Bishop Barry, Bishop Basil, Reverend Fathers, Reverend Sisters and Brothers of religious communities, members of the O”Connor family, friends and parishioners’ of Our Lady of Victories. It is my pleasure to welcome you here this evening as we begin the formal part of this celebration and thanking God for 25 years of Priestly ministry of Fr. John O”Connor. It Is indeed appropriate that we have begun this celebration with Holy Mass.
In a few moments we are to hear from some significant people in Fr. John’s life. But before I introduce our first speaker I want to share my thoughts on my Parish Priest and friend. If there is one aspect of Fr. John that stands out, it is his love for the God that he serves. And nowhere is this better exemplified than in his love for the Liturgy of the Mass that we have just experienced. We have at Our Lady of Victories been reintroduced to the beauty and treasurey of our Roman liturgy with the introduction of the new translation by the gentle guidance of Fr. John. All so that we can better worship the God who loves us all.
I am not sure if you are aware, but Fr. John’s favourite beverage is milk. He shared with parishioners last Sunday that in joining brother priests in Queenstown to commemorate his 25years of priesthood, some milk would be drunk. What you may not k now is that I have it on good authority that this milk comes all the way from the highlands of Scotland!
One of Fr. John’s frequent sayings is “God never misses a chance”. God never missed a chance on the blessings he has bestowed on Fr. John. We thank God for that.
Our first speaker is a priest of the ChCh diocese currently teaching at the national Seminary in Auckland. When this Priest came to assist during the seminary recess last Christmas, Fr. John broke one of his cardinal rules. “Carey, when you get a supply priest, always make sure they are not quite as good as you. Then parishioners welcome you back next week.” He failed miserably in introducing us to Fr. Steve Lowe.
Fr. Steve Lowe's reflection
It is now my pleasure to introduce Kathryn, a sister of Fr. John who is representing the family at tonight’s celebration.
Before we have our last speaker, we will pause for a moment to allow you all to charge your glasses for a toast at the end of the address.
I would now like to welcome Mike Doolan, a parishioner and friend of Fr. John to speak on behalf of the parish. Mike will share with us the travel he has undertaken to be with us this evening. Thank you Mike.
Thank you Mike. It is now my pleasure to ask Fr. John to address us.
John's Silver Jubilee Celebration
11 December 2010
For those of you who haven’t met me, I am Kathryn, John’s little sister. It is great to be here to celebrate with John and with you all today.
I speak on behalf of John’s family and especially Con and Evelyn who are most definitely here in spirit, and would of course have loved to be here today in person to share their pride in John, with all of you.
Mum and Dad were very committed to teaching the Catholic faith to us as children.
For as long as I can remember we attended Mass regularly every Sunday, not going wasn’t even considered. I remember Con reading excerpts from my children’s Bible at bedtime, along with Banjo Paterson.
I saw from a young age the strong faith in God that my parents had and this was taught to us. They were community minded, generous and accepting, and a great team in bringing up their family to have the values that were the foundation for their own lives.
If I could say some words about the part that John played in my life as a brother.
He was, and still is someone who encourages me to think outside the square, to learn and explore new ideas or projects or see another person’s view point. John taught me this from a young age, I remember Christmas presents that were the starting point of hobbies – bread baking book, a pot with flower seeds, something to pull me forward and learn something new. John explores things and gives them a go and does them well, beekeeping, , knitting, making ginger beer, keeping pigeons, wine making, pond building, gardening and landscaping and many more that I haven’t heard about.
I remember being a Brownie and I was about 8 yrs old. I had a fancy dress day at Brownies after school one day and John offered to make me a costume. I thought I was very lucky to have such a creative brother. Out came a book on costume making that morning, and I arrived home from school to find that John had made me a huge cardboard cotton reel reaching from knees to chin and he was winding an incredible length of coloured wool around it. I manoevered myself into this outfit and my arms stuck out at funny angles and I couldn’t sit down and I thought it was fabulous. Mum hadn’t returned home in time to drive me to Brownies so on to the back of John’s bike carrier I hop – costume on and ready to go. I commend John for his bravery.
