{"id":324,"date":"2019-10-25T15:28:39","date_gmt":"2019-10-25T04:28:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/library.sydneycatholic.org\/?p=324"},"modified":"2020-01-23T16:30:36","modified_gmt":"2020-01-23T05:30:36","slug":"priests-i-have-known-ted-kennedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/library.sydneycatholic.org\/priests-i-have-known\/2019\/priests-i-have-known-ted-kennedy\/","title":{"rendered":"Priests I Have Known: Ted Kennedy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" allow=\"autoplay\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=https%3A\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/659860661&amp;color=%23ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=false&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false&amp;show_teaser=false\"><\/iframe>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Ted\nKennedy\u2019s funeral was celebrated in a tent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Where?\nRedfern of course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2018<em>Standing in a light drizzle outside a large marquee,<\/em><br><em>set up in the middle of Redfern\u2019s notorious \u2018Block\u2019,<\/em><br><em>at the funeral of his lifetime friend Fr Ted Kennedy, <\/em><br><em>stood David Cremin, celebrant, bishop, friend to all, offering<\/em><br><em>greeting and welcome to those who arrived.\u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These brief words describe a\nremarkable moment in the history of the Sydney church &#8211; the farewell to the\nbeloved pastor of Redfern.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Those who gathered included many\nformer priests, television crews,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>musicians and artists, the alienated\nand the devout, former members of the High Court,&nbsp; journalists, indigenous residents of the\nBlock, together with priest and bishop colleagues of the saintly deceased\npastor of Redfern. One of the guests sitting quietly under the canvas was\nCardinal Ted Clancy.&nbsp; Living at St Marys\nCathedral a the time, I was just getting ready to go to Redfern when over the\nbreakfast muesli Cardinal Clancy asked me would I offer him a lift to the\nfuneral.&nbsp; Never one famous for displaying\ngreat emotion, he was visibly moved at the death of Kennedy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ted Kennedy died in 2005. A beacon of\nconcern for the dispossessed and a national authority on the plight of the\nAborigines in our country. His funeral, which I just described, was a\nremarkable moment in his story and an inspiring and faith-filled celebration\nof&nbsp; his life and ministry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The place known as \u2018The Block\u2019 was a\nSydney site with a famous indigenous history. It is a unique project for\nAboriginal-run housing near the centre of Sydney, which excited enormous\nemotions and symbolism, and is viewed by the largely rural Indigenous as a\nspiritual home in Australia&#8217;s largest city. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But back to the story of Fr Ted\nKennedy. In 1971, Kennedy came to St Vincent\u2019s Redfern as parish priest where\nhe would stay for thirty years. With two younger priests, Fergus Breslin and\nJohn Butcher, Ted was convinced that they should work as a team. This was in\nstark contrast to the traditional parish structures&nbsp; where the parish priest made all the\ndecisions and the \u2018curates\u2019 (the assistant priests) were the hired hands.\nSitting down in the kitchen one night, as Kennedy would tell the story, the\nthree of them began to pool their opinions about the particular part of Sydney\nwhere they were invited to minister. They came to realise that within a five\nmile radius of the presbytery there was one of the largest aggregation of\nindigenous in Australia. If this team was to minister genuinely to the\ncommunity in which they lived a significant emphasis need to be directed to\nthese people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>How best to do it, was the question. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u2018Their first caller was an Aboriginal\nwoman seeking food.\u2019<\/em>&nbsp; Fr Ed Campion would say in his obituary. <em>\u2018From\nthen on, the doors were always open to Aborigines, for food, lodging or a\nsympathetic ear\u2019 . <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Kennedy, Breslin and Butcher would\nlearn on the job. Firstly meals would be offered during the day in the form of\na rough soup kitchen. Then the front room of the presbytery was made available\nfor an itinerant from northern Queensland. More and more came. Gradually the\npresbytery was taken over for emergency accomodation, then the Church Hall.\nWhen his two colleagues left, Kennedy moved his bed into the sacristy.&nbsp;&nbsp; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;\u2018<em>On wet winter nights up to 100 would crowd\ninto the presbytery to sleep wherever there was space,\u2019 <\/em>Campion\u2019s eulogy\ncontinued. <em>\u2018Friction with the police was constant and Aborigines found\nchampions at the presbytery. At times the atmosphere in the house could become\nsticky or even dangerous but the priests never, ever called the police\u2019. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So began what Kennedy would call his\nlove affair with Aboriginal people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When enthusiasts were drawn to Redfern\ninspired by the Church\u2019s challenge to working for social justice, and there\nwere many, Kennedy\u2019s caution to them \u2018<em>If you want to work with the poor you\nneed to be able to cope with two realties &#8211; stench and violence.\u2019<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Back in the eighties, I hosted the\nSydney visit of a remarkable French priest Abbe Pierre, famous for his work\nwith the \u2018ragpickers of Paris\u2019. Pierre spoke no English &#8211; his host spoke no\nworkable French. The French visitor asked to meet some indigenous Australians.\nSo I drove him to Redfern where we sat at the kitchen table with Ted. Little\nconversation lots of body language. The problem was solved by Kennedy going\ndown to the local pub The Empress and brought back a friend wet with the heavy\nrain, and slightly merry from his Friday night socialising. Henry was an\naboriginal digger who had served in France during the war. He spoke fluent\nFrench &#8211; the meeting was saved. Conversation flowed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u2018Poetry is the person of faith\u2019s native language.\u2019<\/em> claims English writer Mark Oakley. Kennedy\nbelieved this strongly. It kept him sane and deeply engaged in the hazardous\nministry he had chosen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He loved many poets &#8211; Australian poets James McAuley, Les Murray, others\nfrom a wider tradition Yeats, Hopkins, Dylan Thomas. He befriended James\nMcAuley before coming to Redfern when he was chaplain at&nbsp; Sydney University. McAuley and his musical\ncollaborator Richard Connolly&nbsp; wrote some\nof Australia\u2019s best loved hymns. Later another outstanding Sydney priest, Roger\nPryke, included many of these hymns&nbsp; in a\nproduction of the Living Parish hymnbook which would become a standard in\nparishes and schools for decades. While at Sydney University he encouraged&nbsp; songwriter Peter Kearney whose music spoke to\na new generation of&nbsp; young teachers and\nparish liturgists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But it was Redfern church which\nbecame his most enduring legacy. It became the centre of many progressive\ncatholics who Kennedy would gather from all over Sydney to worship there of a\nSunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After two major strokes Kennedy\ndied in 2005. Dylan Thomas would write \u2018old age should rage and burn at close\nof day.\u2019 <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Fr Ted Kennedy\u2019s rage about the\nhand dealt to the poor and the dispossessed would continue &#8211;&nbsp; as it would in the story of the Aboriginal\nhistory of the city of Sydney.<\/p>\n\n\n<p><!--EndFragment--><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ted Kennedy\u2019s funeral was celebrated in a tent. 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