The Catholic Church in Aberystwyth During WWI ~ part two

 The Catholic Parish and the Irish Carmelites

The activities and presence of the Catholic Church in Aberystwyth during the war, was not restricted to the female Catholic religious orders of the Daughters of the Holy Spirit and the Sisters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul, which were discussed in the previous blog in this series. As, the wider Catholic parish of Aberystwyth and the Irish Carmelite priests, which had served the parish since January 1936, were also impacted by the war. How far these impacts of the war also drastically changed the presence of the Catholic Church and how these changes increased the demands and responsibilities of the Irish priests in Aberystwyth, will be discussed. The reaction and response of Catholic parishioners to these changes, will also be considered.

The Irish priests who were based in Aberystwyth provided mass and spiritual guidance for many different groups of people who found themselves being stationed or evacuated to Aberystwyth. One such group were those who were Catholics amongst the Army and the R.A.F., who had been stationed for training purposes in and around Aberystwyth and the surrounding areas. Fr. Malachy William Lynch and Fr. Laserian Patrick Geary, were responsible for the pastoral care respectively of the R.A.F. and Army personnel. On Christmas Day in 1942 many parishioners also opened their homes to these R.A.F. and Army personnel, so they could share a meal together, despite food resources being tight and rationed. 

 

Fr. Laserian Patrick Geary (1908-1992). Photograph from W. McGreal, A Stumbling Pilgrim Guided by Indirections. A biography of Carmelite friar Fr. Malachy Lynch 1899-1972 (Kent, 2016). Used with permission of the Prior of Aylesford.

These men who were stationed in Aberystwyth came from all across the United Kingdom, such as James ‘Jim’ McCabe-Brennan from West Lothian in Scotland, who was part of the R.A.F personnel stationed in Aberystwyth. Jim met his future wife Morfudd, who was working at the local Boots Chemist whilst he was stationed there in 1941. Morfudd and Jim McCabe-Brennan, who were interviewed for the local Catholic parish magazine, Cross-ties in February 1995, as they had become very active members of the Catholic parish there, recalled that this encounter in Boots was no surprise as it was a popular place to shop amongst those stationed in Aberystwyth. After their first date at the Coliseum in Aberystwyth they went onto have a lasting friendship and marriage, with most of their married life being spent in Aberystwyth after they moved back to the area from Wrexham in 1947. Morfudd and Jim are just one example of the way the war changed the Catholic Church in Aberystwyth, both due to the increased demand for spiritual guidance that personnel like Jim required as well as the lasting presence and role which him and Morfudd went onto to play in parish life there. 

Amongst the 600 students who were evacuated to Aberystwyth from University College London were students who were members of the Catholic University Society there, who much like the R.A.F. and Army personnel required spiritual guidance and direction for the duration of the war from the Irish Carmelite priests based in Aberystwyth. This student society had just over 30 students in 1939 when they were evacuated. Throughout the course of the war Fr. Lynch arranged for these students to have discussion groups on every Sunday during term time from 1939 onwards, on topics ranging from politics, social issues, pacifism, and capital punishment as well as giving lectures and hosting a retreat for the students before the Easter academic vacation in 1940. These lectures and discussion groups were held at various locations, such as St Mary’s College, which was the seminary for the Catholic priesthood that the Carmelites ran in Aberystwyth or either at Alexandra Hall or the presbytery next to Our Lady of the Angels and St Winefride’s Catholic Church on Queens Road. 
 

Father Malachy William Lynch (1899-1972) seated right in the photograph, with his brother Fr. Elias Murtagh Lynch (1897-1967) on the left and Fr. John James Cogan (1873-1941) in the centre, c. 1926. , c. 1926. Photograph from W.M. Lynch, Into the Land of Carmel (Aberystwyth, c. 1950s). Used with permission of the Prior of Aylesford.

St Mary’s College played host not only to the evacuated university students from London but also to a wide array of other people during the war. The college was a busy place under both the wartime priorates of Fr. Geary between 1940 and 1943 and Fr. Lynch from the beginning of the war until 1940 and again from 1943 until 1946. Despite the rationed food resources the College and the Carmelites had, many people were invited to join the Carmelites there for lunch, these guests who were all brought along by Fr. Lynch, ranged from the editor of the People newspaper to the Lithuanian Ambassador. Evacuee schoolchildren from St Francis Xavier secondary school in Liverpool also experienced a warm welcome when they were provided with a temporary space in the College as well as in a Sunday School Room in another Christian church in the town, so they could continue their schooling when they were evacuated to Aberystwyth in 1941. 27 of these evacuated school children were also provided with the sacraments of First Holy Communion at Easter in 1941, again displaying the increased need for spiritual provision that the Carmelites were faced with during the war. 

 

St Mary’s College, Aberystwyth c. 1950s. M. Lynch, The White Friars Return to Wales, (Aberystwyth c. 1950s), Carmelite Library Aylesford, p. 6. Used with permission of the Prior of Aylesford.

