Today being the feast of All Souls, or The Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed, as my missal has it, it's time to revisit my annual post where I remember those gone before me. It's a special day in the Church calendar dedicated to trying to help those we've loved, and even those we've conspicuously failed to love, and so many who we've never known, to make their way towards God and towards becoming who they were truly created to be.
The word 'Purgatory' may not appear in the Bible, but that doesn’t mean the doctrine isn’t there, readily drawn out from references to prayers that help the dead, to how nothing imperfect can enter heaven and a fire that purifies us after death, and to a prison where souls go till their debts are paid. Those are the lessons the early Christians drew from these lessons, and from their Jewish forebears. Just as it’s for the Blessed in Heaven to pray for us, so it is for us, then, to visit those souls in prison but guaranteed to share in the Blessed Vision, praying for those destined for heaven that they may more quickly reach the top of Dante’s mountain of hope. Having done the Camino de Santiago, and even the three-day pilgrimage at St Patrick's Purgatory at Lough Derg, I have a better sense these days than I once did of how we're all in this together, obliged to pull together to help each other to the finishing line. And with all the reading I've done over the past few years I've a much better sense now than I ever did of how the medieval Irish shaped how the Church thought about this reality: in many ways ours was a penitential and purgatorial church, looking from the first towards the Last Judgement.
With that in mind, then, I have a lot of people to pray for today, just as I hope lots of people, here or up above, are praying for me, since we all need each other's help at one time or another. Many of these, I'm sure, don't need any prayers at all, but it certainly can't hurt, and if anyone here needs any help at all, I do hope my prayers will give that, in whatever meagre way they can.
This last year, I should say, has been a hard one, with many losses, for me and for those I care about.
Paul Mullally, a friend from my days in primary and secondary school, died in early December last year; he was a deeply kind and supportive person, who I'd known since he'd eagerly shared his Star Wars fan magazines with me as a small child, and who would go on in our secondary days to tell me the most remarkable Palmerstown news of my life
William Morris, who I'd known and who'd hosted me for dinner and driven me home many times in my Wilmslow days, passed on a few days later. A funny, wry, wonderfully straightforward man, I'm very glad I'd known him through his wife Eleanor.
My mum's younger sister, Eileen Hawksey, followed a few days later. Auntie Eileen had always been someone I'd loved deeply as a child, and who I'd often been compared to. I'm glad I got to know her as an adult when I lived in Manchester and could visit family in Liverpool, though I'm still heartbroken I missed her funeral, having reached the airport gate just moments after it had closed, with my plane on the runway for half an hour after I got there.
Ella McGarty, my friend Eamonn's mum, died in March; she was a sweet, elegant, gentle person, and one who I'm very glad to have known.
Seb Carney followed in April, and to this day I keep thinking of the picture of him and Paul Brown and me from Sarah's 21st, and shake my head that neither of the lads are with us now.
Of all the deaths this last year, I'm not sure any have hit me more than that of Therese Delaney, who died in June, on the birthday of my sister who had been Therese's best friend when they were children. I'd basically grown up in the Delaney house, and in a way always thought of Therese as my sister. I think too that in a way she thought of me as an extra brother, but as I realised at her funeral, that's how so many felt around her. What an extraordinary gift to have had, to make so many feel she was their sister, to make so many feel like her siblings. The world feels so much poorer without her.
Paul MacKay died a few days later. I hadn't known Paul well, in his time as director of the Irish Catholic, but he was always good company, and I suspect too that insofar as the paper was well run at all it was down to him.
Emma Kenny, a childhood neighbour, died a few weeks after that, in early July. She had seemed an impressive figure when I was a child and friends with her youngest brother, and now that I've got to know others of her siblings I rather wish I'd known her better.
Fr Anthony Cogliolo, my parish priest from my Wilmslow days, passed on a few days later; I'd always got on well with him, and enjoyed my time with him in the parish though I think I perhaps impressed more as a reader than a CAFOD chair. He had been seriously supportive of me when I was heading towards the Dominicans and for that I'm deeply grateful.