Through being a priest, and through John being John, he makes a difference to many, many families. In our own family John has been the strength that we have needed to get us through our tough times, a leader in the important ceremonies in our lives, the baptisms, funerals, the weddings, the reunions and jubilees.
John, I thank you for all you have contributed to me and to our family and your wisdom and guidance. Mum and Dad would be very proud and very fulfilled at a parenting job well done.
Congratulations John on reaching the 25year milestone and your Silver Jubilee. I hope that the next 25 are all you could wish for.
Tribute to Fr John O’Connor on the occasion of his 25th Jubilee of Ordination
on behalf of the Parishioners of Our Lady Of Victories
11 December 2010
Ever since I have known John I have had a running battle with him over the length of his sermons! Even the Pope agrees with me that about 7 minutes is the limit of human endurance of a passive listening audience, as we all are every Sunday. John listened to my arguments thoughtfully and before long, you may have noticed, his sermons were shorter but we had two or three of them over the course of the Mass. We have never resolved the debate – it is an ongoing one and, I think, gives each of us rather more pleasure than it deserves. I hope John is wondering as he listens now, whether he can endure more than 7 minutes of this.
Some of you will know that I have been on the other side of the world these last few weeks and only arrived back this morning. Earlier this week, a representative of the Parish Council asked me to speak at this function on behalf of all parishioners. This is a tremendous honour and one I value, and I have thought really hard about what I should say, in between engagements and sitting around airports or trying to keep warm as yet another blizzard ripped through Amsterdam. John will only have one 25th jubilee of his ordination and I, and I am sure all of you, want what I say to be memorable for him.
· He is, first and foremost, a holy man. His life revolves around prayer and the sacraments and we all need to know if we do not already do so, that there is nothing more important to him than this. Try asking John about the heating or lights in the church just before Mass and you are likely to get short shift. While meeting and greeting people entering the church, he is preparing himself for his most important ministry – celebrating the Eucharist – and this is something one interrupts with mundane issues at one’s peril
· He is a faithful man, a follower of Jesus, loyal to the Pope and his Bishop and unswerving in his commitment to the Catholic Church.
· He is a forbearing man. John has endured harsh criticism at times, such as adverse reactions to his promotion of church teaching on funeral rites, or reactions to the way he carries out his chaplaincy functions, but always he endures this with remarkable fortitude, seeks to see where he could have done things differently without wavering from the truth and most remarkable of all, remains pleasant and personable to his severest critics. That is something I truly admire and probably explains why I could never do what he does!
· He is a creative man. The restoration of our church is the best example of this, John having the vision and creativity to work with Charles Thomas, the original architect, to have Our Lady of Victories achieve its full potential and a post Vatican 2 church.
· He is a playful man. He enjoys company, social gathering and the odd glass of milk. He likes to rag people a little – when we were on Pilgrimage in Italy earlier this year we struck a cold patch of weather. I bought what I thought was a really nice scarf to help me keep warm. John looked at it, admired it and then asked whether the shop sold men’s scarves too!
· He is a demanding man, sometimes working himself and others to the point of exhaustion. He is an active, engaged, involved, energetic Parish Priest. How lucky we are to have him.
· John is an educated man. His continuing education and in particular his liturgical studies are a source of strength in our parish. While his absences are sometimes a cause for comment there is no doubt that we all benefit from his ongoing education and study. Just consider the effortless ease with which he has led us to a true understanding and acceptance of the “new words” and chants of the Mass. Our Parish is in the front line of liturgical development in the Diocese and we have our Parish Priest to thank for that.
I have long believed that Fr John is a man of our times in the Catholic Church, and a man for the future. He has a restless sort of urgency about him and this stirs passions and can lead to conflict and disagreement in those who see things differently. But those who take the time to listen and to know him better discover a rare quality – a true man of principle who knows and appreciates the teachings of the Church and wants us to understand them too.
