Columban Fr Tony Collier: the first foreigner to die in the Korean War. Sunday Reflections, 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

Fr Anthony Collier

20 June 1913 - 27 June 1950

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

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel Matthew 21:28:32 (English Standard Version Anglicised, India)

Jesus said to the chief priests and elders of the people:

“What do you think? A man had two sons. And he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ And he answered, ‘I will not’, but afterwards he changed his mind and went. And he went to the other son and said the same. And he answered, ‘I go, sir’, but did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. And even when you saw it, you did not afterwards change your minds and believe him.

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Monsignor Patrick Brennan

Prefect of Kwangju (now Archdiocese of Gwangju)

13 March 1901 – 24 September 1950

Columban Fr Ray Collier recalls that when he was eight or nine the parish priest of Clogherhead, County Louth, Ireland, came to the school in October 1950 and announced to the assembled pupils and teachers the death in Korea of Fr Anthony Collier. Earlier that year the young Ray had been serving his uncle’s Mass daily. Father Tony was a Columban priest who went to Korea in 1939 and spent the World War II years in Korea under house arrest by the Japanese who had occupied that country since 1910. Father Ray remembered his uncle as easy-going and who delighted in making films of his family, unknown to them, with his cine-camera, something rare at the time. He recalled too that before he returned to Korea in the early summer of 1950 Father Tony told the family that North Korea would probably invade the South.

This they did on Sunday morning 25 June, beginning a war that ended on 27 July 1953 with the signing of the Korean Armistice Agreement. 

After Sunday Mass on the morning of the invasion Fr Collier, who was parish priest of Suyangno, Chunchon city, met with Monsignor Thomas Quinlan, the Prelate of the Prefecture Apostolic of Chunchon and Fr Frank Canavan. Father Tony turned down the offer of an American officer to take the priests to safety saying, ‘I want to be with my parishioners’. Two days later North Korean soldiers arrested him and Gabriel Kim, a parish catechist. They tied them together, shot them and left, thinking both were dead. But Gabriel survived and reported Father Tony’s death to the Columbans. The Clogherhead priest was the first foreigner to die in the Korean War.

Six other Columbans were to die within months as a result of the Korean War. They were Monsignor Patrick Brennan, Frs James Maginn, Patrick Reilly, Thomas Cusack, John O’Brien Francis Canavan. All seven are included in a list of 84 martyrs of the 20th century, Korean and foreign, proposed for beatification in a process initiated by the bishops of Korea in 2013.

You can find information about each of the seven here.

Columban Martyrs of Korea

[Source]

I see something of today's Gospel in the story of Fr Tony Collier. Like the two sons he made a decision. One of those, after telling his father that he would work in the vineyard, decided not to. The other, after telling his father that he wouldn't, decided that he would. The people listening to the story Jesus told understood very clearly which of them was doing their father's will.

Father Tony, who spent much of World War II as a prisoner of the Japanese in Korea, went back after a vacation in Ireland in 1950 knowing that war was probably imminent. 

His parish was near the border with North Korea. Despite the danger he was in and despite the fact that he was offered a way of escaping to safety he chose to stay with his people, well aware that his life was in danger.

The alternative Communion Antiphon sums up Father Tony Collier's life: By this we came to know the love of God: that Christ laid down his life for us; so we ought to lay down our lives for one another (1 John 3:16).

The Lord’s Prayer in Korean

Sung by Rosa Jin Choi to a Korean folk melody

Traditional Latin Mass

Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 10-01-2023 if necessary).

Epistle: 1 Corinthians 1:4-8. Gospel: Matthew 9:1-8.

Christ Healing the Paralytic

Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini [Web Gallery of Art]

“Rise, take up your bed and go home.” And he rose and went home (Matthew 9:6-7; Gospel). 

'Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.' Sunday Reflections, 5th Sunday of Easter, Year C

The Last Supper, El Greco [Web Gallery of Art]

Today's Gospel is from the Last Supper Discourse of Jesus.

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

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

Gospel John 13: 3i-33a, 34-35 (New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised Catholic Edition, Canada)  

When Judas had gone out, Jesus said, ‘Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer.” 

