IT WAS the end of an era on St Patrick’s Purgatory Lough Derg recently when long-time staff member Mary McDaid retired from the pilgrimage island in Donegal.
Mary had been coming to the island since 1977, but in 1988 the then staff member Fr Dick Mohan asked if she could help out on the island for three weeks as there was a shortage of staff. Thirty-six years later, Mary is finally hanging up her boots.
Initially, she cleaned toilets, made the toast, ran the reception, and eventually took on the role of gaffer on the island.
All of this responsibility was carried out alongside a teaching job in Enniskillen, leaving there each afternoon in June and then living on the island in July and August.
Now as she looks back over her almost 40 years of association with the pilgrimage island, she has seen great changes.
She looks back with great fondness on the Priors, Priests and staff that she was privileged to work with and, in particular, she feels honoured to have worked with Fr Rajheed Gann, who worked on the island, but who later died a martyr’s death in his native Iraq and whose cause to Sainthood has begun.
Mary also acknowledges the faith of the children who now come to the island for their Confirmation Retreats.
It’s something that assures her that faith is not dead.
One of her lasting memories was when the Papal Legate Cardinal Quellet came to the island to meet survivors of clerical church abuse during the 20th Eucharist Congress and the healing stone that was erected on the mainland to commemorate that.
For her, Lough Derg was always a great place of fun, craic, and laughter.
She is so grateful for the many opportunities she was given to represent the island all over the country – primary among these was her meeting with Pope Francis back in 2019.
Speaking about Mary’s retirement, the present Prior Mgr La Flynn said: “What I will miss most about Mary’s departure will be her boundless passion for Lough Derg and for all it means in the fabric of faith in Ireland, and in the lives of so many of our pilgrims.”
“Next to the late Fr Mohan, for more than one generation of Pilgrims, Mary has been the face of Lough Derg, particularly in the three-day pilgrimage season.
“Since she joined our full-time team in 2017, Mary has played a key role in delivering the one-day retreats for Confirmation children,” Prior Mgr La Flynn concluded, “her shoes will not easily be filled.”
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