to complete the Chapel furnishing before all else. We were hoping to have him with us for many years when God saw fit to take his to Himself, after a little more than a year of office.

On Monday, May 20th, he took the mid-day meal with the Community, and chatted after dinner in his usual cheerful way. During the afternoon he told Father Pigot that he felt unwell, and he was advised to rest himself. In the evening his illness took a serious turn, and next morning we were grieved to hear that he was very ill. He had developed a cerebral hemorrhage, and the doctors said that the only chance of recovery lay in his immediate removal to the hospital, and con stant skilled attention.

He showed the greatest resignation and sweetness throughout. He often used to say, when in health, that he would be ready to go “on the last journey at any moment”, and this was literally true of him. When Father Corcoran went to his room early on the Tuesday morning, he said, quietly, “Well, Father Minister, I will be going home before you, after all. I believe I am going there now”. Father Corcoran was on the eve of his departure for Ireland, his homeland, and the remark was characteristically supernatural.

He was taken to Lewisham Hospital that morning, and edified all by his patience, even joyfulness, at the call of God. When he was brought to his room in the hospital, he looked round quietly and smiled, and said, “Everything is so nice and neat; so it's here it is to be”. When told by the Sister that he might die, he said, “Yes, but I received the last Sacraments two days ago, and am ready”. He passed away gently and unobtrusively - his death was like his life - in complete peace and resignation, early in the morning of Thursday, the 22nd May. He really was “going home”,' and why should he be sad?

On Friday evening the remains were brought to the College, where an escort was waiting at the avenue gates to welcome all that was left of one whose death had made a void in the hearts of many in Riverview. The Rosary was recited by all, and when the Chapel was reached we said the Vespers for the Dead, and then during the evening many a boy, and many a master, would say a prayer for the soul of their dear Rector. Next morning we sang a short Requiem Mass, and then the remains were conveyed to St Mary's, Ridge Street, North Sydney. Here an immense concourse of members of the clergy and laity had assembled to take part in the Solemn Office for the Dead and Requiem. His Grace the Archbishop presided. Very Revs T O'Reilly PP, VF, and J P Moynagh PP, VF, acted as deacons at the Archbishop's throne. The chanters at the office were Revs L Chatelet SM, and T Hayden. The Mass was celebrated by Rev E Corish SJ, the deacon being' Rev J HealySJ, and the sub deacon Rev Father Ignatius CP, (an old Stonyhurst boy). Among the clergy: present: were Right Rev Monsignor O'Haran DD, PA, Right Rev Monsignor. O'Brien DD, Right Rev Monsignor Coonan PP, VG,. and Venerable Archpriest Collins PP, Very Rev P B Kennedy OFM, Revs H E Clarke OFM, R Piper OFM, F S McNamara OFM, M P Kelly, OFM, Very Rev P Treand MSH, Revs E McGrath MSH, F Laurent SM, Ginsbach SM, Very Rev Father Francis CP, Revs P Tuomey DPH, W McNally, E Brauer, P Walsh, T Barry, W Barry, T Phelan PP, J Kelly, J Roach, R O'Regan, J Rohan, R J O'Régan, R Darby, P Nulty, A O'Farrell, M Rohan, J J O'Driscoll, T Whyte, P Murphy.

Representing: the Society of Jesus there were present the Community of Riverview College, also Fathers J Colgan, J Brennan, P McCurtin, E Sydes, J Forster, R O'Dempsey, R J Murphy, T Cahill, T Fay, T Carroll. There were also representatives of the Marist. Brothers and Christian: Brothers; De la Salle Brothers, Sisters of the Little: Company of Mary, Sisters of Charity, Sisters of Mercy, Loreto Nuns and Sisters of St Joseph. Many prominent members of the Catholic laity were present, including a large number of Riverview ex-students. One seemed to recognise old Riverview boys everywhere, and all ages were represented.

