Week ending 29th March 2016
I should be shouting “Alleluia’s” this week to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ at Easter, but “Alleluia” is finding it hard to get past the lump of sorrow in many throats, The recent death of Fr. Micheál Mannion, Parish Priest of Clonbur and of The Aran Islands before that, brought great sadness, most of all to his family and friends, but also to all who knew him in the parishes I have mentioned as well as in Westport, where he served for eleven years. For his Archbishop, Dr Michael Neary and for the priests of the Archdiocese of Tuam there was great shock and sadness, because we had not only known Micheál, but his uncle, Canon Tommy before him. Tommy had served as Parish Priest in Louisburg and Claremorris in Co. Mayo as well as in Cill Chiaráin, An Cheathrú Rua and The Aran Islands. I shared fifteen years of parish life with him in the Galway Gaeltacht in the seventies, eighties and nineties of the last century. I had invited Fr Michael to preach at the Novena in Cill Chiaráin a month ago, which he did beautifully on the 11th of February, Feast of Our Ladt of Lourdes, despite having to say prayers at a wake in his own parish later that night.
The people of Clonbur and Cor na Móna had the added sadness of having lost their previous Parish Priest, Fr. Peter Connolly, who died last year. I paid tribute to Fr. Peter in the pages of this newspaper after his death, not just for his time as curate in Cor na Móna and later as Parish Priest of Clonbur, but for his work in Achill, The Aran Islands, An Tulach and An Cheathrú Rua in Conamara, as well as here in Carna, where “An tAthair Peadar” is remembered with great affection. To lose a second priest at such a young age and in such circumstances is difficult to accept Despite their shock and sadness, his family, parishioners, fellow priests and members of the Church of Ireland community gave Fr. Micheál a wonderful send-off, with beautiful music, song and prayer, while their affection for him was palpable. The strength of the community was evident in the organisation of the wake and funeral, from those directing traffic at crossroads a mile outside the village, to parking, prayers and arrangements sensitively shared with Micheál’s family and friends.
In the meantime many of the clergy have been dealing with confirmation ceremonies, Saint Patrick’s Day, Palm Sunday, preparations for and taking part in the Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter ceremonies, as well as the all too frequent March funerals, with little time to process our own personal grief for Fr. Micheál. The coming days and weeks will hopefully give us an opportunity to do that. Easter itself helps, of course in that we see and hear the sorrow and devastation of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemene and on the cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” There is so much we don’t understand, but we still live in hope. “HE IS RISEN”
The people of Clonbur and Cor na Móna had the added sadness of having lost their previous Parish Priest, Fr. Peter Connolly, who died last year. I paid tribute to Fr. Peter in the pages of this newspaper after his death, not just for his time as curate in Cor na Móna and later as Parish Priest of Clonbur, but for his work in Achill, The Aran Islands, An Tulach and An Cheathrú Rua in Conamara, as well as here in Carna, where “An tAthair Peadar” is remembered with great affection. To lose a second priest at such a young age and in such circumstances is difficult to accept Despite their shock and sadness, his family, parishioners, fellow priests and members of the Church of Ireland community gave Fr. Micheál a wonderful send-off, with beautiful music, song and prayer, while their affection for him was palpable. The strength of the community was evident in the organisation of the wake and funeral, from those directing traffic at crossroads a mile outside the village, to parking, prayers and arrangements sensitively shared with Micheál’s family and friends.
