REQUIEM FOR FATHERS KINKEAD, CRONIN, AND LEWIS

New Zealand Tablet, 20 February 1919, Page 19

REQUIEM FOR FATHERS KINKEAD, CRONIN, AND LEWIS

On Wednesday, February 12, a solemn Requiem Mass for the repose of the souls of the three Wellington priests who died during the recent epidemic was held at St. Joseph’s Church, Buckle Street. The celebrant was the Right Rev. Mgr. McKenna, Y.G. ; deacon. Rev. J. O’Ferral, S.M.; subdeacon. Rev. James Bow© (Dannevirke) • master of ceremonies, Rev. D. Hurley, S.M. His Grace Archbishop O’Shea presided, and the following clergy were in the choir :—Archdeacon Devoy, Very Rev. Deaqs Binsfeld, Power, Lane, Holley, James McKenna, and T. McKenna, the Rev. Fathers Maillard, J. Kelly, V. Kelly, W. Tymons, McLoughlin, Bowden, A. Cullen, J. Power, Saunderson, Whelan, C.SS.R., Phelan, O’Reilly, Sukra, Herring, Eccleton, O’Connor, M. Devoy, Mangan, Dwyer, Hoare, McDonnell, Arkwright, Forrestal Cashman, Duffy, Harnett, Outtrim, J Cullen, Ryan, W. Buckley, Gilbert, Quealy, Mahony, Schaeffer, Gondringer, Dignan,' Kimbell, Campbell, Langley, Hickson, Fitzgibbon, and Kelly. The Mass was beautifully rendered by St. Patrick’s students’ choir, assisted by Fathers Mahony, Fitzgibbon, Outtrim, and . Ryan, while Father Schaeffer presided at the organ. A large congregation, among whom were many of the parishioners of the deceased priests, was present. After the Mass, his Grace the Coadjutor Archbishop from, the text, “The souls of the just are in the hands of God, and the torment of death shall not touch them, . . . And though in the sight of men they suffered torments, their hope is full of immortality.” (Wisdom hi. 1-4.) delivered the following panegyric: We have been living through stirring, times during the last few ■ years. A great war —the greatest in history— has been waged, and it brought the whole civilised world within its influence. But though it went on for four and a-half years, and brought sorrow and mourning into innumerable homes, yet if we except the few countries that were actually the scene of fighting, men went their ways much as usual. Pleasure and material interest were uppermost in their thoughts. Death might be taking its heavy toll, but that was far away from most of the world’s great centres of life and business, and men were not impressed by it. Business had to go onprofits had to be made and pleasures to be indulged in. Then suddenly, when we were congratulating ourselves on the end of the war and the cessation of slaughter, death appeared in another and even more terrible form, and stood at our very doors, thousands of miles from the battle-front. God wanted to teach us the lesson that the war with all its horrors had apparently failed to teach, and to remind us of the end of things. The world was taken completely by surprise, though we could have learnt from past history and from the warnings of Holy Writ,. that war is always associated with pestilence and famine, and that they almost always follow in its train. And, as in the other places when the pestilence reached us, it found us unprepared, and to a great extent also panic-stricken. Then it was that the courage and heroism of certain souls showed forth in a most remarkable manner. Now, amongst the first to face the situation as it should be faced, were our ’ priests. Without the slightest hesitation or fear they went amongst the sick and dying—giving spiritual consolation, administering the Last Sacraments, and performing the corporal works of mercy as well. And as no class of persons was exempt from infection, many of the' priests were themselves struck down, and to-day w© are singing _ n.i.,:, -r» ; j-1 .£ i.l ..1_ „£ xi__ a Solemn Requiem for the repose in the souls of three belonging to this archdiocese, who gave their lives in the discharge of their priestly duties. Within the .space of a single week we had to mourn the loss of Fathers Thomas Kinkead, Daniel Cronin, and Michael Lewis. ; All three were young men. They .were but three out of the number who worked. amongst; the 7plague-

stricken or were stricken down themselves." God might have called others to Himself, but in His wisdom He chose Fathers. Kinkead, Cronin, and Lewis ,to receive their reward the soonest. I think, that there is a special heroism in the priests who worked so nobly and who laid down their lives in the recent epidemic. This diocese had already sent, several priests to the front as chaplains. All did well, arid we have had to mourn the death in action or from wounds of two splendid men Fathers McMenamin and Dore. But. the chaplain at the front who ministers amid shot and shell to the soldiers under his care is surrounded even in the eyes of the world with a certain halo. The applause of men, the gratitude of his boys, and of the relatives of those whom he may have attended in their last moments, all this brings comfort to his soul and is a reward even here below. And if he falls, as our priests have fallen, he is already acclaimed by the world not only a hero but a martyr.