Charlie Gunning, another childhood neighbour, died a few days after that. The onetime nextdoor neighbour of the aforementioned Emma, I'd have known him as much as a child from funny stories my mam would say as I would have from him himself, though I'm glad I got to know him in my years working in the pub.
Ian Roberts, one of my Liverpool cousins, was the first death I knew of in August. I only ever met him a few times -- usually in the company of his sweet and much-missed brother Richard -- but he was always fun to meet and I'm glad we at least got to know each other a little online in recent years.
I did not know her, but my friend Susan lost her beloved little niece Meadbh Versuri Gorman a couple of days later; the world is dreadfully hard sometimes.
Bishop Noel Treanor died a few days after that; I had met him a few times and interviewed him at length in Belfast once, with him ringing the paper a few days later to thank me for the piece, him having been I think rather surprised at how I'd made sense of such a long and wide-ranging conversation. I do feel that both the Irish and wider European church may miss him.
Barely two months after Therese's death, her uncle Vincent Murtagh died; he was always good fun at those family events I was lucky enough to be invited to; his loss, coming after Therese's, must have been very hard.
And rounding out August, Breda Gunning, Charlie's widow, died less than a month after her husband. I'd always liked her as a child, and am glad I got to know her too as one of my regulars in my days as a loungeboy and a barman in the pub. I'm only sorry it's been so many years now since I last saw her.
Greg Hillis died in early October, having had cancer for a long time. I'd never met Greg in person, though I'd known him online for a decade or more, and had long wanted as one of my great online aspirations, to go to a baseball game with him and just spend the hours enjoying that beautiful pastime and listening to what he had to say. His was a voice of rare warmth and wisdom, and the world of online Catholicism is desperately diminished without him among us.
A couple of days later, my dad's cousin Cecil Doyle passed on. I'm afraid I didn't know him well, just as I'd not known many of my parents' cousins, but the losses of those close to us matter, and we should remember them too.
Finally, just a week ago my cousin Lyn O’Toole died. Lyn had always been part of my life, just a couple of years older than me, and it's very hard to believe she is gone - or that her mum has now outlived two of her four children. Life at times seems profoundly unfair, and I can really only just hope and pray that things make more sense on the other side of the tapestry.
And so, to turn to those who would have been in mind this day last year too...
I pray for my mum, Veronica Daly, who we lost at Christmas 2020 and laid to rest in Dublin and Liverpool over the next two years, her ashes divided between the city where her family raised her and the city where she raised her family. I pray too today for Nana and Grandad, all the Dodds, Auntie Maureen, Valerie McKenna, my cousins Philip, David, Susan, and Lily; for Auntie Brenda and Uncle Tommy, Auntie Kathleen, Great Auntie Mary, my cousins Janet and Michael, and Richard; for my uncle John; for Mam's parents, for aunt Doreen and for Monica. I pray too for Joan's husband Gerry Kavanagh, and for Edwin Bergquist and Terry Winker, both of whom I've lost from the wonderful family into which I've been blessed to marry.
I pray for Mary and Paddy Hoare, for Mr Harwood, for Mr and Mrs McCourt, for Mrs Carrigan and for Michael Carrigan, for Mr Gahan, for Mr and Mrs Reeves, for John Ryan, Mick Doyle, Mr Lyons, Jim Freeman, Mrs Gibson, Mr and Mrs and Bernie Flanagan, Mrs Mannelly, Mr Doyle, Elizabeth Kenny, and Matt and Clare O’Reilly.
