Tribute to Father Patrick Cleary

Tu Tangata, Issue 26, 1 October 1985, Page 45

Tribute to Father Patrick Cleary

A Tu Tangata reader has written to congratulate staff on the article on Cy McLaughlin in the June/July issue of Tu Tangata.

Bert Turner of Foxton believes Cy McLaughlin should be given official recognition as an ambassador of maoridom. And he draws attention to a Maori Missioner, Father Patrick Cleary who died in June in Palmerston North hospital.

“I was in Palmerston North hospital recently for ten days in the same Ward as Father Cleary. He was I consider the most popular patient in the hospital. He suffered extensively from a car accident. He was never without a smile, although seriously injured with broken ribs etc bladder and kidney injuries. There were groups of Maori visiting daily. His area was covered with cards as well as flowers and gifts.

We talked for hours daily on maoridom and he knew most of my wife's cousins.

I gained much friendship with the visitors, as I met so many of them. They knew people who my wife and I knew.”

The following is a poroporoaki for Father Cleary: June 4, 1985 Father Patrick Cleary, a Catholic priest who had spent 44 years working in Maori communities, died in Palmerston North on Sunday 2nd June. Father Cleary, 69, had been based in Porirua since 1977 and was to have returned to his Cannons Creek mission, Tu Hono. He had been recuperating in Palmerston North after complications following injuries suffered in a minor motor accident on his way home from Te Puke at Easter.

Father Cleary was educated at St Patrick's College, both Wellington and Silverstream, and was ordained in December 1941 in Hawke’s Bay.

He worked at Maori missions in Jerusalem (Wanganui), Meeanee (Hawke's Bay), Normanby, Highden (Rangitikei), Pakipaki (Hawke's Bay), Wellington and Porirua.

He was editor of “Whiti Ora,” a Catholic Maori publication, and had been director of the Maori Mission League since 1957.