The Venerable Matt Talbot Resource Center exists to compile writings about the life, times, conversion, and recovery from alcoholism of Matt Talbot (1856-1925) of Dublin, Ireland. Disclaimer: The placing of information on this site from external linked sources does not necessarily imply agreement with that information. This center is independent of any other center, group, organization, website, or Facebook page. Comments are welcome at: ven.matt.talbot.resource.center@gmail.com
Earlier this month Gerry Mc
Donnell, a poet and author living in Dublin, informed us that he had
recently written a radio play based on the life of Matt Talbot and was seeking someone who would be willing to produce it. This is an unique opportunity to help expand awareness of Matt Talbot. We are,
therefore, inviting everyone who might be interested to contact Gerry at gerrypoet@gmail.com.
This is a radio play which is approximately a half
hour long. It is essentially about the journey and how people return changed
from happenings on the journey.
Dan travels from Boston to Dublin to visit the
shrine of Matt Talbot. He had promised his dying mother, who believed that he
had been cured of alcoholism because of her prayers to Matt, that he would do
so. He is skeptical and is on a dutiful visit to hand in notification of Matt’s
intercession in his recovery from alcohol addiction. On the plane he meets Al a
nervous, talkative traveller and a priest who has coincidentally written a
pamphlet on Matt Talbot having been cured by praying to him. They talk about
this patron protector of the alcoholic; their beliefs and
doubts.
Dan arrives at the church where Matt’s tomb is. He
stands at the back of the church in the gloom. The sacristan explains that he
could talk to the priest after Mass. Soon after, the sacristan is back at his
shoulder more loquacious than before. Dan gets a smell of drink off him. The
Mass is long and after it is over the priest speaks to each parishioner in turn,
giving them a blessing. Dan is waiting impatiently. He has to catch a flight
back to Boston that afternoon. He explains his predicament to the sacristan who
agrees to give the envelope to the priest. Once more the sacristan approaches
Dan saying the priest would see him now. Dan asks the sacristan for the envelope
which he doesn’t have. It transpires that the sacristan’s brother, who hangs
around the church begging, has the envelope. Dan failed to distinguish between
the two, in the shadows.
The priest assures him that his visit will not be
wasted. He urges Dan to pray at Matt’s tomb. Dan is having compulsions to drink.
He hears the voice of Matt encouraging him to stay sober. It is a transformative
experience and he leaves the church with a blessing from the priest. His grimy
surroundings look pristine. As he walks through the streets it is as if he is in
love with everybody and everything. Feeling a little bit ungrateful he wonders
is he having a flash-back to his drinking and drug taking days. He gets a taxi
to the airport and boards his plane. He reaches into his pocket to read some of
the literature on Matt which he got in the church. He takes out an envelope. It
is the one given to him by his mother. The sacristan’s brother has the other
envelope. He reflects on all that has happened. A fellow passenger engages him
in small talk. He says, “I’m returning home, or am I?”
Some background
information about Gerry Mc Donnell:
GERRY MC DONNELL was born and lives in Dublin. He was educated
in Trinity College,
Dublin where he edited ICARUS, the
college literary magazine; and at Dublin
City University.
He has had six collections of poetry published. He has also written for stage, radio
and the television series Fair City.
His play Making It Home,a two-hander
father and son relationship, was first performed at the Crypt Theatre at Dublin Castle
in 2001. A radio adaptation of this play was broadcast on RTE Radio 1 in 2008
starring the acclaimed Irish actor David Kelly as the father and Mark Lambert
as the son. It has been translated into Breton and has been published. A stage production
will happen in July 2014. He has written a radio play, a stage play and a
libretto based on the life and work of the Irish poet James Clarence Mangan
(1803 – 1849).
His stage play Song of
Solomon, set on a canal in Dublin, has a Jewish
theme. His interest in Irish Jewry has resulted in the chapbook Jewish Influences in Ulysses; a collection of monologues
called Mud Island Elegy, in which Jews of 19th
century Ireland speak about
their lives from beyond the grave; Lost and Found
concerning a homeless Jewish man living in the Phoenix
Park in Dublin. Mud Island Anthology, concerning ‘ordinary’ Dublin
gentiles who lived in the latter half of the 20th centurywas published in 2009 and is a
companion collection to the ‘Elegy’ poems.
His latest collection of poetry, Ragged Star,
was published in 2011 by Lapwing Publications, Belfast. His novella called Martin Incidentally was published in January 2013. I Heard An Irish Jew, selected poems and prose, will
be published in 2014.
He is a member of the Writers
Guildof Ireland and the Irish Writers’ Union.
When
asked as to what led Gerry to write this play, he responded with the following very personal reflection:
THE CAUSE OF MATT TALBOT
Gerry Mc Donnell
December
2014
I grew up close to
where Matt Talbot lived. I had heard him spoken of fondly by ordinary working
class people. I also heard that he passed the picket on a strike. So I had
conflicting ideas about him. Anyway he was a figure of the past and had little
impact on my life, I thought; that is until I followed in his footsteps down the
dark tunnel of alcoholism. At this time I was rebellious and had little time for
religion or things spiritual. It was to be some years before the figure of Matt
re-emerged in my thoughts. The intervening years had brought the tragedy of the
untimely deaths of my parents. So I was ripe for resentment and blame which
started with God and moved down to mankind.
Matt Talbot was in
my consciousness during my recovery from alcoholism. I wondered how he could
have stayed sober in a city awash with alcohol and poverty. The fact that he had
lain down the drink at twenty-eight and remained sober for the rest of his life
puzzled me. How could a man, on his own, beat the demon drink? Of course he
wasn’t on his own. He turned to his religion and devoted himself to Our Lady. I
too turned to religion in the battle to stay sober. But I also had the
fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous for support.
