Famous folk confess all in praise of favourite priests

GEORGE Hook’s doused the fires of hell creeping around his feet by telling him sex was normal.

Alice Taylor’s was the ideal house guest, bringing a sense of peace and tranquility every time he stepped through the front door.

And Mickey Harte proved the power of prayer by leading the Tyrone senior football team in Mass just hours before they beat Kerry in the 2008 All-Ireland final.

The well-known figures all have fond stories to tell of their favourite priests and they have committed them to film as part of the In Praise of Priests project organised by the Catholic Church to mark the end of a special Year for Priests 2009-2010.

The short films, which can be seen on YouTube as well as the catholicbishops.ie website, were unveiled at All Hallows College in Dublin yesterday where Bishop Donal McKeown of Down and Connor who chairs the Council for Vocations, admitted the timing of the project might raise questions.

“There are those who find it a bizarre time to launch any material in praise of priests, in that it might well be seen as piously self-congratulatory or blindly arrogant,” he said.

“We all know lots of people – some in our own family circles – who have no time for clergy.”

However, he said, the stories captured on film showed there were many people in Ireland with great memories of priests who had influenced their lives to the good, and he said there were many more priests ready, willing and able to do likewise.

“Ireland can turn to NAMA to sort out the bad debts of the consumerist ideology that had consumed us all. It will take an awful lot more to sort out the rubbish heap of shattered dreams, lost trust and broken promises that fester in the corner of modern Ireland,” he said.

“It is precisely in a time like this that we need people who have what even secular management theory calls ‘spiritual intelligence’, that ability to take the rubble of the past and make it into foundations for the future.”

Bishop Philip Boyce, Bishop of Raphoe and chairman of the Council for Clergy, also acknowledged that the Year for Priests had been marked by many reasons for regret rather than celebration.

“The past year also saw the serious sins and crimes of some priests highlighted as well as the failure of church leaders to deal adequately with these cases. This is a source of deep shame and sorrow,” he said.

However, he added: “These revelations must not obscure the outstanding and exemplary ministry lived by priests throughout this land and beyond.”