John, you guide us and, from time to time, you chide us, but of one thing I am very certain – that you love us, the parishioners of Our Lady of Victories, and for this we are profoundly grateful. We rejoice with you in this milestone of your ministry. We remember with gratitude also, Evelyn and Con, your parents whose faith and generosity predisposed you to your vocation as a priest. We hope we only lose you to promotion!
On that subject, a Rabbi talking once to a man like you was curious about promotion in the Catholic Church. What is your next step, he asked the priest. I suppose I could become a Monsignor. And what after that? Well, perhaps a Bishop. And next? Well the next step is a Cardinal. Is there a step after that asked the Rabbi? Well, yes, I could be Pope. And what comes after that? Good heavens man, said the priest, do you think I could become God? Well, said the Rabbi, one of our boys did.
Hang in there John!
I remember as a small boy helping my father to build a garage. I’m not sure I was much help as I mixed some cement in a saucer with a knife and poured it onto a concrete block. Dad would then lay the next block on my little pile of cement and I would use my knife to smooth the join.
I don’t remember too much about the building, but I will never forget the moment the Mormans came up the drive. They were better dressed than any Catholics I had ever met. They were more direct too. They asked if we had been saved. My father seemed to think we had been and chatted with them as he carried on with the building.
The Mormans got a bit frustrated. They didn’t seem to find it easy to talk with people who kept on building garages. They got a bit desperate for attention and told us that the world was going to end. The nuns had told me about this at school so I wasn’t too shocked. My father seemed to have heard this before too. It probably got mentioned at St Bede’s once or twice.
But Dad went on to react further. put down his trowel, stood up and wiped his hands. The Mormans looked pleased. They had his attention. My father looked uncertain and asked the visitors: “well, is there any point in me finishing this garage?”.
Sadly the Mormans had been trained only to give answers to questions that were in their handbook. They had not been programmed to talk about garages. Such complex implications of theological certainties were beyond them and they walked their new Hallensteins suits back out the gate. Every time I think of the end of the world, or the end of a human life I remember my dad and those Mormans.
The security of health, relationship and employment we live in is really very unstable. Yet these changing realities of life are the place where we must live in every moment. These sometimes gentle, sometimes traumatic realities, serve to keep us awake to God breaking into our lives anew in every moment. Jesus said to his disciples: “there will be signs…”
Over the past week our country has been shaken awake by the trauma and the tragedy of the mine explosion at Pike River. At a time like this the citizens of our country become a family. We share the enormous pain and grief of the closest family and friends of the miners and contractors.
We have been shaken out of a complacency that convinces us that we are in control, and can design our own destiny. In the event of such a wake-up call we feel a profound helplessness. We turn to prayer.
If we look to our prayer to provide answers we will often be disappointed. Prayer is not about getting answers to our own limited questions. Instead, in our prayer we find a home with God where (in the midst of our trauma and loss), we find a sense of peace and perspective.
In these moments of prayer we realise that God has come to us anew in the midst of our grief.
I’d like to meet those Mormans again. I think we could have a great conversation about the ways in which God enters our communal and personal human reality. They may have added a chapter on garage-builders to their handbook by now.
These difficult days reminds us that the signs God uses to wake us up are usually not what we expect. The signs are rarely of our choosing.
The circumstances that we have to live in at any moment, whether they be attractive or painful, are simply the circumstances of my life in this moment. The circumstances themselves are little more than the environment of my life today. Before I finish reading this reflection things may have changed by a phone call or a memory. But for this moment, this is where I live.