I still had
ambivalent feelings about Matt and his fervour. Was he a religious maniac or a
holy man? The chains he wore pointed to the former, yet the man I got to know in
my reading about him bore testimony to the latter. In a secular world it is easy
to interpret his life in a negative way and dismiss his self-denial- the block
of wood for a pillow and the tear at the knee of his trousers so he could better
feel the discomfort of his flesh on the granite steps of the church where he
went to Mass before a hard day’s work in a timber yard- as the actions of a
fanatic.
However, as I
matured in my sobriety I began to see him as a holy man. I read that he shared
what little lunch he had with his fellow workers. He was kind and happy in
himself although no doubt he had his demons to wrestle with. This was not the
portrait of a deranged man. Nobody suffering from a mental illness could
accomplish what he did as a life-long diligent worker and a daily Mass goer.
What led me to
write my play, The Cause of Matt Talbot, was my identification with his
Catholic, working class life and his recovery from alcoholism. I hope I have
given a true picture of him in the play or at least have not besmirched his
memory in any way.
As a child, I found most of the stories of saints
I read to be distant and abstract, entirely irrelevant to a young dreamer like
me. As an adult, however, not only have the lives of the saints influenced my
spirituality and lifestyle, but many other people’s stories who have not yet
been canonized have quickened my heart and linger there. The story of Venerable
Matthew ("Matt") Talbot and his conversion is one of them.
Venerable Matt Talbot was a typical Irishman who
lived and worked in Dublin at the turn of the nineteenth century; he was typical
in the sense that he was born into a large, Catholic family deeply impoverished
and afflicted with the family disease of alcoholism. But the sanctified manner
in which he died was dramatically divergent from the sinful, selfish lifestyle
he maintained from the onset of adolescence until his eventual conversion. “Matt
Talbot was not someone who did things by halves. For as fervently as he devoted
himself to drinking in his young years, he just as fervently gave the rest of
his life to God” (McGrane, 2006). He lived in an epoch and milieu in which
alcoholism was pervasive; Dublin alone in 1865 sheltered over two thousand pubs,
and many people were recorded to have died from alcohol poisoning in 1865-1
(McGrane, 2006).
Matt’s father was an alcoholic, and Matt himself
began drinking heavily at age twelve; it was readily available to him through
his job at a “wine and beer establishment in Dublin” (McGrane, 2006). His
father tried to dissuade his drinking through intense scourging at home when
Matt would arrive after work in a drunken stupor, but nothing and no one could
prevent Matt from the downward spiral into the darkness of alcoholism.
By today’s definition, he was truly addicted to
alcohol. His wages were essential to supplement his family’s needs. There were
twelve of them living at home, and both his mother and father were hard workers
yet very poor. As soon as Matt was paid, he gave his favorite pub owner all of
his hard-earned money with the instruction to keep it all until he drank his
earnings dry. He often became so desperate for alcohol that he would beg from
his friends for extra money, and he even came home on more than one occasion
with no shirt or boots, as he had sold them for alcohol money (McGrane,
2006).
At the age of 28, Matt hit rock bottom and
pledged to his mother that he would never imbibe again. He held true to his
promise. Amazingly, he was able to do this without the help of any sort of
rehabilitative program, as none existed to assist him at the time. It was truly
a miracle of God’s grace that Matt was able to change his life from the moment
his mother told him, “Go, then, in God’s name, but don’t take [the pledge]
unless you are going to keep it.” As Matt responded that he intended to keep
his pledge “in God’s name,” his mother added, “God give you the strength to keep
it” (McGrane, 2006).
Soon afterward, Matt chose to deepen his
relationship with God, which had been waning since the disease of alcoholism had
consumed his entire being. “As an alcoholic, Matt’s god was the bottle, and his
altar was a bar” (McGrane, 2006). Yet, as is the case for many heroic saints
whose vigor for self transforms into pining for God, Matt’s zeal for drinking
quickly and permanently became transformed into a thirst for God. He realized
that God alone could slake his eternal thirst, and returning to the sacraments
was grace enough for Matt to tackle withdrawals and long-term sobriety.
A striking feature of Matt’s conversion is that
his life did not drastically change on the exterior; he remained a hard worker
at his job doing manual labor, and he continued his daily regimen without much
notice from others; yet Matt’s interior life was deepening rapidly, and he kept
this dramatic conversion largely to himself out of profound humility.
Eventually, however, everyone noticed Matt’s
spiritual metamorphosis, though it was entirely by the silent witness of his
changed life. The day after Matt made his pledge to stop drinking, he began a
lifelong commitment to attend daily Mass, and he would arrive at least a half
hour early for silent prayer and devotions. Instead of spending every last iota
of money on alcohol, Matt donated much of his earning to charitable
organizations. He joined several Catholic sodalities through his boyhood
parish, and he was faithful to classic devotions, such as the Stations of the
Cross and the Rosary. Most notably was how “Matt ate very little food and chose
to sleep on a plank instead of a mattress” (McGrane 2006) as an act of
penitence.
Matt Talbot died at the age of 69 while walking
to daily Mass at St. Saviour’s Church; he had been ill with heart and kidney
problems (possibly related to the many years of abusing alcohol) and yet
soldiered on to spend time with the Lord while he was suffering and struggling
in the physical aftermath of his former malady. No one could identify Matt when
he collapsed on the road outside the parish, as he was carrying only a rosary
and a prayer book. Probably most shocking of all is that physicians discovered
Matt’s body was covered in chains beneath his clothing once they began to
prepare his body for his funeral. Matt may have chosen to succumb to instant
gratification and sensual pleasures early in his life, but he certainly became a
man of humble and authentic austerity in the end of his life.
