Memories of my eldest brother, Stephen Comerford, who died a week before Christmas, 55 years ago

Stephen Edward Comerford, born on 22 August 1946, died 55 years ago on 18 December 1970

Patrick Comerford

Tomorrow (18 December) marks the fifty-fifth anniversary of the death of my eldest brother, Stephen Edward Comerford, who died in Durham, North Carolina, at the age of 24 on 18 December 1970.

Now that I am in my mid-70s, five or six years is hardly an age gap between people of my generation. But they mark a major chasm when you are a child, and that gap was compounded by the fact that he was the eldest child in the family and I was the fourth of six.

Steve was born in Dublin on 22 August 1946. He was named after our father, Stephen Edward Comerford (1918-2004), who in turn was named after our grandfather, also named Stephen Edward Comerford (1867-1921). The name Stephen had come into the Bunclody branch of the family because our grandfather was born on 28 December, three days after Christmas Day and two days after Saint Stephen’s Day.

As small children, we were all separated, going to different members and friends of the extended family: Steve was packed off to our grandmother Maria (Crowley) Murphy (1882-1957) and aunt Margaret (Murphy) Barrett (1920-2014) in Millstreet, Co Cork, while I went to George and Peggy Kerr in Dublin and the extended Hallinan family in Cappoquin, Co Waterford.

The accent Steve acquired in Millstreet brought him the nickname ‘Corky’ in his primary school when he returned to Dublin. By the time I was going to primary school, he was already at boarding school.

The Wexford historian Brendan Culliton, later the President of both the Wexford Historical Society and Wexford Wanderers Rugby Club, has remembered him as his friend throughout their shared years in primary school. ‘We were two of the ‘brainboxes’,’ he recalled some years ago. ‘In those days, we were two to a desk and I had the privilege of sharing a desk with Stephen for the whole of that year.’

He told me, ‘Stephen was very well read and was a pleasure to sit beside. He was one of the quieter members of the class, but I can remember the interesting chats we had on every subject under the sun. Before Christmas that year, we had shared what present we hoped to get. I am sure my interests at the time didn’t move far from Meccano and Just William. Stephen told me he had asked for books on history. That struck me as a bit odd, but if that was what he wanted, then that was him.

‘After Christmas, he brought in two bound copies of Carty’s History of Ireland to show me. I remember the covers were green, and plain. Other classmates would have been dismissive of books like these as a ‘Christmas present’. What, after all, was wrong with Dan Dare or Billy Bunter? But what struck me most was that Stephen was thrilled to show off these treasures. He was genuinely happy and, to me that was the important thing.’

Brendan Culliton was a year younger and stayed back a year. ‘So, when I went to Gormanston, Stephen was a year ahead of me. He was also in a different Clann / House, so our paths didn’t cross that often. However, when we did meet, a short greeting was never enough. I always recall there being real substance to the conversation.’

Stephen and I both went to Gormanston, but the five- or six-year gap was so wide that by the time I arrived, although there were teachers who remembered him, no-one in my year had ever come across him. We are also in different houses or clanns, and so any memories were few and rarely shared.

Yet, he was remembered for his achievements in maths and sciences, his fluency in the Irish language, and for his interests in chess, swimming and, to a lesser degree, golf. He taught himself the harmonica, and I remember his efforts to teach me to play chess – a pleasure that remains. But our academic and sporting interests seldom overlapped.

While I was at Gormanston, he was studying at University College Galway and at University College Dublin. When Brendan Culliton arrived in UCD, he recalled, they ‘encountered each other now and then around Earlsfort Terrace and, when we did, it was always cause for surprisingly lengthy conversations … There is no question that he was very intelligent and hugely talented. He was also genuine and sincere.’

By the time I left Gormanston in 1969, Stephen had completed his BSc and MSc degrees. We spent some time together that summer, sometimes going for meals together in Rathmines. I remember how we sat up together to watch the first moon landing on the night of 20 July 1969.

But by then he was moving to the US and Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, where he was a PhD candidate. I cannot recall that we ever met again. I was training to be a chartered surveyor with Jones Lang Wootton and working on a BSc in estate management with the College of Estate Management, then part of the University of Reading.

A colleague from his post-graduate days in Duke spoke of Stephen as ‘unfailingly courteous, and inclined to dress in jacket and tie … He gave the dining room a touch of class … dressed to the nines and carrying a rolled up umbrella.’ Perhaps he had retained a hint of that Cork accent he picked up in Millstreet as a child. ‘ We all had accents, but Stephen’s was a delight.’

He died on 18 December 1970, aged 24, and is buried in Maplewood Cemetery, Durham, North Carolina. The news of his death came in a chilling ’phone call in the middle of the night, seven days before Christmas, just days after my father’s birthday. Steve’s wrapped Christmas presents for his parents and each of his brothers and sisters arrived in the post a few days later, but by then the Christmas tree and the decorations had come down, and the Christmas lights had been switched off. It seems Christmas was cancelled that year.

The depths of a mother’s grief are unfathomable, I never fully understood or appreciated the ways my parents continued to suffer ever after, and at the time I never found ways to explain to friends and colleagues how I felt.

Brendan Culliton told me five years ago that when he heard of Stephen’s death it ‘was sad news then. It’s still sad news today.’

The Annals of Irish Mathematics and Mathematicians includes his name in the Gallery of Irish Mathematicians. He would have been 80 at his next birthday on 22 August 2026.

May his memory be a blessing ז״ל

A Christmas-time photograph of Steve visiting Santa as a child

Saint John Henry Newman, the new Doctor of the Church, is remembered in Oxford, Dublin and in Calverton

The bust of John Henry Newman in the Newman University Church in Dublin is by the sculptor Thomas Farrell (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

John Henry Newman is to be declared a Doctor of the Church, Pope Leo has announced in recent days. He is the 38th Doctor of the Church recognised by the Vatican, and the third to be associated with England, after the Venerable Bede and Saint Anselm of Canterbury.

John Henry Newman (1801-1890) is celebrated in the calendar of the Church of England today (11 August), the anniversary of his death in 1890, but in the Roman Catholic Church on 9 October, the anniversary of his reception into that Church in 1845.

Newman was one of the most influential figures in Church life in both England and Ireland in the 19th century. He is remembered in England as the most prominent member of the Oxford Movement, reconnecting Anglicanism with its Catholic roots and heritage, and in Ireland as the founding rector of the newly-formed Catholic University of Ireland in 1854. He was also the founding figure in the Newman University Church which built on Saint Stephen’s Green, Dublin, in 1855-1856.

John Henry Newman was born at 80 Old Broad Street on 21 February 1801 and was baptised in Saint Benet Fink on 9 April 1801 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Newman was canonised a saint in Rome six years ago [13 October 2019], and was beatified 15 years ago on 19 September 2010 by Pope Benedict XVI during his four-day visit to England.

The future Cardinal John Henry Newman was born at 80 Old Broad Street, London, on 21 February 1801 and was baptised in Saint Benet Fink Church on 9 April 1801. At an early stage in life he was seen as evangelical background in the Church of England. He studied at Trinity College Oxford, and became a Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford, in 1822. He was ordained deacon in Christ Church, Oxford, in 1824, priest in 1825.

Newman remained a fellow of Oriel College from 1822 to 1845. During those years he was also the college chaplain (1826-1831, 1833-1835) and Vicar of the University Church of Saint Mary the Virgin (1828-1843).

