Saul man with St Patrick link is on the road to priesthood

Saul man with St Patrick link is on the road to priesthood

2 July 2025

THE great great grandson of a Saul man, who donated the land for St Patrick’s monument, is set to become the first priest to be ordained in the parish for four decades.

Thomas John Hampton’s namesake has just been ordained a ‘transitional deacon’ in Rome – with hopes of ordination to the priesthood next June.

Rev Thomas Hampton is now home from Rome after a well-attended ceremony at the Basilica of St Paul Outside the Walls.

The last man to be ordained a priest in Saul was Fr Brendan Kelly, rector of the Redemptorist Clonard Monastery in Belfast, though two men, Rev Jackie Breen, from Saul, and the late Rev Paul McCormick, from Downpatrick, were ordained to the permanent diaconate around three years ago.

“Paul was always someone I could turn to,” said Rev Hampton, who delights in his connection to St Patrick.

A few months ago, the seminarian thought his biggest challenge was essays and exams. Then, he suffered a dramatic health crisis and underwent surgery to remove an abscess on his brain.

“I feel great – and exhausted,” he declares with great joy. “I’m still letting everything sink in.”

It was in the quiet of the Covid lockdown in 2020 that his priestly vocation became irresistible. 

“It had been on my mind since I was eight and it always came and went, back and forward. I always thought I was not good enough,” he said.

Rev Hampton was also put off as a teenage student in Downpatrick when a teacher at De La Salle High School  unwittingly stated that it was only grammar school boys who historically went to the seminary in the Diocese of Down and Connor.

“I thought I am not in grammar school and I am simply not smart enough,” he said.

Instead he pursued a vocation as a secondary school teacher, spent some years in England, and now, aged 45, regards these years as preparation for the priesthood.

Indeed, he has been fast-tracked from the usual seven years. “I am in the Pontifical Beda College in Rome, which was originally set up for the more mature, vintage man.”

Indeed it is the ‘vintage man’ who is answering the Lord’s call to the priesthood these days.

“We have lived a life and had a few knocks and bruises along the way. Without even realising it we were getting pastoral experience before we stepped into any sort of seminary and I think that’s really important.”

He credits an aunt, along with many others, for encouraging him in his religious vocation –long before he ever spoke a 

word to anyone about the priesthood.

“I thought my aunt was coming to see my parents but she said, ‘I’m here to see you! Have you ever thought about the priesthood’?”

His aunt, a parishioner in Saintfield, had been spurred on in 2018 by her parish priest to give her nephew Thomas a “gentle nudge” through the power of the Holy Spirit.

“Fr McHugh had put the gauntlet down to all the parishioners to go out to your son, or grandson, or your nephews, whoever it is in the family, and ask have you ever thought of being a priest,” he recalled.

So how did he respond to his aunt’s question?

“I said I have never ruled it out. I think about it all the time.”

He thinks many others should echo his aunt’s easy invitation. “Maybe someone needs to hear it because we are all vulnerable people and we always think we are never good enough. So those words can mean a lot.”

“Other people have said it over the years and I sort of brushed it off and thought ‘no I am going for a career in teaching’ or ‘it’s not for me’.”

Initially he reached out to a religious order but was rebuffed because he was over the age of 35. But after the initial disappointment, the call grew stronger. 

He reached out to Fr Kevin McGuckien, then Down and Connor vocations director.

“Everything just fell into place,” he said. “It was almost like I don’t need to fight in my mind any more.”

Soon, he learned that Eithne Brennan, a fellow parishioner from the St Joseph Priests’ Society, had been offering regular rosaries, not just for vocations but for a man from her home parish of Saul to enter the seminary.

“I thought that was fantastic. We didn’t know each other – but we know each other now and I think getting prayers from strangers carries a lot of weight.”

It was on March 18, while in a moral theology class, that he became dangerously ill, suffering the first of two violent seizures, one in the ambulance on route to hospital.

He was sedated and unconscious for a few days before undergoing surgery to remove the abscess on his brain followed by treatment to remove the infection.

He has no memory of the trauma, but vividly recalls the love and support of family, and friends. The youngest of four children, he was keenly aware of the anguish of his parents, Thomas and Bernadette, who hope to attend his ordination to priesthood next summer.

His advice to those who think they may be called? “Go for a quiet walk on the beach – find a bit of nature – and see the truth of creation and what God has given us.  Maybe meditate and pray there. You can hear God more clearly at times in those places.”