There are two reasons Matt Talbot’s story strikes
me so deeply: firstly, I belong to a family riddled with alcoholism and
addiction. I have witnessed family members and close friends become slaves to
this disease, and a few of them have tragically died as a direct result of the
consequences of alcohol and drug abuse.
Secondly, I find the humility and asceticism of
Matt's life to be so relevant and inspiring. Matt’s conversion was sincere,
because he was encased in humility, and humility is a virtue so contrary to our
natural concupiscence. In fact, humility is the antidote to the vice of pride,
which many theological scholars agree is the foundation and root of all other
sins. We dwell in the midst of the technological revolution in which it is
commonplace for every American household to contain a plethora of virtual
devices. Yet asceticism draws the spirit of humanity, entices the eternal
thirst of every soul back to its source: God and eternal rest with Him in
Heaven. I cannot imagine that any of us will acquire sainthood without
obtaining the virtue of humility, which necessitates a perpetual dying to self;
yet it seems even more challenging to achieve this when we are immersed in
busyness; surrounded by constant noise; and generally exhausted and unfulfilled
by the nagging restlessness that pervades our lives. Matt Talbot recognized his
own restlessness and responded quickly and fervently to God’s call for healing
and holiness; this is the universal beckoning of all of
humanity.
Matt Talbot may have earned an early reputation
as a drunk, a low-life, and a selfish man, but he died a saintly man whose cause
for canonization began in 1931. He shed everything in his old life that
encapsulated his sins and instead became a true zealot for everything that
encompassed holiness: living for and in God’s abundant grace so that he could
gain eternity by embracing a life of extreme simplicity and penitence, prayer
and self-denial. Who knows how many sufferings Matt silently offered as a
sacrifice to God in reparation for his sins and for the sake of many other
souls? Yet that is precisely what makes his story so beautiful: he is one of
us, and his life’s journey serves as a hopeful reminder that anyone in a state
of darkness and sin has the potential to become a great saint when s/he
cooperates daily in the act of total abandonment to God’s love and
mercy.
Matt Talbot knew God’s mercy well, because he was
cognizant of the enormity of God’s love for him and for all souls. He is an
excellent patron for those we all know who suffer from the disease of addiction,
and what hope we can all gain in knowing and sharing his legacy with those who
have lost all hope.
REFERENCE: McGrane, Janice. (2006). Saints
to Lean on: Spiritual Companions for illness and disability, 81-93. Cincinnati,
OH: St. Anthony Messenger Press.
"The saints in Christian history are models
for almost any kind of human behavior. Some, like the great Augustine and the
modern Irishman, Venerable Matt Talbot, are also models of change. They showed
that early wildness does not define a life. The worst cad and drunk can become
someone worth imitating for virtue.
At last month’s synod on marriage and
family in Rome, some of the bishops spoke of such change as a “gradualism”
recognized by the Catholic Church. Some other bishops at the synod worried that
such talk is dangerous. People could misunderstand it as tolerance of poor
judgment and a careless attitude toward virtue in youth.
St. Augustine is famous for praying, “Grant
me chastity and continence, but not yet.” This was during his early dissolute
years. He finally reached that goal, but not until after fathering a child and
leaving the mother. He had been drawn to Christianity even as a young man, and
he knew how to pray. Even in his wandering he was listening for the movement of
God in his life. But Augustine’s move from reckless playboy to Christian hero —
with the title Doctor of the Church — was made gradually, at his own personal
pace.
Matt Talbot’s story is
similar. He lived from 1856 to 1925 as a laborer in Dublin. In his early teen
years he began drinking any liquor he could get, borrowing money for drinks,
even stealing when the money ran out. After 16 years of this he made a pledge of
sobriety, kept it, and became known for quiet kindness and charity to fellow
workers. When he dropped dead on a Dublin street at the age of 69, he was found
with a small chain wrapped around his body. It turned out that he had worn this
for years as a practice of penance and self-control.
There are people who seem to move
through life on a steady ladder of growth in virtue. For most of us, the story
is different. We rise and fall, stumble, slip, rise and fall. And keep hoping,
keep growing in our own ragged way, like Augustine and Matt
Talbot...”
Notes:
A woman who spent over two decades as a
self-described ‘low bottom’ drug and alcohol addict and is now in recovery and
practicing her religious faith again has recently stated that “I know now what I
didn’t know before, that life doesn’t have to stay the same. For years I didn’t
know I had a choice to live any other way. Now I know that I have a daily
choice.”
One of the many spiritual books that Matt Talbot
read in sobriety was Confessions by St. Augustine.
God has us here in this
place at this time for a reason. We have some very particular purposes in His
plan and He alone knows them all. Try for a moment to appreciate your dignity in
this regard. You play a critical part in a cascade of events that ripple from
your life and your place in God’s plan. No one can take that place and your role
is crucial to millions of subsequent transactions in God’s wonderful vision.
Psalm 139 has this to say:
O
LORD, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it
completely, O LORD. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me
to attain. For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s
womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are
wonderful. All my days were written in your book before one of them came to
be (Psalm 139, selected verses).
Despite whatever differences exist in our perceived
purposes in God’s plan, one common
purpose is to share our interest about Venerable Matt Talbot with others and to
pray for his canonization.
At first glance one might think that this Dublin bridge
solely honors Venerable Matt Talbot. But as this article indicates, it honors
many in addition to Matt.
Stories of remarkable men in
different times, in Dublin and in far flung places, are commemorated in the name
Talbot Memorial Bridge. Matthew Talbot was one of Dublin’s poor. Born in 1856, he
was both a worker and a drunkard by the age of 12 - a fate that was all too
common among his family and fellow inner city Dubliners. That he pawned his
shabby shoes, short changed his long suffering mother, drifted between jobs and
conned friends and acquaintances - all for the sake of yet another drink - is
too unremarkable a story for Matt to have made it into the history books.