Tom Tower and the Quad at Christ Church, Oxford, where Newman was ordained (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Newman went on a holiday in Italy in 1832 with his friend Richard Hurrell Froude (1801-1836) of Oriel College and his father. He left them in Rome as he travelled on to Sicily, but there he became gravely ill with a fever. When he recovered, the weather delayed his return to England and he was forced to stay on board his ship for a further three weeks.

During those weeks, he wrote one of his best-known and best-loved poems and hymns, ‘Lead, kindly light, amid the encircling gloom’. The poem expresses his sense of complete uncertainty and disorientation, and reveals his sense of groping in the darkness, pleading with God to lead and guide him.

The University Church of Saint Mary, where Newman was Vicar during his days in Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

On the Sunday he returned to Oxford, 14 July 1833, Newman heard John Keble (1792-1866), Professor of Poetry at Oxford, preach his famous ‘Assize Sermon’ in Newman’s own church, the University Church of Saint Mary the Virgin.

Keble’s sermon was an attack on state interference in church affairs, prompted by government moves to reform the diocesan structures of the Church of Ireland, and is now regarded as the beginning of the Oxford Movement.

Newman became the driving force behind the Oxford Movement, alongside Keble and Edward Bouverie Pusey (1800-1882), and Oriel is pre-eminently the college of the Oxford Movement, the first phase of which lasted from 1833-1845. Its proponents produced the Tracts for the Times, a series of 90 tracts that gave them the name ‘Tractarians’, and Newman wrote 27 of the tracts.

Besides Newman, Keble and Pusey, other figures of the movement associated with Oriel included Robert Wilberforce (1802-1857), Richard Hurrell Froude (1803-36), GA Denison (1805-1896), Thomas Mozley (1806-1893), Charles Marriott (1811-1858) and RW Church (1815-1890). Richard Whately (1787-1863) was a fellow of Oriel (1811-1821) and Drummond Professor of Political Economy in Oxford (1830-1831) before becoming Archbishop of Dublin (1831-1863).

Oriel College is pre-eminently the college of the first phase of the Oxford Movement (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Many of the Tractarians met in the Rectory in Calverton, near Stony Stratford, including Newman, Pusey, and Edward Manning, and some of the Tracts for the Times were planned if not written at Calverton. At the time, the Revd the Hon Charles George Perceval (1796-1858) was the Rector of Calverton. He was of Irish descent, a devout High Churchman and a supporter of the Tractarians. He came to Calverton in 1821 at the relatively young age of 24, and was a younger brother of George Perceval (1794-1874), who became the 6th Earl of Egmont in 1841.

Meanwhile, Newman was gaining a reputation as a poet and his edited collection, Lyra Apostolica, including ‘Lead, kindly light’, was published in 1836.

In a seminal exposition of Anglicanism in his Prophetical Office of the Church (1837), Newman maintained that the essential points of Anglicanism are its doctrine, its sacramental system and its legitimate claims to be the Catholic Church in England. However, he reached a turning point in 1841 with Tract 90, in which he tried to reconcile the 39 Articles with the decrees of the Council of Trent and the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.

Newman was censured by the university and was silenced by the Bishop of Oxford. He resigned from Saint Mary’s in 1843, and after considerable hesitation became a Roman Catholic and was received into the Roman Catholic Church by Dominic Barbieri on 9 October 1845.

He defended this decision in his Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. Five years later, the Roman Catholic hierarchy was officially founded in England and Wales. Newman founded the Oratory of Saint Philip Neri in Birmingham, and remained at the Oratory in Birmingham for the rest of his life – apart from a few short years in Dublin.

At the time of Newman’s move, Roman Catholicism in England was going through a traumatic transition. Until the early 19th century, it was dominated by the old landed recusant families – the sort of families who would later figure in Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisted. But it was changing with the increasing influx of poor Irish immigrants, and Birmingham became the heart of the Irish slums in the English Midlands.

Newman House, where Newman was Rector of the Catholic University of Ireland, and Newman University Church on Saint Stephen’s Green, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

In 1854, Newman moved to Dublin, and for four years he was rector of the newly-founded but short-lived Catholic University of Ireland. His plans for a university were frustrated, yet his stay in Ireland saw him publish his The Idea of a University.

Newman lived at Mount Salus in Dalkey during the autumn of 1854 while he was establishing the Catholic University in Dublin. He wrote, ‘Tastes so differ that I do not like to talk, but I think this is one of the most beautiful places I ever saw.’

His college chapel survives as Newman University Church on Saint Stephen’s Green, beside Newman House, the Department of Foreign Affairs at Iveagh House, and the former sites of the Methodist Centenary Church and Wesley College.

The University Church was designed by John Hungerford Pollen, who was invited to Dublin by Newman as Professor of Fine Art. Newman rejected Pugin’s Gothic style, seeing in it echoes of the pagan forests of Northern Europe; but he also associated the classical style with his Anglican past and Greek and Roman paganism. And so, he favoured the Byzantine style for his university church.

Pollen’s design is the only successful Byzantine-style church in Ireland, and shows the influence of John Ruskin’s Stones of Venice.

Newman House on Saint Stephen’s Green now houses the Museum of Literature Ireland and backs onto the Iveagh Gardens.

Newman University Church, Saint Stephen’s Green, Dublin … celebrating John Henry Newman today (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Practical organisation was not among Newman’s gifts, and after four unhappy years in Dublin he returned to Birmingham. Little did he know that his efforts to establish a university in Ireland would eventually bear fruit in University College Dublin. The Literary and Historical Society (L&H), which he founded, remains one of the best-known university debating societies in Ireland.

Back in England, a controversy in 1863 and 1864 involving the Anglican social reformer, Charles Kingsley, led Newman to publish his Apologia pro Vita Sua, earning his place as one the greatest Catholic minds of his time. His other great works include The Dream of Gerontius (1865) and the Grammar of Assent (1870).

Newman was not uncritical of his new Church. His opposition to the Pope’s retention of temporal powers led to a breach in his friendship with Cardinal Manning (1801-1892), another former evangelical Anglican and subsequent Tractarian who had been Archdeacon of Chichester and then became Archbishop of Westminster in 1865 and a cardinal in 1875.

Yet Newman retained many Anglican friends throughout his life, including Richard Church, Dean of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London, and a nephew of Sir Richard Church, the Cork-born liberator of Greece. He read Anthony Trollope’s Barchester Towers on the recommendation of Pollen. When Newman heard of Kinglsley’s death he acknowledged Kingsley’s role in prompting his Apologia, his defence of the Athanasian Creed, and how he had preached kindly about Newman in Chester Cathedral, and added: ‘I said Mass for his soul as soon as I heard of his death.’

A copy of the portrait of Newman as a cardinal, by Sir John Everett Milais, in Newman University Church, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Although never a bishop, Newman was made a cardinal by Pope Leo XIII in 1879 at the suggestion of the Duke of Norfolk. He chose as his motto Cor ad Cor Loquitor, ‘Heart Speaks to Heart’.

When he died on 27 February 1891, Newman was buried in Rednall Hill, Birmingham, in the same grave as his lifelong friend, Ambrose St John, who lived with Newman as his companion for 32 years. To thwart attempts to make a cult of his remains, Newman ordered that he should be buried in a rich compost so that his corpse would decompose rapidly. When his body was exhumed some years ago in an attempt to retrieve relics, nothing was found except the brass plate and handles of his coffin.

