The Dominican Ideal, Pursued

Fr John Neill, O.P.

Why did I decide to apply for the Order?  Ultimately, it is like the question: Why did you marry that person?  There is always an element of mystery about the question, something beyond quantification.

I was born on 15 May 1932.  It was Pentecost Sunday that year.  I was the first born, the only son.  I have two sisters, Janet and Carole.  My home was in Randwick, Sydney.  That parish is still under the care of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart.  It was a blessing to grow in the Faith as lived and preached by a community of priests.  This was an influence in my life choice of which I was aware only later.

My mother Elizabeth was born of Irish Catholic stock.  She trained as a nurse.  I’ve wondered whether she would have passed exam in Religious Education.  But she was the one called on by neighbours in all emergencies from sick children to care for the dying.  My father, Robert Sydney Neill, was a convert.  He became Catholic, not by conviction but to keep the family united.  The whole family’s attendance at Sunday Mass was as natural and necessary as breathing.  My father was a clerk for a small moneylender; he was a local employee.  In the context of the Great Depression, my mother told me later that she had cried often during her third pregnancy, worrying about how to feed another child.  I cannot remember being hungry; my parents were good cautious providers.

Like most children of the time, I left school at age 15.  I was not an able scholar.  My father had a heart attack at age 49.  In accord with the medical knowledge of 1947, he was “wrapped in cotton wool” for the remainder of his life.  My mother had found work, but I needed to get a job to help support the family.  I went to work in the wholesale and retail trade.  This was to occupy me for the next seven years.  It involved work on weekdays from 9am till 5:30pm, and Saturday till 12noon.  I attended “night school” to learn aspects of the trade.  I enjoyed the world of the city.

However I came to wonder whether this was the best thing I could do with my life.  I had taken my faith for granted.  Working in a world of different values, I came to reflect on family, schooling, the parish life, and the whole Catholic worldview.  Would the sharing of this inheritance, this treasure with others be a task to which I might contribute?

If I was to be considered for the seminary or a religious institute, I needed to upgrade my formal education.  So, for two years, I studied at night for the Matriculation Exam.  This involved passing five subjects in the one year.  I was successful in the second attempt.  Also, I knew that for priestly studies, I would need at least Year 10 standard in Latin.  So, I enrolled at the Marist night school at Church Hill.  It was there that I met now-Dominican Fathers Bernard Maxwell and Peter Lucas.  I guess most in the Latin class were thinking of the priesthood.  We began to visit the communities of clerical religious in the Sydney area.  In due course, we visited Holy Name Dominican Priory at Wahroonga.  We were sufficiently impressed to join the Tertiaries (Dominican Laity).  So, I grew in my understanding of the Dominican Tradition.  Indeed, it was not so much the individual friars who attracted me as the culture they strove to embody.  It was time proven, yet adaptable and balanced.  Like its founder, St Dominic, it championed the essential goodness of the human person and yet proclaimed the absolute need for the Redeemer.  The Dominicans spoke of the complementary functions of faith and reason, and of love expressed most powerfully in a disciplined preaching of the Gospel.  I fell in love with this ideal enough to be part of it.

Fr John Pictured 3rd from the left.

- Fr John Neill, O.P. is Prior of St James’ Dominican friars, Glebe.  He has served in and led secondary and tertiary education institutions, as Headmaster of Blackfriars Priory School Adelaide and as Trustee and the Foundation Chaplain of the University of Notre Dame Australia; the latter honoured him in 2006 with the honorary degree Doctor of Laws.