The Irish province of the Vincentian Community was founded in 1833, inspired by the work of Vincent de Paul, who had founded the Vincentians in France in 1625. https://vincentians.ie/who-we-are/the-history-of-the-irish-vincentians/
Travers, Aloysius, 1870-1957, Capuchin priest
William Patrick Travers was born into a prominent Cork family on 20 March 1870. The family were devoutly Catholic. John, his elder brother, was also a Capuchin friar and took Anthony as his religious name. Another brother was an Augustinian friar while a sister became an Ursuline nun. William joined the Capuchin Franciscans in 1887, took the religious name of Aloysius, and was ordained to the priesthood in 1894. From his earliest years, Aloysius took a keen interest in promoting the work of the temperance movement. He was appointed President of the Father Mathew Hall in Dublin, and held this position from 1904-13. During his years as President, he used the Hall for the promotion of temperance and as a recreational venue for the members of the Sacred Heart Sodality. To further support the ideals of temperance and to revitalise interest in Irish culture, he founded 'The Father Mathew Record' which began publication in January 1908. The year before, he had inaugurated the Féis Maitiu which promoted Gaelic cultural revivalist activities such as storytelling and festivals of native song and dance. Fr. Aloysius also used the pages of the 'Record' to strongly promote a ‘Buy Irish Campaign’. About this time, he also established the League of Young Irish Crusaders. Like many of the Capuchin friars of the Dublin community, Fr. Aloysius was involved in ministering to the Rising leaders during their imprisonment and was present at the execution of James Connolly in Kilmainham Jail on 12 May 1916. He later championed the cause of various labour leaders in Dublin. It has also been speculated that Fr. Aloysius undertook a secret mission to Pope Benedict XV in connection with the Irish struggle. He was elected seven times to the office of Provincial Definitor (Councillor) and was Provincial Minister of the Irish Capuchins from 1913-6. In his later years, he became an enthusiastic member of the Legion of Mary and published numerous devotional tracts including a popular prayer book, 'The Voice of the Church', 'The Seraphic Standard' and 'ĺosa Mo Mhian'. He died on 2 May 1957 at the Capuchin Friary, Church Street, Dublin. He was 89 years old and was a Capuchin friar for almost 69 of these years. He was buried in Glasnevin Cemetery.
Murphy, Columbus, 1881-1962, Capuchin priest
Daniel Murphy was born on 17 June 1881 in Cork. He was baptised in St. Finbarr’s Church on 19 June 1881. His parents were James and Sarah Murphy (née Flynn) of Ethelville, Western Road, Cork. He was a student of Presentation College and later Rochestown College in Cork. He applied for entrance to the Capuchin novitiate in August 1898 taking the religious name of Columbus. He was ordained a priest in 1906. He subsequently studied at the Catholic University of Louvain and obtained a Bachelor of Divinity in 1909. His life as a friar was mostly devoted to missionary and retreat work. At the outbreak of the 1916 Rising Fr. Columbus was a member of the Church Street community in Dublin. He would go on to play an important role in bringing about a cessation of hostilities. The day after the surrender of the Four Courts garrison on 29 April there was still confusion in North King Street and in other locations as to whether this was a truce or a complete surrender. To clarify, Fr. Columbus went to the Four Courts to retrieve Patrick Pearse’s note which had led to the surrender of Commandant Edward Daly. He later negotiated with the British military to arrange a personal meeting with Pearse in Arbour Hill and brought a copy of his surrender order to Commandant Patrick Holohan at North Brunswick Street. Between 30 April and 4 May Fr. Columbus was called upon to minister to prisoners in Kilmainham Jail prior to their executions. He later compiled a memoir recording his experiences of ministering to various rebel leaders awaiting their court martials and sentencing (IE CA IR-1-2-6). Fr. Columbus later acted as President of Father Mathew Hall, Church Street, Dublin, from 1925-8. He died on 20 February 1962.