In the meantime many of the clergy have been dealing with confirmation ceremonies, Saint Patrick’s Day, Palm Sunday, preparations for and taking part in the Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter ceremonies, as well as the all too frequent March funerals, with little time to process our own personal grief for Fr. Micheál. The coming days and weeks will hopefully give us an opportunity to do that. Easter itself helps, of course in that we see and hear the sorrow and devastation of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemene and on the cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” There is so much we don’t understand, but we still live in hope. “HE IS RISEN”
Week ending 22nd March 2016
Easter Sunday will miss April Fool’s Day by four days, but there is a sense in which we celebrate the foolishness of God in a good sense in this feast, the seeming foolishness of a God who gives his all for us, but doesn’t just leave it at that. He overcomes death while he is at it. The words: “He is risen.” have raised many hearts in the past two thousand years. Throw in a few of the “Alleluias” we have missed since the beginning of Lent and the joys of Easter will be celebrated with gusto. We toss around the word “unbelievable” nowadays to describe anything vaguely surprising. The idea of someone rising from the dead is very close to really being unbelievable, yet billions of people will next weekend celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ in many parts of the world. Even people with little attachment to formal religion tend to be touched in some way by the magic of Easter.
Magic may not be the right word but it is not the wrong word either. A story which has a young man crucified on a Friday, flitting around like a butterfly just escaped from its cocoon on the following Sunday has a quality of the Houdinis about it, only better. It is some jump from the ridiculed to the sublime in a matter of days. Not easy to believe but not too difficult either when we take into account the person involved. For followers of Jesus it has a logic of its own. How could you keep a good man down? It was not just the rock at the mouth of the tomb that was blown away. We all were.
Belief in the resurrection of Jesus is a matter of faith, but it is not without evidence that could stand up in court or in some kind of tribunal of inquiry. There is the matter of the empty tomb. “Who moved the stone?” was the title of a book on this subject that I read many years ago. A good barrister would suggest that anyone might have removed it as well as the body of Jesus. As for the angels reported to have been seen inside the open tomb, he or she (the Attorney) would probably decide to “rest my case” and leave it to the jury to decide on that one.
The nearest we have to proof of the resurrection of Jesus is the change that came over his followers between Good Friday and Pentecost Sunday. Something happened that changed the craven cowards of Calvary to the confident preachers of Pentecost, willing not to just live but also to die for their faith, something most of them did. This was in some ways the real resurrection, the one that changed cowards into champions of a faith, a faith forged in brokeness and betrayal, fear and trembling. What can you say about this Jesus? Un-put-down-able. Happy Easter.
Magic may not be the right word but it is not the wrong word either. A story which has a young man crucified on a Friday, flitting around like a butterfly just escaped from its cocoon on the following Sunday has a quality of the Houdinis about it, only better. It is some jump from the ridiculed to the sublime in a matter of days. Not easy to believe but not too difficult either when we take into account the person involved. For followers of Jesus it has a logic of its own. How could you keep a good man down? It was not just the rock at the mouth of the tomb that was blown away. We all were.
Belief in the resurrection of Jesus is a matter of faith, but it is not without evidence that could stand up in court or in some kind of tribunal of inquiry. There is the matter of the empty tomb. “Who moved the stone?” was the title of a book on this subject that I read many years ago. A good barrister would suggest that anyone might have removed it as well as the body of Jesus. As for the angels reported to have been seen inside the open tomb, he or she (the Attorney) would probably decide to “rest my case” and leave it to the jury to decide on that one.
The nearest we have to proof of the resurrection of Jesus is the change that came over his followers between Good Friday and Pentecost Sunday. Something happened that changed the craven cowards of Calvary to the confident preachers of Pentecost, willing not to just live but also to die for their faith, something most of them did. This was in some ways the real resurrection, the one that changed cowards into champions of a faith, a faith forged in brokeness and betrayal, fear and trembling. What can you say about this Jesus? Un-put-down-able. Happy Easter.
Week ending 15th March 2016
Some of the busiest weeks of the year for clergy are coming up as I write this. We will have confirmation in Cill Chiaráin for all of the parish of Carna on the fifteenth of March, quickly followed by Saint Patrick’s Day, Palm Sunday and Holy Week, with all that entails, as we follow and re-enact the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. After almost forty-five years as a priest this should all be a doddle to me, but the nerves begin to jangle for most people when their boss is coming to visit. Most of the nerves come, I think, from folk memories of bishops who liked to let their underlings know who is boss. I heard talk of one priest who always took to his bed when confirmation time came around. He would feel a little braver the following Sunday when his purgatory was over, and he would announce to his congregation; “I hear ye had the buck the last day,” with an account of all he had heard “the buck” was complaining about.
