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Sebastian Keens C.P. Obituary by Fr. Dominic O'Neill C.P. 1891

The Province of St. Joseph has sustained a severe loss by the death of the Rev. Fattier Sebastian of the Blessed Sacrament, This zealous son of St Paul of the Cross, known in the world as Sebastian Keener lived 41 years in the Congregation and died on the anniversary of his birth on the 28th of September (1891) having been bom on the same date 1831.

The place of his birth was London and his parents were pious Catholics, his father having been converted from Protestantism in early youth. He entered the Congregation in 1849 and was the last novice accepted by the V. Rev. Fr. Dominic of the Mother of God. Having made his profession on the 14th February I850, tie years of his studies were marked by his love of the Holy Observance, and when in due time he was promoted to the Holy Order of the Priesthood, he was chosen Vice Master of Novices.

In 1858 he was sent by his superiors to St. Paul's Retreat, Mount Argus, Dublin, anc to this Retreat he remained attached until the time of his death, except from 1869 until 1872 during which interval he was Rector of St Joseph's Retreat Highgate, London.

It was thus at Mount Argus that the greater part of his Priestly life was spent, and here it was that he displayed that wonderful zeal for God's glory which so distinguished him. During the 30 years that he was connected with Mount Argus he was truly indefatigable in his labours. Frequently engaged on Missions in Ireland, England and Scotland his preaching drew thousands of poor sinners to the Sacraments, and every mission given by him was blessed by God with marvellous results. Without having much of the gift of eloquence property so called he spoke from the heart in his sermons and seldom failed to touch the hearts of his audience. In the duties of the confessional he laboured with unwearied assiduity, and never I seemed to rest while sinners were to be attended to in the Sacred Tribunal.

This is true of him not only on missions but i t was his daily life in the Retreat of Saint Paul.

He had a rare gift of attracting souls from the vanities of the world and placing them in the secure sanctuary of the Religious State, One of the greatest services he rendered to our Province was the number of pious and talented subjects who through his means entered the Congregation. Of these two were made Provincials, several Rectors and some of our most valued missioners were attracted to our institute under his direction. With the same zeal he led a great number of his female penitents to enter the Religious State, and it would be impossible to form an idea of the numbers who are now in convents in both hemispheres. The Sisters of the Passion gratefully acknowledge that their numerous convents in England and Ireland are filled with holy and zealous Religious who under God owe their vocation to his burning zeal.

Besides this wonderful life of zeal for God's glory and the sanctification of souls in the intervals between his missionary and spiritual labours he was for 30 years the zealous questor for the temporal wants of the community. To his exertions we are principally indebted for the spacious Retreat of St. Paul Mount Argus and its universally admired church. The words of the Psalmist can with truth be applied to him, "I have loved, O Lord, the zeal of Thy house and the place where Thy Glory dwelleth."

In his religious life he was remarkable for childlike simplicity of character. His obedience to his superiors was prompt and cheerful. His charity for his brethren was very great especially when any of the community were sick he would seek to procure for them whatever would alleviate their sufferings or tend to their comfort and he always gave great edification by speaking in praise of his brethren in the presence of seculars, thus-increasing the respect of all for his Mother the Congregation.

He was unremitting in his exertions to promote devotion to our Lord's Sacred Passion and this not only in sermons and in the confessional and through the Confraternity of the Passion attached to our church, but he established the Confraternity on missions wherever he could and invested great numbers with the Black Scapular of the Passion in all parts. Great also was his devotion to the Dolours of the Blessed Virgin and to the Divine Sacrament of the Attar. He wrote and published several volumes on our Lady's Dolours, The Manual of a Happy Death, Our Lord's Passion, The Blessed Sacrament, and Saint Michael which have passed through several editions. In this wa y did his zeal inspire him to labour for souls where his voice could not reach and took means that even after death he should yet speak to the hearts of many of God and the salvation of their souls.

His life of unremitting toil could but tell on his naturally strong constitution. For some time past his brethren could observe a great change in him and on Sunday morning the 30th August while in the confessional as was his custom at that time he felt suddenly unwell. He passed out to prepare to offer the Holy Sacrifice and while thus engaged he had suddenly a stroke of apoplexy. The medical attendant was soon with him. and for some time he seemed daily to improve having recovered the use of his right hand and side which were paralyzed. But on the 21st September he received a second stroke which paralyzed his left side and rendered him completely unconscious. In this state he remained with slight intervals of consciousness until the morning of the 28th September his 60th birthday when he calmly breathed his last fortified by the Sacraments of Holy Church. The day of his death was the eve of the feast of Si Michael to whom he had a special devotion. The colossal statue of St. Michael which now adorns the front of St. Paul's Church is due'to his exertions.

