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| Joss Breen OP |
Dominican priest Joss Breen died in the early hours of the morning of July 7 in Guardian Angels Nursing Home, Scarborough, Perth, Australia.
The nursing home is situated near the Dominican priory of the Holy Rosary and the community of Dominican Sisters of Western Australia.
Sister Marlene Laracy OP of that community, a good friend of Joss, was especially attentive to Joss as his health failed during his last few months.
Joss, also known at one stage as Luke, was born on July 8, 1934. He joined the Dominicans in St Mary’s Priory, Pope’s Quay, Cork in September 1959 and was ordained a priest on July 3, 1966.
He grew up in Kilworth, Co Cork and on finishing school joined the Presentation Brothers, where he spent a number of years working as a primary school teacher.
In the immediate years before he joined the Dominicans he taught the scholarship class at Bun Scoil Chríost Rí, at Turners Cross in Cork City. Former pupils of that class remember Joss as a great teacher.
The scholarship class was a special class at primary school that prepared pupils for county council scholarships.
Every year local authorities granted a limited number of scholarships to pupils, which went towards the payment of school fees at post primary level.
With the introduction of free post primary education, the scholarship examination was discontinued.
Because Joss had already been a member of a religious congregation before joining the Dominicans, he took solemn vows immediately after his noviciate,
After priestly ordination in 1966 Joss completed post graduate theological studies at the University of St Thomas, Rome, while living at the Irish Dominican Priory on the Via Labicana nearby.
On returning to Ireland the following year he studied for his Higher Diploma in Education at Maynooth College.
He later obtained an M.Ed in Education and a diploma in guidance counselling from Trinity College Dublin.
Joss spent the majority of his Dominican life in Ireland at Newbridge College, where he taught, and then later was the school’s career guidance counsellor.
In 1985/’86 he went to Australia and New Zealand on a sabbatical break. He so liked this experience he sought permission from the Irish provincial to go live and work in Australia.
He remained a member of the Irish Dominican Province.
In his years in Australia he lived at Dominican priories and worked in a number of parishes. Before his health deteriorated he was parish priest at Gosnells in Perth.
Joss was a tall man, who chose his words carefully. He had a dry sense of humour, that could easily be misinterpreted.
He gave an impression that he was meticulous in what he did, yet he would have no difficulty in explaining that he was anything but so.
And regularly it would be that impish smile of his that would tell the full story. One got the impression that Joss liked to leave people wondering as to who he was.
In my first days teaching in Newbridge College, he called me aside and told me always to carry a folder when walking about in the school. "It gives others a sense of your importance," he told me with a roguish smile.
He seldom expressed his views on current and political issues but on the rare occasion, during a discussion, he might quietly disagree with what was being said. His words would always be felt and noted. Joss was well able to express a sense of gravitas.
Joss was a gracious host and while in Australia always received Irish visitors with open arms.
He was a private person, who carried out many acts of kindness, all done in his own quiet manner.
Joss seldom bragged about his Cork roots but made it very clear he was a Cork man to anyone whoever attempted to speak badly about his native county.
He enjoyed walking in the hills and while at Newbridge he procured a boat, which he kept at the picturesque marina on the Grand Canal and Old Barrow Line at Lowtown, near Robertstown, Co Kildare.
A fellow Dominican, who boated with Joss on a number of occasions, remembers some of their boating escapades.
Once on the River Barrow it was Joss's companion's job to open and close the lock gates and provide food. "Joss was particular about his food. I went off and found some wild garlic in a field, cleaned it up and Joss was none the wiser as to its provenance," he explains.
On another occasion at Leighlinbridge, the River Barrow was in flood and the craft got stuck under a bridge. "The boat sat under the bridge. Eventually I climbed on to the top of the boat, and using the bridge as a support, I was able to push the boat up river. Otherwise, we might still be sitting there,"he smiles.
"Joss never let me control the boat but one day at a pier he was unable to get back on the boat, it was left to me to guide it so that he could get aboard. But I was subsequently chastised for how I manoeuvred the vessel" he recalls.
They also boated from Lowtown to the River Shannon, again with Joss in control and his fellow Dominican opening and closing the lock gates, supplying and cooking the food all the way to the Shannon. But all done in good fun and a fine sense of camaraderie.
"His little boat was his study. It was there that he read and studied," his fellow mariner remembers.
That Joss had a boat was surrounded in true Dominican-style ‘secrecy'.
It was a top class secret that he had a boat and yet every one in the Dominican community in Newbridge knew that Joss was the proud owner of a watercraft. But it never came up for discussion, as if it were a taboo subject.
Joss’s funeral Mass will be celebrated by the retired bishop of Geraldton, Justin Bianchini.
As of yet there are no details of funeral arrangements.
This obituary appears on Joss's 86th birthday.
May he rest in peace.
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