Two thousand years ago a young woman was visited by an angel. Mary’s presence of mind and heart and her response to this moment meant that nothing was the same again for the world. Three years later Jesus noticed Judas leave the table early... At this moment Jesus had many valid options before him. He could have gone out with Judas and in a brief conversation changed Judas’ plan. He could have run away. Instead he chose to place his total trust in his Father. The one who had argued with Pharisees, turned over tables in the temple and raised the dead to life, now simply relaxed into total dependence on God. The person of faith is sensitive to these hourly advents. The person of faith sees every moment as an “advent”, an opportunity for intimacy with our all-powerful and all-loving God.
The events of each hour are above all else a reminder to “wake up” and to be aware. God is coming anew into my life in the midst of whatever circumstances I have been dealt at this moment.
(Published in Christchurch Press 26 November 2010)
New Zealand Catholics are the first to welcome new English translations of the two thousand year old Mass.
After almost a decade of study and consultation, the revised texts will be used at all Masses in New Zealand from this Sunday, the first Sunday of Advent 2010.
Other English-speaking countries will receive the same new texts over the next twelve months.
Forty years later
It is forty years since the Catholic Mass was translated from the universal Latin into local languages. In almost every language, a “formal correspondence” to the Latin was retained for the Mass dialogues between priest and people.
However those responsible for translating the Mass into English, were instructed to produce a more vernacular English translation that was only “dynamically equivalent” to the Latin.
The result was that while our English texts seemed more user-friendly and contemporary, they were out of harmony with the robust and theologically rich translations of other languages.
An example is the people’s response to the priest’s greeting “The Lord be with you” (“Dominus Vobiscum”). This was translated as “and also with you” (Latin: “et cum spiritu tuo”).
In other languages, “spirit” (the heart of the ancient scriptural greeting) was retained: “Et avec votre esprit” (French), “Y con to espiritu” (Spanish) and “E con il tuo spirito” (Italian).
A more tragic consequence has been the diminishment of the language of the Mass as a vehicle for the tradition, doctrine and theology of the people of God.
Praying what we mean, and meaning what we pray?
In our personal and private prayer we seek to pray what we mean. Such prayer is authentic since we actively orient ourselves towards God, presenting our needs and offering our gratitude.
But when we gather for the Mass we are doing something different. We are humbly remembering that God is actively oriented towards us. We are hearing God speak to us.
Therefore our intention in the prayers of the Mass is not to articulate what we mean. In these ancient texts we are united with our ancestors in hearing our human potential proclaimed and professed. In the Mass we are formed and re-formed. In the Mass we grow to mean what we pray.
Mass: the prayer for miners’ families, and for newly-weds
In this way, every Mass is appropriate worship for every human emotion: the rejoicing newly married couple, and the grieving families of the miners. Whatever our present reality, in the Mass God speaks to us and we allow ourselves to be drawn nearer to God.
Antiques are treasures
The arrival of the first English translations of the Mass in the late 1960’s coincided with an emergence of new and ‘free’ thinking. These were the years when we discarded anything that seemed ‘old-fashioned’. We moved the old oak dining table to the shed. To replace it, we bought a new formica and chrome suite. “This one is more modern, and easier to keep clean” we said.
A generation later we realized that we had lost a lot more than an old table when we threw out the old table. Without the table, we no longer had a daily reminder of great-grandparents who were given the table as a wedding gift, and who sailed with this treasured possession from England. Lost too was the mark of my grandfather’s toddler teeth where he bit into the table leg. The old table told stories. It carried our heritage.
Once again we saw the beauty of the table. We gave it the venerable title “heirloom” and it has pride of place in our modern dining room.
Second Vatican Council 1962-1965
In a rediscovery of our tradition of worship, and armed with the maturity of forty years of growth, Catholics are now ready to implement fully the liturgical teachings of the Second Vatican Council of the early 1960’s.
The first of the sixteen documents to emerge from this gathering brought together a century of liturgical research, consultation, and experimentation. To date, many of the heirlooms and treasures presented by the Council have not been fully received by the Church.
