John Magee (bishop)

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Bishop John Magee

John Magee, SPS (b. 1936), Catholic bishop.

1 Early life
2 The death of John Paul I
3 Service under John Paul II
4 Bishop of Cloyne
5 International profile
6 Last ad Limina Visit
7 External links

[edit] Early life

He was born in Newry, Northern Ireland, in the Catholic diocese of Dromore, on September 24, 1936. He was ordained priest on March 17, 1962. He served as a missionary and was an official of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples in Rome, when he was chosen by Pope Paul VI to be one of his private secretaries. On Pope Paul's death he remained in service as a private secretary to his successor, Pope John Paul I.

[edit] The death of John Paul I

It was John Magee who is said to have found Pope John Paul I dead in bed on the morning of September 28, 1978 though his public accounts of the event have been contradictory. Richard Cornwall in his book A Thief in the Night, specially commissioned by the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Social Communications, after a thorough forensic examination of all the facts surrounding the late Pontiff's death was unable to exclude that the Pope's secretary was in some way unwittingly involved in the Pope's death.

[edit] Service under John Paul II

He remained for a time in the same capacity with Pope John Paul II, elected on October 16, 1978, but was quickly transferred to the much less prominent position of papal Master of Ceremonies and continued in this post until on February 17, 1987 he was appointed Bishop of Diocese of Cloyne, in Ireland.

In January 2007, Cardinal Stanislaus Dziwisz, Archbishop of Krakow and former private secretary of Pope John Paul II for forty years, published a book of reminiscences of his life with the Pope entitled Una Vita con Karol(Rizzoli, Milan). Although Dziwisz mentions other colleagues such as Archbishop Kabongo and Mons. Thu, who also acted as private secretaries to the Pope, he does not recollect John Magee at any point in the 250 page book. Vatican watchers do not regard the omission as an oversight but see it as a highly significant statement as to the authentic custodianship of the late Pontiff's memory. Bishop Magee has not publicly commented on Cardinal Dziwisz's view of his service to Pope John Paul II and his spokesman declined to answer any questions on the subject.

[edit] Bishop of Cloyne

Bishop Magee has played a pivotal role in the Irish Episcopal Conference where he has been a leading figure in the modernization of the Liturgy in Ireland, especially in championing the avant-garde. His efforts on behalf of the Conference in relation to the Catholic Boy Scouts of Ireland have been noticeably less successful and have ended in the secession of the Irish Scouting Movement from the Catholic Church. In a statement issued by the Conference, the Bishop expressed his regrets for the departure of the Scouts from the Catholic Church and extended an apology to the Conference. Shortly after, another Bishop was deputed to handle the problem of the Scouts' secession. Bishop Magee's pastoral strategy has always placed heavy emphasis on the promotion of vocations to the priesthood but, after some initial success, the number of vocations in the diocese of Cloyne entered a period of slow but certain decline with numbers of seminarians easing from 46 to 5. Bishop Magee, with a familiar sanguine attitude, has announced his intention of tackling the shortage of vocations by encouraging lay persons of both sexes to become active in Church life at all levels. In a daring move, he appointed Ireland's first female faith developer and entrusted her with the daunting task of transforming an Irish rural diocese into a cosmopolitan pastoral model using techniques borrowed from several urban dioceses in the United States. Bishop Magee is reported to be happy with the initial results of the experiment and has made the faith developer's services available, free of charge, to the wider pastoral horizon of the Irish Episcopal Conference.

Bishop Magee's moral authority in the diocese of Cloyne has, according to some, been severely impaired by his recent public dispute with the Friends of St. Colman's Cathedral, a local conservationist group in Cobh which has protracted a highly effective opposition to the Bishop's controversial plans to wreck the interior of Cobh Cathedral. In an oral hearing conducted by An Bord Pleanala, the Irish Planning Board, it emerged that several irregularites had occurred in the planning application that were traced immediately to Cobh Town Council who some have deemed too willing to accommodate the Bishop's plans to modify the Victorian interior designed by E.W. Pugin and George Ashlin. On 2 June 2006, an Bord Pleanala directed Cobh Town Council to refuse the Bishop's application[1]. Bishop Magee was in Lourdes when news of this arrived and he is reported to have forbidden any discussion of the Bord's decision for the duration of the diocesan pilgrimage. In the meantime, a notable group from the parish of Cobh arranged to celebrate the Bord's decision with a party in the Hotel de France et d'Angleterre in Lourdes.

