MONSIGNOR JAMES CASSIN (1947-2020)

 

Priest, Administrator, Evangelist, Educator

Resident 2004-2016

 

This obituary, which first appeared in the Kilkenny People, is of a priest who, while  not an alumnus or staff member at Maynooth, became part of the College community as a staff member of one of the branches of Irish ecclesiastical governance based on the campus.

 

Monsignor James Cassin, who died at the age of 72 in June 2020, was one of a  generation of Kilkenny-educated priests who, as pastors, academics and social justice activists, can stand comparison with any similar group anywhere in the world.

The achievement of these men, all natives of the Diocese of Ossory, and all of whom received their secondary education at St. Kieran's College in the 1960s, is visible worldwide, through the lives and work of Walter Dunphy in Japan, Sean Cassin in Vietnam, Charlie Kelly in Germany, Liam Bergin in Boston, Benny O'Shea in Brighton and Eamonn Tobin in Orlando, among others.

Alongside them in that generation are another group of priests (including Frs. Tom Norris, Fergus Farrell, Willie Dalton and Dan Cavanagh) who, like Jim Cassin, combined pastoral, academic or judicial assignments abroad or elsewhere in Ireland with ministry in their native diocese, where Jim spent the greater part of his life as theology professor, seminary dean and president of St. Kieran's, and later lived in retirement following a critical illness. 

In that last regard he was also among a group of priests from that same generation, the last of its type, who were educated in Rome, Maynooth and Kilkenny, and whose pastoral ministry was focused entirely on service in the diocese of Ossory, including on the staff of the diocesan college.

 

A THOMASTOWN NATIVE

 

James Cassin was born in Coolroebeg, Thomastown, on 23 September 1947, one of two children, both boys, of Denis Cassin and his wife Mary. His father was a member of a large family, well known in farming and sporting circles; his mother was the only child of the neighboring (O')Hanrahan family, though both of her parents had died before their daughter married.

James attended Chapelhill National School, and later Thomastown Boys N.S., where he began to show the early scholastic promise that continued at St. Kieran’s when he was a student there from 1961 to 1966. In the latter year he was selected by Bishop Birch to attend the Irish College in Rome, where he studied philosophy and theology at the Pontifical Lateran University, graduating with the degree of B.Ph. in 1968, and the degree of Bachelor of Divinity in 1972. 

He was ordained in the following year and attended the Gregorian University for a further year to acquire the degree of Licentiate in Theology. He had been joined in Rome at this stage by his classmate Fergus Farrell, who had received his early seminary education at Maynooth, where he graduated as a Bachelor of Science and stayed on to complete a Master of Science degree. They were the first Gregorian University students to come from Ossory, which had previously favoured the Lateran for the entire academic formation of its Rome-based students.

 

MINISTRY ABROAD AND AT HOME

 

Following his Roman interlude, Fr. Cassin was sent on loan to the Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle, where he became an assistant to Ballyragget-born Fr. Patrick Lacey at St. Joseph’s parish in Hartlepool. He was succeeded there by another recently-ordained Ossory priest, Fr. Michael Campion, who eventually moved permanently to the English diocese.

In 1975 Fr. Cassin returned to Ireland and to a position as a Professor of Moral Theology in the ecclesiastical division of St. Kieran’s College. The seminary at that time had begun to show the signs of decline that would affect it more severely over the next two decades, although a contemporary report by senior students at the college held out hope for a new less formal dispensation based on smaller numbers. Jim Cassin's easy and sympathetic manner was key to that development as a succession of seminary alumni led the institution - Monsignor Martin Campion succeeded Monsignor Tommy Maher as President and was in turn succeeded by Monsignor Michael Ryan.

In the year that Fr. Cassin joined the seminary staff, the first-year class formed half the total number of students; there were only six students in the final three years and only one in the final year. More seriously, there were no students destined for service in America, Australia or New Zealand, traditional area of mission for St. Kieran's alumni. But the deficit was made by students intended for Irish dioceses in the northern region of the country, so that today a significant proportion of priests in Raphoe, Derry, Down and Connor and Meath can boast of a Kilkenny education. In addition a contingent of students from Wales were enrolled at the seminary during that era.