Nothing was expected of his life other than he would die as he had lived - drunk
and in abject poverty.
Yet within a year of his death in 1925 he became an
inspiration to millions across the world. For Matt took the pledge - a promise
to abstain from alcohol - in 1884 and turned to God. He overcame tortuous
temptation with prayer, attending Mass each morning at 5am. He died on the
street, the depth of his devotion becoming obvious when the heavy chains and
knotted ropes, embedded into his flesh, were removed by mortuary
workers.
He had lived as an anonymous ascetic but in death became
venerated for his saintly life. Though Matt had kept his feet on terra firma,
for many young lads of the north and south docklands a life at sea beckoned -
from the days of being press ganged to fight in the service of the British, to
joining the merchant navy to sail the seven seas, or working on the ferries
criss-crossing the Irish Sea. Thousands said ‘good-bye’ never to return again,
meeting their fate in some distant land or finding their final resting place
beneath waves which would never wash an Irish shore.
During the Second World War, in particular, Irish seamen
knowingly risked their lives to bring essential supplies home to Ireland, a
neutral country. From a small fleet, 16 ships were lost to unprovoked attacks -
by aircraft, mines and torpedoes - and 136 men died. The Talbot Memorial Bridge
is a monument to these ordinary and, at once, extraordinary Dubliners and
Irishmen.
While their lives only overlapped
by seven months, the temperance movement message of Fr. Mathew, especially in
Ireland and the USA, influenced Matt Talbot and hundreds of thousands to take
the pledge to abstain from
alcohol.
“THEOBALD MATHEW: Temperance ‘Precursor’
to Fr Cullen”
A ‘Who’s Who’ of Ireland’s great benefactors will rarely
nowadays include a biography of Fr Theobald Mathew. His enormous achievements
and legacy will be skipped over, as if to minimise the enduring impact of his
endeavours to help the Irish extricate themselves from the heartbreak and sorrow
of addiction to alcohol.
Today the message of Fr Mathew is sorely needed, as Irish
young people as a group, like their peers in so many other countries, seem deaf
to all the warnings from their elders. They seem to have little idea of how
easily alcohol addiction is acquired. Fr Theobald, now dead for over 150 years,
would have his hands full in the Ireland of today. Were he a time-traveller, all
his charismatic skills would be required to persuade the youth of Ireland that
drinking alcohol is not a harmless activity.
The debate over alcohol addiction is never far from the
Irish conversation. It is omni-present, and ubiquitous. Yet, it was Fr Mathew
who put this issue in the forefront of the national debate, and made it
impossible to ignore. The abuse of alcohol and the casualness of the Irish
people towards it was always on his mind and, aiding the Irish as a nation, in
effect, educating and advising them, became his life’s work.
Few would have predicted that the shy teenager,
self-effacing and uncertain in the family home in County Tipperary would one day
become the most charismatic preacher of his era. Fr Mathew didn’t have a magic
formula, or even a guarantee of success. From pastoral experience, he knew that
our pre-Famine population of eight million was far too inclined to indulge. The
imperialism of Britain was often cited as an excuse. However, even after the
dreadful trauma of the Famine, the love of the Irish for drink did not go away.
If anything, it increased, although our population had been reduced by over
three million. For Fr Mathew, it would be an uphill road.
The self-imposed task he underwent to reform Irish drinking
habits would exhaust him but he kept battling on until his death on 8 December
1856. The boy who would one day become the Venerable Matt
Talbot and one of the glories of the ‘pledge’, a concept promoted
vigorously and successfully by Fr Mathew, was born in the May of that same
year.
Fr Theobald was one of twelve children, nine boys and three
girls. He was born on 10 October, 1790. ‘Toby’ was the nick-name by which his
family knew him, and ‘Darlin’ Master Toby’ by the poor of the locality who
considered him ‘a born saint’. He was educated in Thurles and Kilkenny,
excelling at Greek, Latin and English history. After applying and being accepted
for Maynooth, ‘Toby’s stay there was cut short because the authorities in the
college took umbrage at his organising a social event. Toby went home, dejected
and embarrassed and, for some time, had little to do by way of ecclesiastical
engagements, until it struck him to join the Capuchin Order, where he was
quickly accepted as a novice.
He was one of the generation of young Irish people to make
their way to seminaries and novitiates once again, as the rigors of the Penal
Laws began to ease early in the nineteenth century. In both Kilkenny and Dublin,
Fr Theobald was singled out by the congregation as being a rare and kind
confessor. It would be in Cork, though, that ‘Toby’s’ great life’s work had its
origins: ending the scourge of alcohol abuse. Thus, the yearning congregations
of Cork would readily adopt the ardent young man from Co Tipperary. In addition,
‘Toby’ became renowned for his generosity to the poor. He would never allow a
poor person to go away empty-handed. ‘Give, give’, he used to say, ‘what you
have, you got from God.’
Theobald was elected Provincial of the Capuchin Order in
1822, on the death of the then Provincial, and held that office for almost
thirty years, eventually retiring due only to ill health. Contrary to public
opinion, Fr Mathew did not invent the concept of total abstinence. It began in
America the previous century, and had much success with Protestant communities,
who embraced the whole notion of abstaining from alcohol, in cases where
moderation failed. The Quaker community also recommended abstinence, and it was
one of their own, a Quaker called Martin who set the ball rolling in Cork, very
close to where Fr Mathew lived with his community. At this juncture, Fr Mathew
began to consider the possibility of promoting total abstinence from alcohol
among his beleaguered people. The whole jigsaw of finding and ending the curse
of alcohol addiction came together in his mind, and he suddenly saw a way
forward.