Despite vague expressions of support from the body of Irish Bishops, it would seem likely that as a result of testimony at the planning hearing, a number of people associated with the case may have to answer before disciplinary hearings and the Irish courts.

Bishop Magee published a pastoral letter[2] in the diocese of Cloyne on 28/29 July 2006 explaining that he would not be challenging the decision of An Bord Pleanala by instituting a judicial review in the Irish High Court. A diocesan official explained that the bishop did not wish to proceed because of the financial implications of such an action and because of the bishop's desire to avoid a church state clash. Claims that An Bord Pleanala's decision infringed the constitutional property rights of religious bodies were dismissed as irrelevant when it was revealed that Cobh Cathedral is owned by a secular trust established in Irish civil law[3]. It is estimated that Bishop Magee expended over Euro 200,000 in his unsuccessful bid to ultramodernize the interior of Cobh Cathedral.

The Cobh Cathedral controversy recently drew further international attention as a result of a BBC World Service news item which emphasised the controversy's wider significance for what Patsy McGarry, religious affairs correspondent for the Irish Times, referred to as the waning of Bishop Magee's influence and the irony of his having provoked the opposition of some of his closest supporters in the parish of Cobh by his desire to remodel the interior of St. Colman's Cathedral[4].

Public interest now focuses on who will pay the substantial bill incurred by the trustees of St. Colman's Cathedral.

Who's Who in Ireland [2006] describes Magee as "remote [and] low profile". It comments that many ecclestiastical observers "expected him to return to Vatican City by now" and highlights the fact that the "Red Hat still eludes him".

[edit] International profile

On the death of Pope John Paul II he was greatly sought after by the media and spent much time in Rome, making himself available to the various Italian television channels. In a Christmas (2005) message to the diocese of Cloyne, Bishop Magee, commenting on how he learned over the phone of the grief being poured out by the people of his diocese at the Pope's death, explained that his "heart went out to all of them and [he] gave as much time as [he] possibly could to sharing [his]thoughts and, indeed, [his]grief through the various channels of the media". "Indeed I was most grateful to all the journalists who interviewed me on that occasion", said he.

[edit] Last ad Limina Visit

Bishop John Magee made what is expected to be his last ad Limina visit to the Vatican from 15-31 October 2006. The visit, which is made every five years, will next take place in 2012, almost a year subsequent to the bishop's mandatory retirement at the age of 75 which is scheduled for September 2011.

It is understood that Bishop Magee's contribution to this visit was restricted by the Irish Episcopal Conference to ceremonial matters as the Conference was anxious to cultivate good relations on important subjects with the various Vatican offices. Bishop Magee did manage to attract public attention, however, by the broadcasting of a life of Pope John Paul I on the Italian State Television (RAI)to coincide with the ad Limina visit. The programme had been made several months earlier without having obtained the permission of the Vatican which habitually distances itself from all of Bishop Magee's media interventions, especially when concerned with the death of Pope John Paul I. It is reported that the RAI broadcast drew mixed reactions, especially in Italian ecclesiastical circles. Official Vatican criticism of the film and those involved in it came swiftly in the form of an interview given to the Italian Catholic daily Avvenire on 26 October 2006 by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Cardinal Secretary of State to Pope Benedict XVI. That such comments should have come from so senior a source can only be read as an indication of the Vatican's unhappiness with the programme and with Bishop Magee's collaboration in making it. Cardinal Bertone emphesized that the portrait of John Paul I painted by the RAI production was morbid and in no way related to Albino Luciano's robust government of the Patriarchate of Venice prior to his election. It is understood that Bishop Megee's input may have contributed to the distorted image of Pope John Paul I promoted by RAI and so severely criticised by Cardinal Bertone.

In a surprise move, Bishop Magee, who is responsible for liturgy within the Irish Episcopal Conference, made no statement to the press concerning his dealings with the Vatican with regard to liturgy and declined to answer any questions on the subject. The press office of the Irish Episcopal Conference also made no comment with regard to reports about a serious rift engendered between the Irish Episcopal Conference and the Holy See as a result of Bishop Magee's unmeasured statements.

Bishop Magee remined in Rome following the departure of the other Irish bishops as their token representative at a meeting of the International Commission for Eucharistic Congresses.

On 26 October 2006, Pope Benedict XVI met Bishop Magee in a private audience that, surprisingly, lasted only eight minutes.