Subfonds 537 - Fr Michael Gerard O'Brien SJ

Born: 29 September 1927, Market Square, Kilrush, County Clare
Entered: 07 September 1945, St Mary's, Emo, County Laois
Ordained: 31 July 1959, Milltown Park, Dublin
Final Vows: 02 February 1963, Chiesa del Gesù, Rome, Italy
Died: 19 December 1997, St Joseph’s, Shankill, County Dublin

Part of the Sacred Heart, Limerick community at the time of death.

Father was a business man.

Elder of two boys.

Educated at Christian Brothers Primary and Secondary Schools in Kilrush for eight years, he then went to Mungret College SJ for two years.

by 1962 at Rome, Italy (ROM) studying
by 1964 at Heythrop College, Oxford (ANG) teaching
by 1979 at Mount Street, London England (ANG) working

◆ Interfuse

Interfuse No 97 : Special Edition Summer 1998

Obituary

Fr Michael G O’Brien (1927-1997)

29th Sept. 1927: Born in Kilrush, Co. Clare
Early education: Christian Brothers and Mungret College
7th Sept. 1945: Entered the Society at Emo
12th March 1948: First Vows at Emo
1947 - 1950: Rathfarnham, Arts at UCD
1950 - 1953: Tullabeg, Studied Philosophy
1953 - 1956: Mungret College, Teaching
1956 - 1960: Milltown Park, Studied Theology
31st July 1959: Ordained Priest at Milltown Park
1960 - 1961: Rathfarnham, Tertianship
1961 - 1963: Gregorian University, studied Ethics
1963 - 1967: Heythrop College, Lecturing in Ethics
1967 - 1970: Milltown Park, Lecturing in Ethics/Moral Theology
1970 - 1974: Mungret College, Teaching
1974 - 1978: Tullabeg, Retreats/work in Church
1978 - 1993: London, Farm Street Church work
1993 - 1997: Limerick, Sacred Heart Church work.
19th Dec. 1997; Died aged 70.

Michael was first admitted to Cherryfield Lodge in March 1996 following surgery. He was again admitted to Cherryfield in January 1997 in a confused and restless state. He was assessed by Doctor Cooney at St. Vincent's Hospital and diagnosed as suffering from a severe from of dementia. He was transferred to Crinken Nursing Home in July 1997, where he died peacefully on 19th December 1997. May he rest in the peace of Christ.

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them” (Ephes 2, 10).

This text of St. Paul came to mind as I reflected on the strange contrast between Michael's early life as a professor of philosophy for seven short years (Heythrop 63 - 67 and Milltown Park 67 - 70) and the nineteen years of his later life as a dedicated Church-father first in Tullabeg (74 - 78) and later in Farm Street (78 - 93). His Jesuit superiors had judged him capable of teaching philosophy and presumably saw this as his life work as a Jesuit. But "we are God's workmanship" and God had other plans for Michael, After only seven years of faithful but stressful teaching, and after a dark-night of depression, God transformed him into the “Wounded Healer” who exercised such a fruitful ministry for four short years in Tullabeg and then for fifteen years in Farm Street. His apparent failure as a professor of philosophy must be seen as God's tempering of his chosen instrument: “Designer infinite - must Thou char the wood ere Thou canst limn with it?” In the dark hours of his depression Michael must have heard Christ's words to St. Paul addressed to him: “My grace is enough for you, for my power works best in weakness”, and with St. Paul he must have found the grace to reply: “gladly therefore will I rejoice in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest on me”.

There is convincing proof that Michael did have considerable academic ability. Joseph de Finance S.J. was the director of his doctoral studies in the Gregorianum (61 - 63). De Finance was the highly regarded Professor of ethics in the Gregorian University for twenty five years. In 1991 Michael presented to the Milltown library an autographed copy of his translation of de Finance's final work entitled: “An Ethical Enquiry”. This is a large volume of five hundred closely reasoned pages. In a prefatory note to the translation de Finance expresses “his deep gratitude to Fr. Michael O'Brien, SJ whose translation, faithful but not slavish, is marked by a concrete, figurative style which gives easier access to the ideas. Thus he has achieved his purpose which is and must be first of all service to the student”.

From this commendation of his director we can legitimately conclude that Michael was well equipped to teach the course of ethics assigned to him. If he proved less than successful as a teacher of ethics in Heythrop and Milltown the reason can be found in the academic turbulence that followed the conclusion of Vatican II. By now Thomistic Philosophy had lost its pride of place even in seminary schools and the “philosophia perennis” had lost its perennial vigour. In the academic supermarket it had passed its 'sell-by' date!

Michael as a product of an older tradition would have still seen philosophy (especially ethics) as the “Handmaid of Theology” - but the handmaid had become restive and even insubordinate since John 23rd had encouraged a more open dialogue with the modern world. Had Michael begun his teaching twenty or even ten years earlier I feel he might well have been a respected and successful professor.

The controversy that followed on Paul VI's Humanae Vitae with its forthright condemnation of contraception, must have made Michael's work as a regular preacher and confessor more difficult. Joseph Fuchs, Professor of Moral Theology in the Gregorian, and Jim Healy and others in Ireland had advocated a more liberal approach and felt that “legitimate dissent” was justified. Michael, on the other hand, regarded fidelity to the teaching of the Magisterium as the very touchstone of orthodoxy. He always remained a totally committed defender of the papal decisions. In his work as a preacher and confessor he must have helped wavering penitents to remain faithful to that decision even if he must also have had to share the pain of others who found the official teaching a burden too heavy to bear.