On 10 April 1838, Fr Mathew uttered his famous phrase ‘Here
goes in the name of God’, and launched, in Cork, with Quaker Martin, what became
a great temperance campaign, introducing large numbers of his fellow-Irish to
the notion of total abstinence from alcohol. Large crowds came to hear Fr Mathew
preach. He was invited all over Ireland as well as to Britain and the United
States to spread his message. Hundreds of thousands of people of all religious
persuasions took the pledge on hearing him speak. The statue of him in Dublin’s
O’Connell Street shows him as he was - enthusiastic, exhorting, encouraging
others, as he reached to the skies.
Fr Mathew’s success as a temperance leader is indisputable.
His legacy waned when, after his death, many of those ‘pledge-takers’ reverted
back to alcohol-abuse. Nevertheless, many families and communities reaped a
plethora of rewards for as long as they remained abstainers. Fr James Cullen,
Pioneer founder, was inspired by the work of Fr Mathew and had the ambition to
take up where his great predecessor had left off. In a sense, Fr Mathew was the
forerunner of the Pioneer movement. Perhaps in the Ireland of today, those of us
blessed enough to be Pioneers, can offer up our gift of abstinence for the
people we know or hear of, who can’t abstain at all. Perhaps we, who don’t drink
alcohol, can ‘launch into the deep’ with a prayer that life may be made bearable
for those whose drinking is a source of suffering for both themselves and
others.
Matt Talbot’s purpose in
life until his 28th year of life was basically to work and drink. Then one
Saturday when his mates refused to buy him drinks, he experienced his personal
“bottom,” took the pledge not to drink, and returned fully to the Catholic
Church, remaining sober until his death 41 years later.
"All of us have a purpose in life. God
put us here because of his great plan for us. He has also equipped us with the
right grace, strength, intelligence, etc. for us to fulfill this purpose or
mission he has planned for us. But we have a choice whether to accept this
mission or not.
When we do accept the mission, we can go
through it properly doing the best that we can do for the greater glory of God
or we can do it half-heartedly out of laziness or maybe not do it at all for
fear of the unknown future. Again the choice is ours. The more blessings we
receive, the more we are called to be of service to others and share these
blessings. It is good to remember though that whatever choices we make there are
consequences. This is the task we have at hand… the choice is ours.
As an author, speaker, and founder
of Matt Talbot Kitchen & Outreach in Lincoln, Nebraska, Mary Costello has
introduced people to Venerable Matt Talbot for decades. She will be speaking on
the following topic November 20, 2014 at 7 pm at MTKO.
"Some of you who receive the Catholic paper, The Southern
Nebraska Register might have already read about the miracle performed by
God through the intercession of Matt Talbot. But the wonderful news to those of
us here in Lincoln is that the family involved in the miracle heard about the
man they prayed to because of the Kitchen and Outreach center here in Lincoln,
Nebraska!
Many of us who are concerned with alcoholism and addictions
have been praying, working and hoping for a verifiable, physical miracle to be
performed through the intercession of Matt Talbot for 75 years. But while Matt
continues to help thousands of men and women, wives and husbands, sons and
daughters, moms and dads, grandmas and grandpas return to lives of sobriety and
serenity, these are considered psychological miracles and cannot be considered
by the Congregation of Rites, the folks who decide these things in Rome. They
need physical miracles to move a candidate from the status of “Venerable” where
Matt stands today, to “Blessed” and then, Praise God one day, to the level of
“Saint.”
Yes, there has been a miracle in the suburb of Overland
Park, Kans. A young couple, Shannon and Patrick Watkins, traveled to Lincoln for
the baptism of a relative’s baby and heard about our work and decided to name
their baby Talbot. I’ll explain more about the miracle when I come to see you
all in November.
I know many people, even people associated with MTKO really
don’t know much about the man, Matt Talbot. No, he wasn’t a relative of mine,
nor a friend! Let me tell you a little about this marvelous man and, hopefully,
soon-to-be-saint: he was born into a very poor, alcoholic family in Dublin,
Ireland in 1856. He had very little education and admits himself he was probably
an alcoholic by his early teens. He went to work when he was only 12, which was
the custom and because of another interesting Irish custom (the biggest employer
being one of the world’s largest brewers) the paychecks were not sent home with
the workers but were deposited with the local pub owners. Sounds incredible, but
true. (It was the Catholic Church that finally led efforts to change this
custom, but not until the 1920’s!)
Therefore, every worker had to pass through the neighborhood
watering hole before he arrived home on payday. We can only surmise how many
ever made it home with a few shillings still jangling in his pockets. This was
at a time when Ireland was still recovering from the Great Famine of the late
1840’s and 1850’s; thousands of people were unemployed, starving farmers were
streaming in from the west and soldiers were coming home from the Crimean War.
Dublin was a sea of destitution and poverty.
Matt Talbot and his brothers were some of the unfortunates
who usually happily received their paychecks on Saturday noon and had drained it
by Tuesday night. The rest of the week they drank “on the cuff” or on the
charity of their friends. But one week when Matt was 28, he had been sick all
week. He didn’t draw a paycheck at all. One Saturday noon he stood outside his
favorite pub waiting for one of his pals to invite him in for a nip or two. No
one did. Matt walked a few steps to the bridge overlooking the Royal Canal. He
had never been a particularly spiritual person. His religious education had
taken him only to his First Communion and Confirmation and while he attended
Mass most Sundays he did not receive the Sacraments. There was in Ireland at the
time a practice called “Taking the Pledge” designed by a Catholic priest, Fr.
Mathew, to stem the tide of the horrendous problem of alcoholism in Ireland in
the mid-Nineteenth Century.
