Lest We Forget....

Remembrance Sunday

 Fr John Gwynn was an Irish Jesuit Priest serving with the 1st Irish Guards during WWI.  During that time, he did what any priest would do;  hearing confessions, anointing the dying, bringing comfort and hope in the midst of chaos and sharing in the danger faced by the troops. Already wounded Fr Gwynn returned to his duties until he eventually met his death during battle.  This is what his commanding officer, Lord Desmond Fitzgerald wrote in a letter to a Jesuit priest, William Delaney, SJ : 

'No words of mine could express or even give a faint idea of the amount of good he has done us all out here, or how bravely he faced all dangers and how cheerful and comforting he has always been.  It is certainly no exaggeration to say that he was loved by every officer, N.C.O and man in the battalion. The Irish Guards owe him a deep and lasting debt of gratitude, and as long as any of us are left who saw him out here, we shall never forget his wonderful life and shall strive to lead a better life by following his example. The unfortunate shell landed in the door of the Headquarters dug out on October 11.  Fr Gwynn received two wounds and was sent to hospital but died later from his wounds. Fr Gwynn has made it his unfaltering practice to write to the relations of any man who had fallen, and, in this way, his words brought comfort to many Irish families.  He has always been found in the worst places ready to help the wounded or administer the sacraments to the dying. It was said he would been happy to die as a 'soldier of God'.

Fr Gwynns’ memorial, funded by the men of the Irish Guards, is in the Sacred Heart Church Caterham (Caterham being the barrack town of the Irish Guards at the time). His is simply one of thousands of stories that could be told as we remember all those who have fallen in battle and as we continue to prayer for all those who serve in the armed forces.  May we never forget....

With every blessing

Father Simon