Moynihan, Senan, 1900-1970, Capuchin priest
John Moynihan, the son of Thomas and Mary Moynihan, was born on 24 November 1900 in Castlegregory, County Kerry. He was educated at Aughacasla National School (eight years) and at St. Brendan’s Seminary, Killarney (four years) and he matriculated in June 1918. He studied at All Hallows College in Dublin from October 1918 to March 1919. He joined the Irish Capuchin Franciscans in September 1920 taking the religious name of Senan. He took his final vows in 1925 and he was ordained a priest in 1928. Shortly after his ordination in 1928 he was appointed editor of ‘The Father Mathew Record’, a popular monthly publication of the Irish Capuchins which promoted the Order’s overseas’ missions (particularly in Africa) and carried articles supporting the cause of total abstinence. Fr. Senan strove to create a higher grade, more literary publication. He was acquainted with many well-known Irish writers and artists and he secured permission from the Order’s leadership to publish an ‘Annual’ in 1930. ‘The Capuchin Annual’ was published from 1930 to 1977. The publication was very much the work of Fr. Senan and he remained its editor until 1954. In 1955 a decision was made at the Capuchin Provincial Chapter to remove Fr. Senan from the editorship of the ‘Annual’. Soon afterwards he travelled to Perth at the invitation of Archbishop Redmond Prendiville (1900-1968), a fellow Kerry man. Fr. Francis Moynihan, a brother of Fr. Senan, had also been resident in Australia and was parish priest of St. John’s, Clifton Hill, in Melbourne. Fr. Francis was also the editor of ‘The Advocate’, a leading Catholic newspaper in Australia. Fr. Senan arrived in Perth in 1959. He was incardinated into the Perth Archdiocese on 1 April 1959 (as a diocesan priest having left the Capuchin Order). On arrival he took up a position as chaplain to religious sisters at St Anne’s Hospital, Mt Lawley (now Mercy Hospital). He did not, however, act as a chaplain to the patients. Archbishop Redmond Prendiville appointed him the first archivist of the Archdiocese of Perth in July 1962. Fr. Senan died in Perth on 26 July 1970. He is buried in Karrakatta Cemetery, Perth.
The Presentation Brothers are an international, Catholic congregation of religious brothers, founded in 1802 by Blessed Edmund Rice in Waterford, Ireland. The expressed mission of the Presentation Brothers is to "form Christ in the Young" and traditionally they have worked to achieve this through education.
Edmund Rice was born in the townland of Westcourt near the village of Callan in County Kilkenny on 1 June 1762. His parents, Robert Rice and Margaret Tierney Murphy, were prosperous farmers. At the age of 17, Rice was apprenticed to his uncle, Michael Rice, in Waterford city. Several years later, Edmund’s uncle signed the business over to him and Edmund began to invest his growing fortune in land and property. At the age of 25, Edmund married Mary Elliott but, sadly, Mary died in January 1789 following a horse-riding accident. Edmund and Mary had a daughter who was also called Mary.
After his wife’s death, Rice became more religious and he developed a devotion to St. Teresa of Avila. He also became involved in charitable works and regularly visited the poor of Waterford providing financial assistance to those in need. In 1798, Edmund helped the Presentation Sisters open a convent and school for girls in Waterford. Rice decided to try something similar for young boys, and in 1800 he began to teach youngsters at his business premises in Barronstrand Street with the assistance of some volunteers. The following year, Rice converted some stables on New Street into a makeshift school. His friends and colleagues described it as an act of "mad folly". Two men, Patrick Grosvenor and Patrick Finn, arrived to help. The three men lived above the school where they prayed together and shared their possessions. This school would go on to be known as Mount Sion Primary School which exists to this day.
Between 1802, when he opened his first school and 1808, Rice gathered around him a group of companions to help him in his work. These first Brothers took their vows on 15th August 1808 in the chapel of the Presentation Convent, Waterford, and together they became known as the Society of the Presentation. They lived their religious life based on the Rule of the Presentation Sisters (founded by the Venerable Nano Nagle in 1775), adapted for men. The Presentation Rule defined the new institute as a diocesan institute. This meant that, initially in Waterford, and later on in other dioceses where the Brothers worked, the local Bishop was their Superior. Unlike institutes of pontifical rite, the new religious institute had no Superior General of its own.
