Saturday, Jun. 06, 2009

Bishop Boland, leader of Diocese of Savannah, marks 50 years since ordination

“Bidden or not bidden, God is present.”

Carl Jung, the Swiss psychologist, is the author of this quote and had it carved over the front door of his Zurich home as well as on his tombstone. It is an English translation of the Latin “Vocatus Atque Non Vocatus Deus Aderit,” a saying Jung came across when studying the Catholic theologian Erasmus. Bidden means “invited.”

The carved quote sits on a bookshelf in the office of Bishop J. Kevin Boland of the Catholic Diocese of Savannah and was a gift from his brother, Tony, and his wife, Colette.

The diocese happens to be in the inviting mood. Boland, 74, is having a party. On Wednesday, he will celebrate Mass at a service marking the 50th anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood. The Mass begins at 5:30 p.m. at The Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in downtown Savannah, the “center” of the 90-county diocese that covers the lower half of the state. A reception will follow. Both are open to the public.

‘Shy young priest’

Bishop Boland was ordained June 14, 1959, in Ireland, his homeland.

“What I remember is how squashed we all were. There were 41 of us crossways in the floor in a semi-circle,” Boland said in a phone interview this week from Savannah.

He was named the bishop of the Diocese of Savannah in 1995 by Pope John Paul II. From 1983-95, Boland was pastor of St. Anne Church in Columbus, which was his longest assignment on a parish staff, by one year. He came to the States following his ordination and was first assigned as associate pastor of St. Mary On the Hill in Augusta. Monsignor Daniel Burke was the pastor.

“I remember him as a shy student and a shy young priest,” Burke said in a video interview on the diocesan Web site. “He was a very docile assistant, very trustworthy.”

Boland was told that his new boss was a “conscientious and harsh disciplinarian,” Boland recalled. The reports proved wrong. The young priest found him sympathetic and caring. “He was a phenomenal symbol of the Church. That was my first impression,” Boland said. Boland did have learning curves in his new country, where he had to find his way, not only in his vocation but with American customs and southern accents. Right out of school, the young priest didn’t have money for a car so he rode a bicycle around St. Mary On the Hill, which sits in a residential neighborhood just west of downtown.

“People always got a kick out of it. They’d see me and say, ‘Can I give you a ride?’ ”

To the west side

From Augusta, Boland became associate pastor of The Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, Savannah (1961-62); pastor, Saint Michael, Tybee Island (1967-68); rector, Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist (1970-72); pastor, Blessed Sacrament, Savannah (1972-83); and pastor of St. Anne, Columbus (1983-95).

Boland faced another adjustment, this time in the religious sense, when he came to Columbus from the coast in 1983. On the one hand, he enjoyed the diversity of the people — due largely to Fort Benning — but on the other he found the city lacking in Catholic influence. (That’s partly due to geography. The first Georgia Catholics found their way to the state via ocean, so the east side, particularly the coastal cities, have a heavier Catholic flavor.)