‘I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

John 13: 3i-33a, 34-35 in Filipino Sign Language

A familiar sight until a couple of months ago here in St Columban's, Dalgan Park, Ireland, where we have a community of more than 70 Columban priests, mostly retired and many in our nursing home, was that of Fr Jim Gavigan, now 92, pushing the wheelchair of Fr Paddy Hurley, then 94. Only two years ago Father Jim was using a wheelchair himself for a while after a hip operation.

Father Paddy went to his reward on 15 April. He had spent more than 60 years in the Philippines on the island of Negros. His two Columban brothers, the late Fathers Dermot and Gerry, had spent many years in Fiji. That's where Fr Jim Gavigan had worked all his active years, being a member of the pioneering Columban group that went there in 1952, as was Fr Gerry Hurley.

In the last few days I've seen Father Jim 'driving' another priest's wheelchair. (We have professional staff here who do this work very efficiently and with great care but sometimes others chip in.)

In all of this I see today's gospel being lived out. It is a gospel that is central to the Missionary Society of St Columban.

Frs Owen McPolin, John Blowick, Edward Galvin 
China 1920

On the evening of 29 January 1918 an extraordinary event took place in Dalgan Park, Shrule, a remote village on the borders of County Mayo and County Galway in the west of Ireland. At the time Ireland was part of the United Kingdom, which was engaged in the Great War. Thousands of Irishmen were fighting in the trenches in France and Belgium. Many, including my great-uncle Corporal Lawrence Dowd, never came home. There was a movement for independence in Ireland that led to the outbreak of guerrilla warfare in Ireland later in 1918. There was widespread poverty in the country, particularly acute in the cities.

Despite all of that, on 10 October 1916 the Irish bishops gave permission to two young diocesan priests, Fr Edward J. Galvin and Fr John Blowick to have a national collection so that they could open a seminary that would prepare young Irish priests to go to China. The effort was called the Maynooth Mission to China, because Maynooth, west of Dublin, is where St Patrick's National Seminary is, where Fr Galvin had been ordained in 1909 and Fr Blowick in 1913.

The seminary opened that late winter's evening with 19 students and seven priests. Many of the students were at different stages of their formation in Maynooth but transferred. The seven priests belonged to different dioceses but threw in their lot with this new venture which, on 29 June 1918, would become the Society of St Columban.

This Sunday's gospel was part of what the new group reflected on as they gathered in the makeshift chapel in Dalgan Park, the name of the 'Big House' and the land on which it was built. Among the seven priests was Fr John Heneghan, a priest from the Archdiocese of Tuam, as was Fr Blowick, and a classmate of Fr Galvin. Fr Heneghan never imagined that despite his desire to be a missionary in China he would spend many years in Ireland itself teaching the seminarians and editing the Columban magazine The Far East. But his dream was to take him to the Philippines in 1931 and to torture and death at the hands of Japanese soldiers during the Battle of Manila in February 1945, when 100,000 people, mostly civilians, were killed and most of the old city destroyed.

Fr John Blowick emphasised the centrality of the words of Jesus in this Sunday's gospel, I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. The second sentence there was written into the Constitutions of the Society, drawn up the following year.

To this particular Columban these words of Jesus from the Gospel of St John are the greatest legacy of Fr John Blowick to the many men from different countries who have shared his dream and that of Bishop Galvin to this day. 

And not only men, but women too, as Columban Sisters and as Columban Lay Missionaries. 

The Society of St Columban was born in the middle of the First World War because of the vision of two young men who saw beyond that awful reality and who took Jesus at his word. Down the years Columbans have lived through wars, in remote areas where their lives and the lives of the people they served were often in danger. Some have been kidnapped and not all of those survived. Among those who did was Fr Michael Sinnott, kidnapped in the southern Philippines in October 2009 when he was 79 and released safely a month later on 12 November. He is now one of our community here in Dalgan Park.

Fr Michael Sinnott in Manila on the day of his release

Father John Blowick's insistence on the words of Jesus in this Sunday's gospel becoming part of the very fibre of the being of Columbans sustained Fr John Heneghan, Fr Patrick Kelly, Fr John Lalor and Fr Peter Fallon, as Japanese soldiers took them away from Malate Church, Manila, on 10 February 1945, and their companion Fr John Lalor who was working in a makeshift hospital nearby who with others was killed there by a bomb three days later. 