I pray for Sr Margaret Murtagh; for Johnny McGrath, Delores Spittal, Dick Molumby, Frank Beggan, Dessie Breen, Sean Forde, and Mollie O'Callaghan, and all those I know from Palmerstown Credit Union; for Gerry Hendricken, Frank Coakley, Damien Brunton, and Paddy and Margaret Trodden; for Joe and Nora Hanrahan, Matt Garrigan, Dave Leavy, Frank and Mrs Towey, Jack Farrelly, Shay Lord, Jim Skerritt, David Fitzgerald, Billy Callaghan, Jimmy Owens, Gary Kennedy, Liam Coffey, Gerry Murray, Paul's uncle Francis Kennedy and Neasa's aunt Marie Doyle, all known to me from the Silver Granite; for Mary Ward; for Tom Corr, Sean Mitchell, Eamon Woulfe, Liam Glynn, Eddie Martin, Padraic Naughton, and Bro. John Hyland from Moyle Park.
I pray for so many of my peers, taken far too soon, and for those with whom I have worked and walked: Gavan Nugent, Padraic Ryan, Anthony Desmond, Sean Kenny, Paul Brown, Claire Edmonds, Conn Murphy, Marie Plisnier, Agueda Pons, Michelle Cosgrave and her father Ollie, Ultan Sinclair, Susan Dunne and her parents Paschal and Angela, for Renate Kurzmann, and for Nina-Jayne Birley; for Kathleen Griffin and Niamh Moloney from Catholic Voices; for Maria Lezama from Cork L'Arche; for Julie Yipp and Kevin Hunneybell from my Camino, for Francis McKenzie from my visit to Peru; for Declan Moroney from the Irish Catholic and Mark Howard from Veritas.
I pray for Val Grant, Alex Walker, Theresa MacDonagh, Gerard McCarthy, Sheila Griffith, Brian Pullan whose death I missed when it happened in 2022, and Alan Gilbert from the University of Manchester; and for John, Kathleen Bibby, Mary McFaul, John and Agnes Ainsworth, and Kate Gregg, all from Wilmslow.
I pray for Sr Mary David Totah; for Fr Con Curley, Fr Gerard Byrne, and Fr Flo Lynch; for Fr David Lumsden and Fr Martin Ryan; for Fr Tom Heneghan; for Fr Simon Roche OP, Fr Martin McCarthy OP, Fr Dermot Brennan OP, Fr Bob Talty OP, and Fr Denis Keating OP; and for Sr Margarita Schwind OP.
I pray for Jenny Daly, and Sr Agnes, and Helen, and all the other ladies from Mam's nursing home.
I pray for Bill Kinsella from Boora; for Marion Doyle from Kilcormac; for Fritz Schult from Pollatomish; for Steve's wife Ruth Southall; for Sarah's grandad Alan Martindale; for Laura's grandad Tony Adams; for Jason's mum Marlene Crowley and Sophie's dad Johnny von Pfluegl; for Christopher's mum Mary Dawson; for Michael's mother Ann Kelly; for Colum's dad Joe Keating, for Eamon's dad Packie McGarty, for John's dad Gerry Duffy, for Aidan's father Colin Higgins, for the fathers of Daron Higgins, Lucy Corcoran, Dara Gantley, Bláithín Ni Giolla Rua, Martin Brady, and Bridget Martin, and the parents of Claire O'Brien; for Ned's mum Maura Hughes; for Jean's dad Kevin Callaghan; for Breda Polly and Tom Crotty; for Rory's mum Anne Fitzgerald; for Dan's wife Naima Jackson; for Mike's sister Katie Lewis; for Bob's dad Brian McCabe; for Dawn Foster and Liam Cahill who I knew just through their writing and their warmth and wisdom over the internet; for Polly and Dan’s friends Will Scott and Dominic Crisp; for George Kiely, who stood with me when I needed true support; and for John Brierley, who helped guide me on Spanish and other paths.
I pray for the souls of all those dear to those I love, for the souls of all those dear to me, and for the souls of all those whose names and faces I have forgotten.
I pray too for the families of all those I remember, and of those who, like Francis Benedict Pyles and Margaret Mary Hill, are not themselves in need of any prayers and went to God assured of their rest in his blessed vision.
May the Lord God almighty have mercy on their souls, and may his perpetual light shine upon them; may they rest in peace.
Amen.
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