As the work of Edmund Rice expanded to Dublin, Cork and other Irish cities and towns, a need for central planning and direction emerged in the developing educational mission of the Brothers. From 1817 onwards, Edmund Rice began to consider adopting a constitution along the lines of that used by the Brothers of the Christian Schools in France. The De La Salle Brothers were an institute of pontifical rite, and had their own Superior General and elected administration. They were, to a great extent, independent of local bishops and this gave them great freedom in the development and expansion of their work. Rice felt that the Presentation Rule had served the group well in its early years, but Rome would only grant his group pontifical status if they adopted a pontifical rule already in existence. He decided to propose to his Brothers that the group should adopt a new De La Salle style rule. Controversy and debate ensued over a number of years and ultimately led to a division within the group. The vast majority of the Brothers ultimately accepted the adoption of a rule along the lines of that used by the Brothers of the Christian Schools in France. A minority of two continued to live the Presentation Rule and remained under the jurisdiction of their local bishops. The majority, known as the Christian Brothers since 1822, elected Edmund Rice as their first Superior General. The group experienced considerable expansion and development during the following decades.
Of the two Brothers who chose to remain with the Presentation Rule, Brother John Ignatius Mulcahy taught at a school in Cappoquin, County Waterford until his death in 1845. He was not joined by any followers. The second Brother, Michael Augustine Riordan of Cork, was joined by a number of followers and continued to follow the Presentation rule.
Brother Michael Augustine Riordan had entered the North Monastery in Cork in 1814 (there had been a community of Brothers in Cork since 1811; Brother Jerome O'Connor and Brother John Baptist Leonard founded the Peacock Lane Monastery, also known as the North Presentation Monastery, and were given charge of the Cork Charitable Society’s North School off Chapel Lane by the Bishop of Cork, Dr Francis Moylan). There had been considerable division in the North Monastery concerning the acceptance of the new rule over a number of years. An architect by profession, Riordan had helped in the building of many Cork churches before his entrance to the Brothers. His personal sense of loyalty to the then Bishop of Cork, John Murphy, greatly influenced his decision to remain with the Presentation Rule. In 1827, with the support of Bishop Murphy, he left the North Monastery and was given a house in Douglas Street, on the south side of the city. This became known as the South Monastery and Brother Riordan was joined there by some companions who lived as Presentation Brothers under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Cork.
The Brothers began to conduct two schools in the city, one in the South Monastery itself, another a Lancasterian School on Great George's Street, today known as Washington Street. Thus, Brother Riordan played a pivotal role in the survival of the Institute of Presentation Brothers who would continue to live the original rule chosen by Edmund Rice and his early companions.
The Presentation Brothers continued their work in the Cork schools and expanded to Kerry in 1838. A foundation was made in Deptford, England in 1876 and in Birr, Co. Offaly, in 1879. By the 1870s however, a new younger group of Brothers began to address the issue of diocesan versus central control. As various types of schools were founded in diverse places, it became obvious that the Presentation Congregation should develop from its present diocesan status to being an institute of pontifical rite. In 1874, the Bishops of Cork and Kerry, on behalf of the Brothers, requested Rome to grant pontifical approval to the Presentation Institute. A Decree was received from Rome in the same year granting temporary approvaI. In 1885, the Presentation Brothers submitted a petition to Rome requesting its approval for a central government for the Presentation Institute under its own Superior General. By 1889, Rome granted temporary approval and final approbation came ten years later in 1899.
Throughout these developments, the Brothers retained the original Presentation Rule. Changes were inserted however to allow for a central government under a superior general and council. The first formal general chapter of the Brothers of the Presentation Institute was held in the South Monastery Cork in July 1889. Brother Patrick Shine was elected superior general and with him four assistants to help in the government of the Congregation.
