Warm tributes paid to Sir John Gorman

Warm tributes paid to Sir John Gorman

11 June 2014

KILLYLEAGH war hero Sir John Gorman whose funeral service was held in the town last Monday was described as a “gentleman with the common touch.”

During the funeral mass at St. Mary’s Star of the Sea Church, Fr. Eugene O’Neill described Sir John as a “man of deep friendships” who inspired great loyalty, relishing the intimacy and brotherhood of the field of action.

Fr. O’Neill said Sir John carried friends with him through life, was generous with his colleagues and a man who never lost the grace and joi de vivre which were characteristic features of his personality.

During his homily, Fr. O’Neill said from his youth, Sir John was an independent-minded person of “energy, great determination and huge capacities.”

He continued: “Sir John was a man of courage who had actually experienced some of the most turbulent years of the 20th century. He was a real hero, decorated on the field of battle by Field Marshall Montgomery.

“Sir John had put his life on the line during the war and served his country in the cause of freedom from tyranny. He was a man whose basic approach to life was not to ask ‘what can I get?’ but, rather, ‘what can I give?’

“This spirit of service for the common good was the foundational principle of his military and police service, of each part of his long and varied career in public life, and the reason why his name is held in esteem by people across the spectrum of politics as a byword for decency.”

Fr. O’Neill said behind the public man, lay a loving father full of fun who managed that extraordinary feat of energy and organisation, combing a demanding career with the successful raising of a large family and being a devoted husband to Heather for over 60 years.

“I believe Sir John was a man of faith: a belief, quiet yet profound, absorbed in the heart of his family and adhered to throughout life; a conviction expressed in his service in this parish as Minister of the Eucharist and Reader, in his membership of the Sovereign Order of Malta and his carrying of the stretchers of the sick in Lourdes.”

Fr. O’Neill said Sir John witnessed the reality of war not from the pages of history books, but first hand, with all its chaos and capricious ironies, where the innocent and the good were struck down with as much violence as the guilty.

“Having witnessed that could have left him with the judgement that human existence itself was chaotic, cruel and meaningless. Yet he drew the opposite conclusion,” said the parish priest.

“Sir John concluded that for him, instead of chaos, at the heart of earthly life was the presence of a divine love; the presence of a person who himself witnessed human loss and suffering every bit as real as anything we have suffered but whose resurrection asserted: this will not be the last word.”

Sir John was a former deputy speaker at the Northern Ireland Assembly where tributes were recently paid to the former Ulster Unionist politician who died on May 27.

Speaker William Hay said the constant theme of Sir John’s life was public service, while UUP leader Mike Nesbitt said Sir John’s life was one of “public service of the highest calibre” and he was “a soldier of whose feats of derring-do were simply legendary”.

DUP MLA Peter Weir, said two words summed-up Sir John’s life “service and duty,” while Sinn Fein’s Mitchel McLaughlin said Sir John had always managed to keep his cool during a time of tremendous political challenges.

SDLP leader, Alasdair McDonnell, paid tribute to the “massive contribution” Sir John made to society, while Alliance’s Stephen Farry said Sir John was “very much a servant to all of Northern Ireland.” NI21’s Basil McCrea, the TUV’s Jim Allister and Green Party MLA Steven Agnew paid tribute and expressed their condolences to Sir John’s family.