His obsequies were attended by about 80 priests secular and regular. The Most Rev. Dr. Woodlock, Bishop of Ardagh, presided at the Office, and the Requiem Mass was sung by the V. Rev. Fr. Gregory, Provincial of the Anglo-Hibernian Province. The vast numbers of the laity whom the spacious church could not contain attested to the esteem and respect in which tile good Father was held by the people in whose midst he had laboured so long and so faithfully.

We have no doubt that God has prepared as the reward of his laborious life a bright crown of eternal glory, but as he had to pass before the Judgement Seat of Him Who has declared "Ego justifies judicabo* I beg of your Reverence to have the usual suffrages offered for the repose of his soul.
Signed "Dominic of the Imm. Heart of Mary, Rector"/

William Joseph Walsh was born at 11 Essex Quay in Dublin on 30 January 1841. He was the only child of Ralph Walsh, a watchmaker from County Kerry, and Mary Pierce of Galway. He was educated at St. Laurence O’Toole Seminary School in Dublin before attending Newman’s Catholic University. He then went to study at St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth, in 1858. Excelling at Canon Law, Hebrew, and Divinity, he completed his Ordinary Degree in 1864 followed by a combined three years of post-graduate study and lecturing in the Theology Faculty. He was ordained to the priesthood on 22 May 1866. The following year, at the age of twenty-six, Walsh was appointed Professor of Dogmatic and Moral Theology at Maynooth. He served as Vice President of the College from 1878 and was made President in 1880. On the death of Cardinal Edward McCabe (1816-1885), Walsh was appointed Archbishop of Dublin. He was appointed to the See of Dublin on 3 July 1885. This was hailed as a triumph by Irish Nationalists as Walsh’s sympathies were well known. For the next quarter of a century, Walsh was one of the dominant personalities in the Irish Catholic Church and played a key role in both pastoral and public affairs. His motto was ‘Fide et Labore’. He died on 9 April 1921 and is buried in Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin.

Baptismal name: John (Patrick) Ryan
Religious name: Br. Pacificus Ryan OFM Cap.
Date of birth: 27 Aug. 1876
Place of birth: Loughane, County Cork
Name of father: John Ryan
Name of mother: Catherine Ryan (née Cronin)
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: 2 July 1894
Date of first profession: 4 Oct. 1895
Date of final profession: 31 Jan. 1903
Ministries: A newspaper report on the golden jubilee of Br. Pacificus Ryan OFM Cap. in 1944 read: ‘Born in Cork, Brother Pacificus is a member of a well-known Cork family, and has several relatives in the city and county. During his long life in the Capuchin Order, he served in Kilkenny, and for a long number of years in Dublin, returning to Rochestown over twenty years ago. He served there in the capacity of sacristan and is a very popular and highly respected figure. He is looked upon as an authority on the Rubrics and Church ceremonies’.
Date of death: 1 July 1950
Place of death: South Infirmary, Cork
Place of burial: Cemetery, Rochestown Capuchin Friary, County Cork

Baptismal name: Thomas Hynes
Religious name: Fr. Jarlath Hynes OFM Cap.
Date of birth: 21 Dec. 1867
Place of birth: Mountbellew, County Galway
Name of father: Michael Hynes (Baker)
Name of mother: Mary Hynes (née Ryan/Rogan)
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: 8 Dec. 1886
Date of first profession: 8 Jan. 1888
Date of final profession: 21 Feb. 1891
Date of ordination (as priest): 13 Dec. 1891
Leadership positions: Provincial Definitor (Councillor): 1898-1901; 1901-4; 1907-10
Date of death: 25 Mar. 1918
Place of death: Barrowville, County Carlow (He was a member of the Church Street community in Dublin at the time of his death).

Baptismal name: Alphonsus McGarry
Religious name: Fr. Columban McGarry OFM Cap.
Place of birth: Rasharkin, County Antrim (Diocese of Down & Connor)
Date of birth: 20 April 1901
Name of father: Patrick McGarry
Name of mother: M.A. Cleland
Date of reception into Capuchin Order: 18 September 1921
Date of first profession: 15 October 1922
Date of final profession: 22 December 1925
Date of ordination (Rome): 29 July 1928
Education: BA (1st class honours): 1925; Doctorate in Divinity, 1929 (Rome); Licentiate of Sacred Scripture, 1931 (Rome).
Ministries: Spiritual Director of the Pontifical Ethiopian College at the Vatican from 1966-70; Guardian of St. Fidelis Hospice, Rome, from 1970-5; returned to Ireland in 1975 and was appointed to the Church Street community in Dublin.
Date of death: 24 December 1987
Place of death: Fahan Nursing Home, County Donegal
Place of burial: Cemetery, Ard Mhuire Capuchin Friary, County Donegal