Was Newman a pious Anglo-Catholic who prefigured those Anglican priests who moved to Rome in recent years?

Or was he essentially an Anglican who continued to resist Papal encroachments on the Church and on the conscience of the individual?

What has been called the ‘battle for Newman’s legacy’ took on a new intensity at the time of his beatification with John Cornwell’s book, Newman’s Unquiet Grave: the reluctant saint.

Pope Benedict once claimed that Newman was a faithful supporter of the papal magesterium and pontifical dogmas on many issues, and was an opponent of Catholic dissent. However, John Cornwell portrayed Newman as a dissident when it came to papal authority, infallibility, the downgrading of the laity and the primacy of papal dogma over individual conscience.

‘I shall drink to the Pope if you please,’ Newman once wrote, ‘… still to conscience first and the Pope afterwards.’ He once wrote of the ageing Pope Pius IX: ‘He becomes a god, has no one to contradict him, does not know fact, and does cruel things without meaning it.’

Newman’s hymns include ‘Praise to the Holiest in the height’ and ‘Firmly I Believe’, both from his poem ‘The Dream of Gerontius’. A third, well-loved Newman hymn, ‘Lead, kindly light’, shows how he was never a man for easy answers or the ready acceptance of imposed dogma and authority.

The timber relief of Cardinal John Henry Newman by Sean McDonnell in the Church of the Assumption, Dalkey (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Newman is remembered in the Church of the Assumption in Dalkey, Co Dublin, with a sculpted timber relief by Sean McDonnell. In the same niche is a plaque with the closing words from a sermon Newman preached on 19 February 1843, two years before he became a Roman Catholic: ‘May he support us all the day long, till the shades lengthen and the evening comes; and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then in his mercy may he give us a safe lodging, and a holy rest and peace at the last.’

The legacy of the Oxford Movement continues to inform life at Oriel College, Oxford. The college traditions include singing the ancient hymn Phos Hilaron (‘Hail Gladdening Light’) on feast days and other special occasions.

The space once used by both Whately and Newman was rebuilt in 1991 as an oratory and memorial to Newman and the Oxford Movement. A stained-glass window designed by Vivienne Haig and realised by Douglas Hogg was installed in 2001.

Newman has also given his name to one of the five quads at Keble College, Oxford: Liddon, the largest, named after Henry Parry Liddon; Pusey, named after Edward Bouverie Pusey; Hayward, named after Charles Hayward; De Breyne, named after Andre de Breyne; and Newman, previously the Fellows’ Garden.

A well-known prayer by John Henry Newman has been adapted in prayer books throughout the Anglican Communion:

Support us, O Lord,
all the day long of this troublous life,
until the shadows lengthen and the evening comes,
the busy world is hushed,
the fever of life is over
and our work is done.
Then, Lord, in your mercy grant us a safe lodging,
a holy rest, and peace at the last;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.

The oriel above the chapel entrance in Oriel College once formed part of a set of rooms occupied by Archbishop Richard Whately and by Cardinal John Henry Newman (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

‘God on a Bike’ and the architect who designed Hatch Hall for the Jesuits in Dublin

University Hall, also known as Hatch Hall, on Hatch Street, was an integral part of students life in Dublin for over a century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

University Hall, also known as Hatch Hall, on Hatch Street, was an integral part of students life in Dublin for over a century, and is an impressive part of Dublin’s architectural heritage.

Since it closed, the former Jesuit-run university hall has been used as accommodation for asylum seekers and there are plans today to turn it into a 60-bedroom 5-star hotel.

Hatch Hall dominates this corner close to the junction where Lower Hatch Street, Lower Leeson Street and Upper Pembroke Street meet. It its heyday as student accommodation, Hatch Hall was close to University College Dublin, then on Earlsfort Terrace, and it is close to University Church and Newman House on St Stephen’s Green, to nightlife in Leeson Street and Harcourt Street, and to the Iveagh Gardens and Grafton Street.

Hatch Hall was designed in 1910 by the Dublin architect Charles B Powell (1881-1956) in a late-Victorian and Gothic Revival style and the building offers an interesting contrast to the predominantly simple Georgian architecture of the houses and buildings in this quarter of Dublin.

Charles B Powell was born Co Dublin, a younger son of the English-born stained-glass artist and church decorated Henry Powell (1835-1882), and his wife Ellen (McCormack). Henry Powell was a partner in Hardman and Powell studios, which worked closely with AWN Pugin, and was a nephew of the Birmingham ecclesiastical decorator John Hardman and a brother-in-law of Edward Welby Pugin’s sister Anne, who married John Hardman Powell. Henry set up the Hardman studios in Grafton Street in 1853, and the business continued as Earley & Powells.

Charles Powell was an infant when his father died in 1882. He went to school in Blackrock College, and may have been trained as architect by George Coppinger Ashlin.

Powell became something of a recluse in later life, living with his widowed mother until about 1940 and then living alone and working from his home on Maxwell Road, Rathmines, where his two dogs ‘protected him fervently’. A bearded figure who rode around Dublin on a bicycle, he was known as ‘God on a bike’.

His connections with the Hardman, Pugin and Ashlin families introduced him to the church clients who gave him with most of his commissions, including churches throughout Ireland and at least one church in England: Saint Mary’s Catholic Church in St Helen’s, Lancashire.

Powell was the favoured architect of the Dublin Jesuits in Dublin designing extensions for Rathfarnham Castle, and alteration at Belvedere College and Milltown Park. He also worked for the Carmelites at Aungier Street and Terenure College, the gates of the Passionist Monastery at Mount Argus, and on a number of convents, as well as works for the Neptune Rowing Club.

The central gable-fronted five-storey entrance front has carved limestone copings and a cross finial at its apex (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

At first, Francis Bergin was approached to design the new hall. But in 1911 the Jesuits commissioned Powell to design their University Hostel in Hatch Street, a Gothic building in bright red brick, rising conspicuously above the neighbouring terraces.

The nine-bay four-storey residential hall was built by W Connolly & Son of Dominick Street in 1910-1913. The central gable-fronted five-storey entrance front has carved limestone copings and a cross finial at its apex and is flanked by full-height octagonal turrets to north or front elevation. The segmental-headed carriage-arch has a carved limestone cornice and a decorative wrought-iron double-leaf gate, with Tudor rose detail. The decorative tympanum has a shield with a gold leaf IHS monogram.

There is a 12-bay return to the east, and a 13-bay two-storey rear south block incorporating a five-bay, bow-ended first floor chapel and enclosing a courtyard.

Other features include attic accommodation, a canted oriel corner bay, canted oriel windows, turrets. Pointed arches, a pitched slate roof with clay ridge tiles, a red brick parapet with limestone coping, stepped red-brick chimneystacks with limestone copings, stepped red brick cornices, gabled dormer windows with timber bargeboards, conical copper roofs and finials on the turrets, copper gable-fronted projections, gargoyles and wrought-iron railings.

The north façade is particularly fine, with limestone detailing used to good effect to provide a contrast with the warm red brick, as well as emphasising the horizontal lines, and its copper and crenellated turret roofs punctuating he skyline.

The five lancet windows in the chapel commemorating Joseph Dolan were commissioned by the Jesuit Aubrey Gwynn and made in 1947 by Evie Hone (1894-1955). The windows depict the Lamb, the Fish, the Pelican, the Dove and the Alpha and Omega.

