CAPUCHIN FRANCISCAN friars travelled from South Africa, South Korea and New Zealand to attend the funeral Mass in Cork yesterday of Fr Donal O’Mahony, founder of the housing organisation Threshold.
Paying tribute at noon Requiem Mass at the Holy Trinity Church in Cork city, Fr Silvester O’Flynn said his lifelong friend was a man “of extraordinary empathy”.
“In Donal’s presence one was welcomed in to a space of hospitality. He was a man of extraordinary wisdom.
“Donal was always very conscious that it is very easy to talk and give lectures about problems but you must back it up with action. Threshold now is the recognised speaking voice for flat dwellers with up to 20,000 calls a year. He planted the seed and handed it over to others and let it grow.”
Fr O'Mahony (74) was a native of Blackrock in Cork city. On leaving school he joined the Irish Independentas a sports journalist for three years but found his "latent vocation" and embarked on a completely different path in life becoming a member of the Capuchin Order in 1958. After ordination in 1966, he was based in Church Street in Dublin and worked in the inner city where he became aware of the number of provincial young people working in the city and living in flats, many of which were sub standard and with no protection of tenancy.
In the 1980s he worked in Northern Ireland engaging with paramilitaries on both sides to promote dialogue as an alternative to conflict. In his role as national chaplain of Pax Christi in Ireland and as a member of the charity’s international board based in the Netherlands he made undercover visits to Iron Curtain countries before the fall of communism and the Berlin Wall. He was also principal mediator in a number of well-publicised international kidnapping cases, all of which were concluded successfully. In Ireland, he is probably best known for the mediating role he played in the bid to release kidnap victim, the Dutch industrialist Tiede Herrema, who had been abducted by Marion Coyle and Eddie Gallagher in October 1975.
Dr Herrema was released 36 days after his capture with the help of Fr O’Mahony.
He was appointed to Rome as secretary general of the Capuchin Order for Peace, Justice and Ecology which led him to travel to 94 countries over seven years.
In 2003 he moved to South Africa where he was based in Pretoria. While there he founded the Damietta Peace Initiative which was endorsed worldwide in 2005 by the general minister of the Capuchin Order. Two years ago, he received the Peace Award from the Interfaith Foundation in South Africa.
Mourners were also told of Fr Donal’s love of sailing around the Fastnet Rock in west Cork and his fondness for the Irish language and culture. Among those in attendance were representatives of Threshold, the general of the Order of the Friars Minor Capuchin (OFM Cap), Fr Peter Rogers, and friars from as far away as Ethiopia and Spain.
The family of Fr Donal thanked staff at the Bon Secours Hospital and Marymount hospice in Cork for their special care of their loved one over the last weeks of his life. Fr O’Mahony is survived by his sister Mary and brother-in-law Dom and his nieces Colette, Jane and Lisa.
HERREMA KIDNAPPING: PRIEST'S MEDIATION ROLE REMEMBERED
THE ROLE of the late Capuchin Franciscan friar Fr Donal O’Mahony in mediation to secure the release of a Dutch businessman kidnapped by the IRA in the 1970s was recalled yesterday.
Industrialist Dr Tiede Herrema was abducted near his Limerick home in October 1975, 35 years ago, and held for 36 days by Eddie Gallagher and Marion Coyle.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Liveline programme, Dr Herrema said he had not been aware of the role Fr O’Mahony played until afterwards. He first met the priest a few days after the kidnapping when he returned to Limerick.
Dr Herrema said he had played golf at Castletroy golf club with Fr O’Mahony, who did not initially explain his role in the kidnapping: “When I met him, he was very modest, also about the role he played.” He said he appreciated very much what Fr O’Mahony had done for him, and passed on his sympathies to the priest’s family.
Dr Herrema, now in his late 80s, said he was last here just three weeks ago with a Dutch film crew who are making a documentary to be broadcast in October, to coincide with the anniversary of his kidnapping. Gallagher and Coyle were later disowned by the IRA, which claimed it had not sanctioned the kidnapping.
– Elaine Edwards