A new opportunity
The Council's challenge to “active participation” in the Mass is often reduced to describe only those who have a visible role or ‘ministry’ at Mass. This emphasis can disguise the deeper call to personal heart-felt encounter with God in the action of the Mass.
The formation of parish Liturgy committees often became an opportunity for distracting and unnecessary creativity at Mass, rather than a guide for faithful celebration of a timeless treasure in a time-tested form.
In our well-intentioned desire to encourage congregational participation with popular hymns, we had moved away from the simple, sound and restorative rhythm of scriptural verses and psalms.
As ancient chant tones (composed to simply carry rather than enhance or nuance prayers) were used less in liturgy, music companies experienced a demand for recordings of nuns and monks praying in Gregorian chant. When people could not find what their souls sought at Church, they looked elsewhere.
Too often silence faded from the Mass at the very time when busy and stressed people sought solitude.
We began to see the Liturgy of the Church as our creation and our work. Instead the Mass is the ultimate activity of God in the lives of Catholics.
In this restoration of the Liturgy, Catholics are not embarking on a nostalgic regression. Instead we now know that we are prepared to move into the future, only when we savour the wisdom and traditions of our ancestors.
It is a mature faith community that can pray in the English, Maori, Latin and Greek language of our ancestors within one liturgy. A community that chants Latin in one prayer and sings modern hymns in the next has reached a deep appreciation of the timelessness of faith.
Next Sunday Catholics will not find a new Mass. Instead they will experience revised texts that better express and communicate the timeless wonder of the presence and action of God in all human life.
Below find the homily delivered by Bishop Basil Meeking at the Funeral Mass for Bishop John Cunneen.
Over 78 years ago John Jerome Cunneen was baptised, in the old church, in this parish of St Mary, North Christchurch. Now he has completed his earthly pilgrimage. So we gather for his Requiem Mass, our Bishop Barry Jones, his fellow bishops of New Zealand, his family, the priests, religious and faithful of the Catholic Diocese of Christchurch and many others who have known and loved him and whose lives he has touched and blessed in significant ways.
The life of Bishop John Cunneen was all of a piece. He was a man of the Church firmly, wholeheartedly; he was always comfortable with that, no matter whose company he was in. When he was only 14 years old he went to Holy Name, the national minor seminary just when it opened here in Christchurch and so began his path to the priesthood.. His whole life from then on was given to the Catholic Church, yet in a quite remarkable degree, wherever he was, he was part of the human community too . He had a deep feeling for Canterbury and for the institutions and lives of the people of the province. He was one of those persons of whom you could say, “Nothing human was foreign to him,” This was in no way contradicted by the fact that first and foremost he was a Catholic priest. He was quite without any kind of personal or ideological agenda; he was a man with no concern for possessing money or material goods; he simply found in the priestly ministry his raison d’etre and his way of living the Gospel of Jesus Christ .
As I look back over the 65 years that John Cunneen and I have been friends, one phrase comes to mind that encapsulates the essential thrust of his life. It consists of only two words which were used by the Second Vatican Council in the mid-1960s when speaking of the priestly ministry.
From the outset and at every stage in his life Bishop Cunneen was a man of unwavering “pastoral charity”. Pastoral charity – before the Second Vatican Council we used call it zeal. “A good priest is a zealous priest”, we would say. That remains true. A priest should be zealous for the salvation of the world. But the reinterpretation of zeal as pastoral charity is an advance in understanding of the attitude and the habits a priest needs in order to carry out his ministry. Pastoral charity indicates not only zeal for the salvation of the world but love for the world. It does not mean adopting the standards of the world or being taken in by the world. It is just that you can’t really evangelise someone you don’t love. You can’t speak of evangelising a culture unless you are able to take part in it and can show that you love it. Only someone whose life is marked by love has the ability to reveal the self giving of God the Father in a redemptive love for the world. Pastoral charity is not some general kind of love; it is always love for persons, particular persons made in God’s image. If a priest is truly pastoral it means he never offers his own kind of salvation for people; it means rather that he brings the one God in three Persons to his people and that he is prepared to sacrifice himself in doing so.