The decorative wrought-iron double-leaf gate, with Tudor rose detail and a decorative tympanum with a shield with a gold leaf IHS monogram (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The Jesuits opened University Hall or Hatch Hall in in 1913, and it provided accommodation for third level male students, mainly at UCD when it was based around the corner at Earlsfort Terrace, until the hall closed 20 years ago in 2004.

The Jesuits promoted a spirit of 'Friendship, Faith, Involvement', and the hall was well known for its community spirit. The hall’s motto was Sic Luceat Lux Vestra, ‘In this way let your light shine’.

Initially, Hatch Hall accommodated 70 students, a dean and other officials at the turn of the century. At first, the students were mostly studying medicine in UCD. But the intake grew progressively larger throughout the 20th century to over 100 male students a year.

The hall supported a number of societies including film, debating and photography societies, and encouraged voluntary work in the community through local charities and homework clubs. The highlight of the hall’s calendar was the annual ‘Hatch Ball’ in the Shelbourne Hotel on Saint Stephen’s Green. Past residents have included Desmond O’Malley, founder and former leader of the Progressive Democrats, the former Taoiseach Brian Cowen and Michael O’Leary, Ryanair CEO.

When Hatch Hall closed in 2004, it was bought for €16 million by the property developer Gerry Barrett. He planned to develop the hall into a hotel, but permission for an 81-bedroom hotel was overturned. Later the building served as a direct provision centre, with accommodation for 365 asylum seekers and refugees.

The building was bought by Red Carnation Hotels for €20 million in 2019, with plans to convert it into a 5-star boutique hotel. In 2013, the landmark building was sold yet again for €23 million, to Rosado Developments, a Wexford-based company. The property came with planning permission for conversion into a 60-bedroom luxury hotel with a gross floor area of 7,292 square metres.

Meanwhile, the five Evie Hone windows have been relocated from the chapel in University Hall to the Ignatian Room to Saint Francis Xavier Church, Upper Gardiner Street, Dublin. According to the author and historian Frank Rogers says the windows are some of the best examples in Ireland of religious icons in stained glass.

The Jesuits were among Evie Hone’s main patrons, and some of her finest windows are in the Jesuit Retreat House, Manresa, in Dollymount, where they were moved when the Retreat House in Rahan, Co Offaly, closed in 1991.

Hatch Hall was sold last year for for €23 million with planning permission for conversion into a 60-bedroom luxury hotel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Newman University Church has been a landmark on Saint Stephen’s Green in Dublin for 170 years

Newman University Church, Saint Stephen’s Green, Dublin … celebrating John Henry Newman today (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

Newman University Church or Catholic University Church in Dublin is celebrating the Feast of Saint John Henry Newman at 11 am and 6:15 today (6 October 2024), with Archbishop Dermot Farrell, the University Church Singers and the Vocare Ensemble.

The church is tucked away behind a terrace of buildings on the south side of Saint Stephen’s Green, beside Newman House and between the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Justice.

This beautiful church, formally known as the Church of Our Lady Seat of Wisdom, has been a distinctive landmark in Dublin city centre for almost 170 years and I visited it once again last week during yet another fleeting visit to Dublin.

University Church has been a distinctive landmark in Dublin city centre for almost 170 years (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

John Henry Newman (1801-1890) was the most prominent member of the Oxford Movement, reconnecting Anglicanism with its Catholic roots and heritage. Newman was received into the Roman Catholic Church on 9 October 1845 and was ordained a Roman Catholic priest on 30 May 1847.

Newman was the founding Rector of the newly-formed Catholic University of Ireland in Spring 1854, and work on building Newman University Church in the gardens of 87 Saint Stephens Green began in May 1855.

The church opened a year later on Ascension Day, 1 May 1856. The interior decoration was completed some months later. Although the church building project was placed under the protection of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, the church was formally placed under the patronage of Our Lady, Seat of Wisdom.

John Henry Newman was made a cardinal by Pope Leo XIII in 1879, choosing as his motto Cor ad Cor Loquitor, ‘Heart Speaks to Heart’.

Inside University Church … designed in a Byzantine Revival style by John Hungerford Pollen (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The church is distinctive in its architectural style and exceptional in its decoration. The English architect John Hungerford Pollen (1820-1902) designed the church in a Byzantine Revival style, in response to Newman’s dislike of Gothic architecture.

Pollen was closely associated with the Pre-Raphaelites and the Arts and Crafts Movement. He was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, and was ordained an Anglican priest in 1845. He became a Roman Catholic in 1852, and resigned his fellowship at Merton College, Oxford, where he had worked on the hall ceiling.

Pollen’s other works, mainly in collaboration, include the University Museum in Oxford, the Arthurian murals at the Oxford Union, in a group that include Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones, and Brompton Oratory. Pollen was Professor of Fine Arts at the Catholic University of Ireland from 1855 to 1857. He later settled in Hampstead, worked for The Tablet and became assistant keeper of the South Kensington Museum.

Figures representing the four evangelists at the church porch (Photographs: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Artistically and architecturally, the church in the style of a continental basilica and embraces both the Eastern and Western traditions of Christianity. The cost of building the church came to £5,600, almost double its original estimate, and a substantial donation from Newman helped to defray most of the costs.

The church is entered through a porch built with polychromatic brick with four short columns whose capitals bear the symbols of the four evangelists along with the figures of six angels. A suspended belfry was later built above the porch. Inside the porch, six steps lead down to the atrium, and beyond the atrium is the church.

The sanctuary and apse are inspired by San Clemente in Rome (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Inside, the richly decorated church is oriented on a south-north axis rather than the traditional east-west liturgical orientation. It is rectangular in shape, following the dimensions and orientation of the garden on which it was built. The floor of the church is paved with unglazed Staffordshire black and red tiles.

The flat red-timbered roof is painted with acorns, oak leaves and branches. It is supported by red painted beams and joists. Just below the roof at irregular intervals are windows with knots of glass made at a bottle factory in Ringsend, Dublin.

The sanctuary, inspired by the sanctuary in San Clemente in Rome, is raised above the level of the nave and is approached by a flight of five steps. A short alabaster communion rail divides the sanctuary and the nave.

The semi-dome above the sanctuary features Our Lady enthroned as Sedes Sapientiae – the ‘Seat of Wisdom’. A great vine – the Tree of Life – fills the semi-dome, its coiled branches bearing the images of martyrs holding palm fronds, symbolic of their victory in Christ. They are surrounded by various animals of creation.

The semi-dome above the sanctuary features Our Lady enthroned as ‘Sedes Sapientiae’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

There is a richly decorated elaborate gilded baldacchino over the altar, and a marble reredos. The original alabaster altar frontal has 12 discs of Derbyshire fluorspar crystal set in two groups of six. Six tall Byzantine-shaped gilded candlesticks stand on the altar along with a cross made of brass.

At the Gospel side of the sanctuary, a choir gallery is supported on eight marble pillars. The choir gallery is over nine meters in length but only some 1.8 meters wide.

Opposite the choir gallery, outside the sanctuary area, the pulpit stands on four pillars of polished marble, each pillar bearing the symbol and name of one of the four evangelists. Perhaps because of his evangelical Anglican background, Newman placed great emphasis on the importance of preaching. He hoped to make Dublin a Catholic centre of religion and learning, as he had experienced as an Anglican in Oxford.

