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Homily delivered
at the Liturgy of the
Re-dedication
of St Mary’s Church, Killyclogher
by Fr Michael
Collins PP, Limavady
It is customary on
occasions such as this to invite a
native born son of the parish who
has risen to some degree of eminence
in his chosen way of life and who
has displayed an unflinching loyalty
and commitment to his native parish
down the years to say a few words.
In view, then, of the intense level
of scrutiny to which most aspects
of life are subjected today, it would
be a wise and diplomatic precaution
if I were to confess before I go any
further that I am here under false
pretences, on all three counts.
I am not, in fact,
a native born son of Cappagh Parish.
I missed that privilege by a mere
four weeks, which is the age at which
I migrated from Castlederg to take
up residence in Coneywarren. Neither
have I risen to any degree of eminence
in my chosen way of life, as any of
my clerical colleagues will cheerfully
testify, and neither have I shown
any great degree of loyalty to the
Parish of Cappagh, because the house
in which I was reared lies just inside
the parish boundary but it is also
three to four miles from both Knockmoyle
and Killyclogher Churches, and a mere
mile from the Sacred Heart Church
in Omagh. So for Saturday Confessions,
Sunday Masses, Parish Missions and
First Communions, and for all other
religious ceremonies, instead of supporting
Cappagh, you could say I joined the
opposition.
I was, though, confirmed
in Killyclogher, an occasion of which
I have no memory whatever, but I do
have a photograph of myself and my
sister on Confirmation Day. She had
risen from her sick bed to be there,
and in the photo she looks rather
like a victim of famine, and standing
alongside her is myself, looking like
I had caused the famine. I was not
merely fat. I was wearing short trousers,
the ultimate indignity for a ten year
old. In fact, the only occasion which
competes with it for embarrassment
was the Silver Jubilee of my Priesthood
when I foolishly boasted to the young
lady who was serving Mass for me that
I could still fit into the soutane
which I had worn on the day of my
Ordination, twenty five years previously.
She looked at me with that air of
devious innocence that children do
so well and said “Why? Were
you always fat?”
In view of all this
unfamiliarity with Killyclogher Church
I thought it only wise to ask your
esteemed Parish Priest for some historical
background on the church and he sent
me an article which I duly read, but
which talked of purlins and chancels
and vaulted ceilings but never mentioned
history, the reason for which became
clear when I got to the end of the
article and found the signature of
the architect for this project who,
as it happens, lives down the street
from me in Limavady, and probably
knows as little about the history
of Killyclogher as myself Nonetheless
I was able to unearth a few exotic
titbits about the parish. For example,
even six hundred years ago the people
of Cappagh knew that it pays to be
nice to bishops. When Archbishop Colton
was making his famous inspection of
the Derry Diocese in the fourteenth
century his first stop was Cappagh,
where he was welcomed by the people
of the parish and given a whole ox
to feed himself and his retinue, before
being pointed in the direction of
Ardstraw and told that he might find
many more things in need of inspection
there than he would find in Cappagh,
and if that was not enough there was
always Derry, some miles further on.
A little less enlightened
was the decision four hundred years
later to send their Parish Priest
to take part in the notorious Deny
Discussion, a week long debate between
Catholic and Protestant clergymen
from which both sides emerged convinced
they had been victorious and more
entrenched than ever in their ignorance.
On the home front things were a little
more encouraging. Early in the 1800s
the Blessington Mountjoy Estate gave
the site for a church at Knockmoyle,
and sometime later a church was built
there by the Parish Priest Daniel
O'Flagherty and also a small church
at Killyclogher, but it was in 1840
that a protestant landowner called
Hope or Homer Wilson gave land to
the parish so that it could build
a larger church and have space for
a graveyard in Killyclogher. It would
also seem that the church was largely
rebuilt in the 1 870s. After that
the historical record runs dry. It
is the I920s before the church is
mentioned again, this time to record
the installation of a new marble altar
and two side altars. Everything after
that is within living memory.
However, leaving
aside the historical record for a
moment let us concentrate on the spiritual
aspect of parish life here in Killyclogher.
One of the most favoured quotations
from scripture for occasions like
this is the line from chapter 3 of
Exodus “The place in which you
stand is holy ground”. If you
read newspaper accounts of church
openings a hundred years ago the chances
are that it will begin with these
words. And they are appropriate words
because this is indeed a holy place,
but not holy because it is a building
dedicated to the worship of God, nor
because it is shaped and constructed
in a way that makes its religious
purpose immediately recognisable,
nor because holy functions and services
are celebrated here, but because generation
after generation of people from this
community have sat or stood or knelt
before God in this church and offered
him an unending chorus of worship
as an expression of their relationship
with God.