 

A DIVERSE AGENDA

 

Despite the reduced numbers, St. Kieran's still managed to field an impressive team of academics in the sacred sciences, an asset to the diocese and the community that was perhaps not valued as much as it should have been. Over the next twenty years Jim Cassin was an integral part of every major faith development initiative in the college and the diocese. These included the Pastoral Conference initiated by Bishop Birch in 1977; the Bicentenary celebrations at St. Kieran's College in 1982, when he supervised liturgies and spiritual exercises for alumni, including a retreat given by the newly-appointed Bishop Joseph Cassidy of Clonfert for four hundred priests; the establishment of the Creidim Centre for Adult Faith Development at St. Kieran's initiated by his successor Bishop Forristal, a fellow-native of Thomastown parish, and the preparations for the Diocesan Forum in the early years of the 21st century.

During this time, Fr. Jim also maintained a wide personal ministry, particularly among his extensive family connections, and was well thought of by the students he encountered in both the seminary and on the lay side, where his talent for music was invaluable as an introduction.

In 1994 the seminary that had operated in Kilkenny city for almost exactly two hundred years (with a short break towards the end of the 19th century) closed its doors and its remaining students were dispersed to other institutions. In the following year, Fr. Cassin was appointed President of the college in succession to Monsignor Ryan, thus becoming the first holder of the position in modern times not to be educated for the priesthood at St. Kieran's or Maynooth. He was supported by two new appointments - Fr. Kieron Kennedy as Administrator of the college, incorporating the historic position of bursar, and Micheál O Diarmada as Principal of the Secondary School, the first lay person to occupy the position, in succession to Fr. Nicholas Flavin. Sadly this landmark year for Fr. Jim was also marked by the death of his beloved mother.

 

TWO MAJOR INITIATIVES

 

By the late 1990s the prospect of replacing the seminary programme with another third-level educational activity was being discussed, and in 1997 an announcement was made that NUI Maynooth would operate an Outreach Campus on the Kilkenny site. This long-awaited development brought a new dimension to heritage and professional learning in the region; as well as the flagship BA in Local and Community Studies, which involved nine NUIM departments, the campus also offered a range of shorter Certificate and Diploma programmes including Counselling, Addiction Studies, Spanish, Creative Writing for Publication, Irish and Philosophy. (In 2010 the outreach campus expanded its offering to provide postgraduate programmes in Adult and Community Education which could be taken part time up to Masters level).

Jim Cassin worked hard to gain and maintain this important initiative for Kilkenny, and in so doing extended his acquaintance with many in the broader community who were working for a full-scale university in the city and who became members of its supervisory committee. Alas it was not to be permanent; the campus closed in 2018 as the local take-up potential was exhausted and access to other national and regional campuses became easier.

Meanwhile Fr. Cassin had begun to gain a national profile following his election as President of the Association of Management of Catholic Secondary Schools, which had joined with representatives of Protestant secondary schools in a initiative under the Joint Managerial Body to represent the entire voluntary post-primary sector, involving over four hundred schools.

This was time of massive change, as schools run by dioceses and religious orders entered joint ventures with state-run schools to create community schools and colleges, and as residential facilities were closed, co-educational formats were introduced to single-sex institutions, and trusts were created to take over the management of schools run by religious orders.

Though St. Kieran's maintained its boarding facility during his entire tenure as President, it was fated to close shortly after his departure. But though this emphasis on the residential element in both seminary and secular education was now to be  completely lost, Jim set a sterling example in the hospitality he always extended to past students of both seminary and secondary school at their reunions and occasional visits.

  Meanwhile the number of students attending the college had expanded dramatically and the financial challenges of running the establishment had increased with them. Using his Kilkenny experience, Monsignor Jim, as he had now become, was therefore in a good position to fight for a proper support structure for the voluntary sector as head of the JMB. He also made many friends in the Church of Ireland community whose interests he represented as president of the organisation.

His legacy is the continuing existence of a formidable grouping which operates in ten regions across the country and whose executive is currently headed by John Curtis, a former principal of St. Kieran's, with a staff of twenty including specialists in development, management, research and procurement.

 

 

A NEW DIRECTION

 

The Monsignor's work in this area was highly regarded by the conference of Irish bishops, who had made education a major area of interest by creating a separate commission for Catholic Education and Formation, which covered councils or sub-committees for Catechetics, Doctrine, Ecumenism and Dialogue in addition to Primary and Post-Primary Education.

