Fr Brian O’Loughlin, USA
 People come to Mass who say they don’t regularly attend
when they are working but make time while on vacation.
Fr Brian O’Loughlin VG is from Australia. Here he shares
his experience of the importance of cruise ship priests.
I have been a cruise ship priest for the last 24 years
and find it an excellent means of working vacation. I like
the sea, I like meeting new people and I like being able to
help guests to enjoy their cruise and the crew to receive
some spiritual comfort, which people ashore can so easily
take for granted.
Mgr. John O’Shea, former National Director of AOS
Australia is now Chaplain of a holiday island off the coast
of Australia. I always bear in mind what he says about
maritime ministry: people come to Mass who say they don’t
regularly attend when they are working but make time while
on vacation. I have found that cruise ship ministry is like
that too. That guests take the opportunity while at sea
because they are relaxed and away from usual commitments and
have time to think and do what they wish to do rather than
what the rush of modern life dictates.
In this regard I would like to share with you my cause
celebre of cruise ship ministry. It concerns Terry who
attended Mass on the ship on which I was Chaplain. After
Mass, I stood at the door and made myself available to the
guests as they were leaving. Terry asked to speak with me. I
asked Terry to sit down, which he did and then dissolved in
tears. After he recovered I asked what was wrong? Terry said
he had remarried outside the church, but that his first wife
had died. He wondered if anything could be done?
I asked if his wife had approached the Church’s Tribunal?
He said he didn’t know there was a Tribunal. I encouraged
him to do so when they returned home. I later met his wife
and she said she was prepared to do so. We exchanged email
addresses and before the following Easter, Terry was
delighted to email me saying the Tribunal had addressed the
irregularity and his wife was being received into the Church
through the RCIA.
Many cruise ship priests would have similar accounts of
how the ministry has been so effective. I remember another
guest who approached me after the first Mass of the cruise
and said she really values her daily Mass. Before deciding
which cruise line to sail with, she phoned the head offices
of Celebrity and Princess asking if a priest would be on
board for daily Mass. Celebrity said they endeavoured to
have a priest onboard every cruise of every ship. So you
know who she choose for her cruise. |