Among the laity present were the President of the Ex-students Union, Mr A W M d'Apice BA, LLB, Hon Thomas Hughes MLC, Messrs T J Dalton KCSG, James Dalton KSG (Orange), T Mac Mahon, C. Brennan MA, C G Hepburn, F W T Donovan, T McCarthy, P Minahan, I B, Norris BA, LL, Lieutenant-Colonel Fallon, J Lane Mullins, B A McBride, G E Flannery, BA, LLB, P J ODonnell, G B Bryant, C Moore, Roger Hughes BA, A Deery, P Moore, Bryan Veech, A Moran and very many others. All the great public schools were represented at the church or at the funeral, the Headmasters' Association being specially represented by the Rev C J Prescott MA (Newington College), Brother Borgia (St Josephs College), and Mr Lucas (Sydney Grammar School).

After the last Gospel His Grace the Archbishop: delivered a touching panegyric based on the text from St Luke, “Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when He cometh, shall find watching”.. His Grace referred to the shock which such a sudden death must give to all, and to the temper of consolation to be found in our Holy Faith, and the doctrine of the Communion of Saints, by which we believed that we could help our suffering departed friends by our suffrages to God, that their purging pains might be shortened, and they might soon enter into the life of bliss, a life which Father Keating had “richly deserved”, we might hope with assurance, by his many good deeds. We should all be ready like him, at the call of our: Maker, to render an account of our stewardship. After His Grace the Archbishop had pronounced the last absolutions, the funeral procession proceeded to Gore Hill Cemetery. The cortège was headed by a detachment of cadets from St Joseph's College, Hunter's Hill, St Aloysius College, North Sydney, The Sydney Grammar School, and the Church of England Grammar School,
The cadets from Riverview College formed the immediate guard of honour to the hearse, and: the detachment marched with reversed. arms, while muffled side-drums rolled a plaintive accompaniment to the marching. Major J Lee Pulling, of the Church of England Grammar School, was in command of the military escort, and was assisted by Lieutenant Murphy, of St Aloysius College Corps, and Lieutenant Loughnan, of Riverview, while Staff-Sergeant Major Harvey represented the Fifth Brigade.

The cortege was a very long and representative one, many, who had attended the long church service walking in the funeral procession to the graveside, as a last tribute of respect.

At the graveside the Rev J Corcoran SJ, performed the burial service, at the termnation of which the Riverview choir chanted the “Benedictus”. The guard of honour saluted our departed Rector by presenting arms, and then rested on reversed arms, while the bugler of St Joseph's College Corps sounded the “Last Post”.

Father Keating was a man of great culture and charming personality. He was a master of the Latin and Greek languages, and conversed fluently in French, German, and Italian, As one can see from the life account we have given, he spent many years of his life in various parts of Europe, as well as America and Australia, and perhaps this contact with diverse types of men gave to him much of the urbanity which was to many his greatest charm. One remembers the interesting way he would chat about his stay in Rome during the siege of 1870, of the Vatican Council, of his life at Maria-Laach, and the almost constant habit he had of breaking off into snatches of foreign popular airs.

The charm of his personality seems to have been felt by all who knew him. Among the very numerous letters and telegrams which came to the College for several days after his death, there were many from old boys, from parents of present boys of the college, from those who had found in him a strong guide and a warm friend. But perhaps what impressed one most was the obvious effect of his personality on those who had not known him so intimately as his confrères, his pupils, or his clients. From headmasters of the schools, from mernbers of the legal and medical professions, from the clergy, from men of commerce, came a continual stream of letters, in which one and all attested their conviction of his sterling worth. Mr W A Purves MA, headmatser of the Sydney Church of England Grammar School, wrote: “I am sure everyone who knew Father Keating feels an individual loss. For myself, I never knew quite so courteous an entirely charming a gentleman. I think such personalities as his have a strong influence in maintaining friendly relations among us all, and while in a sense one cannot mnourn the second and better birthday of a good man, one cannot but miss him sorely”.