We don’t know what God whispered to Matt that afternoon in
1874, but it must have been something wonderful. Matt walked home and said to
this mother, “I’m going to take the Pledge,” and she said, “Don’ take it unless
you’re going to keep it.” He said, “I am going to keep it.”
But the way that he kept it was the great thing, the thing
that turned him into a saint. From home that first day, Matt walked to Conliffe
College, a seminary in Dublin, where he went to Confession and took the Pledge.
The next morning, he went to Mass and Communion for the first time in many
years. During the week, he got up early and went to daily Mass, praying that the
Lord would help him stay sober. After work, instead of going to the bar, he
visited the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. He asked the priests at the College
to teach him to read (he could barely read and write his name) so he could read
the lives of the saints and he ended up reading and understanding deep
theology.
Matt Talbot especially loved Our Lady under the title of Our
Lady of Wisdom and he slept with a statue of her in his arms. For the next 40+
years, he ate only enough to keep himself alive and gave away most of his
earnings (the Columban Fathers were one of his favorite charities); he lived
simply, sleeping on planks for only a few hours a night and spending many hours
a day in prayer or spiritual reading. He died on his way to his third Mass of
the day on Trinity Sunday, June 7, 1925. After years of study, he was declared
“Venerable” by Pope Paul VI in 1975 indicating that this man had lived a life of
heroic virtue.
Since his death, Matt has performed many, many miracles,
well, of course God performs the miracles but we pray to Matt and he intercedes
at God’s throne for us. But this is the first physical, verifiable miracle that
has been performed through Matt’s intercession. When I come to talk to the
group, I will tell you more about Matt, and more about the miracle. If you would like more information about Matt Talbot, please
contact me at marykcostello@yahoo.com or at 3901 S,
27th St, unit 4, Lincoln Ne. 68502. I have prayer cards and medals
available."
O Jesus, true friend of the humble worker, Thou hast given us
in Thy servant, Matthew, a wonderful example of victory over vice, a model of
penance and of love for Thy Holy Eucharist, grant, we beseech Thee, that we, Thy
servants, may overcome all our wicked passions and sanctify our lives with
penance and love like his.
And if it be in accordance with Thy adorable designs that Thy
pious servant should be glorified by the Church, deign to manifest by Thy
heavenly favours the power he enjoys in Thy sight, who livest and reignest for
ever and ever. Amen.
“For nine Tuesdays in the months
of October and November starting on Tuesday next, 30th September, people will
gather each week at the Shrine of Matt Talbot in St. John & Paul Church,
Shannon, to pray and intercede for people suffering or sharing in the life of
addictions.
Matt Talbot
was born in Dublin in 1856 and died suddenly in 1925, experienced at first hand
the pain and suffering of addiction. Matt worked and prayed and fasted
for the gift of temperance. He had experienced at first hand, in his own body,
the havoc and the ravage wrought by his drinking alcohol to excess. He
had felt the horrors of hangovers and saw its effects on his work and on his
relationship with his friends and with his family. In fact, he saw that he was
slowly but surely destroying himself. Somehow or other, by the grace of a
good and generous God, he got the strength to give it all up and to go
sober. He began to see that our hunger and thirst for food and drink is
something good – given to us by a good and generous God, to encourage us to eat
and drink to keep ourselves alive and strong and well. But he saw also that it
was something to be used in moderation. One of the things we need, at all
times, is a proper approach to the use of food and drink and the sexual power,
given to us by God to bring new life into the world. There is a right
way and a wrong way of using his gifts. There is a temperate way and an
intemperate way. The temperate way is the better way. The intemperate way is
the way that leads to disaster, but people don’t see it like that unfortunately.
The temperate way is possible. Matt Talbot is an outstanding example of
prayer and conversion. The Matt Talbot Novena, now in its 22nd year in Shannon,
is our annual opportunity to support by prayer and reflection all suffering or
sharing in the life of addictions. Matt Talbot has shown that it is
possible to change; the power of prayer should never be
underestimated.”
2014 has been an eventful year for Popes who knew
of Matt Talbot. Earlier this year Pope John Paul II and Pope John XXIII were
both declared saints.
And yesterday, 19 October 2014, Pope Francis beatified Pope Paul VI (1897-1978), the pope who
declared Matt Talbot as “Venerable” on 3rd October 1975, fifty years after
Matt’s death.
In a 1974 address in Rome to Calix Society members
on the occasion of their twenty-fifth anniversary, the now “Blessed Paul
VI” stated: “You have chosen to look upon Matt Talbot as an admirable exemplar
of discipline and supernatural virtue. It is our hope that his success will
encourage countless men and women throughout the world to realize the need for
conversion, the possibility of real rehabilitation, the serenity of Christian
reconciliation, and the peace and joy of helping others to overcome abuses,
disorders and sin.” (http://venerablematttalbotresourcecenter.blogspot.com/2008/03/pope-paul-vi-calix-society-and-matt.html)
Whenever the negative voices in your head threaten
to take over, consider reciting The Knots Prayer:
Dear God,
Please untie the knots in my mind, my heart and my
life.
Remove the have nots, the can nots, and the do
nots that I have in my mind.
Erase the will nots, may nots, and might nots
that may find a home in my heart.
Release me from the could nots, would nots and should
nots that obstruct my life.
And most of all, Dear God, I ask that you remove from
my mind, my heart, and my life all of the “am nots” that I have allowed to
hold me back, especially the thought that I am not good
enough.
Thousands of
moral miracles have been reported by recovering alcoholics through the
intersession of Venerable Matt Talbot. But for beatification, a
Vatican confirmed physical miracle is required, which has not occurred
yet.
But one is
possibly on the horizon...one that does not involve an addiction nor an adult
laborer.