There is a story told in this part of the country about Archbishop John Healy, a Sligo-man, who had an interpreter to translate the questions for him in Gaeltacht areas. It was quite common at the time that young people who had missed much of their schooling because of hard work on the land would come late for confirmation. One such young man was brought up before Archbishop Healy, who didn’t want to be too hard on him. “Ask him who is the Pope,” the bishop said to his interpreter, Father Geoffrey Prendergast. The young man had a good look at the Archbishop in his purple robes before pointing to him and answering: “Níl a fhios agam munab é an boc mór sin thall,” (I don’t know, unless it’s that big buck over there.) “Is he right?” the bishop asked Fr. Geoffrey. “He is,” came the reply.
Today’s Archbishops and bishops need to have a lot of grit and courage in dealing with a changing church. During the aftermath of the recent General Election I was surprised that I heard no political commentator comment on the intervention by bishops in the last week of the campaign on behalf of the unborn. Could that be really what brought the combined Fine Gael/Labour share of the previous Sunday’s polls to eight percent less on polling day? Could children yet unborn, who won’t have a vote until about 2035 have administered the coup de gras to a Government? I feel no sense of glee in asking such questions as I was one of the few priests in Ireland to publicly support the Government on the Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill as well as in the gender equality referendum. Both coalition parties would have been naive must not to be aware the mitres were waiting for them in the long grass. As Gerry Adams might have put it: “The croziers have not gone away, you know.”
There is a story told in this part of the country about Archbishop John Healy, a Sligo-man, who had an interpreter to translate the questions for him in Gaeltacht areas. It was quite common at the time that young people who had missed much of their schooling because of hard work on the land would come late for confirmation. One such young man was brought up before Archbishop Healy, who didn’t want to be too hard on him. “Ask him who is the Pope,” the bishop said to his interpreter, Father Geoffrey Prendergast. The young man had a good look at the Archbishop in his purple robes before pointing to him and answering: “Níl a fhios agam munab é an boc mór sin thall,” (I don’t know, unless it’s that big buck over there.) “Is he right?” the bishop asked Fr. Geoffrey. “He is,” came the reply.
Today’s Archbishops and bishops need to have a lot of grit and courage in dealing with a changing church. During the aftermath of the recent General Election I was surprised that I heard no political commentator comment on the intervention by bishops in the last week of the campaign on behalf of the unborn. Could that be really what brought the combined Fine Gael/Labour share of the previous Sunday’s polls to eight percent less on polling day? Could children yet unborn, who won’t have a vote until about 2035 have administered the coup de gras to a Government? I feel no sense of glee in asking such questions as I was one of the few priests in Ireland to publicly support the Government on the Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill as well as in the gender equality referendum. Both coalition parties would have been naive must not to be aware the mitres were waiting for them in the long grass. As Gerry Adams might have put it: “The croziers have not gone away, you know.”
Week ending 8th March 2016
As the years roll on I find myself identifying more and more with the Victor character in the TV series: “One Foot In The Grave.” When it comes to bureaucracy I find that anything that can go wrong seems to go wrong. Broadband and I for instance do not have a happy relationship. It seems to be involved in a constant game of hide and seek with me. The delivery of an article each week to “The Connaught,” or of a newsletter to be printed often involves watching for the times there is not a red light on my modem, or trying to get an e-mail away between the winks of green light on the same instrument. I sometimes pin the question: “Wh’EIR?” to the door of the former Eircom facility in Carna, while my latest pun at times of major frustration is: “Nightm’EIR’ “ In fairness to that company they actually have a real person rather than an inanimate voice to answer questions and give directions when a breakdown of one, two or three days occurs.