In a letter from the Rev Ashworth Aspinall MA, headmaster of the Scots College, we find these words: “It was my privilege to meet him years ago, and more recently, and I realised the charm of his cultured personality, and can thus in some degree realise the loss which the College and your Church has sustained. The State has too few men of culture not to deplore the loss of one who so muclı honoured the teaching profession”.

The letters received from old pupils were characterised by a note of warm affection, Everyone who knew Father Keating intimately loved him. At the Annual Dinner of the Old Boys' Union, held shortly after his deatlı, several told of incidents illustrating all those things that went to make up “dear Father Keating's” character - how he had reproved one for his good, and almost crushed him with sarcasm; how he had encouraged another, how he had entered into the sports of the boys to gain their hearts, how he had shown sympathy with the sorrows of the new boy whose heart ached with thoughts of the home he had left. The homesickness of one new boy seemed incurable. Father Keating, Rector of Riverview at the time, won his affection and it was lifelong and cured his homesickness by chaffing him about his untidy hair, and brushing it for him in quite fine style with his own hair brush! Perhaps the occasion may excuse the writer for telling of Sunday mornings he remembers himself, when Father Keating's room would be invaded by an army of small folk - Father Keating always loved the little ones and a judicious selection would be made from the throng. We would go off bird-nesting, and the two hours before dinner-time would pass in a flash. Everyone would enjoy the walk, Father Keating himself most of all. It was difficult to say why one liked him so much; perhaps it was the simplicity of his view which suited the young ones. He seemed, like them, to have an insight into the things which are more real because invisible and intangible, the really beautiful things which Plato imagined to be stored away in some ideal place where all is perfect and without spot.

Looking back one sees that those early days of companionship were indeed a time when the common things of nature.
“did seem
Apparelled in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream”.

Further intercourse with Father Keating at a more mature age has strengthened this feeling; the key to his charm lay in the simple child-like, single view of all, which gave a zest to life. One felt in his presence the value of living, and the joy; the supernatural became evident in his cheerful, bright view of all eventualities, actual or possible. It did one good to know him, and one felt a participation of the strength which the supernatural view of all things gives, a strength proof against all vicissitudes, against the onslaught of external or internal foes, an unutterable security which seemed to be his reward for his perfect life; and which radiated in some way from Father Keating to all those who had the privilege of knowing him.

PJD

-oOo-

Lines to Father Keating, Scholar and Priest

Was it from wells of ancient classic lore
He drew his cultured sweetness, and the store
Of high and holy thoughts that made his life
So gracious, yet so firm-amid the strife
Of warring creed and class - that if the world
Had crashed, and all its fragments wildly hurl'd
Thro' space, his soul had still stood unafraid?
Perchance 'twere so! But something he displayed,

Ne'er caught from Greece or Rome's most glorious days,
That, more than classic culture, won the praise
And love of men. For now, the Light of Old
Is but a lonely star, that sternly cold,
Keeps from the frighted herd of clouds apart,
Or stoops to let them pass with scornful heart,
And glimmers thus thro' life, and dies at death.
Not thus was he! His was the mighty Faith.
Unclouded, glad, and simple as the sun,
That saw and met life's sorrows one by one,
The weariness—the sadness—and the crime,
The “tears of things” but straight, o'erleaping Тіmе,
Reached out to Heav'n with hands of eager prayer,
And caught and flung the mantle of God's care
O'er all the world-and what before was night
And night's wild storm-lo! now was Peace and Light.

DF

◆ Our Alma Mater, St Ignatius Riverview, Sydney, Australia, Golden Jubilee 1880-1930

Riverview in the ‘Eighties - A McDonnell (OR 1866-1888)

