The
Catholic Weekly
Online
Sydney
2 November 2003
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Christ’s message holds key, says Cardinal Pell
New cardinal-electors
Cardinal is ‘honoured and delighted’
New managing editor for Catholic Weekly
Wiggles help Vinnies
Change to super laws rejected
Service commemorates Night of broken glass
Don’t leave HSC study to the last minute
Poverty forum call
Italians come clean over holy water
‘Don’t change Medicare’
Hope on Smokey Mountain
New dean of education
‘Give generously’ appeal call
Passion added to atmosphere for players
Mother Teresa
Editorial: Be not afraid
Letters: Biblical errors?
Conversation: Donna Mulhearn, human shield and crusader for kids - Back to Iraq
with ‘lots of love, hugs and care’
The freedom of God
Jesus ‘Lord and healer’
Oath of Fidelity
Sandhills and history
The Italian connection
New deal for deaf high school students
New college Campus
US post
115 years in the sun
Rose Bay victory
Life of the ageing priest
Companions on a Redemptorist’s journey to his final vows
‘Richest year of my life’
Life of the ageing priest
By Marilyn Rodrigues
When a priest who has happily given up his whole adult life to the service of others finds his work taken away because of old age or ill health, does he cope better with the drastic change than other retirees?
Not necessarily, says Redemptorist Fr Kevin Carroll.
Fr Kevin, 79, has lived in the Redemptorist community in Kogarah for five years since retiring from ministry as a parish priest.
The community, led by its superior, Fr Kevin O’Shea, is made up of about 20 mostly elderly, sick and retired priests and brothers.
“There are many men here who are much older than I am; who spent more than 30 years on foreign missions and their health is broken down and they’ve had to retire,” says Fr Kevin. “Because our life is a very active one they then find it very hard (to cope). They feel very much their inability to do external apostolic works.
“But an important part of our spirituality is to try and accept that and integrate it into our lives.
“It helps to realise that this stage of our lives is not wasted or ineffective because it gives us the opportunity to make sacrifices and to pray for those who are engaged in outside apostolic work.
“Ageing also gives you a time to reflect and to realise how good God has been to you over the years and the help that you’ve received, not only from your parents in your home but from priests and brothers, and especially through our community life.”
Fr Kevin finds his own days get quite full, with visits from the community’s nurse, offering Mass, receiving visitors who come for his advice and spiritual direction, joining the community’s prayer and spending time in private prayer and reading.
He has been a Redemptorist for 55 years and a priest for 49, spending most of that time ministering in parishes in Australia and overseas and teaching young men aspiring to the priesthood. His main subjects were Latin and Greek.
He was born in Cooyal, near Mudgee, in a family of 12 children, but grew up in Sydney, starting his schooling under the Brown Josephites (Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart) at Belmore before moving to the Christian Brothers at Lewisham.
He felt from a young age that God was calling him to the Redemptorist congregation.
“I had met many Redemptorists and I had read about the order, so I finished my secondary schooling at the Redemptorist college,
St Clement’s, Galong,” he says.
“When I was baptised my mother called me Alphonsus, after the Redemptorists’ founder, for my second name, so I’m sure St Alphonsus had a hand in it, too.”
Fr Kevin was not alone in his choice.
Two of his brothers also became Redemptorists, two sisters joined the Mercy sisters and another
sister joined the Brown Josephites, the order founded by Fr Julian Tenison Woods and Bl Mary MacKillop.
Fr Kevin hopes to use the extra time he now has to begin writing on two topics close to his heart; scripture and his family history.
“I think that some of the translations of parts of the New Testament could be improved upon because I don’t think the subtleties of the New Testament Greek language have always been fully appreciated,” he says.
“And I would like to do something on my family background and history, mostly for the benefit of the younger generation.”
Fr Kevin’s family, like many others, has seen younger members drift away from the Catholic faith that was so important to their ancestors.
“Materialism makes inroads, and it’s very strong in Australia, and people seem to think they are quite all right, that they don’t really need God except when they get into trouble,” he says.
“One of the strongest parts of the Church these days is in Korea, because in the 1900s there were 10,000 Catholics martyred.
“And it’s the same with the Vietnamese and their persecution under the communists, and the Eastern Europeans.
“It’s always been true in the history of the Church that the faith is stronger when people suffer for it.”