The number of communities and schools established and managed by the Presentation Brothers greatly increased in the subsequent decades, both in Ireland (including Cork, Cobh, Kinsale, Bray, Dungannon, Enniskillen, Carrick-on-Shannon, Boyle, Letterkenny) and overseas (including Canada, USA, Ghana, Nigeria, Barbados, Grenada, St Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago, Peru, and Slovakia).
The Presentation Brothers have a presence in a number of these locations to the present day, and continue to work in the area of education as well as a wider range of ministries including with the homeless, elderly, disadvantaged youth and the Roma people.
Much of this history of the Presentation Brothers was sourced from 'The Contribution of the Presentation Brothers to Irish Education 1960-1998: A Study of a Roman Catholic Religious Teaching Institute in a Time of Change and Transition', a PhD thesis written and submitted to the University of Hull by Br Michael Martin Kenneally.
Dowling, Thomas, 1874-1951, Capuchin priest
Michael Joseph Dowling, the son of Michael and Catherine Dowling (née Byrne), was born in Kilkenny on 13 March 1874. John Dowling, a younger brother, joined the Capuchins in 1888 and took Laurence as his religious name. Michael followed in his brother’s footsteps and joined the Order in Kilkenny a year later in September 1889. He took Thomas as his religious name and he was solemnly professed as a friar in October 1894. He was ordained a priest in Kilkenny on 21 December 1896. Fr. Thomas was a professor at Rochestown Capuchin College in Cork, and later served as guardian (local superior) of the Capuchin Friary in Dublin. He visited Oregon in the United States in 1910 to select a suitable mission parish for the Irish Capuchins in Baker City. In this period, he held several senior administrative positions in the Order and served as definitor (councillor) from 1907-10 and was Provincial Minister of the Irish Capuchins from 1910-3. He was also guardian of Holy Trinity Friary in Cork in 1920.
He emerged as a prominent public figure in Cork because of his high-profile campaigning on social and political issues. He was active in the Anti-Conscription campaign in the city in 1918 and was elected Honorary President of the Cork and District Trades and Labour Council. During the First World War, there was widespread economic distress in Cork as wages failed to keep pace with rising prices. The result was numerous strikes and general worker unrest. Dowling had studied social reform and he threw himself wholeheartedly into the task of industrial dispute mediation. His interventions were accepted by employers and trades unions alike. He presided over negotiations between tramway workers and their employers in a crucial wage dispute and was instrumental in securing a settlement between the two sides in 1919. He was awarded the freedom of Cork in 1920 in recognition of his invaluable services in preserving the peace of the city and for his role in successfully resolving industrial disputes. He also received an honorary degree (an LL.D. or a Doctor of Laws) from Professor P.J. Merriman (1877-1943), President of University College Cork. The award was given on account of his ‘invaluable services’ in ensuring peaceful and harmonious social relations in the city. The Cork Trades’ Council later donated a stained-glass window to Holy Trinity Church to mark his contribution in securing workers’ rights.
His ministries as a Capuchin friar centred on preaching missions and retreats and he was also an enthusiastic promoter of the temperance cause (he was instrumental in organising the Father Theobald Mathew Pavilion at the Cork International Exhibition in 1902). In 1926 Fr. Thomas offered to travel to the United States to work as a missionary friar. The Irish Capuchins had established a mission custody on the American Pacific Coast in 1910. His first appointment was in Our Lady of the Angels Church and Capuchin Friary in Burlingame near San Francisco. He was appointed Pastor of St. Lawrence of Brindisi Church situated in Watts in South Los Angeles in 1937. In the following years he succeeded in paying off the considerable debt on both the church and the adjoining school. He served as Custos (Superior) of the Western American Capuchin Mission from 1940-6. He died on 7 January 1951 and was buried in Calvary Cemetery in Los Angeles.
Cronin, Leo, 1859-1949, Capuchin brother
Michael Cronin was born in Cork in January 1849. He was received into the Capuchin Order at Rochestown in County Cork on 30 July 1882. He took Leo as his religious name upon joining the Order. He was solemnly professed as a Capuchin friar in August 1887. For the following sixty-seven years he fulfilled the ordinary duties of a lay brother in most of the houses of the Irish Capuchin Province. He was particularly known as a Brother Questor in Dublin, seeking alms and donations for the poor. Following several years of ill-health, he died in the Capuchin Friary on Church Street in Dublin on 23 October 1949. He was buried in Glasnevin Cemetery.
