Page 7, 9th May 2008

9th May 2008

Page 7

Page 7, 9th May 2008 — 'Fame won't make us neglect our parishes'
Close

Report an error

Noticed an error on this page?
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it.

Tags

Organisations: Queen's University
Locations: Belfast, London, Rome

Share


Related articles

Sony Signs Singing Priests For £1 Million

Page 1 from 2nd May 2008

The Full Kit With Added Caboodle!

Page 7 from 9th January 1998

`maybe We S Can Be An Te Antidote To Depression'

Page 7 from 6th June 2008

An Island Of Faith In A Sea Of Secular Cynicism

Page 16 from 9th November 2007

Anna Arco Notebook

Page 10 from 8th September 2006

'Fame won't make us neglect our parishes'

Anna Arco meets the singing priests who have just signed a deal with Sony cameramen are packing up their kit. PR people talk loudly on mobiles and journalists hover in corners of the drawing room of the west London hotel. In the middle of all this the three priests sitting on comfortable sofas amid the remains of tea and scones present an island of calm and bonhomie. Fr David Delargy and brothers Fr Eugene and Fr Martin O'Hagan appear to be weathering the media public relations storm that surrounds them surprisingly well.
Earlier that day the parish priests from the Diocese of Down and Connor in Northern Ireland signed a El million record deal with Sony BMG, the proceeds of which will go to charity.
Anyone who has kept abreast with the news in the last couple of weeks will know their story. Discovered by an Irish pop musician, these normal parish priests have a special contract to put together a classical CD which will allow them to continue with their usual parish duties.
The brothers and their old school friend have sung together since their school days, through university and seminary, in Rome and back in Northern Ireland after they took on their parish work. They've always found time to sing together, be it for liturgies or concerts, and are quite well-known locally for their love of music.
But when we meet, all this news is still under wraps and fame is still a day away. Not even their parishioners know that these priests are on the cusp of celebrity.
After the official signing, the obligatory photographs at Westminster Cathedral and a day of interviews, the fathers admit they didn't quite realise the amount of publicity their singing trio, named "The Priests", would generate.
"Before we came over we didn't know that the PR machinery would go into full swing today. We were under the impression we hadn't asked actually that it wouldn't be until the actual CD was about to go onto the shelves," says Fr Eugene, the eldest of the three and a tenor. So unprepared were they for the media machine which springs into gear at highprofile music contracts that they had not really told their bishop that they might be signing a contract with Sony before they left for London.
They tried to get in touch with the bishop as quickly as possible once they realised what was going to happen, but he was in the middle of a Confirmation so they spoke to the diocesan media liaison officer and the chancellor instead to let them know. Fr Eugene's big blue eyes twinkle as he tells the story, and he slaps the table with the tea things exuber: antly as his voice goes an octave higher. "The media liaison officer said, 'Good news at last!"
Being parish priests, they are busy people each has two churches in his parish and celebrates Mass in both, and as Fr Eugene points out. "manpower is a wee bit stretched at the moment". But they are convinced that they won't be spending too much time away from their parishes. In fact they will go straight back after the interviews are over and the last details are worked out with Sony. They've only taken two days for their jaunt to London.
"People in our parishes won't have to ask 'Where is Father?' because they'll have their priest there," says Fr Martin. smiling. They hope to do most of the record in their days off so that they can continue their normal work.
It was Fr Martin, Fr Eugene's younger brother, who was out visiting the sick when he got the phone call from "a Liam Bradley" asking whether the trio could come together and make a demo tape with him. Mr Bradley turned out to be an Irish pop star who was scouting around for a singing priest for EMI Records, part of Sony, and had heard them sing.
They met in Fr Eugene's office in Belfast, where he is on the marriage tribunal, and put together some music and a short video clip, before "dashing back to their parishes".
After 19 years of priesthood for Fr David and Fr Martin, who were ordained on the same day, and 22 years for Fr Eugene, and even longer singing together, the priests hope that the contract with Sony will help young people understand the priesthood better.
Fr David, the baritone of the little group, says: "I would love to think that any young person who becomes aware of our story might realise that a priest is a real person; a priest is an ordinary person who brings all his gifts and talents into the priesthood. and that you don't have to fit into just one particular little kind of a box. God chooses all different kinds of people and you bring who you are and all your gifts and talents with you. And you don't cease to be an ordinary person, a real live human being."
Ireland has launched a "year of vocations" and Fr Martin thinks that the chance offered by the record deal is providential, especially at this time.
"I think it's lovely that there is a fusion of our role in terms of dialogue with secular society. It's also maybe challenging to secular society that we can in fact live a life this way, which is very much rooted in the priesthood, while being able to give people a lot of pleasure, uplift hearts and praise God," says Fr Martin. He also hopes that the fact that they are priests singing religious music will give their CD an added dimension.
"People listening might say 'Maybe these boys actually believe what they're singing'," he says.
Encouraged to enter the priesthood after school, Fr Eugene was torn between his love of music and his love of God. Eventually he decided that if he did not discern his vocation and "find out what it was", he might regret it. At Queen's University in Belfast he lived in a seminary and later was at the Irish Seminary in Rome, where he overlapped with his brother and Fr David.
"I wasn't unhappy in that environment and continued to grow happier as time went on. I believed, and now 22 years on, I'm still happy in my vocation," he says.
The other two followed suit, though Fr Martin felt that he had to grow into his vocation.
"Growing into the vocation is something I feel I have to renew every day. You can never have 100 per cent certainty; it may seem rather strange, but you re-commit
every day. It's almost like being ordained every day, but I think the journey into the priesthood is a challenging one, a shaping one and there is a necessity for constant ongoing formation and pastoral care. A vocation is very stretching and you have to face all sorts of eventualities, experiences and situations," he says.
He postponed his deaconate when he was in Rome because he felt he was not ready, but then went ahead, a few months atter te David had been ordained a deacon.
"You have your ups and downs, conscious of your strengths, conscious of your brokenness and yet it's only in your brokenness that you really realise what it is to need God," he says.
Fr Eugene pipes up: "And music does that too."




blog comments powered by Disqus