In 2004 it was announced that Monsignor James Cassin would become Executive Secretary of the Commission, based in the Columba Centre on the Maynooth College campus. Working closely with the episcopal, religious and lay members of its various councils, he brought the body through one of the most dramatic reorganizations of control and management in the voluntary education sector since the introduction of free post-primary education in 1967.

Jim helped set out the agenda for his tenure in editing with Sr. Eithne Woulfe in a Veritas publication entitled ' From Present to Future: Catholic Education in the New Century', which appeared in 2006. This agenda was implemented in dramatic fashion in the events that followed. These included the handover of management of the Christian Brothers schools to the Edmund Rice Trust, and the formation of Ceist by four religious orders of females and one of males to take over the running of their schools. It also involved the restructuring of the Catholic Primary School Management Association, which was expanded to take account of the radical changes following from the introduction of boards of management with strong lay participation; the setting up of the Association of Catholic School Trustees and the Catholic Schools Partnership, and an increasing emphasis on liaison with the Council of Catholic Maintained Schools in Northern Ireland. The fact that many of those organisations had their headquarters on the Maynooth campus added to the efficiency of the network he helped to create.

Throughout his tenure at the Association of Management of Catholic Schools, the Joint Managerial Board, and the Episcopal Commission for Education, it was clear that Jim had found his true calling: to bring the spirit of personal dedication and priestly service into the areas of professional interaction and administration in this vital but sensitive area of denominational control of education.

At their June 2020 meeting, conducted for the first time using video conferencing, the Irish bishops heard a tribute from Bishop Brendan Kelly, chairman of the education commission, to Jim as someone who 'as a trusted interlocutor, forged constructive relationships with key State officials and with other education patrons as he worked to maintain a choice for parents – within a rapidly growing and increasingly diverse environment – who desired a Catholic ethos for the education of their children.  A gifted preacher, Jim’s ministry was characterised by the joy of the Gospel: holiness, fidelity, service and a kindness, warmth and love for anyone fortunate to meet with him.'

 

 

A PASTORAL OUTREACH

 

During the decade in which he served in the Education Commission position, Jim lived at the centre of the Maynooth campus, taking rooms in the floor above the President's Arch. His membership of the college community, itself expanding and diversifying rapidly as it grew to embrace the new reality of a secular university alongside the national seminary and Pontifical University, was a distinct asset as it reached out to a new constituency of young Irish men and women.

He also maintained close contact with his native area and his diocesan confreres and was always willing to be involved with social initiatives and liturgies for family, friends and colleagues. In this environment too he had a natural charism of simplicity, generosity and spirituality that reinforced the traditional values of the priesthood and the church in troubled times.

His entire life was conducted against a background of a pulmonary condition that worsened as he got older and by 2015 it was clear that only a serious life-saving operation would allow him to continue to function. He had continued to work beyond the normal secular retirement age but when the opportunity of a lung transplant presented itself, he resigned and committed himself to the long preparation and recovery required. 

That recovery took place first of all at a diocesan residence in Kilkenny City, and then at the Curate's House in his native Thomastown parish, near the family home from where his brother Paddy kept watch of his welfare. He was able to enjoy some sense of normality and the company of friends and fellow priests for a few years before the Covid epidemic struck in March 2020. Although his general wellbeing had begun to deteriorate in the early part of the year, his compromised immune system could not resist the full force of the rampant infection, and he died in St. Luke's Hospital on the evening of Friday 5th. June. He was buried in the family grave at the New  Cemetery, Thomastown, on Tuesday 9th June following Requiem Mass at the Church of the Assumption, at which the principal celebrant was Bishop Dermot Farrell, and the homilist Fr. Dan Bollard, the parish priest and Jim's close friend.

The church in Ossory, and indeed the Irish church, can ill afford to lose people of the caliber of Fr. Jim Cassin. They - and his brother and extended family - can only take consolation in the fact that his life stood out as a sterling example of the vibrancy of a deeply-felt vocation to the eternal priesthood, lived out in an exemplary and humble way in a troubled era. May his gentle soul live in infinite peace.