'This is my Son, my Chosen One; listen to him!' Sunday Reflections, 2nd Sunday of Lent

 

Transfiguration of Christ

Paolo Veronese [Web Gallery of Art]

And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah (Luke 9:30; Gospel).

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan,)

Readings (English Standard Version, Catholic Edition: England & Wales, India, Scotland) 

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel Luke 9:28-36 (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

At that time: Jesus took with him Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray. And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered, and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. Now Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep, but when they became fully awake they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him. And as the men were parting from him, Peter said to Jesus, ‘Master, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah’ — not knowing what he said. As he was saying these things, a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud, saying, ‘This is my Son, my Chosen One; listen to him!’ And when the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and told no one in those days anything of what they had seen.

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

         

Fr Edward Allen

1906 - 2001

The line in today's Gospel, as [Jesus] was praying, the appearance of his face was altered reminded me of an incident late in 1988 or early in 1989 in the Philippines involving two Columban priests in their late 80s, Fr Edward Allen and Fr Aedan McGrath. They were both born in Dublin in 1906, Father Aedan early in the year and Father Eddie, as he was known to us, later in the year. Father Aedan was ordained in December 1929 and Father Eddie twelve months later. Each had two brother who were priests. Father Aedan's were both Columbans. One of Father Eddie's was a priest of the Archdiocese of Dublin, the other a Vincentian. Another, a Discalced Carmelite, died not long before he was to be ordained priest. Both these two great friends were small in stature and both, in different ways, were what we Irish call 'mighty men'. 

Father Aedan had spent most of the early years of his priesthood in China where the Cofounder of the Columbans, Bishop Edward Galvin, asked him to get involved with the Legion of Mary which had been introduced there by another Columban from Dublin, Fr Joseph Hogan, ordained in 1925. Archbishop (Later Cardinal) Antonio Riberi, then the Apostolic Nuncio to China, asked Father Aedan in the late 194os to spread the Legion of Mary throughout the country. The Chinese Communist government put him in prison in 1951 and he spent nearly three years there, mostly in solitary confinement in a tiny cell. I remember his homecoming to Ireland in 1953 when the President, the Prime Minister and thousands of people were at Dublin Airport to greet him. He once told me that when he saw the crowds from the plane he said to himself, There must be somebody important on board. He had no idea that he was the somebody important. He became a household name in Ireland and was one of God's signposts pointing me towards being a Columban priest..

Father Aedan spent the rest of his life working for the Legion of Mary, in his latter years based in Manila but travelling to most of the countries in the Pacific Rim and the Pacific island nations. He died suddenly on Christmas Day 2000 at a family gathering. I've written about his funeral in A Heavenly Farewell. (Video form of the article here).

Fr Aedan McGrath with Pope St John Paul

I am all yours, my Queen, my Mother, and all that I have is yours.

Totus Tuus

The late Fr Niall O'Brien, who was imprisoned in the Philippines in the 1980s on a trumped-up charge of murder, wrote an article about Father Eddie after the latter's death in 2001: He Taught Us How to Love.

Father Niall wrote: There is a little mystery about Father Eddie. He never learned to drive or at least he never drove here in the Philippines; he never built any churches or organized schools; he lived a quiet life in the convento (presbytery / rectory), going out when called. But he was never into initiating any evangelizing projects or social projects. Yet, he was the most popular and sought-after Columban priest in Negros. I don’t think the word 'popular' is the right word. He was not interested in popularity; maybe I should say 'loved', the most loved Columban priest.

Father Niall gives an example of this: As an old priest in Himamaylan he was blessing a vehicle for someone; after the blessing he said to the woman who had requested it, 'And how are you yourself?' She responded by sitting down with him and pouring out her problems for a long time. And she became one of his special friends, just like that.

We read in Genesis 1:27: So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. This to me means, among other things, that it is possible to see something of God in another person, just as Peter, James and John caught a glimpse of the reality that Jesus was God when as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered. 

Late in 1998 Father Eddie had a major stroke in the Columban house in Batang, Himamaylan City, where both of us were living at the time. This affected his speech and he also had to be fed through a tube. This was a great deprivation for him. Though small and wiry, he had the appetite of a teenager. However, his mind was still as clear as a bell.

