‘We must resist the temptation to retreat – the Church must be out there meeting people’

Despite the challenges, rumours of the Church’s demise are greatly exaggerated Bishop Paul Dempsey tells Michael Kelly

When the parish priest of Newbridge Fr Paul Dempsey got a call from the Pope’s ambassador in Dublin in mid-December requesting a meeting he quickly made arrangements to go to the capital. The Papal Nuncio Archbishop Jude Okolo told him that Pope Francis had appointed him the new Bishop of Achonry.

It was a different world and while there were vague rumblings from China about a mysterious new virus, little could anyone predict the devastating loss of life and curtailment to daily life that Covid-19 would bring when it reached our shores.

Bishop Dempsey – who was finally consecrated Bishop of Achonry on Sunday after an earlier ceremony scheduled for April had to be postponed – is keenly aware of the effects of coronavirus from his ministry in Kildare, a county which remains in a partial lockdown.

When his appointment to replace Bishop Brendan Kelly was announced on January 27, the Cathedral of the Annunciation and St Nathy in Ballaghaderreen, Co. Roscommon the mother church of the diocese was filled with students celebrating Catholic Schools Week. Sunday’s ordination, in contrast, saw just 50 people and many of Bishop Dempsey’s friends and family were unable to travel.

“It’s an extraordinary time alright, and no sign of it abating for quite a while either,” he tells The Irish Catholic.

Ordination

The postponement of the episcopal ordination had very practical consequences for a new bishop keen to familiarise himself with the pastoral challenges of his diocese. Bishop Dempsey (49) says that “moving into a new situation – a new place that I’m not awfully familiar with, and doing that in the middle of a world pandemic has been quite a personal journey”.

The lockdown has prevented Bishop Dempsey meeting the priests of the diocese and getting to know the parishioners.

However, that hasn’t stopped the outpouring of goodwill. “I’ve been overwhelmed by the support and the letters, the emails and the texts. I don’t think I ever realised what a priest might mean in the parish until something like this happens and that gives me great hope,” he says.

I put it to the bishop that moving from Newbridge – a town with a population of almost 23,000 people – to Achonry where there are fewer than 40,000 people in the entire diocese will be quite a difference.

“Of course they’re very different places – but people are people, no matter whether they’re living in Newbridge or Clane or any of the places I’ve been, or whether they’re here in the Diocese of Achonry”.

Bishop Dempsey sees relationships as being at the heart of pastoral ministry. “And that’s what I need to build on now – relationships with priests and people here in Achonry, just as I tried to build relationships in the parishes I’ve worked in…even though the context is somewhat different, people are there and it’s a matter of trying to build that relationship with people in a different context. As I say, relationship is what is really important at the end of the day,” he says.

Ordained a priest in 1997, Bishop Dempsey joins the hierarchy as the group’s youngest member and a man who chose to accept the challenge of priesthood at a time when the Church was in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. He traces his own vocational journey to a time when he was around eleven years of age.

“I remember being at Mass, and up to that point I think I wanted to be a garda in my innocence as a child, but I remember being at Mass and looking at the priest and something just touched my heart to say that there’s something in what he is doing that maybe I want to pursue”.

He says that it is a sense that has never left him and has guided him through the ups and downs of formation and subsequent ministry.

He spent most of his seminary days in Carlow and remembers it fondly. “It was a very good formation system there that helped me, and guided me along the way to say ‘yes’ to the call of priesthood. And the last 23 years as a priest – despite all of the challenges that have been out there – it has been a very, very happy time…I’ve loved every moment of the last 23 years and, please God, I look forward to that continuing in the years ahead”.

Bishop Dempsey believes that the challenges and scandals in the Church have helped to strengthen his faith.

Difficult time

“We’ve come through a very, very difficult time in the life of the Church as I was in my formation and at the time of my ordination [in 1997] and indeed my years in ministry. It has been a radically different time for the Church – but for me as a priest, my ministry was always pastoral…I was in parishes with people, and I would have found that when one is genuine and when one tries to do one’s best for people in a parish, and you build that relationship with people, people accept you, and your journey with people,” he says.

Accompanying people has been a central theme in the Petrine ministry of Pope Francis and the new bishop sees this as the essence of priesthood. “It’s such a privilege to be able to journey with people in the very great joys of life – also in the huge sorrows that people experience.

“It’s a huge privilege as a priest to be able to walk with people in their homes and experience how people welcome you into their lives – in a matter of a moment, you’re there with them: and that’s what the experience of priesthood has been for me, even with the difficulties and the challenges and the changes that have happened in the last couple of decades,” he says.

