Br. John McTernan

Br. John McTernan

BR. John McTernan, who has died aged 86, was an inspired teacher and a former principal of St Patrick’s Boys’ Primary School in Downpatrick.

He was born in Lurganboy, Manorhamilton, Co. Leitrim. After attending the national school he decided to join  a teaching order, the De La Salle Brothers. He entered the novitiate in 1946 which was a year of training in spiritual matters.

After studies and teacher training he volunteered for mission work in the Far East. In the training college the professor reminded his students that teachers are born not made. John was a born teacher and after the solid foundation he got in college he was God’s gift to the teaching profession.

Having completed his studies, he was posted to St George’s Institution, Taiping, Malaysia. His religious community was of mixed races, namely local, Scottish and Irish. This young enthusiastic missionary faced a new culture that was still recovering from the ravages of the Japanese invasion during the war.

At the end of six years’ teaching John was stricken by a trauma of deep depression and needed hospital care. He was recalled  to Ireland for treatment where he made a complete recovery. He was then appointed to teach in a boys’ home in Kircubbin, Co Down.

Many of the boys whom he taught were orphaned and others came from disturbed and broken homes. John accepted them as they were and treated them with the utmost respect and dignity, even though they could be challenging at times.  Joe Reid, a fellow teacher, recalled that Br. John showed tremendous patience and tolerance with the boys and was ever gentle in his dealing with them.

John spent six years of dedicated service in Kircubbin. He then took a year off to do some extra studies and was then appointed as principal of St Patrick’s Boys Primary School in Downpatick. According to reports the highlight for the staff and pupils was the morning assembly where he reflected on a parable from the gospels or on the life of a saint  in a prayerful  and enlivened fashion.

Br. John was a deeply religious man, inherited from his home and this deeply influenced the people he had dealing with. This is summarised by the testimony of Delia O’Hagan, Downpatrick. “Br. John was undoubtedly one of the best mentors and role models  a young teacher could have wished for at the start of their career. The warmth and compassion with which he carried out his daily duties, imbued a sense of trust and responsibility in others.

“Br. John’s guidance and patience came from a deeply held faith in the ethos of St John Baptist De La Salle. He lived out his vocation with unfailing selflessness always seeing the child of God in each of the pupils before him. It was both an honour and a privilege to have known, spent time with and taught under the inspiration of a great but humble man. He was truly a servant of God and a wonderful friend.’

After John retired from teaching he devoted much of his time in organising prayer groups who used the Brothers’ house for weekly prayer sessions. He also  regularly visited the sick and elderly and the disabled in the town.

He still had  a few crosses to bear in his life. After retiring he was named with others of child abuse in the home in Kircubbin. This caused him much anxiety and stress but he bore it with great faith and confidence. After investigations Br. John was found innocent  and cleared of all the allegations.

Three years before his death he tripped outside his house and was paralysed from the neck down. He was  hospitalised in Belfast and later brought to Miguel House the De La Salle nursing home in Castletown, Co Laois. There, under the tender loving care of the nurses and staff, he surprised everybody with his wit, cheerfulness and acceptance of his situation.

He died peacefully on September 7 and was laid to rest in the community cemetery in Castletown, Co Laois. Ar dheis  Dé go raibh a anam.

MB