He didn't know that Father Aedan was coming down from Manila to see him. I met Father Aedan at Bacolod Airport, about 90 minutes away by car. We arrived at nightfall and went straight to Father Eddie's room. When he saw his friend of more than 75 years his face lit up like the rising sun - and I caught a glimpse of the joy that only God can give. My experience was similar to that of Peter, James and John on Mount Tabor.

I had a similar experience some months later when the nurse on duty in our house called me around midnight and told me that Father Eddie was very ill. I went to his room immediately to give him the Last Rites, something I had done before. He said in a very clear voice, I'm dying. We recited the prayers for the dying, sang some hymns and said our farewells. Then we realised that he wasn't ready to go just yet and I went back to bed, though I expected he would go within a few days.

The following day and for a few days after there was a tangible joy around the house, again a joy that could only come from God. The nurses on duty were even joking with Father Eddie , You were only practising last night, Father! They had a profound love and respect for him and he was giving them strength in their faith through his physical weakness. He lived on until 3 March 2001 when he died peacefully in the Columban house. I was based in Britain by then.

The Transfiguration was a moment when Peter, James and John got a glimpse of true reality, a glimpse of who Jesus really was, a glimpse of heaven to which we are all called. It was a moment that strengthened them when Jesus was crucified, that strengthened Peter and James to be martyred for Christ and John to spend the rest of his long life bringing people to Jesus Christ. It was a moment when they saw Truth in all its beauty - in all His beauty. It was a moment of truth when they knew that the love of God is stronger than any evil force.

In those two experiences with Fr Eddie Allen I experienced the truth of the words of Jesus to the Apostles at the Last Supper: These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full (John 15:11). Today's Gospel tells us: A voice came out of the cloud, saying, ‘This is my Son, my Chosen One; listen to him!’ The Father's Chosen One reveals himself unexpectedly to us in so many ways. 

Blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear (Matthew 13:16).

Bishop Patricio Buzon SDB of Kabankalan blessing statue of St Columban in Batang in 2009

Traditional Latin Mass

Second Sunday in Lent

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 03-16-2025 if necessary).

Epistle: 1 Thessalonians 4:1-7.  Gospel: Matthew 17:1-9. 

Transfiguration

Blessed Fra Angelico [Web Gallery of Art]

This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him (Matthew 17:5; Gospel).

'She had faith that did not shake.' Sunday Reflections, Ascension, Year B

The Venerable Edel Quinn

14 September 1907 - 12 May 1944 [photo]

Solemnity of the Ascension

The Ascension is celebrated on Ascension Thursday, 9 May, in England & Wales, Scotland. In the USA it is celebrated on Ascension Thursday in the Ecclesiastical Provinces of Boston, Hartford, New York, Omaha, Philadelphia. In all of these places Ascension Thursday is a Holyday of Obligation.

The Ascension is observed on Sunday, 12 May, in Aotearoa-New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Ireland, Philippines, USA (apart from the jurisdictions mentioned above).

Ascension, Year B 

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel  Mark 16:15-20  (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

Jesus said to his disciples:

“Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs.

Seventh Sunday of Easter, Year B

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel  John 17:11b-19  (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

Jesus raised his eyes to heaven and said:

Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Servant of God Frank Duff

7 June 1889 - 7 November 1980 [photo]

In her biography of her godfather Frank Duff, founder of the Legion of Mary, Finola Kennedy has a chapter with the heading Edel, Fr Aedan, Alfie. Under the title is a quotation from today's First Reading: You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). Edel, Fr Aedan and Alfie were the Venerable Edel Quinn, Columban Fr Aedan McGrath and Servant of God Alfie Lambe.

This Sunday, 12 May, is the 80th anniversary of the death of Edel Quinn in Nairobi, Kenya.

Both Edel and Alfie Lambe felt called to religious life. Because of her tubercolosis (TB) Edel could not enter the Poor Clares. Alfie spent some time in the novitiate of the Irish Christian Brothers, known officially as the Congregation of Christian Brothers whose ministry is teaching, but had to leave for health reasons. Both became witnesses . . . to the ends of the earth, Edel in East and Central Africa and Alfie in South America. Both died young, Edel at the age of 36 and Alfie at the age of 26. Alfie is buried in the vault of the Irish Christian Brothers in Recoleta Cemetery, Buenos Aires, a touch of what I call 'the thoughtfulness of God', something I first became aware of after my mother's sudden death in 1970.