The pulpit stands on four pillars of polished marble, each pillar bearing the symbol and name of one of the four evangelists (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The walls of the church are decorated to a height of 4.5 meters with marble of diverse colours originating from counties in the four provinces: black from Kilkenny, green from Galway, red from Cork, and brown and grey from Armagh and Offaly.

The upper tiers of the side walls display a series of large paintings. The original work by French copy artists and chosen by John Henry Newman, were copies of tapestries designed by Raphael in the Sistine Chapel and images of the Apostles in the Church of Tre Fontaine.

All 22 paintings darkened over the years and were no longer legible. Several professional attempts at cleaning them were to no avail and the originals were replaced at the time of the 150th anniversary of the church in 2016 with paintings by the American-Turkish artist Levent Tuncer.

Saint Patrick depicted in one of the lunettes or arched panels in the sanctuary (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Eleven arched panels on the side walls feature saints related to Ireland or to Christian education. The lunettes in the sanctuary depict Saint Patrick and Saint Brigid, patrons of Ireland, and Saint Laurence O’Toole, patron of Dublin. Those in the nave depict Saint Dominic, Saint Anthony of Padua, Saint Philip Neri, Blessed John de Britto, Saint Benedict, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Saint Fiachra and Saint Ignatius Loyola.

Shortly after Newman returned to England, an organ was built for the gallery.

The Lady Chapel was added to the church in 1875. Three square stained-glass windows depict the Nativity, the Adoration of the Wise Men and Christ with the Doctors in the Temple – an appropriate image for a church linked initimately with life of a university. The Lady Chapel) also has small marble altar with a niche and painted statues.

The bust of Newman is by the Dublin sculptor Thomas Farrell (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The posthumous bust of Newman in the church is by the Dublin sculptor Thomas Farrell and dates from 1892.

There is an interesting memorial in the church to Thomas Arnold (1823-1900), Professor of English at the Catholic University until 1862 and later Professor of English Literature at UCD from 1882 to 1900. He was a son of Thomas Arnold, headmaster of Rugby School, and a brother of the poet Matthew Arnold. One of his last students in UCD was James Joyce. Arnold was the grandfather of both Julian Huxley and Aldous Huxley.

There is a memorial in the atrium to Eugene O’Curry (1794-1862), the first Professor of Irish History and Archaeology at the Catholic University of Ireland from 1854.

The church can accommodate a congregation of 600, including 100 people in the organ gallery.

The memorial to Thomas Arnold … James Joyce was one of his last students (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Initially, the church was attached to the neighbouring Catholic University and later to Saint Kevin’s Parish, Harrington Street. It became a separate parish church in 1974.

I was in the University Church for two funerals in the same year: for over half a century, my third cousin Sean Comerford (1938-2011) was the long-serving Sacristan of the Catholic University Church; and later in 2011 was there for the funeral of Caroline Walsh, the Literary Editor of The Irish Times.

The church has been in the care of the University of Notre Dame since 2016, and the Notre Dame-Newman Centre for Faith and Reason, founded in 2017 at the invitation of Archbishop Diarmuid Martin.

The church says it ‘welcomes every person as a beloved child of God’ and fosters ‘faith development through respectful dialogue between Church and culture and the meaningful integration of faith and reason’.

Inside University Church facing towards the north (liturgical west) end from the High Altar (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The parish team includes the Revd Gary S Chamberland CSC, Director, Dominique Cunningham, Associate Director of Liturgy and Music, and Katherine Dunn, Director of Information Technology and Communication.

Sunday Masses are at 11 am and 6:15 pm, and weekday Masses (Monday to Friday) at 1:05 pm. There is Taizé-style worship on Tuesdays at 6 pm. There is no public Mass on Bank Holidays or Saturdays.

The church has been in the care of the University of Notre Dame since 2016 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The Museum of Literature Ireland and Dublin’s tributes to James Joyce and so many other writers

The Museum of Literature Ireland is housed in Newman House on Saint Stephen’s Green, Dublin, and backs onto the Iveagh Gardens (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

As Charlotte and I were strolling through the Iveagh Gardens in Dublin last weekend, we were surprised to find the gate leading into the gardens of MoLI – the Museum of Literature Ireland.

The gardens are at the back of the Museum, which is housed at 86 Saint Stephen’s Green – this was Newman House, once a part of University College Dublin. The place still boasts that this is where James Joyce was a student, and the acronym MoLI was chosen as a wordplay on the name of Molly Bloom.

The museum is a digital, interactive celebration of Ireland’s literary legacy and of Irish poets, playwrights and novelists. It features immersive multimedia exhibitions and literary artefacts, including Joyce’s Ulysses notebooks and ‘Copy No 1’ of Ulysses, inscribed by Joyce for his patron Harriet Weaver, who donated it to the National Library of Ireland in 1952.

MoLI also hosts events and performances, creative workshops and education programmes. The changing exhibitions include one that features an in-depth look at one author at a time, while another looks at the connections between Irish literature and international cities.

Maeve Binchy’s words at the gate from the Iveagh Gardens leading into the Readers’ Garden behind the Museum of Literature Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The earliest piece in the museum collection is by a female author dating from ca 900 CE. Other work on display includes Joyce manuscript pages, some annotated, a letter from Joyce to William Butler Yeats and samples of Joyce’s notebooks.

The first of MoLI’s revolving exhibitions, in place for the opening, was on Kate O’Brien, and was followed by another on Nuala O’Faolain. Last year, MoLi marked the 100th anniversary of Brendan Behan’s birth, with ‘The Holy Hour’, an audiovisual installation reframing Behan’s life and work.

The museum is in two Georgian townhouses collectively known as Newman House, where the Catholic University of Ireland was founded in 1865, and also incorporates the original university Aula Maxima or Great Hall of UCD. Newman House remains part of UCD, although the university is now located in Belfield.

Newman House is not one but two restored townhouses. No 85, the granite-faced original house, was designed by Richard Cassels in 1738 for Hugh Montgomery MP, who sold it to Richard Chapel Whaley MP in 1765. But he wanted a grander home, and commissioned another house next door at No 86.

When Whaley lived there, the house developed some notoriety because of the lifestyle and reputation of his son, Buck Whaley, a notorious gambler and hellraiser.

The house is admired for Cassels’s architectural work, but its plasterwork is also known as the finest in Dublin. The artists at No 85 were the Italian stuccodores Paolo and Filippo Lafranchini, whose work includes the detailed Apollo Room on the ground floor. The plasterwork in No 86 is by the Irish stuccodore Robert West. When the Catholic University of Ireland took possession of the house in 1865, the alterations to some of the plasterwork included covering the nude figures with ‘modesty vests’.

A sculpture of a reading Jesuit in the Readers’ Garden behind the Museum … inspired by Gerard Manley Hopkins? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

While Newman House was part of the university, the residents included the Jesuit priest-poet Gerard Manley Hopkins who was Professor of Classics, from 1884 until he died. The students there included James Joyce from 1899 to 1902.

The museum is a partnership between the National Library of Ireland and UCD. Its origins are in a conversation at Bewley’s Café between Eamonn Ceannt, Bursar and Vice-President of UCD, and a representative of the National Library of Ireland, when they talked about a literary centre at Newman House began with a discussion.

The new museum was originally planned as an exposition of the work of James Joyce, to be known as the Ulysses Centre. But, after discussions with Failte Ireland, the concept was expanded to include Irish literature in general.

