Fr Seamus Maguire

This is a series of short stories by Fr Seamus Maguire that have been inspired, for the most part, by his experiences as chaplain at the San Fernando GeneralHospital.
Fr Seamus hopes that this series of anecdotes may help to foster vocations to the priesthood and religious life.
Fr Seamus served the San Fernando Parish between 1995 and 2006. He has since returned to West Virginia, USA.

I was looking for the house of a sick man, who lived somewhere in the area, so I parked my car in the compound of the local Mission of the Roman Catholic Church.

After I had visited him for an hour or so, I came back to my car, only to discover that a large truck was blocking the gate of the compound. I went to the truck driver and told him that he was blocking me, but he continued to unload his cargo undisturbed.

I looked back at the little church and to my surprise the door was open. I was curious, so I went inside and found just five people in the front pew, praying before the Blessed Sacrament, with their Bibles open before them.

We greeted each other and they invited me to join them in the front pew. “Am I interrupting your prayer meeting?” I asked. “Not at all,” John replied, “it really is not a prayer meeting.” Then he explained the reason why they were there praying. John, leader of the group, had read in a magazine that a parish priest had found that he had fewer and fewer at Sunday Mass.

He decided that since Christ had said, “Ask and you shall receive,” he would pray to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament to bring back those parishioners who had left. So he challenged the good Lord to send back the “Fallen-aways” of their parish.

The pastor was surprised to find that many people joined him in prayer, so they became known as the prayer group for our “Fallen-aways”. This prayer group was spectacularly successful, and those who had neglected their duty of attending Mass every Sunday, were flocking back to church.

So now, John and his four followers were trying to do the same as that priest, and were hoping to have the same success. I asked John the obvious question: “How many of your congregation have returned to weekly attendance?”

He said that over the past four months, two families had returned to weekly Mass. We all smiled and then laughed and praised God for his goodness. (Two families is quite a lot for this small mission).

Then I said, “Thank you for your inspiring story, but your prayers did not stop with only two families returning to Church.” Prayer can have astounding effects.

They wondered what on earth I meant, but waited politely for me to explain. “Two days ago, I began, “I was doing my rounds in San Fernando Hospital when I spotted a man who was very, very weak; indeed, I thought, near death.

I went over to him and quietly spoke about death, and how we can allow it to become something frightening and threatening, but it is not the end. Indeed it is only the beginning of a wonderful life. We must, however, be truly prepared to meet our God and expect His mercy. I then began saying an “Act of Contrition” quietly in his ear.

At this point the visitors began to come into the ward, but I continued my prayers in that same quiet manner, and I knew that he just loved every word.

The people who came to visit the man in the bed next to where I stood began to move closer to me as if to hear what I was saying. Finally they asked me to come and pray with the man they were visiting. To my utter surprise, I noticed that the man wore a medal, so upon asking, they told me that he was a Catholic.

The next day I returned to that particular ward and the man I had first prayed with, but I noticed that the bed next to him was empty. I asked my patient if the man had died, but he said that he had gone home.

“Home!!” I wondered how on earth he could even get out of bed let alone go home! The mystery was solved, however, when I got back home.

The secretary told me that he had had a call from those people I had met in the hospital, and they gave the Catholic man’s address, and asked me to come and see him. I went to his house, and as we chatted, he told me that he had not been to confession for at least 20 years, but he would like some time to prepare for it.

I promised to bring him some books on the topics, so that within a day or two, he would be ready to receive the wonderful Sacrament of Penance.

I left his house and returned to my car, which I had left in the Mission Compound, but I found a large truck blocking the gateway of the Compound. Yes, we are back to the beginning of the story. I had just come from the home of the man with the medal.

As I stood there before John and his prayer group, I told them that their prayer group had brought back another “Big Fish” of a “Fallen-away”, and that he actually lived in the house across the road.

 I went out to see if that big truck was still blocking the gateway of the compound of the church. It was gone. So I waved “Goodbye” to John and his prayer group, and wished them all the blessings in the world in their noble apostolate of praying for “Fallen-Aways”.

As I drove back home, I sang Sing A New Song unto the Lord, still amazed at how that non-Catholic man held me up long enough to meet the friends of a Catholic man in the bed next to him.

And how this Catholic man had not been to confession for over 20 years, but had been brought back to the Church by the prayers of those five people, who freely gave of their time to pray for all “Fallen-aways.” The Catholic man went to the sacrament of Reconciliation the next day and passed on into eternity in less than a month.

A prayer group can be a very powerful group in any mission or parish. Sincere pleading to God, for something all of us know is God’s holy will, can reap a mighty harvest, far beyond our expectations.

John had read about the group which was started by a pastor whose flock were getting lazy and God was pleased to grant that group’s request.

Do the people of your parish pray for vocations to the priesthood? Why not have exposition of the Most Blessed Sacrament with prayer directed for that intention. The diocese needs a lot more priests. Who will volunteer? Who will pray?