Frs Lalor, Kelly, Francis Vernon Douglas, Fallon, Monaghan and Heneghan

Fr Douglas died, most probably on 27 July 1943,  after being tortured  by the Japanese in Paete, Laguna.

The words By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another are not only the hallmark of Columbans but of countless other groups, of countless families. They are meant to be the hallmark of every Christian.

JeanVanier with John Smeltzer, a member of L'Arche Daybreak, Toronto, 2009 [Wikipedia]

Two of those 'countless groups' are L'Arche and Faith and Light, which I have often mentioned on this blog. Jean Vanier, the founder of L'Arche and, with Marie-Hélène Mathieu, co-founder of Faith and Light, died in Paris on 7 May. 

I watched part of his funeral Mass yesterday, Thursday, on Facebook and was very struck by something that was said after the Mass by a group from L'Arche in which they thanked Jean for washing their feet - and for allowing them to wash his feet.

Today's gospel comes just after Jesus washed the feet of the Apostles. In both L'Arche and Faith and Light the washing of the feet has a great significance, a ritual that Jean Vanier developed over the years and which I experienced in a retreat he gave in Metro Manila in 1995. A whole afternoon was given to a reflection on what Jesus did. This ended in small groups forming circles where each washed the feet of the person on their left and had their feet washed by the person on their right. I remember that my friend Lala, about whom I have blogged many times, washed mine. 

Lala with Jordan, L'Arche, Cainta, Rizal, Philippines

I am blessed to be a member of the Missionary Society of St Columban for whose members today's Gospel is foundational and to have been involved, mainly on the fringes, with Faith and Light and with L'Arche, in the Philippines and in Ireland.

Jean Vanier embodied today's gospel. May he rest in peace. 

Antiphon ad communionem  Communion Antiphon Cf John 15, 1, 5

Ego sum vitis vera et vos palmites, dicit Dominus;
I am the true vine and you are the branches, says the Lord.
qui manet in me et ego in te, hic fert fructum multum, alleluia.
Whoever remains in me, and I in him, bears fruit in plenty, alleluia.

Columban Fr Michael McCarthy RIP

Fr Michael McCarthy

(28 October 1939 - 5 March 2018)

Fr Michael McCarthy was born on 28 October 1939 in Bealnadeega, County Kerry, Ireland, and attended Meentogues National School before going to St Brendan's College, Killarney, and joined the Columbans from there in 1958. 

St Mary's Cathedral, Killarney [Wikipedia]

Ordained in 1964, he was appointed to Korea and after language studies was stationed in the southern Diocese of Gwangju. Within a short time he became diocesan chaplain to the Young Christian Workers (YCW). It was the beginning of a life-long involvement with people on the margins of society.

Heuksando Island [Wikipedia]

Before a home vacation in 1970 Father Michael moved from the city to the island parish of Heuksando, eight hours out into the Yellow Sea. So by the time he took charge of his first parish in Sadangdong, Seoul, in 1975 he was well acquainted with Korea, its culture and language as well as the skills required for ministry there at an anxious time. These were years of agitation and political strife as the Church responded to the needs of the workers and the poor in the expanding urban areas.

St Joseph's Church, Balcurris [Source]

As a committed Kerryman his cultural adaptibility was further enhanced by a four-year appointment to the then Columban parish of St Joseph, Balcurris, Ballymun, Dublin, in 1980. He relished that experience for its opportunity to 'dialogue with the Dubs' and to discover the new Ireland in whose politics and progress he always maintained a keen interest. [Note: Between 1975 and 1979 Kerry and Dublin had played each other in the All-Ireland Gaelic Football Final four times, each winning twice!]

By 1984 Father Michael was back in Korea, in Tobong parish, Seoul, before being asked to develop a new parish in Unamdong in Gwangju. From 1993 he was drawn more into the Columban effort to develop Korea as an independent Region of the Society with its own support base and training programmes for overseas mission. He made lasting friends with supporters all over the country and always kept in touch over the following years. Appointed Vice-Director of the Region of Korea in 2004 he helped to ensure that Korean Columbans would become an essential part or our mission teams around the world.