The Killarney Strawberry tree in the Readers’ Garden at the Museum (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The original plan was to open in the spring 2019, but because of the Covid-19 pandemic the launch was delayed and MoLI was finally launched on Culture Night, 20 September 2019. Meanwhile, the Dublin Writers Museum on Parnell Square had closed during the Covid-19 pandemic, and finally shut down in 2022 without ever reopening. Since then, many of its collections have been transferred to MoLI.

The Readers’ Garden, which we accessed from the Iveagh Gardens on Saturday morning, includes the café courtyard, secluded places to read, a sculpture of a reading Jesuit – inspired, perhaps, by Gerard Manley Hopkins – and two protected trees: the ash tree where James Joyce had his graduation photograph taken and a Killarney Strawberry tree.

The museum café, the Commons, opens onto the Readers’ Garden, and is run by Peaches and Domini Kemp. Beside it is the museum shop.

Marjorie Fitzgibbon’s 1982 bronze bust of James Joyce in Saint Stephen’s Green faces Newman House and MoLI (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Across from Newman House, on the south side of Saint Stephen’s Green, Marjorie Fitzgibbon’s 1982 bronze bust of James Joyce faces his alma mater. It is mounted on a tall square-plan limestone plinth inscribed with carved painted lettering: ‘James Joyce 1882-1941 Crossing Stephen’s, that is, my green …’ Joyce’s bust is part of a significant group within the Green, including Constance Markievicz, Arthur Guinness, Theobald Wolfe Tone and Rabindranath Tagore.

Earlier that morning, I had come across a more recent image of James Joyce nearby, side-by-side with Nora Barnacle in street art near the end of Dawson Street and close to the Nassau Street gate of Trinity College Dublin. ‘Love loves to love love’ was painted last year (2023) by the artist Andrew McCarthy, who was also the head designer of the new National Transport Livery for TFI.

James Joyce met Nora Barnacle from Galway for the first time on 10 June 1904 while walking down Nassau Street. They had their first date on 16 June 1904, now celebrated as Bloomsday, and she would become his wife and muse and the inspiration for the character of Molly Bloom in Ulysses.

Dublin can never get enough of James Joyce.

‘Love loves to love love’ … James Joyce and Nora Barnacle by Andrew McCarthy near the Nassau Street gate of Trinity College Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

‘The Space Between’: an Irish sculptor’s work on permanent display in Milton Keynes

‘The Space Between’ by the Irish sculptor Eilis O’Connell in Exchange Square, Milton Keynes (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

The public sculptures in Milton Keynes, and among the works I visited on a recent November afternoon is ‘The Space Between,’ a sculpture by the Irish sculptor Eilis O’Connell. It is on permanent display in Exchange Square, the open plaza in front of the Holiday Inn at the corner of Saxon Gate and Midsummer Boulevard.

Eilis O’Connell’s ‘The Space Between’ was placed in Exchange Square to celebrate the Silver Jubilee of Milton Keynes (1967-1992). This work is in patinated bronze with fibre optic elements and was made by in 1992.

Eilis O’Connell is one of Ireland’s leading sculptors, and I have already seen some of her works in Ireland. She says ‘The Space Between’ is based on ancient Celtic boundary markers and the Ogham stones of pre-Christian Ireland. The artist describes the relationship between the space and her sculpture: ‘Exchange Square is a perfectly proportioned square composed of right angles and straight lines. To contrast with this rectilinearity, the sculpture is made up of curved forms.’

The sculptor was born in Derry in 1953 and studied sculpture at the Crawford School of Art, Cork, and the Massachusetts College of Art, Boston, in the 1970s.

She received research fellowships at the British School in Rome (1983-1984) and at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center in New York (1987-1988). A two-year residency at Delfina Studios in London in 1988 resulted in her move to London. She returned to live in Ireland in 2002, but continues to exhibit abroad and works on commissions for both public and private locations.

She is a founder director of the National Sculpture Factory in Cork, a former member of the Arts Council of Ireland, a member of Aosdána, and a member of the Royal Hibernian Academy. Her honours include the Art & Work Award from Wapping Arts Trust, and the Royal Society of Arts Award (1998).

She has shown at the Veni Biennale, the Biennale de Paris (1982) and the São Paulo Art Biennial (1985) and her small sculptures have been shown at the Guggenheim Museum in Venice. Her outdoor sculptures were shown in 2018 at E1027, the home designed by Eileen Grey in Cap Martin, France.

‘The Great Wall of Kinsale’ (1988) has been described as ‘one of the most contentious public artworks ever erected in Ireland.’ It is composed of several sections and forms, and at 179 ft it is also the longest sculpture in Ireland.

The large rusted steel sculpture drew protest, concerns of safety, an attempt to deinstall it, and criticism of its appearance. Eventually, the rusty metal was painted, a water feature was added, and barriers were placed around it without her permission, so that she considers the work to have been ‘destroyed.’

Her work can be seen in several public locations in London, Cardiff, Newcastle, Bristol, Wolverhampton, Southampton, Milton Keynes, Dublin, Belfast, Dundalk, Mallow and Cork. Her ‘Under & Over’ is a bronze sculpture commissioned for Lismore Castle, Co Waterford.

Other privately commissioned works can be seen at the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) in Dublin, the Cass Sculpture Foundation, Chatsworth Houe and Antony House in England, and in private gardens in France and Spain. Her work has also been exhibited in Chester Cathedral and Gloucester Cathedral.

‘Chroma’ (2014) was commissioned by University College Dublin for the New Science Building, in UCD, Dublin. ‘Atoms & Apples’ (2013) was commissioned by Trinity College Dublin to commemorate the life and work of Ernest Walton (1903-1995), who jointly received the Nobel Prize for splitting the atom with Sir John Cockcroft in 1951.

‘Atoms & Apples’ (2013) by Eilis O’Connell was commissioned by Trinity College Dublin to commemorate the life and work of Ernest Walton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Two Comerford Lawler brothers and their cousin, Jesuit priests from Bunclody

The Mall House on the Mall, Bunclody, Co Wexford … once the home of the Comerford Lawler family (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Two Comerford Lawler brothers from Bunclody, Co Wexford, Father Brendan Comerford Lawler and Father Donald Comerford Lawler, and their first cousin, Father Ray Lawler, were prominent Jesuits priests and teachers, closely identified with the life of Clongowes Wood College and Milltown, and with Jesuit mission work in Hong Kong, Australia and Zambia.

Today (31 July) is the feast of Saint Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits. In recent days, I have been writing on this blog about two other Jesuits from the Comerford family: the Revd James Comerford (1885-1963), from Ballinakill, Co Laois, a Jesuit missionary in India and whose mother was from Clonegal, Co Carlow, about 5 km outside Bunclody; and the Revd Richard John Comerford (1911-1970), a Jesuit priest and teacher who spent most of his ministry and teaching career in Sydney, and who was descended from an Irish family that emigrated to New South Wales in the 1830s.

These five Jesuits were contemporaries or near contemporaries and their paths crossed regularly throughout their lives, from Clongowes Wood to Tullabeg, from Rathfarnham Castle and Milltown Park to Hong Kong and Sydney, from Bunclody to Dublin, at ordinations and at family funerals.