We find worship a
difficult concept to grasp nowadays,
so much of our culture is concentrated
on ourselves – self-sufficiency,
self-indulgence, self-possessed, self-supporting,
self-service even self-harm - while
worship is directed away from self
towards God. Worship is the time we
give to God alone. How we spend that
time is not that important. Merely
to stand silently before God is to
worship God, but for us Catholics
the ultimate worship is to offer the
sacrifice of Christ to God His Father
- in short to offer Mass. I continually
bore my congregation with the statement
that “If you believe in God
you must worship God. If you do not
worship God your belief is false”.
When young people tell me that they
belong to the Catholic Church but
they don’t go to Mass I tell
them I belong to the Manchester United
Football team but I don't play football.
One statement is as sensible as the
other.
This is a holy place,
because the people have made it holy.
Down the years and the generations
they have come here faithfully every
Sunday to worship God, and they have
passed that belief on to their children
and their children's children, and
as long as they continue this practice
this will remain a holy place, and
for that reason this church is a place
they can be proud of.
However, lest someone
say “Have the clergy played
no part in this story?” let
me reply by recalling just a few of
the priests who have struggled, in
their own limited way, to maintain
the holiness of life of this particular
parish.
My earliest memory
is of Father John McKenna, a gentle
soul, universally known to the clergy
as “Black John”, not for
any uncomplimentary reason but because
of the colour of his hair and to distinguish
him from his classmate, also Father
John McKenna, who inevitably was known
as “White John”. When
I first knew Father Black John McKenna
he was neither white nor black. At
that time “shining” might
have been a more appropriate title.
He died while hearing Confessions,
not as has been suggested, because
he was submerged beneath the heavy
tide of sinfulness that he encountered
in Killyclogher, but rather because
he was such a compassionate confessor
that customers came from far and near
and dramatically increased the odds
that he would die in the confessional.
His successor, Father
Chapman, vainly tried to interest
the parishioners of Cappagh in a little
musical culture. He was a proficient
violinist, with what one might call
an artistic temperament, who finally
hung up his fiddle and bow, having
signally failed to interest a Killyclogher
audience in the delights of Bach's
Air on a G-string.
Father Willie Dolan
tried to pass on to us younger clergy
his interest in art and antiques,
pointing out to us that the real Waterford
Crystal was not the shiny stuff that
we paid exorbitant prices for in the
local gift shops, but the dull uninspiring
examples from the nineteenth century
which adorned his shelves. He acquired
an impressive collection of oil paintings
- at what we now know were ridiculously
low prices - and derived a great pleasure
simply from viewing them. When age
and infirmity began to overtake him,
he sold off the entire collection
by auction, gave away the proceeds
to different causes and retired to
Nazareth House in Bishop Street in
Deny, a. mere hundred metres from
the house where his successor Father
Francis Murray was reared.
Father Murray might
seem a most unlikely drill sergeant
in his present guise, but during his
time in Limavady, where he was curate
for many years, his altar servers
could do a synchronised right turn
with a precision that would have been
the envy of the Brigade of Guards.
Nothing to compare with it had ever
been seen in Limavady up to that time
and sadly nothing to compare with
it has been seen in Limavady ever
since.
Since moving to Cappagh
Father Murray's expertise has branched
out in numerous directions, particularly
in the field of finance, which must
be a great source of comfort to his
successor Father Boland, who, I am
sure, fully intends to punch a large
hole in Father Murray's nest egg.
Today we celebrate
the re-opening of this church of Killyclogher
and we rightly rejoice in the beauty
of its restoration, but what of tomorrow?
What future lies in store for the
people of this parish? Let's not underestimate
the problem. The church in Ireland
is in dire straits at the moment,
and the clergy have accelerated its
downward slide. As one gets older
one tends to disregard the trivia
and the diversions of life and to
focus on the essentials, and the one
essential for us is the Sacrifice
of Christ on the cross, the sacrifice
which was anticipated at the Last
Supper and that is recalled and re-enacted
every day in the Mass.
Go to Mass every
Sunday, and bring your children to
Mass every Sunday and do not ask them
would they like to go to Mass any
more than you would ask them would
they like to do their homework. The
Mass is work, religious work. It takes
effort and concentration, so don't
try to sell it as entertainment. This
is the only wisdom I have to offer
you. If you go to Mass every Sunday;
if you take your children to Mass
every Sunday then this church will
continue to be a holy place and you
will be a holy people.
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