St Declan’s marks 50th birthday

St Declan’s School celebrated its 50th birthday on 27 September, with past and present students and their families filling Haddington Road church for a Mass celebrated by Jesuit Provincial John Dardis. In 1958, Fr Dermot Casey, a Jesuit psychologist, raised £4000 to buy 35 Northumberland Road, in Dublin 4. He needed a place to cater for children of normal intelligence who could not cope with mainstream primary school for a variety of reasons, such as what we would now call Asbergers Syndrome, ADHD, Dyslexia, Dyspraxia and other conditions. The good fruits of his efforts were manifest at the celebration – never more than when two past students, Sian and Brendan, spoke about what St Declan’s had done for them. Click on ‘Read more’ for the text of Brendan’s address. Read more »

Coláiste Iognáid welcomes government funding

Staff, students, parents, Jesuits and the Board of Management of Coláiste Iognáid have given a warm welcome to the news that the Department of Education will provide the funding for them to proceed with a substantial extension to the school.  This means that the school will for the first time have its own front entrance on Sea Road, through the Andrews building. Ten new classrooms will be built, as well as a new domestic science room. A pastoral area, sports hall, staff room, changing rooms, admin block, and meeting rooms will all form part of the new building.

Slí Eile present cheque to Irish charity

Slí Eile director Padraig Swan presented a cheque for €45,000 to John Clarke of Friends in Ireland on 27 September in the Belvedere Hotel. The money was raised by students from five Jesuit Colleges (plus Terenure College) for the construction of an orphan house in Kokstad, a South African township. Teams of students from these schools also went out to South Africa over the summer to help build the house. Slí Eile partner with Friends in Ireland, a charity run by Marian Finucane and John Clark which identifies and responds to the community needs in local areas in the Eastern Cape, South Africa.

Pioneers keep ploughing away with young people

The Pioneer Association made its presence felt at the National Ploughing Championships, which was held in Cuffesgrange, Kilkenny, and drew a record crowd of 210,000 people over three days. One of the hundreds of organisations which exhibited at the event, the Pioneers received a good deal of verbal support for their mission from the public, many of these expressing their concern at the culture of alcohol abuse in our society. Particularly noteworthy was the number of adolescent members who stopped by. Having committed themselves to abstaining from alcohol until the age of eighteen, they offer a sign of hope for the future.

Clongowes for Kairos

Clongowes Wood College was the venue for not one but two Kairos retreats running in parallel last weekend, 25-28 September. Under the direction of Mary Maume, Peter Sexton SJ and Conor Harper SJ, Clongowes had over 30 Fifth years doing the retreat. They were joined by a group of eight boys from St. Colman’s College, Newry, who are also trying to start their own retreat. Meanwhile next door was the Gonzaga retreat, run by Danny McNelis and Kennedy O’Brien SJ, and they were joined by a group from the Crescent College, Limerick, under the guidance of Dermot Murray SJ and Dermot Cowhey.

Street evangelisation

Fr Charlie Davy SJ, having signed up for a one-day course on evangelisation. was disconcerted to find that it included a bit of practice. He went on to the Galway streets for an hour, and, as instructed, accosted people: who seemed to be at leisure:Would you like to hear some good news? If they said Yes, Charlie followed up with: God loves you. Is that something you have experienced? The responses varied from strong No to strong Yes through reflections on where they stood on religion. Charlie reflected: “I found it hard accosting strangers and proposing faith in a direct way, but I felt it had its place and raised useful questions.”

Ignatian Formation in Jesuit Colleges

Brian Flannery, the Education Delegate for the Irish Jesuit province, hosted a meeting 29-30 September for those involved in Ignatian Formation in the Jesuit Colleges. Attendees were: Helen Barden (Belvedere), Danny McNelis (Gonzaga), Frank Clarke (Clongowes), and Brendan McManus SJ (Galway). Each gave an outline of what their school did by way of induction and formation of new and existing staff. They also worked on sharing programme outlines and resource materials and they brainstormed new ideas for Ignatian staff formation.

Paddy Lavery SJ: a special jubilee

Among the many personal jubilees celebrated in the Irish Jesuit province this year, Paddy Lavery’s (60 years a Jesuit) had a special flavour. His Clongowes brethren gathered round him in Cherryfield where he has lived since 1993, and pictured him holding the Schools Junior rugby cup (Clongowes won it this year): a poignant reminder of the chalice of suffering which Paddy has offered the Lord all these years.

Short Notices

• Fr Brendan Comerford SJ (photo right) will give his popular 4-week Scripture course, an introduction to the Gospels (taking one Gospel each night), from 7.30 to 9.30 on Tuesday evenings from 14 October to 4 November inclusive: in the Fr John Sullivan Room, Gardiner St Church; in conjunction with Iona Rd Parish. No booking required – come along on the first evening. Donation for course: €20.
• Seamus Murphy SJ had a terse and punchy letter in the Irish Times, 30 September, refuting the accusation that the Catholic Church has always been hostile to science.
• Transition Year students (15/16 years old) from Clongowes Wood College will be providing TEFL tuition (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) to interested residents of Eyre Powell Hotel, a Reception Centre for asylum seekers in Newbridge, Co. Kildare. This follows on from a successful pilot-programme last year.