One-year-old Talbot Joseph Watkins wasn’t
supposed to be a healthy little boy. In fact, all medical evidence prior to his
birth pointed to something seriously wrong. But a possible miracle changed the boy’s fate, which may lead to
Matt’s beatification.
This extraordinary story, “The Making of a Miracle,” by
Joe Bollig and published in The Leaven (Catholic Newspaper) on
September 26, 2014, can be read at
An expanded article on page 5 at http://www.theleaven.com/past_issues/_pdf/v36/Leaven%2009-26-14.pdf includes
a brief biography of Matt Talbot, prayer for his canonization, and an interview
with Fr. Brian Lawless, the Vice-Postulator, who visited with the Overland Park,
Kansas family in August 2014.
The Philadelphia Units of The Calix Society announced
that there will be a June 2015 pilgrimage to Ireland lead by
Fr. Brian Lawless. It will include visiting sites important to the the life and
spirituality of Venerable Matt Talbot as well as other spiritual sites (like
Knock) and secular sites.
When we think or hear the word “glutton,” our first
thought might be of a person who simply eats too much too often. But how many
people today think, or in Matt Talbot’s early life thought, active alcoholism
and other addictions as a form of gluttony?
As noted in the following article, Fr.
Longenecker comments on various forms of gluttony and that the original search
for “comfort and sense of well being and happiness” is really found in a
“strong relationship with God and a life of true goodness, truth and
beauty.”
“There is a grotesque scene in the Monty Python film The
Meaning of Lifein which a hugely corpulent
character named Mr Creosote eats a gigantic meal, vomits repeatedly and then,
after eating a tiny after dinner mint, explodes. The comedy is completely
outrageous, but you can’t miss the explicitly revolting depiction of
gluttony.
Being heavy is not always caused by gluttony, nor does one
need to be enormously obese to be guilty of gluttony. St Thomas Aquinas (who was
himself overweight) defined five forms of gluttony: 1. eating food that is too
luxurious, exotic, or costly; 2. eating food that is excessive in quantity; 3.
eating food that is too daintily or elaborately prepared; 4. eating too soon or
at an inappropriate time; 5. eating too eagerly. Gluttony includes any form of
addiction. Drug abuse, caffeine or sugar addictions and alcoholism are forms of
gluttony, but so is any inordinate attachment to food and drink. Similarly
C.S.Lewis (who knew how to down a few pints of beer) points out than being
overly fussy about food and drink can also be a form of gluttony. A person who
insists on their steak being done “just so” then complains and rejects it is
also placing too much selfish attention on food.
We think of gluttony as socially unattractive, but a
sophisticated person dining daintily at a fine restaurant may very well be
guilty of gluttony because they love their food and drink too much. Indeed, a
connoisseur may be a very refined glutton.
Gluttony is a deadly sin not because it is unattractive but
because there is a deeper problem. The glutton uses food for something other
than its proper intention. Food is given for our nourishment, our enjoyment and
for the fellowship of sharing with others. The glutton uses food simply to give
himself pleasure or comfort. Think of a baby with a bottle. Not only does he
gain nourishment, but he enjoys a feeling of comfort and relief from the warm
drink. It’s okay for babies, but we’re supposed to outgrow the need for comfort
food, and we shouldn’t need to rely on inebriation of alcohol or the false high
of drugs to find the peace and happiness we long for.
To put it plainly, the glutton seeks in food, alcohol or
drugs the comfort, and sense of well being and happiness that he should find in
a strong relationship with God and a life of true goodness, truth and beauty.
That is why the lively virtue that counters the deadly vice of gluttony is
temperance.
The seventeenth century poet Thomas Traherne wrote, “Can a
man be just unless he loves all things according to their worth?” Temperance is
that virtue that empowers us to see the good in all things and to love them
without being inordinately attached. Temperance in our consumption of food and
drink also helps us to establish temperance in our relationship to other
material things in life.
A person who is gluttonous is also likely to be greedy. The
person who seeks comfort, peace and happiness in food and drink probably also
clings to material things hoping to find security, peace and happiness. By
exercising the virtue of temperance in the area of food and drink we will also
find victory over our inordinate attachment to our money and
possessions.
Temperance is the virtue that allows us to enjoy food and
drink to the full, but avoids excess realizing that to abuse the gift is to
destroy it. Temperance is therefore gratitude in action. By enjoying God’s gifts
in the right proportion and in the right relationship to all things we are
saying “Thanks” to God and living in the abundant life he promises.”
Note: To read a perspective on
gluttony published during Matt Talbot’s lifetime, see Delany,
J. (1909).Gluttony.
In The Catholic Encyclopedia at
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06590a.htm
In the September 2013 issue of Pioneer
Magazine, official publication of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association
of the Sacred Heart (PTAA), of which Matt Talbot was a member, one article may
be of particular interest at
In the article
titled, “Jim Larkin, Matt Talbot, and the 1913 Dublin
Lockout,” Sean Ua Cearnaigh provides a brief overview of the historical lockout and Matt Talbot’s
role in it. As the author notes, Matt “was not a scab as
some critics who did not know him tried to convey” but one
in solidarity.
This thoughtful reflection was presented at the Venerable
Matt Talbot Hope and Recovery Service held at the Shrine of Venerable Matt
Talbot, Our Lady of Lourdes Church,
Dublin, on 17th September 2014. This spiritual recovery evening was open to all
seeking recovery from addiction.
“We have gathered here this evening
for this service to seek spiritual strength that we need on our lives’ journey
of recovery. We gather in this particular place, in this sacred space to
draw
strength from one who had already done the journey, who had initially been
caught up in the cycle of addiction in which we often find ourselves caught in.
We come to this Church, where the remains of Matt Talbot are kept.
Matt Talbot was born on 2nd 1856 May to
Elizabeth and Charles Talbot on the North Strand, and baptised a few days later.