Edel left for Africa in December 1936. Some in the leadership of the Legion of Mary thought it was a bad idea to send a young woman in poor health on such a difficult mission. After seven years of intense work involving long journeys on poor roads, an intense spiritual life focused above all on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and our Blessed Mother's central role in God's plan of salvation for all of us, Edel's TB caught up on her and she died on 12 May 1944 where she is buried in the Missionaries' Cemetery.

The cause for her beatification began in 1957 and in 1994 Pope St John Paul II declared her Venerable. The cause for her beatification continues.

Frank Duff said of Edel Quinn: She had a faith that did not shake. Without that foundation you would not have that special characteristic of devotion to Our Lady, whose faith is singled out for praise in the Gospel . . . Things like fear would naturally assert themselves in her. Why did they not carry her away as they do with most people? I suggest that in her case the ground was so drenched with the Holy Ghost that the sparks of temptation did not start a conflagration.

Servant of God Alfie Lambe

24 June 1932 - 21 January 1958 [photo]

Alfie went to South America in July 1953 and served in Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina. Because of his family name and short stature he acquired the nickname El Corderito, 'The Little Lamb'. The Archdiocese of Buenos Aires introduced the cause of his beatification in 1978.

Fr Aedan McGrath with Pope St John Paul II

Fr Aedan McGrath was born in Dublin on 22 January 1906 and died suddenly at a family gathering on Christmas Day 2000. He spent two years and eight months in solitary confinement in China for his work with the Legion of Mary. I remember his return to Ireland in 1954 after being expelled from China. He was met at Dublin Airport by the President, the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition and thousands of others. He told me that when he saw the large crowd when the plane landed he said to himself 'There must be somebody important on board'.

Father Aedan spent the rest of his life promoting the Legion of Mary. Based in Manila from 1979 he visited many countries in the Pacific Rim. His story was one of the reasons I became a Columban missionary priest and I was graced to have come to know him very well as a friend during my years in the Philippines and as an inspiring brother Columban priest.

These three missionaries took to heart the words of Jesus in the gospel for the Ascension: Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. The 80th anniversary of the death of Edel Quinn reminds us of this and of what we are all called to be, proclaimers of the gospel by the way we follow Jesus in our daily lives.

You can find quite a bit of material on these three great missionaries by googling their names.

Fr Aedan tells the story of the bird that befriended him in prison

I saw two extraordinary things at Father Aedan's funeral in our cemetery here. During the prayers of commendation before the coffin was lowered a robin redbreast was hovering all the time over it. Then as it was being lowered into the ground a flight of birds in V formation approached from the southwest. Just before they passed over our cemetery one of the birds flew into the middle turning the 'V' into 'A'. You can learn more about this in A Heavenly Farewell, a video I made while still in the Philippines.

Traditional Latin Mass

Ascension Thursday

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 05-09-2024 if necessary).

Lesson: Acts 1:1-11. Gospel: Mark 16:14-20.

Ascension

Lorenzo Ghiberti [Web Gallery of Art]

Sunday after the Ascension

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 05-12-2024 if necessary).

Epistle: 1 Peter 4:7-11. Gospel: John 15:26 - 16:4.

 

Our Lady of China, Covid-19, the Legion of Mary in China

Our Lady of China

With the inscription: Mother of God, pray for us

Someone sent me this photo back in April, in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic and expressing a desire that we should pray for the people of China, where the virus began in Wuhan.

That city is a conglomeration of three cities: Wuchang, Hankow and Hanyang.

When the first group of Columban priests, including our Co-founder Fr Edward Galvin, travelled to China in 1920 some went to Hanyang. In 1927 Fr Galvin was ordained as the first bishop of what was then the Vicariate Apostolic of Hanyang. It became a diocese in 1946.

Bishop Edward Galvin and Fr John Blowick

Co-founders of the Columbans (mid-1950s)

Bishop Galvin lived through wars and natural calamities, serving the people of his diocese with one desire: to do God's will. He was expelled from the People's Republic of China in 1952. In a report he wrote that year he stated the reasons the authorities gave for this.

You have opposed and obstructed the establishment of an Independent Church in China. You have brought into being a reactionary organisation called the Legion of Mary. You have engaged in anti-patriotic propaganda against the government. You have destroyed the property of the people.