Myeongdong Cathedral, Seoul [Wikipedia]

Father Mick had the temperament to contribute to mission in a myriad of ways, not least in sitting down to chat and share stories into the night. Ill health began to curtail his ministry in latter years and he returned to Ireland diagnosed with Alzheimer's in 2014. Even as his memory deteriorated he never let go of the determination to keep in touch with friends and neighbours even if he could only smile in recognition at the end.

Father Michael died in St Columban's, Dalgan Park, Navan, Ireland, on 5 March 2018. He was a friend for life to so many people who were blessed by his care and companionship.

May he rest in peace.                                    [Fr Noel Daly]

St Columban's Cemetery, Dalgan Park

One very poignant moment at the end of the burial, after we sang the Salve Regina was when three Korean women, Columban lay missionaries Lee Kyung-ja, Noh Hye-in and Columban Sister Kim Mihwa sang Arirang, a very old Korean folk song that has many versions in terms of lyrics. The themes of sorrow, separation, reunion, and love appear in most versions. The song has become, in a very real sense, an expression of the 'Koreanness' of the people in both parts of Korea. 

At the removal service (vigil) in the chapel the evening before the burial Fr Anthony O'Brien told us how Father Michael loved to walk in the mountains of Korea. An English translation of one of the many versions of the song contains these lines:

There, over there, that mountain is Baekdu Mountain,

Where, even in the middle of winter days, flowers bloom.

Father Michael loved Korea and its people. May the flowers bloom for him in heaven.

A Columban Centennial on 10 October

Frs Edward Galvin, John Blowick, Owen McPolin

 China 1920

Fr McPolin led the first group of Columbans to Korea in 1933

One hundred years ago on 10 October the Bishops of Ireland gave their blessing to a new venture known as the Maynooth Mission to China. On 29 June 1918 this venture became the Society of St Columban, in the Diocese of Galway, Ireland. The Missionary Society of St Columban, as it is now known, is already preparing to celebrate its Centennial in 2018.

Fr Edward Galvin in China

Sometime between 1912 and 1916

As I see it, 29 June 1918 was the date when the Society was ‘baptized’. It had been ‘conceived’ in China between 1912 and 1916 when Fr Edward Galvin, ordained in 1909, and three or four other Irish diocesan priests working there saw the need for a mission of the Irish Church to China. It was ‘born’ on 10 October 1916 when the Irish bishops, approached by Fr Galvin and Fr John Blowick, ordained in 1913 and already a young professor at St Patrick’s, Maynooth, the national seminary for Ireland, gave their assent to what quickly became known as 'the Maynooth Mission to China'.

Frs Owen McPolin, John Blowick and Edward Galvin 

China 1920

Frs McPolin and Blowick were ordained in 1913 for the Diocese of Dromore  and the Archdiocese of Tuam, respectively, and Fr Galvin in 1909 for the Diocese of Cork.

Fr Edward Galvin in China

In a letter dated 5 October the Superior General of the Columbans, Fr Kevin O'Neill, an Australian, sent a letter to all Columbans and Columban Lay Missionaries in which he wrote, One hundred years ago, on 9 October 1916, in a ground-floor room of the main college building at Maynooth [St Patrick's College, the National Seminary of Ireland], the 28-year-old Fr John Blowick had the nerve to face the Standing Committee of the Irish Bishops and to present his and Fr Edward Galvin’s scheme for a new mission. After about half an hour’s talk with the bishops, [Michael] Cardinal Logue [Archbishop of Armagh] said that they were prepared to grant their approval for the two things Blowick requested, namely, the making of a collection in the country and the foundation of a Mission College in Ireland.

The ‘memorial’, drawn up by a committee of prominent clerics was laid before the full body of the bishops on the 10 th October, 1916 informing them that: ' . . . a vigorous movement, of which the heart is Maynooth College, has grown up among young Irish ecclesiastics to go forth and carry the light of the Gospel to the Chinese . . . The bishops were rejoiced and thankful to God for this new and striking evidence of the continued life of the ancient Irish missionary spirit.' After careful consideration the bishops approved the project and issued a statement to the press.