Baptismal name: Michael Cronin
Religious name: Br. Leo Cronin OFM Cap.
Date of birth: 30 Jan. 1859
Place of birth: Cork
Name of father: Michael Cronin
Name of mother: Mary Cronin (née Foley)
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: 30 July 1882
Date of first profession: 8 Aug. 1883
Date of final profession: 2 Aug. 1887
Date of death: 23 Oct. 1949
Place of death: Capuchin Friary, Church Street, Dublin
Place of burial: Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin
Dowley CM, Philip, 1789-1864, Provincial of Irish Vincentian Province
Philip Dowley was the first Provincial of the Irish Vincentian Province 1848-1864.
Buried in Castleknock: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/259986110/philip-dowley_cm
Fr. Ignatius is dead! Our Congregation has lost an excellent subject on earth, but has gained, as we trust, a saint in heaven. It is very difficult to do justice in a short space to the life of such a great servant of God; it would take volumes. Still, something must be said if only to render to the memory of the deceased the tribute of our veneration.
Fr. Ignatius of St. Paul, born the Hon. George Spencer, was the link, so to say, between the death and resurrection of the Catholic Church in England. It was he who threw the first stone that made Protestantism begin to crumble, and it was he who was to be the corner-stone of the Catholic Church which is now rising from its ruins. As a youth he received the sort of education that is usually given to the English aristocracy. He went first to Eton, and from there to Cambridge, where, at the age of 22, he received the Orders which the English call "sacred" and became a minister in the Anglican church. A brilliant career lay before the young minister. Noble birth, influential friends, his own personal gifts and virtues - all pointed to a high position in the Anglican hierarchy.
The Truth, however, which had already begun to enlighten his mind, was to bring to naught all such expectations. With the help of God's grace he began to see the life of a minister and a preacher of the Gospel in a very different light from that of his countrymen. The sacredness of his vocation, he felt, was not compatible with pomp or wealth or the bonds of matrimony. And so he resolved to lead a celibate life and to adopt a life-style which seemed to him more in conformity with the demands of the Gospel, even though at this time he still considered the Catholic Church to be wrong on these very issues.
There were a number of other things, too, which made him feel ill at ease in his present position. To clear his mind once for all of the many doubts that plagued him, he decided to make an earnest study of other religious systems - a study to which he gave himself with a methodical thoroughness all his own. It was all to no avail. But in the end a ray of that "light which enlightens every man" dispelled all doubts from his mind and made him clearly understand that the true Church of Christ was the catholic Church, and that outside her there is no salvation. For a heart as generous and honest as his, that was enough, and he decided to become a Catholic there and then. He was received into the Church in February, 1830. Far from ever regretting the step he had so courageously taken, he never ceased to thank God for the great grace he had received, and it was his constant endeavour to ensure that all his countrymen should share the same favour.
Shortly after becoming a Catholic he went, on the advice of his bishop, to the English College in Rome to study for the priesthood. It was surely by a special dispensation of Divine Providence that he was ordained on 28th May, 1832, the feast of St. Augustine, the Apostle of England, in the church of St. Gregory - the very place where that Pope had commissioned St. Augustine to preach the Gospel in England. He said his first Mass on the feast of St. Bede according to the Benedictine calendar. Fr. Ignatius never tired of telling that story to his brethren, and he had already written to Fr. Dominic about it, full of gratitude to the Lord for such a privilege.
After his ordination he returned to England where he generously gave himself and all he possessed to whatever work was given him to do. For 15 years he was a model priest in the Birmingham diocese, undertaking whatever duty was assigned to him by his Bishop. He built churches, founded missions and generously contributed to the re-establishment of the Catholic Church in that diocese. Because of his outstanding merits, a special "office" was created for him in Oscott College. It had to be abandoned later on for want of anybody capable of following in the footsteps of Fr. Ignatius.
