The lone voice in the desert declined to recant

On Human Life. Or, as it is in Latin, Humanae Vitae. The encyclical, dated July 25th, 1968, was not published by Pope Paul VI until July 29th. It prohibited Catholics from using "artificial" means of contraception. It also precipitated the greatest crisis of authority faced by the Catholic Church this century.

In Ireland the only voice of dissent came from James Good. When the encyclical was published, Father Good was professor of theology and lecturer in medical ethics at UCC. He was also a curate at the Lough parish in Cork. He said the encyclical showed an understanding which appeared "out of date and inadequate". Its conclusion was "unrealistic and incorrect." It was "a major tragedy for the church".

His bishop, Dr Cornelius Lucey, was on holiday. When he returned, according to a Cork story, he was asked how the holiday had gone. "Damn good," was the reported reply.

He phoned Father Good. "Look, you've made a mistake. Withdraw what you said. Say it to me now privately and we can forget the whole thing," he said. "There was nothing more he could do to help me," Father Good recalled in a recent Teilifis na Gaeilge documentary, An tAthair James Good. Nor could he recant. "I had made my mind up. That's how it is when you have a strong conviction. We said goodbye and he said he was sorry," Father Good said.

On August 12th, 1968, Dr Lucey banned him from preaching and hearing confession in the Cork diocese. "He had to ban me," Father Good explained. They had been close friends. That was now strained. "At that time it really hurt me," he said. One experience he found particularly hard was when a parishioner at the church in the Lough tore his name from over the confessional and trampled it. Father Good was also disappointed that he was left to suffer the slings and arrows alone.

"I was disappointed I was not supported by any Maynooth theologians," he said. "I knew they held exactly the same views on the matter as myself."

He stayed on in Cork for two more years. He was born there in 1924, grew up there and was educated there before going to Maynooth. He received a Doctorate in Divinity and later took a Doctorate in Philosophy at the University of Innsbruck, Austria. He then returned to Cork.

In 1970 he went to teach at the College of Education in Limerick. He remained there for five years.

If Limerick might be equated with purgatory for native Cork sinners, Turkana could well be hell. He went there in 1975. "I doubt if Messrs Satan and Beelzebub can improve on our daily 130 ," he said shortly after arriving.

Turkana is a desert area of Kenya. It is about the size of Ireland, with a population of a quarter of a million mostly poor nomads. Father Good has been there 23 years. He is effectively the Ludwor diocese's secretary there.

The church's emphasis in Turkana is on the practical. He recalled Aquinas: "There is no point in propagating faith to empty stomachs." It is also a place where contraception and authority are not issues. Contraception simply does not exist, he has said, and "canon law doesn't operate here." He intends staying there, dying there and being buried there.

When Dr Lucey retired as Bishop of Cork, he decided to join his old friend as a missionary in Turkana. That was in 1982, and he stayed two years, returning to Cork only when near death. "It was as if he had never been Bishop of Cork, as if he had cut out the rest of his life," Father Good recalled. "For two years he was simply an old priest . . . a nice man who talked to everyone."

They never discussed Humanae Vitae or the ban, but worked happily side by side, both free under God of responsibility imposed by either office or conscience.

Father Good last saw the former bishop in Cork three weeks before he died. "I think he knew he was dying. He said we would meet again in Turkana or perhaps in heaven."

Maybe it was their friendship which prevented Dr Lucey ever putting his ban on Father Good in writing. That was only discovered recently. On the same Teilifis na Gaeilge programme, broadcast last Easter, Father Good said the ban on him was still in place in Cork and that not a day went by when he didn't think about it being lifted.

Father Tom Hayes of the Cork diocese communications office told The Irish Times this week there was "a certain ambiguity" as to whether the ban ever existed. "Whatever happened seems to have happened between himself and the bishop."

The new Bishop of Cork, Dr Buckley, double-checked the archives and found nothing concerning a ban on Father Good. Father Good has recently been informed of this. Father Hayes said the ban "appears to have been verbal."

Father Good is currently visiting Cork where he now preaches homilies at his sister's parish church in Little Island. But he will be returning to Turkana. The area may once have been described as "the frying pan of desolation", but he wonders: "What would I do at home?"

He is also afraid of "the cold easterly wind" in Ireland. He likes the heat. "I don't think I could survive one Irish winter," he said.