Archbishop Antonio Riberi, appointed Apostolic Internuncio to China in 1946, asked the Columbans the following year if Fr Aedan McGrath could be his delegate to travel through China establishing the Legion of Mary. Father Aedan had been involved with the Legion for quite some time by then with the encouragement of Bishop Galvin.

In his book The Splendid Cause, a history of the Missionary Society of St Columban, my fellow Columban priest Fr Neil Collins writes about the experience of a young Irish Columban priest, Fr Oliver Whyte, newly-arrived in China in 1947 in a place called Nanzin where he began the first praesidium of the Legion of Mary in the district. Three other praesidia followed, in Huchow city, Songlin and Sinkadhay. Members of a legion praesidium undertake apostolic work, especially visitation of hospitals, prisons, hostels for down-and-outs, and private homes. Whyte asked the Nanzin legionaries to visit lax Christians, and to instruct house-bound catechumens. All the members of his praesidium were illiterate, except one lady who had to act as both president and secretary. Perhaps the greatest  fruit of the Legion was the effects on the members themselves. Through involvement in the apostolate of the church, study of the Legion handbook, the discipline of a weekly meeting, and prayer, they become so committed that most could resist all communist pressure and indoctrination.

[The basic unit of the Legion of Mary is known by the Latin word 'praesidium', the plural of which is 'praesidia'.]

In The Splendid Cause, Fr Neil Collins tells us, A Campaign of newspaper attacks began in June 1951, with bitter articles on the 'imperialists' in the church. Chief of these was the papal internuncio, Riberi, but the Legion of Mary was also mentioned. Riberi was expelled on 4 September 1951. Two days later Aedan McGrath whom Riberi had appointed in 1948 to organise the Legion throughout China, was arrested. The Chinese government officially suppressed the Legion on 7 October 1951.

I doubt that the authorities in the People's Republic of China were aware that 7 October was the Feast of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary.

Madonna del Rosario

Caravaggio [Web Gallery of Art]

The Splendid Cause then quotes Columban Fr John C. Casey: The next day the secret police, dressed in black uniforms or in mufti arrived . . . From now on the destruction of the Legion of Mary was the immediate target . . . Beating them, roping them halfway to jail were common methods used in the attempt to break them down . . . This went on for over six months . . . Yet not one of them broke down . . . and in the end the Communists had to admit that they were beaten.

Fr Casey along with three other Columbans, Frs Owen O'Kane, Patrick Reilly and Patrick Ronan, were arrested in June 1952 and imprisoned for 17 months. and expelled 'eternally' from China on 28 November 1953. They became known to the Columbans as 'The Four Felons'. You can read about them here. Several members of the Legion of Mary were arrested along with the four priests but there are no records of what became of them.

L to R: Frs Patrick Reilly, Owen O'Kane, John C. Casey, Patrick Ronan

'The Four Felons' after their expulsion from China.

Fr Aedan McGrath was released on 2 May 1954 after nearly three years in solitary confinement and spent the rest of his long life working with the Legion of Mary, especially in the Pacific region. I came to know him very well in the Philippines. He died suddenly at a family gathering on Christmas Day 2000 at the age of 94. I witnessed something quite extraordinary at his funeral, which I wrote about in A Heavenly Farewell. There's a video version of the article that includes the brief video of Father Aedan himself below.

Fr Aedan McGrath talks about his only friend in prison in China

Fr Aedan NcGrath with St John Paul II

Fr Neil Collins ends his section in The Splendid Cause on the work of Columbans in China with this paragraph.

The small group of Columbans in Huchow, 1946-53, trained no students for the priesthood, and their ministry in the district might seem to have been fruitless. But the most striking achievement was the formation, in a very short time - Casey's praesidium existed for only two years - of several remarkable praesidia of the Legion of Mary. The communists searched for members of the Legion who would make accusations against McGrath or the other priests and found none. When Oliver Whyte returned to Nanzin fifty years later he found a healthy church, and one faithful parishioner was the lady who had been the president of the praesidium.

Legion of Mary Tessera

Leaflet with the Prayers of the Legion of Mary

I know very little about the particular image of Our Lady of China that was sent me. Googling will show many other images of Our Lady of China but not this one.

The whole world has been affected this year by Covid-19 that originated in Wuhan in an area with which the Columbans and the Legion of Mary have close connections. But the Church in China has grown in recent decades despite many hardships. I have met young priests and religious from China who joyfully live their faith and that gives me great hope.