The kind of availability for people that is integral to pastoral charity is a self discipline, often a form of penance for the priest. It is the availability that we see in Jesus in the Gospels. His mission on earth Jesus said, was to reveal his Father. That is the mission of the priest, to reveal the Father as the source of all life. The priest is a sacramental sign of Jesus Christ and therefore one who reveals the Father as absolute life-giving love that heals people and transforms them and draws them even to share in the very life of God. Therefore the priest, in revealing God as Father himself shares in a true spiritual fatherhood; he is rightly called “Father”. If the priest is to be effective and at ease in his priestly ministry he must have an increasingly clear sense of himself as a father. It is not a function, not something one does; it is a relationship with God into which the priest brings those he serves and cares for, a relationship that permeates everything, including his free time. This is the pastoral charity that impels a priest to live in the midst of God’s people so as to direct their path and nourish their hope.
In all of this I am describing Father Cunneen, Bishop Cunneen during all his 54 years of priesthood. This is what he became through the sacrament of Holy Orders when he was ordained a priest in Holy Name Church in Ashburton in 1956; this is what he became even more intensely when he was ordained a bishop in the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament in 1992. The holy gifts he received in ordination flourished and bore fruit abundantly in his life not least because he had also notable natural gifts of temperament and character which brought him close to people. A friend to whom I had once introduced him writes from the USA after his death: “I had been impressed by his ability to relate to people immediately He acted as if he had know me for years.” Part of it was his sweet and placid disposition and a real gentleness; I never saw him really angry. He carried optimism almost to a fault; he was the embodiment of those words of the English mystic, Julian of Norwich: “All things shall be well; all manner of things shall be well . “
He was never a man of theory; his clear, wholehearted commitment to social justice, to the relief of human need, to human development was not in the abstract; he simply got on with the job when he saw a person in need. When he came across someone who could not cope with life. I remember once, many years ago, noticing how a team of people funded by the diocese to deal with a certain social situation held meetings and talked a lot while Father Cunneen who was not part of the team was dealing quietly, effectively, with those in need whom the team had been formed to serve; they were beating a path to his door.
A full list of the people with whom he was actively involved cannot be given here; principally there were the Samoan communities in Christchurch to whom he was chaplain and father and friend while there was no Samoan priest in the diocese and whom he continued to cherish and support after we did have Father Paolo from Samoa and after he himself had become the diocesan bishop. Then there were all the young people with whom he could communicate so easily ; they found in him a sympathetic, fatherly figure who understood and cared for them; perhaps some of you here today came to know him at 6A in those Sunday socials in the Xavier College Hall which he organised in the 1960s. For prisoners he was a friend and advocate, someone endlessly ready to listen to them and to give them practical help. Always the Maori people knew they had a friend in Pa Cunneen, one who would share with them not only his time but his possessions too.
All of that was highly personal and it gave him a certain image, yet he always remained solidly based in a parish; he was essentially a hardworking parish priest and he gave of his best in every parish where he served; He met and visited with so many of you who are here today’ in a parish; there he did your baptisms, your First Communions, your weddings and buried your dead. Father Cunneen served as assistant priest in St Joseph’s, North Timaru, in St Paul’s Dallington, at the Cathedral,; then as parish priest in the Chatham Island, after that back as administrator of the Cathedral parish,, then to Sacred Heart Addington, to Rangiora, to Bishopdale and finally Christ the King, Burnside., until in 1990 he became my pastoral assistant, that meant really acting as a kind of unofficial auxiliary bishop; then in 1992 the Holy See agreed to his appointment as auxiliary bishop in Christchurch and I had the joy of consecrating him on St Andrew’s Day that year. Then when I retired in 1996 John Jerome Cunneen was appointed 8th Bishop of Christchurch.