My worst nightmare in recent times has involved trying to have my driving licence renewed. A medical report is required when a person reaches the age of seventy, so I duly visited a Garda station in a nearby town to collect the necessary form which I brought to a doctor. He examined me, filled and stamped the form which I brought to a National Driving Licence Centre. There, I had my forms examined, my photo taken and the matter seemingly processed and completed. I was informed that my new licence would be issued in a certain number of days. A week letter a letter came telling me of a discrepancy in my application but not saying what this was. This led to a series of phone-calls, being passed from Billy to Jack and an eventual explanation that the form I had been given in the Garda Station was obsolete, and that a new one was required, again completed and stamped by a doctor. This I duly did.
Another week, another phonecall while I was at Mass. A message to ring back – there was another discrepancy in my application, but they were not telling me what. Back to a Medical centre. Do it all again. Send it off and hope for the best. If there is another discrepancy I am tempted to forget about a driving licence, face the consequences and use any appearance in court to highlight the post to pillar ageist bureaucratic insensitivity involved. I passed my driving test in 1964, have had fifty-two years of trouble-free driving, renewed my licence on many occasions without any trouble through real people in office settings. I have no trouble with medical or eye tests and understand why they are necessary at my age. But is centralised, automated, heartless bureaucracy necessary?
Next month it will be thirty years since I went to jail for a road traffic related offence. I was part of the Conamara based Cumhacht campaign for better roads which involved the non-payment of car-tax. I would have no problem with going to jail again for not having a driving licence because of the bureaucratic bungling I have been through in recent weeks. My biggest problem would be with possibly not being insured if I do not have a licence, so I need legal advice on that. If I live to be seventy-five I intend to spend any retirement time I get fighting creeping bureaucracy, automatism and the systematic ageism involved.
My worst nightmare in recent times has involved trying to have my driving licence renewed. A medical report is required when a person reaches the age of seventy, so I duly visited a Garda station in a nearby town to collect the necessary form which I brought to a doctor. He examined me, filled and stamped the form which I brought to a National Driving Licence Centre. There, I had my forms examined, my photo taken and the matter seemingly processed and completed. I was informed that my new licence would be issued in a certain number of days. A week letter a letter came telling me of a discrepancy in my application but not saying what this was. This led to a series of phone-calls, being passed from Billy to Jack and an eventual explanation that the form I had been given in the Garda Station was obsolete, and that a new one was required, again completed and stamped by a doctor. This I duly did.
Another week, another phonecall while I was at Mass. A message to ring back – there was another discrepancy in my application, but they were not telling me what. Back to a Medical centre. Do it all again. Send it off and hope for the best. If there is another discrepancy I am tempted to forget about a driving licence, face the consequences and use any appearance in court to highlight the post to pillar ageist bureaucratic insensitivity involved. I passed my driving test in 1964, have had fifty-two years of trouble-free driving, renewed my licence on many occasions without any trouble through real people in office settings. I have no trouble with medical or eye tests and understand why they are necessary at my age. But is centralised, automated, heartless bureaucracy necessary?
Next month it will be thirty years since I went to jail for a road traffic related offence. I was part of the Conamara based Cumhacht campaign for better roads which involved the non-payment of car-tax. I would have no problem with going to jail again for not having a driving licence because of the bureaucratic bungling I have been through in recent weeks. My biggest problem would be with possibly not being insured if I do not have a licence, so I need legal advice on that. If I live to be seventy-five I intend to spend any retirement time I get fighting creeping bureaucracy, automatism and the systematic ageism involved.
Week ending 1st March 2016
My old Maynooth classmates are getting thin on the ground, which is not surprising as most of us are turning seventy this year. The most recent death was that of Fr. PJ Byrne, Parish Priest of Kilcock which is only four miles from the seminary in which we spent seven years together. A Carlow-man, he had that athletic bulk people would associate with his fellow county-man, the Tullow Tank, Irish international rugby player, Sean O’Brien. PJ’s ministry included working with Irish emigrants in London, and being the Irish Bishop’s representative for emigrants for many years. I am sure that he touched the lives of many readers of this newspaper in one or other of those roles. He worked too as curate in the large midland towns of Portlaoise and Portarlington, before becoming a much loved pastor by the banks of the canal in Kilcock. May he rest in peace.