Remaining rooted in a sense of priestly identity has always been very important for Bishop Dempsey and while reluctant to offer advice to others he is clear that: “Once you keep focused on what your call is – and Christ has called us as priests to be with people, to be in solidarity with people, to walk with people – that’s helped me to keep focused on what is important in ministry, and what’s important in life”.

As a seminarian, Bishop Dempsey had an early experience with personal grief and dealing with bereavement. When he was 22, his mother died of cancer and just 12 days later his father also died.

Changing

“It was obviously a huge life-changing moment, and I was very lucky to have a wider circle of family and friends that supported me and guided me through that time and they continue to guide me at this time. But it was a very difficult time, maybe not to sound too pious about it, but it also helped me to focus on my relationship with Christ as well…It’s a little bit like at this moment in time, coronavirus has thrown us all: we don’t know what the future holds. It’s a life-changing thing. Now it’s not quite the same as losing both parents in a short succession of time, but perhaps these moments of huge and radical change in our lives bring the bigger questions to the fore.

“I remember the image that I had at that time when I lost my parents, was almost the tangible sense of the Lord holding me by the hand and guiding me through this difficult time: and that’s something that has stayed with me,” he recalls.

While a devastating personal experience, the death of both parents at such a young age was to prove a difficult early lesson in one of the most important pastoral duties of a priest: comforting the bereaved.

“One of the huge parts of a priest’s life is the whole bereavement ministry and working with families who are grieving and are working through grief…I think my own experience, having gone through a very heavy experience of grief myself, certainly helped me to understand how people experience grief…I would have heard other younger priests who wouldn’t have had the experience of grief or bereavement in their life doing funerals, but they never really knew what it was actually like to lose somebody,” he recalls.

Consecration

Bishop Dempsey’s consecration was heralded by one of the national secular newspapers with a report claiming that there would be fewer priestly ordinations in Ireland this year than episcopal ones.

It wasn’t quite accurate and omitted some ordinations, but the figures remain stark. As we speak, Fr Shane Costello has just been ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Tuam. That same diocese buried seven priests over the last year and a further four retired.

One doesn’t need to be John Nash to know that those figures only point in one direction. As a former vocations director for Kildare and Leighlin, it is a situation close to Bishop Dempsey’s heart and it will be an important part of him ministry. “I think it has to be wider than that as well – it’s not either/or: it’s both. I think working to develop the vocation of laypeople must be a crucial part of the ministry of a bishop.

“We have to try and continue to encourage vocations to the priesthood and religious life, but in tandem with that we have to try and encourage and develop the whole area of lay ministry within the Church which is something I’ve been very much involved with down through the years,” he says.

While not underestimating the difficulties presented by the vocations crisis, he thinks it can present a moment for lay ministry to flourish in a way that it hasn’t yet.

“We have to create a culture where people who are not committed to priesthood or religious life can, through their baptism, contribute in a huge way to the life and ministry of the Church”.

It’s clear that Bishop Dempsey is a shepherd in the mould of Pope Francis replete with the smell of the sheep. He also sees remaining hopeful and joyful in the midst of challenges as vital in sustaining a healthy pastoral ministry.

“Maybe some people might think I’m naive, but I actually think that this is a very critical time and a very exciting time in the life of the Church to realise the vision of Vatican II [of co-responsibility].

“If you read the Vatican II documents – they are still so alive, still so visionary, and that must be template for the Church of today. That’s still there for us to grasp, and obviously it’s a very different cultural situation today but I believe that the Vatican Council speaks so aptly to the situation of today and I think we need to reflect on that in a very serious way as we go forward as a Church in Ireland today,” Bishop Dempsey believes.

He thinks that Pope Francis and his constant proclamation of the joy of the Gospel is helping people who have negative stereotypes about the Church to look again.

“I think people identify with his humanity and also his message about going back to the basics of what we’re about as a Church. He has said a number of times that we tend to focus on certain moral issues – which are absolutely very important – but there’s an awful lot more to the life of the Church than just maybe two or three controversial moral issues – it’s how we live our lives, it’s how we live the Gospel, it’s the joy of the Gospel that we have to try and live and that will attract people.

Pope Francis

“Pope Francis has lived that himself and is witness to that joy of the Gospel – and I think that’s what attracts people to him and to his message,” he says.

One only needs to listen to a discussion about faith on radio or television in Ireland to know that the transmission of the faith is hindered by a sense of negative experiences amongst some people when it comes to the Church.

