Fr Dan Dargan, the Jesuit who brought the biggest ever crowd to Croke Park, has died in Dublin aged 92.Fr Dargan brought 115,000 people to Croke Park in 1959 to celebrate the diamond jubilee of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association of which he was then Central Director.
“Fr. Dargan was a most selfless man who had a tremendous social concern to improve the quality of family life in rural and urban Ireland,” said Fr Barney McGuckian SJ, present Director of the Pioneer Association.
“He gave a warm welcome to Alcoholic Anonymous when it first came on the scene here and shared various platforms with them on many an occasion because he saw its great potential. He will be sadly missed by his Jesuit colleagues and the many friends he had all over the country.”
Fr Dargan was the great grandson of railway engineer William Dargan, who brought railways to many parts of Ireland.
Three years ago, he cut the ribbon on the Luas Bridge in Dundrum, named in honour of his great grandfather.
Fr Dargan was born in January 1915 in St Stephen's Green, Dublin, and joined the Jesuits in 1933. He was eventually sent to Gardiner St. Parish where he began his work with the Pioneer Association.
From there he traveled to Galway where he served as a parish priest for eight years before being sent to Sacred Heart Church in Limerick.
Fr Dargan left Limerick and returned to Dublin five years ago to live in the Jesuit Cherryfield Nursing Home, where he died peacefully Friday morning.
Summing up his life at age 90, he told the Jesuit publication Interfuse: “Well, I will say my life in the Jesuit Society has been very happy. If I began all over again, I’d enter the Society. People have been good to me. I’ve had good friends.”
Fr. Dan Dargan SJ was himself a great friend to many. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Disclaimer
No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.
The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.
Sotto Voce