A former Dominican writes about a former Donminican's story

The column below appears in today's Irish Times. The author, David Rice was a member of the Irish Dominican province and is now living in Clare. David lectured in journalism for a number of years at the Dublin Institute of Technology, Rathmines.

In 1952 a medical student at University College Cork finished his third-year exams and applied to join the Dominicans to study for the priesthood.

His father, an eminent physician, was distressed and tried to persuade Denstone Murphy to change his mind, even signing over to him a farm of considerable value.

Nothing would change the young fellow’s mind: he signed the farm over to a relative and became a Dominican, Br Paul by name. In the decades that followed, Fr Denstone (Paul) Murphy OP, working as a priest in Ireland, then as missionary in Trinidad, and later as lecturer and researcher at Trinity College, became revered for his priestly ministry, his empathy with others, gentle humour and, some would say, downright holiness.

Then, in 1974, Fr Denstone Murphy married Maura Wall, a former Medical Missionary of Mary.

Yet people say he never ceased to be a priest. He simply brought his empathy and constant prayer into married life. He gradually grew to understand that he could still continue ministry, in his teaching, lecturing, caring and counselling, in his married life – the priesthood conferred by Baptism, as outlined in Vatican II’s half-forgotten document, The Priesthood of the Laity.


Well-loved teacher
He loved to quote Walt Whitman: “Every man shall be his own priest.”

On February 5th, 1986, by then a well-loved teacher at Cabinteely Community College, Denstone was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and had to resign his post.

In a way it was a new beginning, for that was when he decided to write the story of his life. Called Rumour of Hope: The Challenge of Choosing, this fascinating book allows the reader inside the mind of a dedicated priest who finally decides to marry.

Denstone Murphy finished the memoir in 1993, three years before he died, but the manuscript remained in Maura Wall-Murphy’s possession for 20 years. Just this year she decided to publish it.

It is not just the sequence of events that makes the narrative come alive: it is his insights into the persons and institutions that brought these events about. And also it is the revelation of his personal motivations that take him, with heartbreaking honesty, almost seamlessly into, and finally out of, the religious life.

Some of it is so sad. For example, his motivation for giving up a medical career to become a priest: “Is my father in the state of grace? How could he be when I am almost certain he never goes to Confession or Communion and eats meat on Fridays, not to mention . . . his occasional attendances at Protestant services . . . I am being called to leave all things and enter religious life in order to ensure his salvation.”

Then, many years later, his motives for leaving the ministry: “I was confident still that I had a vocation to contemplate and communicate, but I could no longer express it within the canonical limitations of the order. I was frustrated . . . Through my work in encounter groups I got a clearer idea of the true nature of human and sexual love . . . I learned quite a lot about my own behaviour and human behaviour in general.

“I learned about friendship. Friendship for me had been to some extent threatening. Perhaps I had taken too seriously the religious admonition discouraging ‘particular friendships’. I was now feeling a painful need for a human, trusting relationship. It was in one of these groups that I met Maura again.

“My mother and sister were totally accepting of my decision (to leave) and supportive. The Dominican Order was generous in ensuring that, in my new life, I would not want for anything. It augured well for the new beginning.

“I had reached a stage when I could best approach the Lord through the sacramentality of human love . . . I had followed the celibate way and was happy in it. But . . . there was a time for me to change, and yet throughout, it is always ‘Time to be Priest’.”

Denstone Murphy’s Rumour of Hope is available from Original Writing Ltd, Dublin (originalwriting.ie). David Rice, a former Dominican, directs the Killaloe Hedge-School of Writing. His Look with Mindfulness will shortly be published.
(LookWithMindfulness.com)