Evacuees, such as the around 100 Catholic children who were evacuated from Liverpool in February 1941, which included those from St Francis Xavier, were looked after and welcomed in many ways by the Catholic parishioners in Aberystwyth. Many parishioners answered the pre-emptive call in July 1940 to provide accommodation for these children. This request came from Fr. Bonaventure Cyril Fitzgerald, who was the Parish Priest from 1937 until he transferred from Aberystwyth to Sittingbourne in Kent, in November 1941. Several of the female parishioners also not only provided accommodation but set about making clothes for these evacuees, who would have left their homes in Liverpool with only a suitcase, as well as offering to mend the clothes the evacuees already owned. It was however clear that some children who were evacuated in 1939 from Liverpool were not able to be provided with a Catholic household, as some were placed in a Welsh-speaking chapel going household, which both came as a shock to their system and Catholic upbringing as well as proving difficult for many of them to settle fully throughout their time there. 

This increase in the Catholic population in Aberystwyth and the surrounding areas due to the number of people who were evacuated and stationed there as well as the response of the Church hierarchy to the war, changed where and when Catholic masses were being said. These unforeseen challenges were faced initially by a relatively new priest in Fr. Fitzgerald, who when he was appointed as the Parish Priest in 1937 was only recently ordained in 1933. The war required the Carmelite Fathers to expand where mass was being held to beyond the confines of St Winefride’s, to cater for the Catholic evacuees and servicemen who were appearing in the villages outside of Aberystwyth. This led to seven outstations and mass centres being created by 1942, in places such as Llanon, Llanarth, Cilcennin, New Quay and Aberaeron. Catholic masses in Borth, which had mostly only been said during the summer months since the Carmelites arrived in 1936, had to be moved to the Public Memorial Hall because of the larger numbers who were coming to mass. This was mostly down to the first group of Catholic evacuees that came to the area arriving in Borth in 1939 and with this again the Carmelites were faced with an increased demand for spiritual guidance and direction. Whilst there was a huge increase in masses being said in many new places, the public celebration of Christmas Midnight Mass was forbidden by both Bishop Michael McGrath of Menevia and his predecessor Bishop Daniel Hannon throughout the Diocese from 1939 until 1944, most likely due to safety concerns for parishioners and priests alike.

Fr. Bonaventure Cyril Fitzgerald (1908-1987), photo (left) taken in 1946 and Fr. Francis Paul Barker (1908-1954), photo (right) taken in 1943, both photographs used with permission of the Archives of the Irish Province of the Carmelites.

  

These changes to the Catholic parish in Aberystwyth were initiated and made whilst also in the background, the position of Parish Priest was going through its first great changes since the Carmelites arrived in Aberystwyth in 1936. As after Fr. Fitzgerald was transferred, Fr. Francis Paul Barker was moved to take over from him but his time was cut short after he had to be sent to Dublin, where the motherhouse for the order was due to health reasons in 1942. From September 1942 until the end of the war the responsibilities of Parish Priest were given to Fr. Geary, who initiated the 11AM Sunday mass at St Winefride’s to relieve the pressure which had amassed on the Sunday masses that were being said at the time due to evacuees and those stationed nearby.

The Catholic Church and more specifically the Irish Carmelite priests therefore, because of evacuations or people being stationed in Aberystwyth and the surrounding areas, experienced a vast increase on the demands and responsibilities which were expected of them. Evacuee experiences were of course varied, with each child experiencing this newfound reality in various ways, for example the experiences of Catholic children evacuated to Welsh-speaking chapel going families compared to those evacuated to Catholic households, is just one example on the surface which demonstrates this. From R.A.F and Army personnel to the evacuation of university students and Liverpudlian children, the needs of these various groups were mostly met through lectures, discussion groups, First Holy Communions, more masses or a roof over their heads, clothes on their backs and food which was shared in their bellies.

Blog by Conor Brockbank

SOURCES

Catholic Herald

Cross-ties: The Roman Catholic Churches of "Our Lady of the Angels and St. Winefride", "The Welsh Martyrs", "Our Lady, Star of the Sea", "Holy Cross" Issue Number 13, February 1995, National Library of Wales.

Daily Telegraph

Davies, A.M. D.H.S, Led by the Spirit. Daughters of the Holy Spirit in England and Wales 1902-1952. Bedford, 2004.

Irish Independent

Irish Press

Kiely, M.B. Annals of the Parish of our Lady of the Angels and St Winefride. Aberystwyth, 1973.

Kiely, M.B. Our Lady of the Angels and St Winefride, Aberystwyth: Centenary 1874-1974. Aberystwyth, 1974.

Lynch, M. The White Friars Return to Wales. Aberystwyth c. 1950s, Carmelite Library Aylesford.

Lynch, W.M. Into the Land of Carmel. Aberystwyth, c. 1950s, Carmelite Library Aylesford.

McGreal, W. A biography of the Carmelite friar Fr. Elias Lynch (1897-1967). Kent, 2007.

McGreal, W. A Stumbling Pilgrim Guided by Indirections. A biography of Carmelite friar Fr. Malachy Lynch 1899-1972. Kent, 2016.

McGreal, W., ed. Sixty Years of Priesthood. Fr. Pat Geary and Fr. Tommy Gallagher, Carmelites. Kent, 1992, Carmelite Library Aylesford.

Morgan, P. The University of Wales 1939-1993. Cardiff, 1997.

O’Dwyer, P. The Irish Carmelites (of the Ancient Observance). Dublin, 1988.

Plumb, B. Arundel to Zabi. A Biographical Dictionary of the Catholic Bishops of England and Wales (Deceased) 1623-2000. Wigan, 2006.

Various photos were kindly provided by the Archives of the Irish Province of the Carmelites