Father Pat Keating (whose brother, Fr, Tom Keating was then at Bourke St.) was a most remarkable man in many respects. A scholar in every sense of the term, he was a man of a most striking personality. Strikingly handsome, he was an all round athlete. It would be hard to find a game requiring strength and skill, which he could not play well. He used to play as a member of our team when the teams of the most formid able cricket clubs about Sydney visited Riverview. Being an all round expert at the game, he used to surprise these strangers, as the following incident will show. A match was being played against one of Sydney's best clubs, and the visitors won the toss. Father Keating went on as one of the bowlers. I was sitting near, and just to the rear of Father O'Connell, who was sitting next to the club's scorer and Secretary. Their admiration of Father Keating's bowling was freely expressed. As the bowler at the other end was also of good quality, the visiting team was out in a short space of time, and Father Keating was one of the opening batsmen. When he proved himself as expert with the bat as he had with the ball the visitors applauded heartily; but when he drove a ball from the visitors' best bowler far into the bush beyond the boundary, the gentlemen with the scoring book jumped to his feet and shouted: “By- that - parson can play cricket”. We did not laugh-aloud..because “language” was bad form; but I noticed that Father O'Connell's back underwent some decided convulsions for some time after.

Father Keating was a man of untiring energy. His day began before five in the morning, and he was still at work at ten o'clock at night, and this year in and year out. His was the first Mass celebrated, and for several months, I, with another boy, served this Mass. Father Keating always acted as prefect of the late or “voluntary” study—from nine to ten pm, and many a knot he solved for me when construing. It was he who awakened in me the admiration for Cicero which I have ever since retained. Though a man naturally of a quick and violent temper, no one could believe such to have been the case except on his own admission. He had so far trained himself in this respect that no one ever saw him exhibit the slightest annoyance or impatience, in word or action, although his face might flush. Some of the wilder spirits used to try to annoy him, but they never succeeded. He succeeded Fr Dalton as Rector at Riverview, and after he had been called by his Order to serve in the United Kingdom he was again made Rector at Riverview, and held that office until his death, which came alas too early, and we may well say we shall never see his like again. He united in himself so many great and admirable qualities, and such high attainments in the intellectual sphere, and yet he was the most humble and approachable of men. A great priest, a great scholar, a cul tured gentleman, a sterling friend, a model of the highest type of manhood, a great member of a great Order, the death of such a man leaves this world much poorer.

◆ The Clongownian, 1913

Obituary

Father Patrick Keating SJ

A cablegram received yesterday at St Francis Xavier's, Upper Gardiner Street, an nounced the death at Riverview College, Sydney, Australia, of the Very Rev Patrick Keating SJ. Although his field of duties during the greater part of his full and laborious life lay outside Ireland, there are still very many amongst us to whom the announcement of his death will cause a pang of bitter regret. Among the older generation, to whom he was a familiar figure, whether in his schooldays at Clongowes, or in the later years as Master there, and in Tullabeg, his name will come back as a fresh and invigorating memory. Prominent in his class, first in games, first in the affection of his school-fellows, such was he during his earlier years, and his later life did not belie the promise of his vigorous youth.

He was born in the town of Tipperary, and from there his family proceeded to America while he was yet very young. Later on he returned to pass his schooldays in Clongowes. He entered the Society of Jesus immediately after his course of rhetoric, and having gone through the full course of studies of literature in France and philosophy in Rome and Ger many, he was called back to Ireland to take up the work of teaching for six years before proceeding to his final theological studies. These were made in Austria and in England. In the year 1883 he volunteered for missionary work in Australia. His name and fame are well known in the Commonwealth. He directed with signal success the destinies of the important College of Xavier in Melbourne, and, later, Riverview, Sydney. Having been for many years Superior of the whole Australian Mission, he was recalled to Ireland to undertake the government of the Irish province. Having accomplished the work with conspicuous success, to the general regret of his friends in Ireland he was recalled to the broader field of his labours, and directed by his gentle and effective sway the Xavier College, Melbourne, before he was sent to undertake again the direction of the great Riverview College, overlooking Sydney Harbour. This position he occupied for some time past, and his later letters from there, received in Dublin during the week, gave his friends no indication either of weakened health or failing powers.

