A LUXURY holiday island in the Caribbean is not quite where you’d expect to find a colony of Irish priests. But men from St Patrick’s Missionary Society, better known as the Kiltegan Fathers, were in Grenada before holidaymakers began to jet in from Europe and North America. This former outpost of the British empire, which achieved independence in 1974, consists of a group of islands off the coast of Venezuela with a population of just over 100,000 and a landmass just one-sixth the size of Co Wicklow.
Grenada itself, 21 miles long and 12 miles wide, is known as the Spice Island – famous for the production of nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves and ginger. With an average year-round temperature of 23 degrees Celsius, some of the world’s best beaches, stunning coral reefs, rain-forested interiors and spectacular waterfalls, Grenada has become a chic tourist destination. But it’s also a developing country with all the attendant problems of poverty, poor infrastructure, high unemployment, and “brain-drain” emigration.
Arriving by sea, the famous Catholic Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception is clearly visible above the horseshoe-shaped harbour of the capital, St George’s. The colourful town – one of the prettiest in the Caribbean — is built on lush green hills.
Much of St George’s has been re-built since the devastation caused by Hurricane Ivan in 2004, although the badly-damaged cathedral is still a construction site.
In the bustling centre, new shops include an outlet for Digicel, Denis O’Brien’s mobile telephony company. Beside the busy spice market, and amid the most unexpectedly chronic traffic, a nun in a spruce white habit and veil looked like the right person to ask for directions. “Ah, you’re from Ireland,” she said, lighting up on detecting the accent. Sr Ireine Loe, a native of the neighbouring island of Trinidad, is a very sprightly 80, with happy memories of visiting her Sisters of Cluny colleagues in Dublin.
Sr Loe introduced the engagingly informal Bishop Vincent Darius, who whipped out a mobile phone and said: “Let’s get Fr Jimmie”.
Fr Jimmie McDonnell (60) was born in Clondra, four miles from Longford town and educated “at Clondra National School and then Blackrock College” before entering the seminary at Kiltegan, Co Wicklow.
The Kiltegan Order, founded in 1932, had originally focused on Africa but in the 1960s, responding to a plea by Pope John XXIII, began sending priests to Latin America and the Caribbean. Fr McDonnell was posted to Grenada following his ordination in 1976 and was appointed parish priest on his arrival. “It was a change”, he says, with remarkable understatement, “but from day one, the people were extremely friendly.”
It’s late morning and he has just come from chaplaincy work at the mental hospital. He is frequently greeted on the streets and there is evidence of considerable goodwill towards both him and Ireland. A typical reaction was that of Michael Caesar, an elderly man visiting St George’s from the outlying island of Petite Martinique who recalled his schooldays with the Presentation Brothers: “The Irish Brothers gave us a good education; their school educated three of our prime ministers”.
Brothers from the Presentation Order established a mission to Grenada in the late 1940s and the school they set up is still considered to be one of the most prestigious in the southern Caribbean. However, due a decline in vocations, there are no longer Brothers from Ireland teaching there.
In more than 30 years, Fr McDonnell has served in different parishes throughout Grenada. He has taken one sabbatical, in 2001, when he went “on a tour of Africa to visit former classmates from Kiltegan” serving in various countries there. He visits Ireland once a year, returning to “the home place in Clondra” where his sister still lives. He also has a brother living in Co Longford and sisters in Perth and New Jersey.
He says “Irish people were very generous after the hurricane”, with public donations being made via Kiltegan House and grant-aid provided by the Department of Foreign Affairs. But despite all the reconstruction, he says there is still a lot of poverty, a big problem with unemployment, a shortage of housing and many of the brightest young people leave to go to the US or England.
There are seven other Kiltegan Fathers on the island – from Belfast, Clare, Dublin, Galway, Kerry and Sligo. Some are retired; others getting close to the age. Fr McDonnell says, “There are no young men coming though the system”, as the era of Irish missionaries in Grenada – and other countries – gradually draws to a close.
Does he miss Ireland? "Not really; wherever I am, I'm happy," he says. "It's easier to keep in touch now with the internet," he explains, saying that he checks the RTÉ news headlines every night and sometimes reads the Longford Leaderonline. Every year, on St Patrick's Day, the few Irish people on the island, "about 15", get together for Mass and a lunch "of Irish stew and a bit of ham".
Fr McDonnell has the option to retire at 65. Will he return to Ireland? “I’ll probably retire here; I can always go back to Ireland for holidays, but even in retirement there’s always work to be done here”. Looking out over a sun-drenched Carenage Harbour, he says, “The good weather here is a blessing
from God; it would be hard to go back to those cold Irish winters”.