TRIBUTES continue to pour in for the late Fr Tom Boland, Brisbane’s esteemed priest historian – a trailblazer who helped the archdiocese’s Catholics form their own unique sense of identity.
Fr Boland achieved this through his meticulously researched books and papers on the archdiocese’s history, most memorably in what one priest described as his “magisterial work” – the life of Archbishop Sir James Duhig.
Archbishop John Bathersby of Brisbane, who presided and preached at Fr Boland’s funeral at St Stephen’s Cathedral on Tuesday, said Fr Boland was one of the great priests of the archdiocese.
“It was said that he was devoted to helping the Australian Catholic Church and its people understand their past, place the present in historical perspective, and draw wisdom and courage for the future,” Archbishop Bathersby said.
“However, above all what drove Tom Boland was not so much his study as his priesthood. It was the very heart of his existence. May he rest in peace.”
Speaking with priests as they expressed their fondness and respect for their colleague in the days following his death at Brisbane’s St Vincent’s Hospital (formerly Mount Olivet) on December 7, a clear theme emerged.
Fr Boland was described as “the full package” – excelling not only in academia but also as a wonderful and caring pastor and fine preacher.
Close friends since seminary days in the early 1960s, Fr Harry Bliss (retired) and Fr Peter Gillam, of Hendra parish, spoke of a man “with no tickets on himself, great company, humble, willing to share knowledge but not one to flout it”.
Fellow academics Fathers Chris Hanlon, Bill O’Shea, Alan Sheldrick and University of Queensland’s Dr Jennifer Harrison all spoke with respect of a man who had “set the bar high” with his “thorough and reasoned research and precise and readable writing”.
Noosa parish priest Fr Mark Franklin spoke fondly of a “man loved by all the people, strong in his faith, a man of great prayer and devotion who could be seen walking daily in the grounds of his beloved Pomona presbytery reciting the Divine Office”.
Fr Bliss said both he and Fr Gillam had become friends with Fr Boland after being taught by him at Banyo Seminary around 1961 and then working on staff with him there at various times.
“It was unusual to become friendly with someone who’d once been your teacher,” he said.
“He loved heading out on the Blissful 2 – my boat.
“We had many trips up the Noosa River, sometimes continuing into the Everglades and up to places like Harry’s Hut.
“For the past two years I had accompanied him on holidays to Caloundra.
“Prior to that I don’t know how many trips I had with him to Pomona – he’d come down by train to stay and I’d drive him back to his presbytery there.
“In recent times I’d been taking him around to interview people for his latest work on Monsignor Frawley.”
Fr Bliss said he and Fr Gillam had last visited their dear friend at St Vincent’s on the Saturday before he died by which stage he was still “very talkative but hard to follow”.
Fr Gillam described Fr Boland as “one of the wisest people I have ever known”.
“The Macquarie Dictionary describes wisdom as: ‘knowledge of what is true or right coupled with just judgment regarding our actions’,” he said.
“Wisdom also includes prudence and common sense.
“Fr Tom exhibited all these qualities during his life but he cloaked them with humility, justice and excellent pastoral care.”
Dr Harrison, a research adviser in UQ’s School of History, Philosophy, Religion and Classics, said although not Catholic, she felt they shared “a common bond with the history of Queensland in its multiple facets”.
“We met about twenty years ago when I started working on the Queensland Immigration Society, which involved about 3000 immigrants brought to Queensland by Bishop Quinn in the years 1862 to 1865,” she said.
“Fr Boland had done his doctorate on this subject in Rome in the early 1960s.
“He published several articles on it around the time of the centenary of the arrival of these people.
“As much more documentation had become available at Queensland State Archives since his research, I was attempting to take aspects of the story further.”
Dr Harrison said Fr Boland had encouraged her “enormously” in this and other projects and that “he will be sorely missed for his integrity and close involvement with his subject matter”.
Fr Hanlon said he’d first met Fr Boland through Fr Boland’s brother Sam, a Redemptorist priest (now living at Emmaus Retirement Village at Nudgee with their sibling Mercy Sister Norah Boland).
“Sam and I had a common interest in history,” he said.
“When I mentioned I was returning to Brisbane, Sam gave me his brother’s address at Banyo seminary where he was rector at the time – the link was history once again.
“I started history studies at UQ around ’75-’76 and he made the resources of Banyo library available.
“At this point I didn’t have the ‘priestly bug’ and was still a Commonwealth public servant.
“However, when I entered the seminary around 1980 I got to know him very well.”
Fr Hanlon said a major project they worked on together, under the direction of Monsignor John Lennon, was the setting up with Fathers Peter Grice and Denis Martin of the Vatican Pavilion at Expo 88.
Around this time, Fr Boland founded the Brisbane Catholic Historical Society, an organisation of which Fr Hanlon has been the chair since 1993.
Fr Hanlon said Fr Boland’s doctoral thesis on Bishop Quinn’s Queensland Immigration Society had been a milestone in Church history, particularly in relation to Brisbane archdiocese.
“In a sense the thesis was the first word – in some ways anything that has happened since then in this field was a result of his efforts.
“Then there were his books like his magisterial work on James Duhig.
“His standards set a very high bar for people like myself and Fr Neil Byrne to follow.”
Fr O’Shea recalled he and Fr Boland had worked together for about 11 years on Banyo Seminary’s teaching staff from 1967 to 1977 when Fr Boland took over from him as rector.
“Tom was a great scholar, a fine historian and lecturer and in his later years had the opportunity to show he was an excellent pastor and preacher,” he said.
“I believe he was responsible for instilling in Brisbane Catholics a sense of identity through his work as a historian – prior to that the thinking was very Sydney-centric.
“He was the one most responsible for breaking that mould from as far back as 1960.
“This was not just through biographies such as that on Duhig, but through his teaching and lecturing as well.
“In time to come it will be realised that we were fortunate to have had historians like him.”
Fr O’Shea said when he had last spoken with Fr Boland several weeks before his death his sense of humour was still very much intact and he was inquiring after people and interested in current events.
“His death is a great loss in all senses,” he said.
“He was the ‘whole package’ – we as a diocese were lucky to have had him for 57 years.”
Fr Franklin who had worked alongside Fr Boland in the Noosa parish had similar sentiments.
“He was an all-rounder – a man loved by all people,” he said.
“He also loved people and this I believe came out in his writing.
“For example if you read his book on Duhig, you find it’s not just about the archbishop, but also about the ordinary people and what was happening for them at the time.”
Speaking as his parish priest, Fr Franklin said he would describe Fr Boland as “a man who was generous with time, a man of great wisdom, a kind man, who guided me as a newcomer to the parish when I arrived in 2003”.
“When I arrived he was very active and loved the area and living in Pomona – you couldn’t have got him out of there with a crowbar,” he said.
“He was a man of great prayer and devotion.
“He would say Mass daily at the church next door and could be seen walking in the grounds of Pomona presbytery at various times during the day, reciting the Office.
“It was reassuring for me and for the people in the Noosa hinterland to have such a priest in their midst and his death is a great loss for all of us.”
Fr Franklin said he had last spoken with Fr Boland by phone at St Vincent’s Hospital.
“In our last conversation, he asked for all the material he had been working on for the Monsignor Frawley biography to be sent to St Vincent’s Hospital with a parishioner,” he said.
“He wanted to continue his work even when he was so desperately ill.
“That was the type of dedication he had.”