Dublin city centre after Easter Rising 1916 [Wikipedia]

In Easter Week 1916 an uprising against British rule in Ireland took place, mainly in Dublin. The country was still part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Irish regiments of the British Army were fighting in the Great War (1914-18), mainly in Belgium and France. Nearly 30,000 of them died during that conflict. There was widespread extreme poverty in Ireland, particularly in the cities. 1916 did not seem a good time to start such a foolhardy venture as sending Irish priests to preach the Gospel in China, a country very few Irish people knew anything about.

Fr O'Neill mentions the influence of the the 'Easter Rising', as it is often called, on the new mission: Shortly after the Irish Bishops’ approval for the new Society, professors from Maynooth, together with priests from religious orders and almost every diocese in Ireland, helped in the nationwide appeals to raise funds for the new Society. The young band of newly formed missionaries avoided publicly taking sides in the nationalist politics of the day in their contact with the clergy while on their parish appeals for funds. But Fr John Blowick is on record as saying, 'I am strongly of the opinion that the rising of 1916 helped our work indirectly. I know for a fact that many of the young people of the country had been aroused into a state of heroism and zeal by the Rising of 1916 and by the manner in which the leaders met their death. I can affirm this from personal experience. And accordingly, when we put our message before the young people of the country, it fell on soil which was far better prepared to receive it than if there had never been an Easter week.'

But the Irish bishops said ‘Yes’ to the Maynooth Mission to China. And the people supported it, as they have continued to do down the years. Fr Blowick once said that the pennies of the poor were more important than the pounds of the wealthy. But he welcomed both.

Commemorative medal 1968

Golden Jubilee of the Missionary Society of St Columban

Obverse side

The vision of a mission of the Irish Church to China broadened to a more international one. After the Society of St Columban was set up – all the founding members were Irish diocesan priests and seminarians – priests were sent to the USA and Australia to establish roots there, especially among the large Irish diaspora. Irish-American Archbishop Jeremiah Harty of Omaha, Nebraska, USA, invited the Society to set up shop there. He had been Archbishop of Manila (1903 – 1916), the first non-Spaniard to hold that position.

The first group of Columban priests went to China in 1920. Fr Blowick went with them but didn't stay as he was Superior General and was needed in Ireland to direct the new Society.

Bishop Edward Galvin

First - and only - Bishop of Hanyang, China

Expelled in 1952

Over the years the Columbans have taken on missions in Korea, Burma (now Myanmar), Japan, Chile, Peru, Fiji, Pakistan and Taiwan. They have had missions also in Argentina, Belize, Brazil, Guatemala and Jamaica.

Fr Leo Distor, first Filipino parish priest of Malate, Manila

Most of the younger Columban priests are from countries the older men had gone to from the West.  Fr Leo Distor, the first Filipino Columban parish priest of Malate, is a symbol of the changing face of the Society. After serving in Korea he spent many years in Chicago and in Quezon City in the formation of future Columban priests from Asia, the Pacific and South America.

This year there are Columban seminarians from Fiji, Peru, Myanmar, the Philippines and Tonga in the formation house in Cubao, Quezon City and on the two-year First Mission Assignment (FMA) overseas, the latter including one from China. There is a seminary programme in Seoul, Korea, and students in formation in Chile and Peru.

The young Fr Edward Galvin (1882-1956), later Bishop of Nancheng, China, and the young Fr John Blowick (1888-1972), not to mention the Irish bishops in 1916, could not have foreseen how the Maynooth Mission to China would evolve from being a purely Irish venture into the international Society it is today with Priest Associates from dioceses in Ireland, Korea, Myanmar and the Solomon Islands, and Lay Missionaries from Chile, Fiji, Ireland, Korea, Philippines and Tonga currently involved in its mission.

Fr Leo Distor (4th from left) with Filipino Columban priests

Starting yesterday, 9 October, and until 22 October Columban priests and lay missionaries under the age of 50 are meeting in Tagaytay, south of Manila. Please keep them in your prayers as these are both the present and the future of the venture blessed by the Irish bishops 100 years ago today.

Thank God for the birth of the Maynooth Mission to China on 10 October 1916.

Graves of Fr John Blowick and Bishop Edward Galvin

St Columban's Dalgan Park, Navan, Ireland