May Our Lady of China obtain God's choicest blessings on the people of China, on the Legion of Mary and on Columban missionaries.

'You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.' Sunday Reflections, 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time Year C

Columban Fr Aedan McGrath speaking about his time in solitary confinement in China, 1950-53

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)                                  

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, India [optional], Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa)

Gospel Luke 14:1, 7-14 (Revised Standard Version – Catholic Edition)

One sabbath when Jesus went to dine at the house of a ruler who belonged to the Pharisees, they were watching him. 

Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he marked how they chose the places of honor, saying to them, "When you are invited by any one to a marriage feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest a more eminent man than you be invited by him; and he who invited you both will come and say to you, 'Give place to this man,' and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, 'Friend, go up higher'; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For every one who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." He said also to the man who had invited him, "When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just." 

Altar used at all Legion of Mary meetings

I remember the homecoming of Fr Aedan McGrath from China to Ireland in 1953 when I was ten. It was front-page news and there was a photograph on the now defunct Irish Press of the President and Prime Minister of Ireland greeting him along with thousands of others at Dublin Airport, much smaller than it is now.

Father Aedan had been imprisoned by the authorities of the People's Republic of China who had come into power in 1949 for his work with the Legion of Mary. He spent nearly three years in solitary confinement.

I had no idea in 1953 that one day I would be a Columban missionary priest like him and that he would become a good friend. I was also to discover that we both spent our early years in Holy Family Parish, Aughrim St, Dublin.

Dublin Airport Terminal as it was in 1953

Father Aedan told me in the Philippines that when his plane landed in Dublin and he saw the thousands of people on the observation deck he said to himself, 'There must be someone important on board'. It never crossed his mind that he was the VIP. Friend, go up higher.

One of the parishioners in St Brigid's, Blanchardstown, in the Archdiocese of Dublin, to which I've  been going home since 1981, is Lawrence Wren, now 89. From 1983 to 1987 he was Commissioner of An Garda Síochána, ie, Chief of Police in the Republic of Ireland. Before, during and after that period he was an active member of the Society of St Vincent de Paul in the parish. The society helps families and individuals in difficult financial circumstances. Once a month members stand outside the church after all Sunday Masses holding collection boxes. Until a few years ago Lawrence Wren was always among them, even when he was head of the Irish police. A stranger would have no idea who he was. When you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you.

The greater you are, the more you must humble yourself; so you will find favor in the sight of the Lord, the Book of Sirach tells us in the First Reading. 

Seamus Heaney (13 April 1939 - 30 August 2013)

When I had reached this point in preparing these Sunday Reflections I learned of the death of Seamus Heaney, the poet from Derry, Northern Ireland, who received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995. Here he is reading his own poem, St Kevin and the Blackbird, which ties in with today's readings and with the story of Fr Aedan McGrath and the bird that used to visit him in prison in China. There was, for me, an extraordinary connection between Father Aedan's experience with the bird and his burial in St Columban's, Dalgan Park, Ireland, a few days after he died suddenly at the age of 94 at a family gathering in Dublin on Christmas Day 2000. You can view A Heavenly Farewell here or read it here.

In Seamus Heaney's poem the prayer of St Kevin, To labour and not to seek reward, reflects today's gospel: But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just. 

In his introduction the poet speaks of Doing the right thing for the reward of doing the right thing. Father Aedan was prepared to go to prison for doing the right thing, even if it meant death, as it did for Fr Beda Chang SJ, a Chinese priest who was jailed with him. For Garda Commissioner Wren Doing the right thing for the reward of doing the right thing meant carrying out his professional duties to the best of his ability at a particularly difficult time in Ireland and serving the poor as a member of the St Vincent de Paul Society almost anonymously.

Thank God for the many Aedan McGraths, Beda Changs and Lawrence Wrens among us and for the Seamus Heaneys who can put words on the lives of so many who quietly serve even the least of God's creatures, who do the right thing for the reward of doing the right thing and who will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.

ST KEVIN AND THE BLACKBIRD

And then there was St Kevin and the blackbird.
The saint is kneeling, arms stretched out, inside
His cell, but the cell is narrow, so

One turned-up palm is out the window, stiff
As a crossbeam, when a blackbird lands
and Lays in it and settles down to nest.

