Fr Donal O'Mahony, OFM Cap:FR DONAL O'Mahony, who has died aged 74, was an inspiring Christian, a tireless peace campaigner and a truly remarkable priest in an age when the traditional leadership role of the clergy is diminishing.
A member of the Capuchin order, following the Franciscan way of life, he was a champion of the poor and will long be remembered as the founder in 1978 of Threshold, Ireland’s main non-profit national housing advisory organisation.
In his capacity as a known peace-maker, he acted as mediator in several high-profile kidnappings, including the abduction 35 years ago of Dutch industrialist Tiede Herrema by an IRA splinter group. Extremely modest, he never talked about it in public later.
Threshold had its roots in the run-down flats of Dublin where the archbishop had appointed him as chaplain to the flat-dwellers in 1978.
His involvement with people at the coalface of Ireland’s housing problem honed his interest in social justice, especially the plight of down-and-out emigrants who had returned, hoping to make Ireland their home, only to fall through the cracks of society, ending up in exclusion and grinding poverty. He also worked with the street girls of the inner city.
Essentially, he founded Threshold as a peace and justice project, focusing specifically on housing and homelessness. It is a registered charity with offices in Dublin, Cork and Galway. Its fundamental work is advising people on their housing rights.
In a tribute to Fr O’Mahony, Threshold’s chairperson, Aideen Hayden, said his work “touched some of the most vulnerable people in Irish society”.
Seeing housing as a basic dignity, she added that “he understood that people didn’t just need a roof over their heads – they needed a home”.
Born in the Cork suburb of Blackrock, Fr O’Mahony was educated by the Capuchins at Rochestown College and the Christian Brothers before attending University College Cork. A late vocation, he was a keen sailor and worked as a sports journalist with the Irish Independent before joining the order in 1958. A conversation about religion with a fellow journalist while covering an international golf tournament at St Andrews had led him to re-evaluate his life. He was ordained in 1966.
A fellow Capuchin described him as “not among the ordinary run of the mill of clerics. He was always pushing the boat out and read the works of Teilhard de Chardin and Karl Rahner when most of us didn’t understand them and was imbued with the ideas of Vatican II when most of us weren’t”.
During the Troubles in Northern Ireland, he was involved with paramilitary groups on both sides, promoting peaceful dialogue as an alternative to the bomb and the bullet.
In October 1975, he was a mediator in the Herrema kidnapping by Eddie Gallagher and Marion Coyle. Following his release, Dr Herrema met Fr O’Mahony and they played golf together at Castletroy Club in Limerick.
With other negotiators, he succeeded in freeing 106 Nicaraguan students imprisoned by the government in Honduras and achieved the release of a British Jewish mother and daughter kidnapped for ransom money in Italy.
In Beirut, he met and engaged in dialogue with the Muslim leader, advocating on behalf of kidnap victims and seeking protection for Christian schools in Lebanon.
In Pretoria, South Africa, he founded the Capuchin Franciscan Peace Centre and created the Damietta Initiative, a quintessential Franciscan vision of peaceful, non-violent living, welcoming people of all faiths to sow the seeds of peace throughout the African continent.
An unsung hero, his career path reads like the CV of a high-flying international diplomat.
In Rome, he was appointed secretary general of his order’s worldwide division for Justice, Peace and Ecology; he taught for a year at Berkeley in California as a visiting scholar; worked with Pax Christi both in Ireland and Holland; and was declared Franciscan of the Year by an American religious journal.
In South America and South Africa, he participated at UN meetings on the environment and sustainable development; set up workshops in Ethiopia and Eritrea on alternatives to violence; and addressed the Parliament of the World’s Religions at Barcelona.
In 2008, he received a Peace Award from the Interfaith Foundation of South Africa.
He is survived by his sister Mary (O’Flynn), bother-in-law Dom, and nieces Colette, Jane and Lisa.
Fr Donal O’Mahony: born August 2nd, 1936; died August 14th, 2010