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August 17, 2008

Holy sleuthing — a little like Indiana Jones

By Dolores Madlener

STAFF WRITER

Interviewee

Father Dennis O’Neill, pastor of St. Martha Parish, Morton Grove, stands before some of his collection of more than 700 religious relics acquired through the years.Catholic New World/Karen Callaway

He is: Father Dennis B. O’Neill, pastor St. Martha Parish, Morton Grove. Has bachelor’s in English literature from Loyola/Niles College Seminary, an licentiate in theology and a masters in divinity from St. Mary of the Lake University. Ordained in 1972.

Youth: Baptized at St. Mel, his dad’s parish on the West Side, but at age one, the family moved to the block where his mom grew up in St. Nicholas of Tolentine on the South Side. Dad was an electrician; Mom a grammar school teacher. Has a younger brother and sister.

What kind of kid: “Introverted. We lived in a part of the parish where there weren’t too many kids so I spent a lot of time reading. I still do. I got spanked every Sunday because although I loved going to church, I couldn’t sit still. Maybe that’s one reason I ended up a priest because now I don’t have to sit still at Mass.”

Religious vocation: “I’m the kind of person, who has known from the beginning I’m some kind of bridge between this world and the other world. So no matter what faith I was born in I’d probably be in the same kind of ‘job.’ I don’t think it was a conscious choice, it’s just one thing in my life that I can’t remember when it wasn’t there.”

Mentors: “There were a lot of mentors in the seminary. Sister Agnes Cunningham was a great teacher. We still keep in touch.” He continues to teach himself and parishioners. This fall he will again offer a series on church history. On his day off he reads and listens to music, “that’s the main stuff.”

He was music director at St. Thomas the Apostle and Christ the King parishes as associate pastor years ago.

A different path: In 1993 after seven years as pastor of St. Clotilde Parish, he took a sabbatical to do AIDS ministry. The Aids Pastoral Care Network was already in place, but he asked Cardinal Bernardin, “if I could try and establish a spirituality center for gender minorities — more than just Sunday Mass.” An interfaith center called The Living Circle came into being.

“When the sabbatical ended, I went to Bernardin and requested to be an associate at St. Benedict Parish,” to get the center solidly on its feet. He came back to pastoring in 2001. “I love St. Martha’s, with its variety of people. This is the biggest United Nations melting pot I’ve ever seen.”

Quest: “Through the years as different churches closed I’ve tried to get hold of whatever relics were there, since no one else seemed to care.” He’s even rescued them off the Internet. “There’s over 700 different saints’ relics in a corner of St. Martha’s multi-purpose building. Many were saved during the French Revolution. There was a whole cache of relics from a Poor Clare convent in France that recently closed. The relics were saved for centuries and suddenly they are being dissipated all over the world.”

Cataloging history: “I want people to know who these saints are and who they were and what help they offer us. Recently I finished a seven-page booklet on the relic chapel. I want to tell the history of these women who preserved them.” (Canon Law says it’s a serious sin to sell relics, but a virtue to rescue them.) He also researched all the reported relics of Mary in the world for another booklet. “Celtic Illumination: The Irish School,” by Courtney Davis is one of several books he has written introductions and commentary for.

Prayer life: The breviary? “I do it. One of the treasures that came our way was the cover of the summer breviary of the Cure of Ars. He died during the summer, so it’s possible this is the cover of the breviary he was using at the time. Before I even touch this, I better be reading my own.”

Foreign favorites: “Two cities I love are Venice and Prague. But just about anywhere in Italy is amazing. Paris, certainly. I use French in my research. And London.”

Favorite author: “I devour historical fiction and history. If it can also involve a good mystery like the Sister Fidelma Murder Mysteries by Peter Tremayne, all the better. She was a nun in St. Bridget’s Convent in Kildare in seventh-century Ireland and a judge in the Irish court system.”