Kevin feels the warm eggs, the small breast, the tucked
Neat head and claws and, finding himself linked
Into the network of eternal life,

Is moved to pity: now he must hold his hand
Like a branch out in the sun and rain for weeks
Until the young are hatched and fledged and flown.

*

And since the whole thing’s imagined anyhow,
Imagine being Kevin. Which is he?
Self-forgetful or in agony all the time

From the neck on out down through his hurting forearms?
Are his fingers sleeping? Does he still feel his knees?
Or has the shut-eyed blank of underearth

Crept up through him? Is there distance in his head?
Alone and mirrored clear in Love’s deep river,
‘To labour and not to seek reward,’ he prays,

A prayer his body makes entirely
For he has forgotten self, forgotten bird
And on the riverbank forgotten the river’s name.

Seamus Heaney
The Spirit Level (1996)

St Kevin's Bed, Glendalough, Ireland, the cave where the saint lived as a hermit.

Please pray for the repose of the soul of Seamus Heaney.

Photos from Wikipedia. Poem taken from The Poetry Place.

50 years with the Columbans

Fr Aedan McGrath

On the first Tuesday of September 1961 - the date was the 5th - I and more than 40 other young men entered St Columban's College, Dalgan Park, Navan, about 40 kms north-west of my native Dublin, hoping to be Columban priests one day and heading off to Chile, Fiji, Japan, Korea, Peru or the Philippines about seven years later. As it happened, some were to find their way to Pakistan, which became a Columban mission in 1978 along with Taiwan.

I was then 18 but since I was 14 had wanted to be a missionary priest. I decided on the Columbans when I was 16 but had to wait to do my Leaving Certificate. I went to Dalgan Park in Easter Week 1961 to be interviewed and have a medical examination. I was very happy when accepted. Then I had to get a black suit, some white shirts and a black tie, not to mention a black hat, required in those days.

One thing was niggling me: what would my parents think if I ever decided to leave? The term 'spoiled priest', someone who left the seminary, was still used occasionally, though never in my family. There were nor relatives who were priests or religious and I was the first in our generation of cousins, all on my mother's side, to do the Leaving Certificate. As if he had read my mind, my father took me aside just before he and my mother drove me down to Dalgan Park and said, 'If you ever decide to leave, as long as you're happy your mother and I will be happy'. It was a great load off my mind. As it turned out, I never seriously thought of leaving.

During my secondary school years I read a number of books by Columbans who had suffered after the Communist takeover in China in 1949 and during the Korean War. I knew that some had been killed because they had stayed with the people.

One priest whom I particularly admired was Fr Aedan McGrath, who had spent nearly three years in solitary confinement in China between 1950 and 1953. I remember the headlines when he arrived hom to be greeted at Dublin Airport by thousands of people, including President Seán T. O’Kelly, a dapper figure like Father Aedan and known to everyone as 'Seán T', and Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Éamon De Valera, 'Dev'. I had no idea then that Father Aedan would become a good friend. He told me that when he saw the crowds from the plane he said to himself, 'There must be someone important on board', not realising it was himself.

Father Aedan was the second of three brothers who became Columbans. The eldest, Father Ronan, was our director during our first year in Dalgan, our Probation Year, similar to a novitiate in religious orders and congregations. One of the reasons I joined the Columbans was that we are a society of apostolic life, secular priests bound by an oath of obedience but with no religious vows. I had no desire to take an oath of poverty, though I didn't expect to become wealthy - nor have I in the financial sense! The third McGrath (pronounced 'muGRA', the 'a' as in 'grass') was Father Ivor.

Father Ronan was then 60 and seemed very old to me. He was to be the first Columban, as Father Aedan put it, 'to enter heaven on a bicycle'. He was hit outside Dalgan while cycling at the age of 90.

Fr John Blowick, one of the two co-founders of the Columbans, was still teaching moral theology when I entered Dalgan, though had retired by the time our class studied theology. However, he was very much in evidence and gave us talks from time to time and stopped for a chat when we met him in the corridors.

Father Aedan died suddenly on Christmas Day at the age of 94 at a family gathering in his native Dublin.

The video below was put together by my editorial staff at Misyon, which I edit for the Columbans here in the Philippines. It incorporates the video at the top.

Please thank God with me for the last 50 years and remember all Columbans, living and dead, in your prayers.