Canon Gerald Rodgers (pictured), a native of Scariff in County Clare, was ordained to the priesthood at Saint Flannan's College in Ennis, having completed his seminary training at Saint Patrick's College in Carlow.
Moving to the diocese of Clifton in England, Canon Rodgers took up several appointments but will always be remembered for the time he spent in the Patchway Parish in Bristol in England's west country.
Speaking on the diocesan podcast, Canon Rodgers said that after he helped set up an Irish Club in Bristol he could never have dreamed of what was to follow him when a young man approached him at the club and asked him for advice on buying a house.
According to Fr Rodgers, “I didn't have any but I knew a man who did. He was Fr Eamon Casey who had launched a housing society in London and who in turn went on to become Bishop Casey of Galway.”
He added, “Fr Casey asked me to get together a group of professionals, including a solicitor, an accountant, an estate agent, mortgage broker and a bank manager together with an architect. To my surprise over 70 volunteers turned up to hear Fr Casey speak and on that very night we formed a Bristol Catholic Housing Aid Society to help young people and families find or keep a roof over their heads.”
Fr Rodgers continued, “We were really just acting as a shoulder to cry on and it soon became obvious that most people simply wanted their own homes and that we would have to become property owners. So it was then we founded the Bristol Family Housing Association (BFHA). Families were encouraged to save £5 or more, which they handed over when they attended BFHA meetings on a Friday night, which the organisation invested until they had enough for a deposit.”
Canon Rodgers explained that in the late 1960's BFHA handed over their housing stock and became part of the new Bristol Churches Housing Aid Society, of which Fr Rodgers became a board member.
By the time he had retired from the society it had a housing stock of well over 600 properties, having developed large sites near the city.
The housing body still operates in Bristol as an interdenominational housing advisory service.
Canon Rodgers still lives in Patchway, and to celebrate his Golden Jubilee, a special Mass was celebrated at the Holy Family Parish Church by the Bishop of Clifton, Bishop Declan Lang.