Returning to Rome: An interview with Fr Aidan Ryan 

Fr Aidan Ryan thought he had his next move figured out. He had served for 50 years as a priest, and spent the last two decades in Ballinahown, so now it was time to retire and spend his days praying, reading, and travelling.

Bishop Francis Duffy gave his consent to the idea, and a house in Moate was earmarked as Fr Aidan's home in retirement. Everything was falling into place. 

Then, shortly after Easter, those best-laid plans suddenly changed. While celebrating his golden jubilee as a priest, he was approached about an impending vacancy for the role of Spiritual Director at the Irish College in Rome. Fr Aidan had served in this role from 1985 to 1990, and was asked if he might consider taking it on again.
 
"Well, now, I was absolutely stunned!" he said. "It had never even crossed my mind."

He enjoyed his previous years in the Italian capital and, as he reflected on the offer, he soon warmed up to it. "I thought, if my priorities are prayer, reading and travel, I can do those in Rome as well as I can in Moate!"

The 73-year-old was speaking to the Westmeath Independent at the parochial house in Ballinahown. He was preparing to move his belongings to Moate, before travelling to Rome on September 17. He will have opportunities to return home to Moate for Christmas holidays and for three months each summer.

"My hope is that when I do retire eventually, and even when I’m on holidays, that I would be available to the surrounding parishes, including (Ballinahown). So I’ve been saying to the people here, you ain’t seen the last of me yet!" 

A native of Mardyke Street in Athlone, where his family operated a drapery business, Fr Aidan felt "great gratitude to God" when he looked back on his 50 years in the priesthood. 

"I’d have to say that my life as a priest has been very happy. I’ve enjoyed pretty much every appointment I’ve had. I’ve also had more variety in my appointments than most priests would have – especially in the early years."

All of his training for the priesthood was in Rome, and he took to the Eternal City "like a duck to water". 

"I really enjoyed everything about Rome: the climate, food, history, culture, art… the whole thing was a great experience," he said. 

"There were seven of us ordained together and, amazingly, 50 years later, all seven of us are still alive, still healthy, and still ministering in the priesthood. 

"(In April) we spent a week together in Rome and it was the first time since we were young lads that we had spent a whole week together. 

"It was very interesting. The conclusion I reached at the end of it was that people don’t change. The characteristics we had as students we still had, only to a greater extent. The quiet fellas were quieter, the talkative ones were more talkative, and the awkward fellas were more awkward!" he smiled. 

After his ordination in 1969, Fr Aidan became the diocesan catechist, a role which involved annual visits to every school and every parish in Ardagh and Clonmacnois. 

"As a result of that, I got to know the diocese much better than I would have if I was a curate in one parish," he explained. 

A diocesan mission to Chipata in Zambia had been started at the time and Fr Aidan was one of four local priests who volunteered to serve there in the late 70s.

He spent six years in Africa and, after adjusting to the climate and language, he found that the experience offered "a different sort of vision of how the Church might be run or organised, and an altogether different experience of what it is to be a Catholic. It broadened our horizons in that way."

In 1984, he returned home and was chaplain for a year in what was then Athlone RTC (now AIT). 

"I found that year difficult because it was such a contrast to Africa and also because my mother died the first week I was there," he recalled.

"I suppose I was coping with bereavement and with change, so that was probably the most difficult year I’ve had."

Around this time, then-Bishop Colm O'Reilly was contacted by the Irish College in Rome and Fr Aidan was asked to return there to take up the role of spiritual director at the college in 1985. 

His five-year term came to an end shortly after the Irish football team was knocked out of the Italia '90 World Cup, and Fr Aidan then became parish priest in Carrickedmond in Longford. 

Nine years after that, he was named as the new parish priest of Leamonaghan - which takes in Ballinahown, Boher and Pullough. His 20 years in the parish means the parochial house in Ballinahown is the place where he has lived for longer than anywhere else in his life. 

The variety in the duties of a parish priest is the thing he'll miss most when in Rome. 

"Seminary ministry is a very focused and confined ministry. You’re living in an institution, an all-male institution, and what I’ll miss in that is just the variety of parish life. 

"As a priest you’re involved with people from the cradle to the grave - literally. You’re baptising the babies, and burying the dead, and everything in between. That’s what I’ve enjoyed most about parish life: the variety of involvements that you have with people at all the different stages of their lives."

He will also miss his visits to schools and interactions with the local children. "Youngsters are great to be with because they’re always full of life and banter and all that kind of thing," he said. 

The population of Ballinahown hasn't increased by much over the last 20 years ("it seems to be especially difficult to get planning permission here") and it's been a "very pleasant village" in which to live. 

"It’s near Athlone, but not too near. It’s rural, but it has the advantage of being close to everything a town can offer as well," he said. 

Fr Aidan is the eldest of seven in his family and his siblings are Noel (who ran the family clothes shop until his retirement five years ago), Noel's twin Brendan (a retired teacher), Joe (who lives in Australia), Mary (a retired teacher based in Dublin), Fran (a Dublin-based engineer), and Ciaran (who is retired from Bord na Mona). 

The family and local parishioners gathered for Fr Aidan's golden jubilee celebration earlier this year and he said he was "uneasy" about having another party to mark his departure so soon afterwards, but there was a gathering for him and his fellow departing priest in the parish, Fr PJ Hughes, after last Friday evening's Mass in Boher. 

Fr Aidan is moving to Rome at a time of transition for the Church, under the leadership of Pope Francis. He said he believes "God provides for the Church, at any particular time, the type of Pope that it needs."

"Every Pope brings the stamp of his own personality to the Church, and Pope Francis’ personality is very outgoing, it’s very pastoral, it’s very happy and joyful. 

"That’s the kind of atmosphere I would look forward to being in. Now, of course, he has his opponents too, but I won’t be one of them!" he commented.