Having attended school for only one year, Matt got his first job. At this time
he began to drink and later admitted that from his early teens to his late
twenties his only aim in life was heavy drinking.
But at the age of 28, an incident made him
realize the abysmal point that he had reached: Matt was broke and so he lingered
outside a pub with his brothers with the hope that one of the many friends whom
he had helped in their moment of ‘need’ would invite him in. But even his
supposed friends disowned him and passed him by, friends whom he had supported
in their own moment of need.
It was an incident which affected him deeply.
It triggered in him a soul searching process as he stood on a nearby bridge,
gazing at the canal, gazing at the water as it flowed over in the lock. There
and then he took a decision; I will no longer share their company or engage in
their hollow laughter, but I will arise from my misery. Matt stopped drinking
and made an initial three month pledge to God not to drink, which he later took
for life. Despite great temptation in the early stages he never took a drink
again.
What helped him take this step?
I think it was his own Feelings, feelings that had been numbed for many years;
without the influence of drink his feelings came rushing in. They were not
comfortable feelings, but since he could not resort to his old way of avoiding
them since he had no money to buy drink, and none of his friends would oblige
him, he had no alternative but to face his feelings.
Contrary to popular
belief, addiction is not about persistently indulging in a substance or some
soothing behaviour. Rather it is about feelings, or rather disconnecting,
cutting off our feelings. We live in an addictive society that seeks to cut off
any unpleasant feelings. And when we cut off our feelings leaves us vulnerable,
for though we may get some relief from the pain, however we cannot realize the
moment when more harm is being done. We need to learn how to Feel our emotions
rather than fear them, and this is what Matt learnt to do. Running away from
your difficult feelings, means running away from yourself. You cannot form and
maintain a solid relationship with anyone else, until you learn how to have a
healthy one with you, until you accept yourself without self-judgment.
He knew that he could not
achieve this on his own; he needed a higher power in his life, a power that
affirmed him, that accepted him without conditions, inviting him to reach his
full potential. Recovering from addiction we know is no easy process and Matt
himself found it very difficult. But he found the strength he needed in the
sacred spaces that dotted the city landscape, in the many churches where he
encountered the Divine Presence, the loving embrace. There he encountered Jesus
and the deep love that Jesus had for him. You are my beloved; indeed here Matt
felt accepted and loved. Whenever he felt weak and the urge knocking at his
door, this is where he fled , away from the streets, away from the pubs, away
from sight to be close to the Lord and bask in his love. One of his favourite
devotions was the Sacred Heart, which is another way of saying sacred Love. His
remaining forty-one 'dry' years, were lived heroically, attending daily Mass,
praying constantly, helping the poor and living the ascetic life-style of Celtic
spirituality. This life was his prayer to God and his defence against a
reversion to alcoholism.
Matt Talbot has been given to us as a beacon of
hope; he is one of us and so he is able to understand us. That is why within a
short time of his death, Matt's reputation as a saintly man and especially as a
protector of those suffering from all forms of addiction and their families was
being established. He once said: ‘Never be too hard on the man who can’t give up
drink. It’s as hard to give up the drink as it is to raise the dead to life
again. But both are possible and even easy for Our Lord. We have only to depend
on him.’
He was able to make the journey from addiction to wholeness, to
holiness. For this is what holiness is about, living a wholesome life relying
not on ourselves but with the help of a higher power. He has been entrusted to
us so that we can follow in his steps. Matt died in Granby Lane on Trinity
Sunday, 7th June 1925 on his way to Mass in Dominick Street. The chains found on
his body at death were a symbol of his devotion to Mary, to whom he wished to
devote himself as a slave.
This coming year 2015 is the 90th year of his
death and it is good that we mark it in a special way. In keeping his memory we
seek to draw the same strength that he himself received from the ultimate
Good.
Matt Talbot was declared Venerable in 1973 which means the Church
has decided that from a human point of view he has the qualifications of a
Saint.
In looking at the life of Matt Talbot, we may easily focus on the
later years when he had stopped drinking for some time and was leading a
penitential life. Only alcoholic men and women who have stopped drinking can
fully appreciate how difficult the earliest years of sobriety were for Matt. He
had to take one day at a time. So do the rest of us."
Writing on the British Jesuits’ site Thinking
Faith, Hedwig Lewis, SJ, gives more background
on the devotion to Mary the Untier (or Undoer) of Knots, which Pope Francis has
promoted for years. You can also visit a website about the
devotion. The devotion is especially appropriate for “problems and struggles we
face for which we do not see any solution:”
Knots of discord in our family, lack of
understanding between parents and children, disrespect, violence, the knots of
deep hurts between husband and wife, the absence of peace and joy at home. They
are also the knots of anguish and despair of separated couples, the dissolution
of the family, the knots of a drug addict son or daughter, sick or separated
from home or God, knots of alcoholism, the practice of abortion, depression,
unemployment, fear, solitude. . .
- See more at:
http://www.ignatianspirituality.com/16382/mary-unties-knots/#sthas
As
readers of biographical articles and books about Matt Talbot are quite aware, Matt
developed a deep devotion to the Blessed Mother from the time of signing the
pledge to give up alcohol.
One
particular devotion that Pope Francis has promoted for many years is to "Mary the
Untier (or Undoer) of Knots" for a wide range of personal struggles such as
“…knots of discord in our family, lack of understanding between parents and
children, disrespect, violence, the knots of deep hurts between husband and
wife, the absence of peace and joy at home. They are also the knots of anguish
and despair of separated couples, the dissolution of the family, the knots of a
drug addict son or daughter, sick or separated from home or God, knots of
alcoholism, the practice of abortion, depression, unemployment, fear, solitude.
. .”
