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March 16, 2008

‘Sláinte’ to an active teacher-preacher son of Ireland

By Dolores Madlener

STAFF WRITER

Interviewee

Father Gene Smith, associate pastor of St. Barnabas in Beverly, has been leading literary tours of Ireland for the past eight years. Catholic New World/Natalie Battaglia

He is: Father Gene F. Smith, raised and schooled in St. Laurence Parish (on South Dorchester). Part of Mendel High School’s championship 1957 football team. Attended Conception Seminary College in Missouri, with graduate studies at the University of Notre Dame and then the University of St. Mary of the Lake. Ordained 1984.

A brogue to charm birds off trees: Parents born in Ulster; his father from County Monaghan, his mother from County Tyrone. Part of the family’s saga is that his dad, as a lad of 14, served as lookout while the great Michael Collins held a secret meeting with patriots in their farm house.

Team spirit: Played on Butch Maguire’s 2006 softball team that made the Chicago Hall of Fame.

South Siders: His dad was engineer at St. Laurence for 20 years and later in the same niche at Quigley South. His mother was cook at Quigley as well. “They lived behind the school, so they were just hands and knees away. I celebrated my first Mass at Quigley.”

Priesthood: “It was probably in the back of my mind from grammar school. I liked what some of the priests stood for at St. Laurence. They had a sense of social justice, a hot topic at the time.”

A late vocation: “I worked for the City Department of Human Services for 10 years.” Responsible for an office with 150 people working on community problems.

Sentimental journey: “I took mother and dad to Ireland in my early 30s. They’d never been back in 50 years. Dad said a day never went by in his life without him thinking of Ireland.”

Some call him a spiritual Celtic: “There’s a lot of fluff about Celtic spirituality at the moment. John O’Donohue was a great proponent. It’s being able to see the life force in all sorts of things, people and nature … recognizing God’s transcendence. O’Donohue said Celtic wisdom is not ‘I think therefore I am,’ but ‘I am, because everything is.’”

Celt influence: “Celtic people are not just the Irish. They were all across Europe, down into the Holy Land. St. Paul writing to the Thessalonians was speaking to the Celtic nation!”

Patrick’s approach: “When St. Patrick evangelized the Irish he didn’t take anything away from them. They were worshiping fire, water and rocks. He sacramentalized it all. You see the Celtic circle, symbol for the sun — Patrick made it the Son and embossed the cross right through it. It became the indelible signature of Celtic spirituality.”

Other hats: “I’ve been leading literary tours of Ireland for eight years or so. I give talks on Irish authors, and a thread of spirituality runs through the entire 10 days of our time together.”

He’s been known to teach “Ulysses” at St. Barnabas Parish in Beverly, where he’s associate pastor. The past 23 summers he’s taught a literature course at Notre Dame with a Shakespeare expert. “It’s English, American or Irish literature, but mostly Shakespeare.”

Favorite authors: “James Joyce, Yeats, Synge, Shakespeare, Eudora Welty and Flannery O’Connor.”

Greatest thrill of his life: “Becoming a priest certainly, and the 2005 World Series.” He tried out with the White Sox in his late high school years. “There were more than 100 applicants, and at the end of the day (and it went all day) there were three of us left standing. They said, ‘We’ll get back to you.’ They never did.”

Why folks say he’s an incredible homilist: “Because they’re related to me!” Then seriously, “I’m really interested in narrative theology — people stories.” He looks ahead at the Sunday Gospel and “during the week I’m on the hunt for those incarnational moments.”

Where does he get the people stories? “From the next person you meet or the last person you spoke with.”

South Side Irish Parade: He’s been on the parade committee since 1983. “The small group of people on the committee could free Ireland!”