Attending a funeral brings a certain finality, but faraway funerals are virtually an impossibility for many clergy in this day and age, as those of us on the periphery of a diocese have little or no cover when going away. PJ’s funeral was in the middle of major novena in Cill Chiaráin church in the other side of Carna parish, so there was no way in which I could be to and from Kilcock before the evening ceremonies. The motorway would have helped, but half of the journey for me is west of the Corrib, the hundred mile return journey on mostly bad and winding roads, not to speak of Galway City traffic. Other classmates, Sean Melody in Waterford and Pat Cotter in Clare had died too in the past six months or so, and in each case I was able to do little except remember them at my own altars.. Forty years or more ago when we were young and mobile, we would travel anywhere for the funerals of those who had shared seven Maynooth years with us, and had died in their twenties or thirties/ Those were the days when there were two, three or even more priests in every parish, so there was usually someone else to do your duty when necessary.
I have been known to joke with mild sarcasm from time to time that we priests offer a great bargain to our parishioners, “one priest for the price of three” that they had in the old days. It is not funny however when old men are overburdened with duties shared by a few others in days gone by. I have little doubt but that this contributes to some of the early deaths. Few priests complain but there is sometimes a feeling of being hung out to dry, despite the wonderful efforts of parish pastoral councils and other helpers. Pope Francis is an inspiration in that he works so hard at an even greater age, but he could help our aging clergy much more by giving consideration to women priests, or allowing priests marry.
There is a lot of bonding in seven years spent together in a seminary, and it tends to lead to people who have very different backgrounds and interests forming lifelong friendships. It is not that you would be likely to meet someone every year or for a number of years at a time, but when you did, you took up from where you left off. The passing years tend to ground people a bit more, and travelling long distances becomes a chore, which leads to regrets when you realise you won’t be meeting, PJ, Pat or Sean, and those others who are gone, in this life at least, any more
Attending a funeral brings a certain finality, but faraway funerals are virtually an impossibility for many clergy in this day and age, as those of us on the periphery of a diocese have little or no cover when going away. PJ’s funeral was in the middle of major novena in Cill Chiaráin church in the other side of Carna parish, so there was no way in which I could be to and from Kilcock before the evening ceremonies. The motorway would have helped, but half of the journey for me is west of the Corrib, the hundred mile return journey on mostly bad and winding roads, not to speak of Galway City traffic. Other classmates, Sean Melody in Waterford and Pat Cotter in Clare had died too in the past six months or so, and in each case I was able to do little except remember them at my own altars.. Forty years or more ago when we were young and mobile, we would travel anywhere for the funerals of those who had shared seven Maynooth years with us, and had died in their twenties or thirties/ Those were the days when there were two, three or even more priests in every parish, so there was usually someone else to do your duty when necessary.
I have been known to joke with mild sarcasm from time to time that we priests offer a great bargain to our parishioners, “one priest for the price of three” that they had in the old days. It is not funny however when old men are overburdened with duties shared by a few others in days gone by. I have little doubt but that this contributes to some of the early deaths. Few priests complain but there is sometimes a feeling of being hung out to dry, despite the wonderful efforts of parish pastoral councils and other helpers. Pope Francis is an inspiration in that he works so hard at an even greater age, but he could help our aging clergy much more by giving consideration to women priests, or allowing priests marry.
There is a lot of bonding in seven years spent together in a seminary, and it tends to lead to people who have very different backgrounds and interests forming lifelong friendships. It is not that you would be likely to meet someone every year or for a number of years at a time, but when you did, you took up from where you left off. The passing years tend to ground people a bit more, and travelling long distances becomes a chore, which leads to regrets when you realise you won’t be meeting, PJ, Pat or Sean, and those others who are gone, in this life at least, any more