Once in charge of the diocese his impulse was to act as parish priest of the whole diocese and though that may have had some drawbacks, his abundant pastoral charity was lavished on people more widely than ever.
In all situations the considerable pastoral skills he had acquired were to the fore. Especially was he a friend to the priests and always felt close to them and sought their company; they appreciated his first hand experience of their tasks and the problems they faced. He gave encouragement to religious men and women as far as possible in their changing and often difficult situations. In particular, the supportive prayers of the Carmelite sisters, their loyalty to the Church and the friendship and encouragement they give to priests led him to act as their chaplain, celebrating their daily Masses for a number of years until his health gave out. Bishop Cunneen gave his full support to the Catholic schools and the Catholic education system which he continued to keep firmly on a diocesan basis. In the administration of the diocese itself he was blessed with good co-operators and prudently followed the financial and administrative policies he found already in place.
Bishop John was assiduous in keeping up the good practice of regular visitation of the parishes of the diocese which is an important part of the ministry of a diocesan bishop. During the visitation he would go to the parish school where he would meet with students, teachers and the board of trustees. Here he was always aware of his responsibility as teacher of the faith. I remember his telling me on one occasion of his concern that some of the students seemed not to know the biblical and Church teaching about life after death and the resurrection of the body. So he explained to them the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ and what that signified for the resurrection of each Christian on the Day of judgement. It is a lesson he continues to teach us today. In the passage from St John’s Gospel which he chose for this Requiem Mass and which we have just heard, Jesus says: “Those who have done good deeds will rise to the resurrection of life.” It was his own firm belief as it is the solemn teaching of the Church.
In Christchurch Bishop Cunneen took his part in public life. His long time involvement with social causes and with people in need had brought him friends and allies in local social agencies, in the business community and in local government. As a bishop he was able to continue and develop such contacts and he gave his time and his presence generously in public life wherever the collaboration of the Catholic Church was welcome and appropriate.
He also took a full part in the work of the New Zealand Catholic Bishops Conference which enables diocese bishops to cooperate especially on matters of national interest. He did not always find it easy. For a number of years he presided over the ecumenical commission of the Conference and was co-moderator of the dialogue with the Anglican Church of New Zealand.
Here his even temperament and ease of manner were important at a time that was not always propitious for ecumenical relations, a time when new divisions seemed to be emerging and some earlier apparent convergences were unravelling. He knew and put into practice the Catholic principles on ecumenism, principles that ensure that dialogue fosters authentic communion in one faith, in one sacramental life and in one teaching authority, and does not degenerate into lowest common denominator negotiations.
All his priestly life Bishop Cunneen had given himself unstintingly, untiringly; this exacted its toll in 2003 when he had a major stroke that incapacitated him for months; he was never to regain complete mobility. Priests and people were deeply impressed at the way he accepted this affliction and at the determined fight he made, with an amount of success, to overcome the effects of the stroke. In 2007 his retirement was accepted by the Holy See and he was succeeded by his coadjutor, Bishop Barry Jones. Since then Bishop Cunneen has had happy days in St John Fisher House in Brougham Street next to Nazareth House where he and I have each had an apartment, thanks to the generosity of the diocese and have had several years of peaceful retirement. Rather suddenly at the end of July he learned of the cancer that was to end his life. He accepted it with fortitude and great faith He had lived with trust in God’s plan for his life and he approached the end of his days in the same spirit. He greatly appreciated the care he received from the Sisters and staff of Nazareth House these past several weeks as they helped him prepare to pass through the gate of death. He entered that gate in the firm faith that in Christ death is overcome and that life with God awaited him.
Today we pray God’s mercy on Bishop John Jerome Cunneen. May God reward his loving service for the Catholic people of this diocese of Christchurch; our memory of him will be of the great pastoral charity which made his life beautiful for God, a blessing for the Church and a sign of hope for us who remain.
Eternal rest grant to him, O Lord.
And let perpetual light shine upon him.
May he rest in peace.
Amen.
