FOUR people in Belfast have been awarded a papal medal for over 50 years of service to the Catholic Church.
Often called the Benemerenti Medal, it is awarded by the Pope to members of the clergy and laity and was originally established for soldiers in the Papal Army.
At a service last Sunday in St Patrick’s Church, Donegall Street, Bishop Alan McGuckian presented the medals for services in the fields of education, music, nursing and pastoral development.
This included Sr Teresa O’Neill, who entered the Down and Connor Sisters of Mercy as a young woman before training as a nurse in the Mater teaching hospital.
Specialising in mental health, she has spent her life serving the needs of the sick in north Belfast and more recently in Belfast City Hospital, where she still works as a hospital chaplain.
She was described as “an outstanding example of the noble line of religious sisters who devoted their lives to medicine in the city of Belfast.”
Spending the last 15 years sharing her expertise into the world of chaplaincy, she has mentored a generation of young priests training as hospital chaplains as well as a lead role in caring for elderly and infirm members of her religious community.
Sr Mary Carlin has been a religious sister for over 60 years.
Formerly a teacher in England and Scotland, she was a parish sister for St Patrick’s for 15 years where she specialised in care for the sick and housebound, preparing children for sacraments and pastoral developments.
Having recently retired from active ministry, she was praised as “an inspiration for the generations of parishioners young and old” and priests she has worked with.
Rita Goldsmith first became involved with liturgical music at Clonard Monastery when she was 15-years-old.
Twenty years later, in 1983, she became organist and Director of Music at St Patrick’s where she remained until her retirement in September 2014.
Her “unbroken service of 51 years to liturgical music,” continued throughout the entirety of the Troubles and meant she “regularly put her own life at risk by travelling through the city” to provide music at weekday and weekend masses.
Brian White, a native-born son of St Patrick’s Parish was an altar-boy and volunteer in many parish organisations since his youth, training as a primary school teacher and serving in the parish for the early part of his career.
Later promoted to principal in St Malachy’s in the market area, he was said to embody “the compassion and integrity” fundamental to every Catholic school.
Since retirement, he has chaired the board of governors of St Patrick’s Parish School, where he was instrumental in the building and opening of a school for a new generation.