In 1846 he made a retreat at a house of the Jesuit Fathers. After it, to the surprise of everyone, including himself, he discovered he had a vocation to the Passionist Congregation. He wrote immediately to Fr. Dominic, who was then Superior of the Order in England, and he received the holy habit at his hands on 5th June, 1847. He was professed the following year, taking the name Ignatius as a gesture of gratitude to the Author of the Spiritual Exercises, through which, under God, he had received his vocation.
His profession marked the beginning of a new life - not in the sense that his former life, especially since he had became a Catholic, needed any kind of reform, but in the sense that, whereas his work until then had been limited to a comparatively small number of people and places, from now on the whole of England as well as Scotland, Ireland, France, Germany and Italy would become his mission field.
In speaking of the virtues of Fr. Ignatius it is hard to know where to begin. The love of God and zeal for His glory had so taken possession of his heart that he could scarcely think of anything else. The constant subject of his conversation was how to overcome heresy and combat sin. Any other subject left him uninterested, to the point that he would often drop off to sleep in the midst of such conversations. He would gladly have travelled the whole world over to set all men's hearts on fire with the love of God that burned so brightly in his own. His prudence and the obedience which he had vowed put a brake on his zeal, but his fervour, far from growing less, only increased the more because, as he used to say, what one does under obedience is not only more pleasing to God, but more efficacious for saving souls.
Because of the poverty of the Congregation and the special needs of the Province, the Superiors were often obliged to ask Fr. Ignatius to travel to many places all over the country to raise money. Not only did he always undertake such a difficult task with prompt obedience, but he would take advantage of it to give greater scope to his zeal in the way we shall now describe.
We have already said how he had set his mind on bringing back his own people to the Catholic Church. He in no way disapproved of the ordinary means of making converts such as preaching, etc., but he held that the most efficacious way was to pray, and to pray through the intercession of her of whom the Church sings: "Rejoice, O Virgin Mary, for thou alone hast overcome all heresies in the whole world." So it was that Fr. Ignatius took advantage of the travels he undertook under obedience in many countries of Europe to ask of all prayers for the conversion of England. In order to encourage people to pray for this intention, he asked and obtained the blessing of the Pope, who went so far as to grant indulgences to the recitation of three Hail Marys together with the invocation "Our Lady, Help of Christians, pray for us." He took this as the sign of approval of his unique mission. There is no telling how much this devotion spread, and is still spreading, throughout a great part of Europe, or what benefits may be hoped for as a result. It is a fact that from the time when Fr. Ignatius started this devotion, initiated what we may call a campaign of prayer, so many converts have been received in England, so many churches and schools have been built, so many convents and monasteries founded, that it would seem that England is no longer what it was 30 years ago. All this is surely the fruit of the prayers said and the prayers asked for by Fr. Ignatius.
To zeal for the glory of God and the conversion of his country, Fr. Ignatius added a great love of the Regular Observance. So great was his zeal for the Observance that his Superiors often had to moderate it. It often happened that, coming home at night tired and weary after a whole day's work in the confessional or in conducting spiritual exercises, he would have got up for Matins at all costs if his Superiors or his confessor had not forbidden him to do so. Generous as he was himself, he could not understand how a religious, or even a Catholic in the world, could commit even one deliberate fault however small. He used to say that he did not like to hear people say - a thing you hear even from the lips of religious occasionally - "I should be quite happy if I get to Purgatory." His maxim was that we must not be content with mediocrity when it is so easy to reach perfection.
His trust in Divine Providence and his acceptance of God's Will were boundless. Whatever happened to anyone, he wanted it to be seen as a gift from God's hand and as such something to be grateful for. "Thank God for everything" was a phrase that was constantly on his lips. One day he was walking along a dark and lonely road and fell to thinking how easy it would be for an enemy to kill him with just one shot. When asked what he would do in such a case, his answer was: "I should hope to have at least one moment to thank our Lord for the bullet that hit me."
