And did you get what You wanted from this life, even so? I did. And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself. Beloved on the earth. ~ Raymond Carver
On Wednesday, 23rd February, 2011, a very special celebration was held in Catherine McAuley House, Beaumont, Dublin, marking the occasion of Sr. M. Assisium Skelly’s 100th birthday. Family, friends, and many Sisters of Mercy gathered to honour her and to enjoy the festivities. Sr. Assisium came from Glebe House, Clonmellon, Co Meath, the oldest of eight siblings, seven girls and a boy. In her local national school she was awakened to a love for music which is still with her. She began secondary school at the Dominican Sisters, Cabra, Dublin, and then went to the Junior Preparatory College in Carysfort Park, Blackrock, Co Dublin. On 8th September, 1930, she entered the Sisters of Mercy in Carysfort together with Sue Mescal, her life-long friend, who later became Sr. Margaret. Sr. Casimir who later taught with Sr. Assisium in Carysfort College also entered on that day. Sr. Assisium made Final Profession on 16th April, 1936, and that same year she qualified as a Primary Teacher, and taught in the schools in Cork Street and Baggot Street. She received a B.A. degree in English and Irish from U.C.D. in 1938, and an M.A. in 1943, and began her teaching career in Carysfort Training College.
From 1972 to 1976 she was Assistant General to Sr. Josephine Burke and then became Mistress of Novices. She lived in Napa, California, Ballyroan, and St. Michael’s, Dun Laoghaire, and in 2007, she made her home in Catherine McAuley House.
Driving up to Catherine McAuley House on the morning of 23rd February, it was obvious that this was no ordinary day. Cars lined the avenue, and balloons danced in the spring sunlight. In the house everything was bright and gleaming and adorned with flowers. The staff members were superb, excelling themselves in entering into the joy of the day. We gathered for the Eucharist of Thanksgiving. Sr. Assisium’s sisters, Sr. Joan and Patricia Brady had come from England and Kilkenny, her sister-in-law, Mary Skelly, from Clonmellon, was there, and there were nephews and nieces and grand nephews and grand nieces. Sr. Margaret Mescal’s brother, Austin, was a welcome guest. There were Mercy friends, and friends made down the years of Sr. Assisium’s life. Fr. Cormac McIlraith, former Parish Priest of Ballyroan and Fr. Paul, who celebrates Mass in the nursing home, were the celebrants.
The readings were wonderful for the celebration of such a long and fruitful life. In the first one the prophet Isaiah consoled us, ‘Do not fear…I will be with you.’ The psalm proclaimed, ‘You, O Lord, are my refuge from my youth. So even to old age and grey hairs, my lips will shout for joy.’ The gospel from Matthew told the story of our lives, our high hopes starting out, our strong sure moments and our down times; when the seeds fall on rocky ground, and the roots do not go deep enough and the plants dry up, when the seeds get choked in the thorn bushes in our lives and when the seeds produce much fruit. Jesus says to us, ‘Listen, then, if you have ears.’
The Prayers of the Faithful remembered the numerous students around the world whom Sr. Assisium taught, her religious family, the wonderful staff in Catherine McAuley House and the members of her family who have gone before her. The reflection after Holy Communion asked that we will be cared for always:-
Carry me, Lord, to peace and shelter
O, carry me Lord from wind and rain
Remember your promise, O Shepherd of Israel
I will be yours and you will be mine.
After Mass Sr. Leonie Boland spoke of the memories she has of Sr. Assisium since she, Leonie, came to Carysfort College as an eighteen year old. She ended her talk with the poem which Seamus Heaney wrote for Sr. Assisium around 1979 when he taught English at Carysfort College. In the poem, ‘Corncrake,’ he used religious imagery all through to link the bird and the nun. It is a work of wonder, understated, sparse, with many layers, depths and allusions, and his incredible use of words.
‘In the wet catacombs of the grass
A loner with a breaking note
Prays tenebrae
He is the mendicant of these acres
And makes his own responses
Litany of solace and reproach.’…
Heaney ended the poem with ‘Gaudeamus igitur,’ as Leonie, too, ended her talk, ‘So let us rejoice.’
Declan Gilsenan, a nephew of Sr. Assisium, spoke about her in the family circle. He also mentioned her connection with Seamus Heaney and told that in his letter to her for her birthday Heaney remembered the day that she travelled to Glanmore to his home in Wicklow, with Teresita Durkan, (Sr. Regina) to ask if he would be interested in a lectureship at Carysfort College.
When Mass was over the residents went to the beautifully decorated dining room and Sr. Assisium and the other guests went to the Skylon Hotel to a very warm welcome, an appetizing meal, the cutting of the cake and the taking of photographs. Afterwards everybody went back to Catherine McAuley House, to the central hall, for further merrymaking, and a sing-song which included Sr. Assisium’s favourite party piece, ‘Moonlight and Roses.’ Then another cake, aglow with candles, was carried in. All her family helped her blow out the candles and she was presented with her cheque from the President.
So many people contributed to making the day memorable – Sr. Nuala Kennedy, leader in Catherine McAuley House, Sr. Basil Gaffney, Sr. Assisium’s relative, Srs. Eithne Doyle, Jane McNamara, Rita Murray, Rosaleen Hogan, Catherine Dooley -the musicians, the staff of Catherine McAuley House, and many, many more. A 100th birthday is rare and precious, and it was good to rejoice.
‘I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch where through
Gleams that untraveled world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!
As though to breathe were life. Life piled on life.
Were all too little.
Ulysses, Alfred Lord Tennyson
South Central Province