Milltown Park, Dublin … Brendan Comerford Lawler was secretary of the Milltown Institute of Theology and Philosophy and Lecturer in Philosophy and Logic (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

1, The Revd Professor Brendan Comerford Lawler SJ, MSc, LPh, STL (1909-1993):

The Revd Professor Brendan Comerford Lawler SJ, MSc, LPh, STL (1909-1993), was born in Newtownbarry (Bunclody), Co Wexford, on 29 October 1909, the son of Peter Paul Lawler (1862-1914) of Bunclody and his wife Victoria Mary (née Derham) Comerford (1873-1971), formerly of Dublin Street, Skerries.

The Comerford name, inherited by Brendan and his brothers, came from their paternal grandmother. Brendan’s paternal grandparents were Denis Lawler (1831-1892), of Rathvilly, Co Carlow, and Bunclody, Co Wexford, and Anne (Comerford) Lawler (ca 1832/1834-1911), of Bunclody.

Denis and Anne (Comerford) Lawler were married in Bunclody on 17 September 1858 and were the parents of ten children, six sons and four daughters:

1, Michael Lawler (1859-1909), born 10 May 1859, died 3 July 1909.
2, Mary Lawler (1860- ), born 6 August 1860.
3, Peter Paul Lawler (1862-1914).
4, Anne Lawler (1863-1942).
5, (Dr) William Comerford Lawler (1865-1935).
6, Kate Lawler (1867- ).
7, John Lawler (1868-1939).
8, Denis Lawler (1870-1941).
9, Edward Joseph Lawler (1872-1873), born October 1872, died 23 March 1873.
10, Sarah Anne Lawler (1873- ), born 23 November 1873.

Denis Lawler died in Newtownbarry on 9 July 1892; his widow Anne (Comerford) Lawler died in 1911. Their third child and second son:

Peter Paul Lawler (1862-1914) of Bunclody, was born 29 July 1862. He married Victoria Mary Derham (1873-1971) of Dublin Street, Skerries, in Saint Francis Xavier Church, the Jesuit church on Gardiner Street, Dublin, on 3 July 1907. Peter Lawler died 3 May 1914; Victoria Lawler lived until she was 97 and died in Dublin in 1971. They were the parents of:

1, Desmond Joseph Comerford Lawler (1908-1980), born 12 April 1908, the Mall House, Bunclody; he lived at the Chase House, Carrigduff, Bunclody, and died in 1980.
2, (Revd) Brendan Comerford Lawler (1909-1993).
3, (Revd) Donald Joseph Comerford Lawler (1911-1984).

Brendan Comerford Lawler was born in Newtownbarry (Bunclody), Co Wexford, on 29 October 1909. His early education was at Clongowes Wood College, the Jesuit-run boarding school in Co Kildare and he entered the Society of Jesus or Jesuits on 1 September 192 6at Saint Stanislaus College, the Jesuit novitiate at Tullabeg, near Tullamore, Co Offaly, known affectionately as ‘the Bog’.

He was a student at Rathfarnham Castle while he was studying science (biology) at University College Dublin in 1928-1932, receiving his MSc in biology. is contemporaries at Rathfarnham Castle and UCD included the Revd Richard John Comerford (1911-1970), an Australian-born Jesuit priest and teacher who would spend most of his ministry and teaching career in Sydney.

Brendan Comerford Lawler moved on from Rathfarnham to study philosophy in Valkenburg, Holland (1932-1935, LPh) and theology in Innsbruck (1935-1938, STL), and he was ordained in Innsbruck on 17 July 1938. He spent those years close to the drama of the rise of Hitler and the Anschluss of Austria. In those years, Innsbruck was also the centre of ‘kerygmatic theology’ and of the liturgical and catechetical renewal spearheaded by JA Jungmann. Soon after Brendan left Innsbruck, the Jesuit house in Sillgasse was turned into Gestapo headquarters. By then, Brendan was safely back in Ireland pursuing further studies.

He was back at Rathfarnham Castle in 1939-1940, spent a year as Professor of Cosmology and Biology at Tullabeg (1940-1941), and then pursued private studies while living in the Jesuit community at 35 Lower Leeson Street, Dublin (1941-1943).

He returned to Tullabeg in Autumn 1943 as Professor of Cosmology and Biology (1943-1962), and during that time he was also Rector (1953-1959). From 1962 to 1968, he was at Loyola House on Eglinton Road, Dublin, as Socius to the Jesuit Provincial.

He returned to academic life in Milltown Park in 1968 as secretary of the Milltown Institute of Theology and Philosophy (1968-1992), Lecturer in Philosophy and Logic, and Assistant Registrar (1982). I got to know him there, and I was a student at the Irish School of Ecumenics in 1982-1984, when it was still based in Milltown Park.

While Brendan was at Milltown, his widowed mother, Victoria Comerford, who was living nearby at 4 Palmerston Villas, Rathmines, died in Harold’s Cross Hospice on 9 May 1971 aged 97.

His natural humour and spirit of companionship blossomed in Milltown. There he organised what came to be called ‘Saturday Theology’, a successful programme of lectures for extra-mural students. Over a period of 20 years, this introduced countless people to the thinking of Vatican II.

His early interest in the scriptures bore fruit in his book Epistles in Focus, for many years the only scholarly book on scripture by a member of the Irish Jesuit Province. During his final years in Milltown he also published in Milltown Studies, including ‘The Star of Implication’ (Milltown Studies, No 5).

He retired to Cherryfield Lodge, the Jesuit retirement home in Ranelagh, in 1993. With the onset of Parkinson’s, he moved to the Royal Hospital, Dublin. He died in Our Lady’s Hospice, Harold’s Cross, on 16 June 1993 at the age of 83.

Father Don Comerford took his vows as Jesuit novice in Emo Court in 1930 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

2, The Revd Donald Joseph Comerford Lawler (1911-1984):

Brendan Comerford Lawler’s younger brother, the Revd Donald Joseph Comerford Lawler (1911-1984), was also a Jesuit priest.

Donald Joseph Comerford Lawler was born on 2 March 1911 in Newtownbarry, Co Wexford, the son of Peter Paul Comerford (1862-1914) and Victoria Mary (née Derham).

Don’s early schooling was at the Dominican Convent, Wicklow, before going on to Clongowes Wood College, Co Kildare. He entered the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) in Tullabeg on 1 September 1928, and he took his vows as a Jesuit novice on 2 September 1930 at Emo Park or Emo Court, the former home of the Earls of Portarlington and the Dawson family, which had been acquired by the Jesuits as a novitiate earlier that year.

Don was a student at Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin, in 1930-1933, studying physics and chemistry. He received his BSc at University College Dublin in 1933, and then studied philosophy at Tullabeg in 1933-1936.

He moved to Hong Kong in 1936, and was in Aberdeen, Hong Kong, in 1937. After two years studying Cantonese, he taught for two years in Wah Yan College, Hong Kong (1938-1940).

The outbreak of World War II in 1939 prevented Don’s return to Ireland for his theology studies, and he was asked to spend another year in Hong Kong. He was then moved to Australia to study theology in Canisius College, Pymble, Sydney, from 1941.

He was ordained on 8 January 1944, in Sydney, Australia, alongside the Revd Richard Comerford, the Australian-born Jesuit who had been a contemporary of Brendan and Don in Rathfarnham Castle and UCD. Their ordination group in 1944 was the first group of Jesuits to be ordained in Sydney.

Don was a chaplain at the end of World War II, and then returned to Ireland in 1945 for further studies. After a year in Rathfarnham Castle (1945-1946), he returned to Hong Kong in 1946, and he took his final vows as a Jesuit on 3 February 1947 in Wah Yan College, Hong Kong.

