‘He hung on to get home’: Family honour dying wishes of missionary priest

Missionary priest Fr Gus Hurley had two last wishes: to return from Glasgow where he ministered for more than 60 years to die at his family home in west Cork; and to be buried back in Glasgow among his flock. Thanks to the determination of his family, both wishes have now been realised.

Fr Gus (92) – or Wee Fr Hurley as he was known in Scotland – grew up on the family farm at Teadies Lower just outside Enniskeane in west Cork. When his father dissuaded him from becoming an artist, he decided to follow another route and enter priesthood.

Fr Gus was educated at St Finbarr's College in Farranferris in Cork and later in Wexford before he was ordained a priest. He headed for Glasgow in 1954 where he was appointed to St Augustine's in Milton. There was no church at the time but Fr Gus quickly set about rectifying that.

His nephew John Hurley said that Fr Gus, although a fervent Celtic fan and a regular at Parkhead, later found himself crossing the Clyde to Govan where, based at St Constantine's church, he was within earshot of Ibrox, the home of Celtic's Old Firm rivals, Rangers.

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"He was a huge Celtic fan and used to go to Parkhead and watch all the games of TV. He was a pioneer when he went to Glasgow but one day he called to this house in Govan and met a man who had 12 children and he told him he would never survive in Govan unless he took a drink." Fr Gus's conversion led him to enjoy the odd drop of Whyte and Mackay Scotch.

He was also a man who enjoyed visits to art galleries in Glasgow and Edinburgh where he admired the work of artists such as Picasso and Monet, his favourite painter.

“He travelled all over the world but used to come home to Enniskeane twice a year. He would time one visit to coincide with Ballybuidhe Races but he was diagnosed with prostate cancer four years ago and when the Covid struck, he couldn’t travel and we couldn’t go to visit him,” said John.

“He was very philosophical when he was diagnosed with cancer – it was prostate cancer but it started to spread. But he continued doing relief work in various parishes around Glasgow and then about six months ago, he slipped and fell on ice and he got very frail and lost confidence.”

John revealed Fr Gus had expressed two final wishes: he wanted to come home to die in Enniskeane and then be buried in the last parish he served in, St Ninian's in Kirkintilloch. "He was delighted to tell us one day he had become a property owner in Scotland – he had bought a grave!"

John and his sister Rose Collins travelled to Glasgow at the end of July when Covid-19 regulations permitted and after they spent the weekend with Fr Gus, met with his good friends Jacqueline and Ian Steel, visited the grave where he was to be buried, they prepared to return to Ireland with him.

“It was very emotional the day before he left. His friends came over to say goodbye and Jacqueline gave him a hug and said, ‘Make sure and come back to me’, and he said, “I will make sure I do, darling, I love you”, and then the next morning we got up at 3am to head down to Cairnryan for the ferry.

"We crossed over to Larne and he was in great form coming down in the car. We were singing It's a Long Way to Tipperary and other songs, and as we came into Bandon, he saw all the banners and bunting out for his grandniece Phil Healy who was competing in the Olympics in Tokyo.

“We got back to Enniskeane around 4pm and he met his brother, my father, Declan, and my mother, Phil, and my brothers and sisters, and then about half two the following morning he passed away. He had hung on to get home and die in the same room his own mother had died in.

“I rang his friends in Glasgow to say he had died. We had his funeral here. It’s been an emotional time but we were so glad we were able to honour his final wishes – to bring him home to die in west Cork and then bury him back in Glasgow – we were going to do that for him, come hell or high water.”