Father McGinty's Funeral

There was still a sense of disbelief at morning Mass today.

Fr McGinty's brother was there this morning. I was at primary school with him hundreds of years ago at OHR.

We were given the proposed details of father's funeral, but these are not final yet.

His body will be brought to St Patrick's next Monday at 5pm. It will lie there till 7pm, when it will be taken to St Stephen's to lie in front of the altar all night.

The funeral Mass will be on Tuesday at around 11.30am.

It is as many of us expected. St Patrick's, his own Parish Church is just too small to hold all those who will wish to attend the funeral Mass. I expect even St Stephen's will not hold all who will want to attend to pay their last respects.

I have been thinking about priests. They come in many shapes and forms, with many different characters. Theirs is a difficult, lonely life. It is truly a vocation.

I am reminded that whenever I see a priest, I see someone God called to the priesthood, not someone who just decided to become a priest.

I have to confess that there are priests who disappoint me by the way they introduce gimmics into Mass, alter the words that should not be altered, fail to follow the proper rubrics. Fr McGinty always said his Masses with great care and devotion.

We should keep all priests in our prayers. They need them. Fitting that just a few weeks ago we were able to pick up a prayer leaflet from the back of the Church with a special prayer for priests.

We moved to St Patrick's when our Parish in Dalmuir was closed. We felt very quickly at home there, and in no small way due to the friendliness of Fr McGinty. He was always smiling, never bad tempered, never laboured the obvious in his sermons, never went on about money and collections. And he was always there at his post near the door at the end of mass with a word for everyone. We will miss him too at the short monthly Padre Pio Prayer group after the First Saturday morning Mass.

In case anyone wonders about the photos in recent blogs, I took them in various churches in Sao Paolo (Brazil) where I was the week before Christmas in 2008