He was the senior science master in Wah Yan College, Hong Kong, for more than 30 years (1946-1976). The Cantonese form of his name is: 羅明德神父

He was an outstanding and conscientious teacher of physics to the higher forms, and played a role in organising science teaching in the schools in Hong Kong. In Wah Yan, he was also a vigorous sports master.

He suffered his first stroke in 1976. He returned to Wah Yan and took a slight part in community life. He managed to attend his Golden Jubilee dinner for a short period, and concelebrated Mass on extreme invalid terms. After a second stroke, the Columban Sisters cared for him in Ruttonjee Sanatorium.

After another stroke, he was brought to Saint Paul’s Hospital, Causeway Bay. He was brought by hospital plane to Ireland in 1979.

Don stayed first in Saint Vincent’s Hospital and then in Lisheen Nursing Home, Rathcoole, Co Dublin. The care of his elder brother, Father Brendan Lawler, helped to mitigate the hardship of his prolonged illness. He died on 4 December 1984 after a long illness, aged 73.

He was remembered for his ‘crystal clear mind … lithe vigorous body … (and) unquestioning independence.’ It was said he had ‘a sturdy distaste for loose thinking and for conventional expression or manifestation of piety. Eschewing gush, he had an unrivalled grasp of the theological and spiritual principles underlying … Jesuit life.’

Father Ray Lawler was born at River View House, Bunclody, the home of his father, Dr William Comerford Lawler (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

3, The Revd Raymond John Bolger Lawler (1921-2001):

Brendan Comerford Lawler and Donald Comerford Lawler were first cousins of the Revd Raymond John Bolger Lawler (1921-2001), also a Jesuit priest.

Raymond John Bolger Lawler (1921-2001) was born in Newtownbarry, Co Wexford, 28 May 1921. He was a son of Dr William Comerford Lawler, physician and surgeon, of River View, Newtownbarry, and his wife Mary Elizabeth (née Bolger).

Dr William Comerford Lawler (1865-1935) was a son of Denis Lawler (1830-1892) and Anne Comerford (1832-1912). He was born on 13 August 1865. He was married three times. He married (1) Elizabeth McCourt (1867-1909) of 115 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin, daughter of Patrick McCourt, in Saint Andrew’s Church, Dublin, on 5 September 1906. She died in Dublin on 23 June 1909. He married (2) Mary Elizabeth Cecilia Bolger (1891-1924), daughter of John Bolger, merchant, of Ferns, Co Wexford, in Dun Laoghaire, Dublin, on 26 April 1919. Their children included:

1, Denis Albert Bolger Lawler (1920-2017), born 28 February 1920, 5 Mount Street Crescent, Dublin. He was a solicitor in Milford, Co Donegal, married and had children. He later lived in Dartry, Dublin, and died 11 April 2017. His funeral took place in Rathfarnham Church of Ireland Parish Church.
2, (Revd) Raymond John Bolger Lawler (1921-2001).
3, William David Bolger Lawler (1922- ), born 9 November 1922 at River View, Newtownbarry, later lived in Canada.
4, Teresa Lawler Joynt (1924-2010), of Barroge, Castletown,Co Wexford, married and had children. She died 25 January 2010 and is buried in Bunclody.

Mary Elizabeth (Bolger) Lawler died on 23 October 1924, aged 33. William Comerford Lawler married (3) Josephine Mary Bolger (1896-1971), Mary’s sister and a daughter of John Bolger of Ferns, in Monkstown, Dublin, on 23 February 1927. Josephine Comerford died 3 November 1971.

The second son of William Comerford Lawler:

The Revd Raymond John Bolger Lawler was born in Bunclody on 28 May 1921. Later in life, when he was preaching at the funeral Mass of his neighbour and schoolfriend, Dr Tom Murphy, former President of UCD, in 1997, he jokingly described Bunclody, where they were both born, as the ‘back of beyond.’

At the age of four, Ray too was sent to the Dominican Convent, Wicklow, as a boarder. He was 11 when he was sent to Clongowes Wood College, where he figured prominently at cricket and rugby. Little did he realise that he would spend almost half of his life there as teacher, prefect of studies, higher line prefect, and finally as third line Spiritual Father which he was when he died at the age of 80.

Ray entered the Jesuits at Saint Mary’s, Emo, Co Laois, on 7 September 1938. He was a student at Rathfarnham Castle, studying arts at UCD (1940-1943), and receiving a BA honours in Latin and French at UCD. He then studied philosophy in Tullabeg (1943-1946), while his cousin Brendan was Professor of Cosmology and Biology. He spent two years at the Jesuit community in the Crescent, Limerick (1946-1948), a year at Clongowes Wood College (1948-1949), and studied theology in Milltown Park (1949-1953).

He was ordained priest in Milltown Park on the feast of Saint Ignatius Loyola, 31 July 1952.

After a further year at Rathfarnham Castle (1953-1954), he returned to Clongowes Wood College (1954-1962), teaching Latin and French and Religion, and he took his final vows as a Jesuit on 2 February 1956. He was Prefect of Studies in Clongowes in 1956-1962.

When an official visitor from Rome to the Irish Jesuit Province made changes in personnel, Ray was moved to Belvedere College, Dublin, for two years (1962-1964). He returned to Clongowes in 1964 again as higher line prefect (1964-1968) and as a teacher (1968-1981).

He was an excellent teacher of French, coached rugby and played cricket regularly for the local club, North Kildare. He was a regular sight on the college golf course and competed frequently in Naas Golf Club.

At 60, Ray had a sabbatical in Toronto, Canada, in 1981-1982. This was followed by two years in Zambia teaching French and Scripture to Jesuit novices in Lusaka (1982-1984). As he left for Zambia, the school secretary said , ‘If there were a university degree for gentleness, I think that Father Lawler would have a PhD’. His character was summed up in the phrase ‘a lovable and loving person.’

When he returned to Ireland, he spent a year in Tullabeg as Director of the Spiritual Exercises (1984-1985), followed by 10 years at Gardiner Street Church as parish chaplain (1985-1995). His uncle Peter Paul Lawler had been married in the same church in 1907.

When Ray was 74, he returned to Clongowes Wood as the third line spiritual father (1995-2001), and he also assisted in chaplaincy in Cherryfield, the Jesuit retirement home near Milltown Park.

He enjoyed good health to the end. He preached on Mandy Thursday to the past pupils who were on retreat in Clongowes and played golf on Good Friday afternoon. He died in his room in Clongowes on Holy Saturday following a massive heart attack, on 14 April 2001 at the age of 80.

Although his funeral took place during school holidays, the college chapel was full for his funeral Mass. Members of his family and students of the school carried his coffin along the Third Line gallery. Present and past pupils formed a guard of honour in a moving tribute to a priest who had come to mean so much to so many young people over so many years.

Psalm 138 (139) was his favourite and he often quoted the lines: ‘It was you who created my being … I thank you for the wonder of my being, for the wonders of all your creation.’ The Psalm ends with the words: ‘See that I follow not the wrong path and lead me in the path of life eternal.’

Clongowes Wood College, Co Kildare … part of the lives of Brendan, Don and Ray Lawler

This posting is now available on the Comerford Genealogy site as part of the series of Comerford Profiles HERE

For a posting on Comerford missionaries, visit HERE