New life in Michigan awaits Fr Brendan
A Lavagh man was ordained in Mullinabreena on Sunday last and is preparing for his new parish in the US.
Brendan McCarrick ( 39) from Cloonbaniff will be going to a large parish in Michigan sometime later this year.
He told The Sligo Champion: “I first began studying for religious life back in 1997 when I was 20. I just wanted to take more time and see if it was for me,” he explained.
The Cloonbaniff native then spent ten years working in Harrington’s concrete manufacturing plant in Kilkee, Co Mayo and also spent time in Australia.
It was there he decided to think about religious life again. “When I was in Sydney in 2008, the World Youth Day event was on. It was while I was there I decided I’d like to return to religious life.”
He contacted the Irish Pallottines society, who have a provincial house in Dundrum.
“They were formed by St Vincent Pallotti, who was ordained in the mid 1800s in a Roman Diocese. He did a lot of work with people affected with cholera, the underprivileged.
“I had been in contact with the Pallottines over previous years and in 2008 decided to go back. I told them I was interested in going a bit further. So I began studying in September 2009.”
He spent seven years studying for the priesthood, which included going to Maynooth College and he also did a hospital chaplaincy course last year. “It’s good to have that as well.”
Brendan comes from a large family of eight children, four boys and four girls.
“Mary and James are my mum and dad. There was a big crowd of relatives at my ordination on Sunday, it was a happy occasion. Fr Peter Gallagher is the parish priest there.
“We are very fortunate in Achonry to have three men studying or being ordained lately, including myself. A few years ago, Paul Kilcoyne was ordained in the same church, while another lad from the parish, Emmett O’Dowd, is studying in the Edinburgh Diocese. Being one of the smallest parishes in the country, having three men soon- to- be ordained is a big thing.”
The Pallottines have priests around the world and they do a lot of work in places like East Africa, Argentina and Michigan, where Brendan is heading off to later this year. “I’m going to a place called Wyandotte, it’s up on the Canadian border. When you’re appointed, you’ll be there for a number of years at least.
“It’s a large parish, there’s three parishes put into one. There are 55,000 people in the parish so it’s big. I’ve no date yet finalised as to when I’m going. I’m still working on visas, but it should be towards early October.”
He is going to keep in touch with friends and family back home in Achonry too. “I’ll be back as regularly as I can. Thankfully America isn’t difficult to get to nowadays,” he laughed.
Time will tell whether he will go to the likes of East Africa or Argentina in the future, he added.
“Wherever I’m asked to go, I’ll go, we’ll have to see as time goes on.”
Although the numbers of young men studying for religious life is not as great as it once was, Brendan says there’s no need for panic.
“The way I look at it is those who are called should respond in their own time. I first started in 1997, that was 19 years ago and then I took a break. I don’t think it’s the case of quantity, it’s about timing and being in the right place,” Brendan said.