Bishop speaks in Rome of hope for canonisation of Fr Doyle

Ireland actually has very few canonised saints, the Bishop of Meath, Dr Tom Deenihan, revealed as he spoke last Sunday week at a ceremony at the Irish Embassy in Rome, honouring the memory of a priest whose cause for canonisation was opened over two years ago in the Cathedral of Christ the King in Mullingar.

Hosted jointly by the Irish and British Ambassadors to the Holy See, Frances Collins and Chris Trott respectively, the ceremony, held to coincide with the Jubilee of Military Personnel, recalled the life and vocation of Father Willie Doyle, an Irish Jesuit who was a chaplain to the Royal Dublin Fusiliers and who died while ministering on the battlefield in 1917 during World War I.

In his address to the event, Dr Deenihan said that despite Ireland’s “rather dated and exaggerated title of the Isle of Saints and Scholars”, it has no great number of canonised saints.

“St Oliver Plunkett, Archbishop of Armagh and the last of the Tyburn martyrs, was second last, born 400 years ago this year in the Diocese of Meath and canonised here in Rome 50 years ago this year. St Charles of Mount Argus was the most recent but only four or five have been through the formal canonisation process,” Dr Deenihan said.

Dr Deenihan noted that during his noviciate, which was served in the Meath diocese, Fr Doyle signed an oath offering his life: “Interestingly, it was signed in his own blood and is now one of the few first class relics of Doyle, given that his body was not recovered from the battlefield,” Dr Deenihan said.

Describing Fr Doyle as a man of intense spirituality, who had encouraged many towards priesthood and religious life, Dr Deenihan described how he was instrumental in negotiating a pact under which Cork businessman William Dwyer, owner of the Sunbeam clothing factory, agreed to build a monastery for the Poor Clare order in Cork, on the basis that his daughter Sister Maria Dwyer would return there from Belgium. That monastery is still going well, Dr Deenihan said.

Fr Doyle died on August 16, 1917, during the Battle of Langemarck. After getting one soldier to safety, he had returned to the line of fire, but was killed ministering to others. Some of those present pulled his body to a safe place, but when they returned later to retrieve it, that place had been bombed too, and Fr Doyle’s body was never recovered.

“We are told that Doyle was nominated for the Victoria Cross for bravery but it was not granted due to him being, as an article in The Irish Times put it a while ago, suffering from the three disadvantages of being: a Catholic, a priest and, dare I say it, a Jesuit!” said Dr Deenihan, revealing that Fr Doyle had been awarded the Military Cross for bravery in 1916.

Dr Deenihan said that the Diocese of Meath, which, with the Fr Willie Doyle Association, particularly through Dr Patrick Kenny and Fr John Hogan, has begun the cause for canonisation, is moved by Fr Doyle’s story, inspired by his faith and encouraged by his generosity and witness: “We pray that he will be soon counted among those whom we publicly venerate and implore,” he said.

Dr Deenihan said the case is going well: “The Theological investigation is complete, the historical Commission is almost so and the Tribunal is making great progress,” he said.

“I expect to be closing the Diocesan stage this year. Whether it will be successful, we cannot know, we can only hope. I believe that it will be. In the meantime, Fr Doyle’s charity, generosity and evangelical zeal have something to offer us. His regard, compassion, sacrifice and witness to all who are suffering, regardless of nationality or creed, are still lessons for our time, perhaps for our time more than it ever was.”

He concluded by stating that, on the Jubilee of Military Personnel, he invoked Fr Doyle’s prayer for those who are on battlefields and his encouragement on those who may be discerning a vocation.

“Above all, we pray that one day we shall count him among the canonised saints and enjoy his intercession on our behalf.”