So profound was his humility that he seemed to have forgotten his noble origins altogether and the esteem in which he was held by people of all walks of life. Kind and affable towards everybody, he took special pleasure in dealing with the poor and the ignorant and with little children. He was never heard to complain. For him everything was good. Even the worst prepared food, the oldest and most patched clothing were to him like the finest gifts.
He held successively a number of offices in the Congregation. First he was Master of Novices. Then Fr. Dominic, before he died, appointed him his successor as Superior in England. Then for three years he was Rector of our house in London, after which he was elected Provincial Consultor - an office he held for nine years, i.e. until 1863 when in the chapter held that year he was elected Rector of St. Anne's Retreat, Sutton, near Liverpool.
He had often expressed the wish to die like St. Francis Xavier or like Fr. Dominic, alone and abandoned by all. Through an extraordinary combination of circumstances, or rather by a special dispensation of Divine Providence, his wish was granted. He was preaching in Scotland one of his "Little Missions" - not so "little" judged by the results they produced. These lasted for three days, with two sermons a day and confessions which he heard during all the time that remained between saying Mass and taking his brief rest. (He had already given 245 such missions since 1857 in England, Ireland and Scotland.)
On Friday, 30th September, he had finished one of these missions in a place called Coatbridge, and had been hearing confessions until midnight. At 6 o'clock on the Saturday morning he went back into the confessional until 7.30, when he said Mass. He then got ready to go to Leith where he intended to start another mission that same day. When he got to Carstairs he found the train was not leaving for two hours. Not to waste time, he decided to pay a visit to an old friend of his, named Mr. Monteith, who lived in the vicinity. But it was here that death awaited him. He had a sudden heart attack and dropped dead about 100 yards from his friend's house, without anybody seeing him or being able to help him. His whole life, however, had been one long preparation for death, and so we have every ground for hope that the Lord has already crowned him with the glory that was waiting for him.
Fr. Ignatius of the Child Jesus, the Provincial, received word of the death by telegram. With some of the religious he went at once to the place where the servant of God had died. When the necessary arrangements had been made, the remains were taken on the following Monday to our monastery at Sutton where the Solemn Requiem was celebrated on 6th October. The funeral was attended by a large number of people, clerical and lay, as well as by the community of Sutton and religious from other houses of the Province. The Solemn Requiem was celebrated by the Provincial, and after it the Bishop of Birmingham, Dr. Ullathorne, preached the panegyric to the large and very attentive congregation that had assembled for the occasion. After the Mass, the Bishop together will all the priests present and a large concourse of people accompanied the body to its final resting place. Inside the tomb the following inscription was placed:
"The mortal remains of Father Ignatius of St. Paul, of the Congregation of the Passion and of the noble family of Spencer. He was at first an Anglican minister; then, having been converted to the Catholic Church, was ordained to the priesthood in Rome in the year 1832. With admirable constancy of mind he laboured for more than 30 years for the conversion of his country. He was numbered among the sons of the Passion in the year 1847, and throughout his life gave an example of all the virtues to his brethren. He journeyed throughout England, Ireland and Scotland, and even in Italy, Germany and France, exhorting the people to their own sanctification and forming them, as it were, into a sacred army to pour forth prayers for the conversion of England. He was engaged in this most gratifying work in Scotland when, on 1st. October, 1864, having offered the Sacrifice of the Mass, he was on his way to visit a friend he had long been acquainted with (Mr. Robert Monteith). He died suddenly at his friend's door, being assisted by God whose glory he had ever sought, and by the angels whose purity he had imitated. His life came to an end in the 65th year of his age. May he rest in peace."(translated from the Italian)
[ The Italian version of the above obituary notice was discovered recently in the library of Scala Sancta Retreat, Rome. A photostat copy was sent to us (December, 1976) by Fr. Frederico, Postulator General. Signed: Ignatius C.P. (St. Joseph's Province.)]
O'Connor CM, Henry, 1883-1960, Provincial of Irish Vincentian Province
Henry O'Connor was Provincial of the Irish Vincentian Province 1932-1942. He was also President of Castleknock College 1926-1932.