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THE ‘HOLY GROUND’ OF OUR ETHNIC MINORITY
FR PADDY KELLY CSsR REFLECTS ON ALMOST 40 YEARS OF MINISTRY TO THE TRAVELLING COMMUNITY IN IRELAND
BY ANNE STAUNTON AND PAT O’SULLIVAN
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Fr Paddy Kelly CSsR
Fr Paddy, tell us how you came in contact with Travellers and what led to your decision to make ministry to them your life’s work?
During my seminary days, I got to know and work with some Traveller lads living on an unofficial site in south County Dublin. I really enjoyed relating with them and often thought of working with the general Traveller community after ordination.
My first few years as a Redemptorist priest were spent in the Philippines but on returning to Ireland in 1975, that desire to work with Travellers got even stronger and I began to make some connections with other Religious already working in that area. Knowing of that aspiration of mine, Sr Patricia Lahiff, a Holy Faith Sister and director of St Joseph’s Travellers Training Centre in Finglas, invited me to join its staff as a teacher. That was the decisive moment that set me on the road I’ve been privileged to be on for the past 38 years.
Sr Patricia Lahiff at her desk in St Joseph’s Traveller Training Centre
Can you describe your work in St Joseph’s?
St Joseph’s was a unique place with a great respect for Travellers, for their culture and for the trainees who attended there. The teenage Travellers would be helped with literacy, maths, computing, cooking and learn new crafts such as knitting, carpentry, etc. From the centre itself we’d venture out to places and events well beyond their world at that time: trips to museums, cinemas, scenic spots but also joining with other centres in sports events and get-togethers. We travelled to many Irish holy wells and with smaller groups to places as far away as Knock, Wales, Lourdes and to Les Saintes Marie de la Mer, a great place of pilgrimage for European Gypsies in the French Camargue region.
One key element of our work in the centre was the yearly celebration of liturgies in various churches on Dublin’s Northside. Together we’d devise liturgies celebrating some aspect of Traveller culture. It was a novel way of transmitting the faith to the trainees and of giving them an appreciation of their culture and how it relates to their faith. Another vital aspect of the work at the centre was drawing on the experience of older Travellers as we tried to make the trainees more aware of the heritage that was theirs, especially in relation to their family tree and the unique language used by their ancestors, the Cant or Shelta.
Before I ever got to know the Travelling Community well, I think it was an awareness and concern for the conditions in which they lived that attracted me to them. Once I became involved with St Joseph’s and got to know Travellers as people, that concern changed into a very real appreciation of their unique culture and tradition and a genuine empathy and love for them, both as individuals and as a community. Having seen their living conditions and the discrimination and racism they had to endure, I experienced revulsion and anger that, in this day and age, people had to live in such inhuman conditions. The situation of many was dire, living in trailers with no electricity, running water or toilets, often in fields that turned to mud in winter. With that I began to see the need to become involved with Travellers in their struggle to put right that which was so wrong in this regard. This
A certain self-emptying on our part is necessary, ridding ourselves of our preconceived notions of Travellers, our prejudices, and trying to see things from their perspective. In doing so, we come to see reality in a whole new way – from the viewpoint of one of those groups in Irish society at the bottom of the social ladder
awareness led me to become involved with other Traveller groups like Pavee Point, Irish Traveller Movement and Exchange House, all of which were supporting Travellers in their struggle for their rights as Irish citizens. With the emergence of very articulate and educated Traveller spokespeople who were well able to put their case very effectively before the public, I decided to concentrate on meeting ordinary Travellers ‘on the ground’, accompanying them through the joys and sorrows of their daily lives. And it was the great privilege of my life to be accepted and welcomed, not just into all homes but into all hearts.
Travellers were recognised as an ‘distinct ethnic minority’ in 2017. What difference is that making to their lives?