Baptismal name: John Knaresboro
Religious name: Fr. Patrick Knaresboro OSFC
Date of birth: 1833
Place of birth: Inch, County Kilkenny
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: c.1850
Ministries: He began his missionary work in India in 1859 ministering to Catholic soldiers and civilians in Shimla (Simla), Chakrata and Dagshai.
Date of death: 3 Nov. 1901
Place of death: Dagshai, Himachal Pradesh, India

Baptismal name: John Butler
Religious name: Br. Colman Butler OFM Cap.
Date of birth: 28 Feb. 1890
Place of birth: Kilgreana, Rosslee, County Mayo
Name of father: Edward Butler (Farmer)
Name of mother: Margaret Butler (née Flannery)
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: 17 Dec. 1922
Date of first profession: 10 Feb. 1924
Date of final profession: 10 Feb. 1927
Date of death: 1 Dec. 1958
Place of death: Kilkenny County Hospital (now St. Luke’s General Hospital)
Place of burial: Foulkstown Cemetery, County Kilkenny

Patrick John Cox was born in Dublin on St. Patrick’s Day (17 March) in 1917. He entered the Capuchin novitiate in Kilkenny in July 1938 and took Xavier as his religious name. He was solemnly professed as a friar in 1942. Soon after his final profession, he volunteered for missionary work in the Prefecture of Victoria Falls in Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia). He left Ireland in late 1943 and undertook the difficult journey to Africa at the height of the Second World War. He arrived in Northern Rhodesia in January 1944. He spent twenty years working at the Sancta Maria mission station in Lukulu in the Western Province of Zambia. He also assisted in the building of a church and adjoining friary at the Saint Martin de Porres mission in Kaoma in 1968. A cancer diagnosis forced him to travel to Cape Town in South Africa to seek medical treatment in the early 1980s. He died in Cape Town on 2 December 1984 and was buried in the Capuchin plot in Maitland Cemetery.

Baptismal name: Patrick John Cox
Religious name: Br. Xavier Cox OFM Cap.
Date of birth: 17 March 1917
Place of birth: Dublin
Name of father: Christopher Cox (Provisioner’s Assistant)
Name of mother: Margaret Mary Cox (née Costello)
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: 20 July 1938
Date of first profession: 21 July 1939
Date of final profession: 21 July 1942
Missionary activities: Travelled to Northern Rhodesia on 12 Nov. 1943
Date of death: Cape Town, South Africa
Place of burial: Maitland Cemetery, Cape Town, South Africa

Baptismal name: Daniel Cryan
Religious name: Fr. Basil Cryan OFM Cap.
Date of birth: 9 Nov. 1898
Place of birth: Ballyfinnegan, Ballintubber, County Roscommon (Diocese of Elphin)
Name of father: James Cryan (Tenant Farmer)
Name of mother: Catherine Cryan (née Murray)
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: 17 Sept. 1916
Date of first profession: 17 Sept. 1917
Date of final profession: 14 July 1921
Date of ordination (as priest): 29 June 1925
Educational attainments: BA (1921); Higher Diploma in Education (1926)
Leadership positions: Capuchin Mission Office Secretary, 1932-7
Date of death: 27 Nov. 1968
Place of death: St. Joseph’s Nursing Home, Raheny, County Dublin
Place of burial: Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin

William Coughlan was born in Passage West in County Cork on 20 September 1925. He was received as a Capuchin Franciscan novice at Rochestown Friary in County Cork in October 1944. He was sent for philosophical studies to St. Bonaventure’s Friary in Cork and was solemnly professed as a Capuchin friar in October 1948. He subsequently travelled to Ard Mhuire Friary in County Donegal for his theological studies. He was ordained to the priesthood on 12 June 1952. Shortly afterward, he went to the United States. During his twenty-three years of ministry in America, he spent two years in Ukiah and a further two years in Bend, Oregon. He also served as assistant pastor for four years in Our Lady of Good Counsel in Fort Bragg in California. He subsequently served as Pastor and Superior for three years in St. Joseph’s Parish in Roseburg and seven years at Our Lady of Angels in Hermiston in Oregon. He suffered a heart attack and died in Hermiston on 29 September 1975. He was buried in the cemetery adjoining San Lorenzo Seminary, Santa Inés Mission, in California.

Baptismal name: William Coughlan
Religious name: Fr. Simon Coughlan OFM Cap.
Date of birth: 20 Sept. 1925
Place of birth: Passage West, County Cork
Name of father: John Coughlan
Name of mother: Anne Coughlan (née Hegarty)
Date of reception into the Capuchin Order: 3 Oct. 1944 (Rochestown, County Cork)
Date of first profession: 4 Oct. 1945
Date of final profession: 4 Oct. 1948
Date of ordination (as priest): 12 June 1952
Educational attainments: BA (1948)
Missionary activities: Travelled to the United States mission in 1952
Date of death: 29 Sept. 1975
Place of death: Hermiston, Oregon, United States
Place of burial: Cemetery, San Lorenzo Seminary, Santa Inés Mission, California, United States