But the priest at home, following his daily routine of duties, earns no such applause, though his work may be hard and monotonous, and though he may be ready when the occasion comes to face dangers more insidious than those of the battlefields, and lay down his life as these noble priests whom we honor to-day have done. These men worked as all good priests work, not for this world nor for its applause, but for a Master Who sees all things, even their secret motives, and Who will reward with "rewards far beyond the wildestdreams of imagination. Fathers Cronin, Kinkead, and Lewis were typical specimens of the priests of the Catholic Church whom so many in the world misunderstand and misrepresent. They are the kind of men who are so often accused of standing between the soul and its Creator, and of preventing its free intercourse with God. Those who say these things, whether they be ignorant or dishonest, ignore the fact that Christ made His priests an essential part of His Church, which He established for the salvation of souls. They ignore* the fact that the Sacraments, especially at the hour of death, are the Catholics' most priceless and longed-for treasures, and that you cannot; have the Sacraments without priests. All these things they forget or ignore, and they look upon the priest merely as an intriguer or an organiser of men for their own profit or for the injury of other sections of the community. They praise, or .rather they fear, the Church's wonderful organisation, which, they assert, extends even to the political field and to the world of business. Little do they know that the Church's chief strength and its unity of action, in certain occasions especially, comes not from organisation as the world understands it, but from the Catholic faith and the Catholic intuition, which instinctively, and without any direction from the clergy at all, knows for certain what course to take in every great crisis. It comes from the ever-abiding presence of the Holy Ghost, Who is with the laity as well as with the clergy, guiding them and directing them as a body to fulfil God's purposes in everything.

This is, then, the secret of that wonderful union which exists between Catholics and their priests all the world over. This is why Catholics, even those who have been careless for years, cry out for the priest and his ministrations whenever there is danger. And this is the reason, also, why the Catholic priest will go where for his people, and will face death itself without the slightest hesitation in order to minister to them. This is why the priest gives up home and cuts himself loose from all ties of family or kindred, that he may be able to devote himself entirely to the service of his people. This is why he has to go through a long and severe training to fit him for the life of constant sacrifice and self-denial that will be his after his ordination. And though the good priest may have his consolations and encouragements they are not such as the world gives, or such as the man of the world looks for, and perhaps requires. No doubt there is human solace in the esteem and gratitude of his people, who know his worth and his work, but even this is too often withheld from the life of the priest. God

however, sees his life and his work and will reward him as He alone knows how. -•■•■ -•

Now, as I have said, the three priests whose loss we mourn to-day, were typical . specimens of the ordinary priest of God. Two of them had labored for eight years in different positions in the archdiocese; one had just recently been ordained. They did their work, wherever they were placed, quietly and conscientiously. They made no stir in the great world around them. Their names were scarcely ever before the public in the daily prints. They never sought cheap advertisement nor the passing praise .of men. They attended to their spiritual work and to their priestly duties. They said their Mass, they baptised, they absolved, they dispensed the Bread of Life, they preached and instructed their people and the little ones in the saving truths of Christ. All these things may seem, ordinary and commonplace to the world, but in the sight of God how far from commonplace they were. Just try and imagine the number of graces that must have flowed into souls through their ministry during the short years that they exercised it. Think of the numbers to whom the merits of the Precious Blood were applied. Think of the sins washed away and of the souls made resplendent with sanctifying grace and objects of beauty in the sight of God and His angels. Can you imagine anything more sublime than these things ? Yet such were the things these men were constantly doing while they ministered as priests -of God. And if to help towards the salvation of even one soul is worth more than all human achievement estimate, if you can, what Fathers Kinkead, Cronin, and Lewis must have accomplished during their lives as priests. And when the occasion came, they who had always done their work quietly, rose nobly to it and displayed a heroism and an utter disregard of death that is characteristic of every true priest. They worked amongst their stricken" people until they themselves went down, and it pleased God to call them to Himself.

And so they died, and in this archdiocese another bright page has been added to the long record of noble heroism on the part of the Catholic priesthood. Their deaths, within one short week of each other, have been a severe loss to the archdiocese, especially at the prsent time, but their heroic self-sacrifice will bring down many a blessing upon all. The people among whom they labored and for whom they gave their lives will bless their memory and remember their souls before the Throne of God. And, while you thank God that He has vouchsafed to givp the Church in this young Dominion such noble priests, be more than ever resolved that you will always profit by their teaching and example. Pray for your dead priests, that they may all the sooner enter into the fulness of their reward. Pray for your living priests, that they may obtain from the Most High every grace to enable them to emulate the deeds of their devoted confreres who have passed hence, and every grace to discharge wisely as well as fearlessly the duties of their sublime office, and thus be the means of bringing salvation to -countless souls. And, as the hope of these good priests was "full of immortality," so, also, may ours be, when God calls us to go before Him. "Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them."

The devotion—or worship, as we say in our Old English speech—to the Blessed Virgin which the Catholic Church teaches to her children, may be best defined in these words: it is the love and veneration which was paid to her by her Diving Son and His disciples, and such as we should have borne to her if we had been on earth -with them : and it is also the love and veneration we shall bear to her next after her Divine Son when, through grace, we see Him. in His kingdom. Cardinal Manning. .' -