Up to the 60s and 70s, Travellers were regarded as failed settled people who needed to be rehabilitated, put into houses and made ‘normal’ like the rest of society. In the mid80s this began to change and we gradually began to understand Travellers as a distinct group with their own culture and way of life. We began to see them as having their own history, language, customs and traditions handed down through the generations. Their nomadic way of life, their history, how they organise themselves, how they relate to one another, the way they think, their values and beliefs, their way of solving problems: all of these make them the people and the unique group they are now understood as.
This awareness finally led the Travelling Community to be recognised as a distinct ethnic group within Irish society. But the implications of this new awareness have not been seen or implemented as yet. The fact that Travellers are an ethnic group means that their culture and way of life is ‘holy ground’, God is present within it. So, it’s something to be respected, valued and loved. That’s why I believe it’s so important for all of us to ‘get inside’ it, to approach it with reverence, to see and find the human and Gospel values within their culture. To do that, a certain selfemptying on our part is necessary, ridding
A blessing with holy oil after Mass at St John’s Well in Warrenstown, Co. Meath
Fr Paddy blesses a grotto at Avila Park, one of the largest group housing schemes for Travellers in Finglas
A community prayer session in Avila Park, Finglas
A colourful procession during a Gypsy pilgrimage to Les Saintes Marie de la Mer in Southern France
ourselves of our preconceived notions of Travellers, our prejudices, and trying to see things from their perspective. In doing so, we come to see reality in a whole new way – from the viewpoint of one of those groups in Irish society at the bottom of the social ladder. And that opens our eyes to the injustices, inequalities and exclusion experienced by so many in our society today, challenging us to take action to transform that reality.
We have always known that baptism, marriage and funeral rites are significant events which Travellers celebrate. How do they view the Catholic Church?
Travellers are a religious people, even if that sense of God and the spiritual is slipping especially among the younger folk. They are religious, but as a people who were made feel inferior down through the ages, they are inclined to see God as ‘the all-powerful one’ who cannot be approached directly. That is why Our Lady and the Saints are so important to Travellers. They act as gobetweens who will put in a word on their behalf.
As well as that, Travellers approach God more with their hearts than their heads. So, the lighting of candles, having statues, medals and holy pictures in the home, sprinkling holy water, wearing rosary beads or scapulars and going on pilgrimage to holy places are important ways of expressing their faith. Going on pilgrimage is an ideal way for them to approach God, because that links in very much with nomadism, one of the basic marks of their culture. Actually, some of the greatest experiences in my ministry with Travellers were associated with the National Traveller Pilgrimages of Solidarity which began in 1989. These were cross-country pilgrimages of Travellers and settled people walking, camping and praying together over the period of a week, highlighting the situation of the Travelling Community in the context of their faith and quest for justice. Each pilgrimage was centred around a biblical theme such as ‘Let my people go’, with weeks of reflection and then walking together up to 120 miles as we journeyed to a holy place for a special Mass and service. I experienced these pilgrimages as so uplifting and enriching that I began to use the idea of pilgrimage much more in my ministry.
Looking back now, Fr Paddy, how do you feel about it all?
In the 38 years of my work among the Travelling Community I’ve come to love them as friends and to respect their culture and way of life. They have great strengths and values we could all learn from. They have been around for centuries, have survived as an ethnic group and have helped preserve much of what is good in Irish society. According to an expert folklorist, it was the Travelling People who preserved much of our native music, songs and stories. Looking back over the years of my involvement with Travellers, there have been some very rare difficult moments which fade into insignificance compared to the friendships developed, the achievements and the satisfaction and sense of fulfilment experienced. My aim has always been to be a companion and support to them in their personal and community struggle to bring about a better future for them as members of the Travelling Community.
In solidarity with them, I and so many others have striven to have their distinct culture and way of life acknowledged, accepted, celebrated and resourced. And I see all that in the context of the struggle for justice demanded of all Christians. Along with many others, I would hope to be one of the friendly faces of the church, supporting Travellers in their faith and being readily available to help them express that faith in a way they consider appropriate in the differing circumstances of their lives. If I have done even some of that, then I could retire a happy man!