For the people of the midlands who came to him in the old church at Tullabeg as for the Londoners who came to him at Farm Street, Michael was a good shepherd and a wounded healer. Again and again they pay tribute to his gentleness, his unassuming friendly manner, and his being a good listener. He was like the Servant in the prophecy of Isaiah (50): “The Lord had given him the tongue of those who are taught that he might know how to sustain with a word him that is weary” and “had woken his ear to hear the cry of the broken-hearted”. Again like the servant he was open-hearted in his welcome for the prodigal son or daughter: “the bruised reed he would not break and the dimly burning wick he would not quench”.

To quote a few of the testimonies from grateful parishioners received by his rector after his death:
“Ten years ago my life was in a mess. Fr, O'Brien helped me to rebuild my life”. A lady from East Anglia told of his kindness to her husband who suffered from Alzheimer's for many years. A man spoke of his patient attention to his wife during her long illness and how she always felt the better of his visits. A teacher who used to prepare children for their First Communion recalled his lovely way with the children who used to look forward to his visits.

Michael was admitted to Cherryfield in January 1997 in a confused and restless state. I joined him on many walks by the Dodder or to Palmerstown or Marley Park. He showed little interest in what attracted my attention - the trees, the flowers, the ducks in the river. His interest was in the people we met, always ready to say a friendly word and get into conversation if possible. He wanted to help people. He had told me he used to spend his free days from Farm Street, in one or other of the London Parks. Though he was naturally rather shy and reserved he seemed to have developed an apostolate of friendly affability towards strangers, winning their confidence and lending them “a listening ear”. I feel sure that many of Michael's walks in the London Parks became “Emmaus Walks” when he “sustained with a word the weary or the lonely”.

I visited Michael often in his last months in St. Joseph's, Crinken. There was a profound pathos in the sensitive concern he still showed towards fellow patients only a little more in need of healing than himself. The severe form of dementia that had been diagnosed in the summer had progressively withdrawn him from normal human contact. Now Michael was finally “in the hands of God” - “the initiative was totally with God”, for he was, in the beautiful Irish expression, a “Duine le Dia” - a person plunged into the mystery of Christ's death and resurrection but like the baptised infant unaware of his life hidden with Christ in God.

He was not able to share “the deeply spiritual experience to know oneself completely in His hands” that Fr. Arrupe spoke of. But in these last mysterious weeks of Michael's life the Divine Artist was putting the final touches to the masterwork which he had begun at Michael's baptism in the church in Kilrush seventy years before.

May he rest in peace.

Edward Fitzgerald, SJ

-oOo-

During his fifteen years on the church staff at Farm Street, Michael O'Brien was loved and respected by many people for his approachability and evident care of them, his prayerfulness and regularity in the church, and his humorous homely anecdotes which were a feature of his straightforward and direct sermons. He was prepared to put himself out for people, and they sensed it. Our non-Catholic doctor spoke warmly of the many visits Michael paid some years ago to his elderly mother in St. George's Hospital before she died. Michael was very regular in his habits and that meant people in need could easily contact him. Often in the church or its environs saying his Rosary. Regularly at the church door to greet people after every Sunday Mass or Holy Day of Obligation, but standing back very modestly when the Parish Priest was around. Michael had a deep affection for the poor. It was very hard for him not to give. He gave not only money (perhaps unwisely at times) but also his time and his attention, sometimes at risk to his own safety.

Throughout my years as Superior and Parish Priest I found Michael a great and dependable support, and a wise and good friend. Farm Street was a residence made into a small parish only in the 1960's. Few Catholics actually lived within the rather grand parish boundaries. Most of the congregation, regular or casual, came from outside, and many more were tourists staying in the twenty or so prestigious hotels in Mayfair. But Michael tried to make Farm Street as much a parish as possible, organising First Communions and confirmations, catechism classes, old people's functions, days of prayer and other devotions. Much of this was for the less affluent residents, such as the families of Indian or Philippino caretakers or hotel workers, quite a few of whom were Irish and warmed to him in a special way. But Michael was blinded as far as class or nation or prestige went. All were just people to be served with respect and devotion.

Michael means a lot to me personally because it can be said that he was instrumental in saving my life, or saving me from serious injury, by happening to be in a certain spot in place of me. I was taking my turn as “duty priest” (to be called to the door on request), but had just left for the church to prepare to say the mid-day Mass. So Michael was called to the door in my place. A deranged man stabbed him in the neck. He was saved from fatal injury by his old-fashioned clerical collar. My new-fangled strip of plastic wouldn't have done the job. Michael was obviously very shaken by the incident and had several weeks of convalescence after he came out of hospital. But he remained very matter-of-fact and modest about it all.

For all his gentleness, devotion to duty and sensitive concerns for others, there was a shadow side to Michael. He suffered from scruples, especially in sexual matters. He agonised about the confessional, while being meticulous about his duties there. I think it was because of this scrupulosity that he had to give up lecturing in Ethics some years before, which was the reason for his coming to us, a welcome acquisition to Farm Street. In my time as Parish Priest he suffered from debilitating bouts of scruplosity which led to a breakdown, hearing inner voices, having to be withdrawn for several months from pastoral work of any kind and only gradually and with great care being nursed back to assisting with Holy Communion, then to saying Mass, then even to being able to preach and hear confessions again. This must have been very humbling for a man to whom priestly ministry meant so much, Incidentally, I was very impressed with the care Phil Harnett showed at this time when he visited us in his capacity of Irish Provincial and very sensitively arranged for Michael's eventual return to Ireland, but without rush or fuss, sensibly planned and monitored, respecting Michael's dignity as a Jesuit, as a priest. Michael deserved no less for the many years he had given to Farm Street.

Anthony Nye, SJ