PAPAL LETTER TO FRIARY STUDENT
A sixth class student at the Friary Girls’ School who wrote to Pope Francis in praise of the school’s chaplain couldn’t believe it when she received a reply from the Vatican back last week, less than a month after she posted her letter.
And school principal, Brid Galligan, said she had no idea that student Ruth McGee had taken it upon herself to write to the Vatican until the pupil produced the papal response last Friday morning.
Ruth, from Lis na Dara, wanted to write to Pope Francis about the school chaplain, Fr Gabriel Harty OP, the 95-year-old Dominican cleric, known as the Rosary Priest and how kind he has been to her and the other pupils over the past number of years.
Mrs Galligan said no-one in the school knew about Ruth’s idea until Friday morning.
The principal said: ‘Ruth came up to me with something behind her back and when she showed it to me, I couldn’t believe it. It was a letter written on behalf of Pope Francis, with an accompanying card for Ruth and a set of Rosary beads, blessed by the Pope, for Fr Gabriel.
The response said the Pope had been pleased to receive Ruth’s letter and ‘asked to thank you and he appreciates the sentiments’ expressed about Fr Gabriel. Ruth had told Pope Francis about what a lively, outgoing, kind and thoughtful chaplain Fr Gabriel has been at the school.
The letter said the Pope was pleased to hear about Fr Gabriel’s good work and added that both he and Ruth, along with the Friary Girls’ School, would be remembered in the Pope’s prayers.
Ms Galligan said that when the Rosary beads and letter were presented to Fr Gabriel, ‘ his smile was unbelievable’. She said: ‘He was just so thrilled that someone would have taken it upon themselves to do this for him and he went back to the house to show the others’.
Ruth’s teacher, Ms Caoimhe Coyle, was ‘ very proud of her’ and ‘delighted for her’ to have received a letter from the Vatican, as is the whole school.
Ms Galligan said she is thrilled for Fr Gabriel, who has been a huge asset to the school since he became chaplain about four years ago. She said: ‘He can relate to children straight away, he is brilliant with them because he’s like them and they are delighted he’s here with them. He’s also a genius at computers, designing and printing his own Christmas cards’.