Thus the cable yesterday came as a great shock to his brethren. Father Keating was a man of varied parts. In a remarkable degree his gentleness, prudence, and knowledge of men were evinced in all his dealings and intercourse with others. He seemed particularly suited to the work of conducting retreats to the communities, but his labor lay mostly in other fields. It was, however to those who knew him most intimately, who enjoyed his confidence and friendship, to those who shared with him the intimacy and amenities of community life - it was to his brethren in religion to whom the charm and worth of his character were best known. His death is a serious loss to the Australian Mission as well as to the whole Jesuit Order in Ireland.

“Freeman” May 16th, 1913.

Keating, Thomas, 1827-1887, Jesuit priest

  • IE IJA J/1502
  • Person
  • 06 July 1827-13 March 1887

Born: 06 July 1827, Tipperary Town, County Tipperary
Entered: 24 September 1849, St Acheul, Amiens, France - Franciae Province (FRA)
Ordained: 1863, Stonyhurst
Final Vows: 15 August 1866
Died: 13 March 1887, St Patrick’s College, Melbourne, Australia

Older brother of Patrick - RIP 1913

by 1854 at Brugelette College, Belgium (FRA) for Regency
by 1863 at St Beuno’s Wales (ANG) studying Theology 4
by 1865 at Tournai Belgium (BELG) making Tertianship
Early Irish Australian Mission 1882

◆ HIB Menologies SJ :
Brother of Patrick - RIP 1913
His family emigrated to the USA. Thomas did not go with them and studied at Thurles and Maynooth. His family had owned an ironmongers shop in the town.

Fellow Novices of his in France were Christopher Bellew and James Tuite.
He was sent to Laval for Theology, which he completed at Stonyhurst at a later time. A reason for the delay in Ordination was because he did not wish to receive it from a French Bishop. So, in the intervening years before he completed his Theology and was Ordained at Stonyhurst, he had been a Teacher and prefect under John Ffrench at Tullabeg.
1856-1862 He was a Teacher at Clongowes.
1863-1864 He completed his Theology and was Ordained at Stonyhurst.
1864-1865 He was sent for Tertianship to Tournai.
1865-1869 He was again sent teaching at Tullabeg and Clongowes.
1869-1873 He was sent as Operarius to Gardiner St, and preached frequently.
1873-1876 He was appointed Superior of St Patrick’s (Catholic University).
1876-1881 He was appointed Rector of Clongowes on 17 February 1876.
1881 He returned to Milltown. he had offered for the Australian Mission, and sailed there with Joseph Brennan, who was a Novice Priest at the time.
When he arrived in Australia, he was sent to St Aloysius, in Sydney as a Teacher.
1886 He was sent to St Patrick’s in Melbourne, where he died March 1887. His brother Patrick had come from Sydney to be with him when he was dying. he died aged 60, which was a real surprise in the community, as he had appeared to be a very strong man.

He was a very capable man. The Abbé of Dunleary said he was very knowledgeable of the Fathers and Scripture, and he gave many Priests retreats. he was though to have a somewhat cold manner and perhaps not very genial, but was considered kind.

Note from Joseph Brennan Entry :
1882 He and J (Thomas) Keating arrived in Australia

◆ David Strong SJ “The Australian Dictionary of Jesuit Biography 1848-2015”, 2nd Edition, Halstead Press, Ultimo NSW, Australia, 2017 - ISBN : 9781925043280
Thomas Keating, older brother of Patrick, studied at Thurles College and the Maynooth seminary before entering the Society 24 September 1849. He was professed of the four vows on 15 August 1866 during his time of teaching the humanities at Clongowes Wood College. From 1874-76, he was superior and procurator at St Patrick's House, Catholic University of Ireland. Then he was appointed rector and prefect of studies of Clongowes Wood, 1876-81, before being sent to Australia.
Upon arrival in Australia in 1882, he went to St Aloysius' College, where he worked until his early death.
He was considered by the Irish provincial to be of “great merit and learning, and full of zeal for God's Kingdom”. Bishops admired him for his retreats, but he was not recommended to be a superior, as he was previously rather stern and exacting on others. Despite this, Jesuits in Ireland held him in “great esteem”.

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