“I think the reality for a lot of people in Ireland today is they have a certain view of what the Church is about and it’s quite narrow in certain ways. Whereas the Church should be involved in every aspect of life – and that’s what the Gospel is about: it’s a refreshing, beautiful message and for us the challenge is to be creative and imaginative in trying to present that message with a sense of joy. It’s so important that we’re joyful people – of course there are all sorts of difficulties in life, but the Gospel offers us that real hope that things can be better and that every single one of us is loved in a very profound and real way,” he insists.

At the same time, Bishop Dempsey is acutely aware from his ministry that there are almost two Churches in Ireland. “There’s that kind of public-face of the Church that’s in the media, that maybe there’s a lot of negativity around it, but on the ground, there’s a strong Church there that’s very positive and is there in a very real way too,” he recalls quoting an observation from the former Bishop of Killaloe Bishop Willie Walshe.

Bishop Dempsey believes that the absence of the sense of unconditional love is evident in modern culture. “There’s a sense today that many people don’t feel that sense of love in their lives or in their hearts, and maybe they go down the line of addiction or whatever it is, whereas we have this precious message that should be delivered to people with a joyous heart…that’s the challenge of ministry today: whether we’re in the priesthood, the baptised faithful or whatever it is that’s the challenge, that’s the mission that we have today.

“I think we just have to be creative and imaginative in that and to try and bring that message in a renewed way to people in Ireland today,” he says with evident enthusiasm.

I asked to Bishop Dempsey whether retreating from the world is not an option for the Church? “Absolutely: and that’s been a very important part of my own ministry – that we need to be out there with people and among people. And when we look at the Gospel, that is what Jesus Christ did. He was out there with the people and most of them were imperfect but he was out there with them and he met them where they were and maybe he wanted to bring them to a place that was better for them. But, what other example can we use except that of the Lord himself and how he ministered to people in his own life? If we could continue to connect with that and be inspired by that example, I think we leave the rest of the Lord as the prayer associated with St Oscar Romero says: ‘we’re messengers, we’re not Messiahs.

“All we can do is just sow a few little seeds, try do our best with that, and then leave it to the Lord then maybe to do the growing after that,” he says.

Youth

As a priest, Bishop Dempsey was also hugely involved in youth ministry including leading groups to World Youth Day. At a time when people can be cynical about young people, he has been impressed by the youngsters that he has met and believes that the Church must keep them front and central.

“I think there’s fantastic young people out there today, and I think they’re longing for some hope-filled message: they’re longing for something more in their lives and I think the Church has something very precious to offer to those young people.

“I think it’s a huge challenge in how we communicate with young people. Do young people see the Church as being old-fashioned or out of touch? I think we need to challenge young people as well,” he believes. And key to that challenge for Bishop Dempsey is helping them see that values like safeguarding creation and looking out for the vulnerable are Gospel imperatives.

“Pope Francis was way ahead of the posse on the whole issue of the environment and has been for years. So, I think Pope Francis has shown great leadership on that and I think we can connect with young people in those areas, so I would be very hope-filled around that,” he says.

Often hope – or perhaps more correctly optimism – can be in short supply in the Church in Ireland. Bishop Dempsey sees hope in the response of many parishes and communities to Covid-19.

“We’re at a very critical time in the midst of the coronavirus situation at the moment and obviously people are somewhat wearisome with it, and we’re not too sure where we’re going with it. But so much good has happened: neighbours looking out for one another, young people helping their neighbours and elderly people…I’ve heard so many stories of goodness and kindness, and it has opened up my eyes to see that this very critical time – even though it’s very difficult – has opened a way to so many positives as well. And I think that’s hopeful,” he says.

Bishop Dempsey keeps coming back to the theme of keeping one’s eyes on Christ and calibrating everything we do by the light of the Gospel.

“It’s not easy, it’s challenging, but I think if we remain focused on the heart of the message and where Pope Francis is leading us: to keep focused on the Gospel on the person of Jesus Christ, because if we lose sight of him we’re in trouble.

“So we must keep focused on Christ, on his message, and renew that connection with Christ. I think that will give us the hope we need to keep going and keep going forward,” he says.

One gets from Bishop Dempsey the impression of a distinct desire to hit the ground running, almost an impatience to get to know the people of Achonry.

“My plans, please God, over the next month is to get around to every parish and just to visit for morning Mass and say ‘hello’ to the people who are there and visit the priest and the parish just to get to know the place and get to visit the people and the priests of the diocese.

“And then after that, we’ll have to sit down and reflect a little bit on where we’re at and where we might want to go as a diocese and we’ll have to put the shoulder to the wheel,” he says.