Right Reverend Joseph McGee, Bishop Emeritus of Galloway — 5th March, 1983
Late in the afternoon of 4th March, 1983, Bishop Joseph McGee suffered a stroke and he never recovered consciousness. A second fatal attack followed in the early hours of the following morning, and this great and good man gave back his soul to God.
He had resigned his bishopric two years before but he had not left us. He had retired to a little house in Prestwick but was always well enough to take part in diocesan events. Indeed, he delighted in “supplying” in neighbouring parishes whenever he could help. The result was that he was still considered to be very much round and about, which fact meant that the news of his sudden death came as a very great shock to the thousands who had come to love and respect him.
Joseph McGee was born in the parish of Monzievaird and Strowan, Perthshire, on 13th December, 1904. After primary school he went to Blairs College for his secondary schooling. Among his contemporaries—though a little younger—was a Michael Foylan, also a student for the diocese of Dunkeld. Their families were close neighbours, and the boys had practically grown up together. Little did they then think that they would both be called to high office in the Church, Joseph to be Bishop of Galloway, Michael to be Bishop of Aberdeen.
In the autumn of 1923 Joseph McGee was sent to the Scots College in Valladolid, Spain to pursue his philosophy. This venerable College, so rich in tradition, so justly proud of its superb contribution to the Church in Scotland, became one of the great loves in the life of the young priest, and for the rest of his life a return to Spain on business or on holiday was an event he cherished. His student years in Spain were Spartan ones; Monsignor Humble was not one to pamper his charges. The present writer has often heard Bishop McGee discuss his own college days with the venerable Monsignor McHardy, his Vicar General, and I was left with the impression that little had changed between 1893 and 1923. The rector who welcomed Joseph McGee and his classmates was not one who thought change desirable, or even possible. But it was, in its day, a splendid regime, and it produced remarkable priests, but it was not for the faint-hearted.
He was ordained priest in the cathedral at Valladolid on 25th May, 1929, and returned home to begin his priestly labours the following month.
He served for three years as assistant in the parish of St. Peter and Paul’s, Dundee. Then sadly, for he loved parish work, he complied with the will of Bishop Toner, his Ordinary, and joined the staff of St. Mary’s College, Blairs. Boys who studied in Blairs between 1931 and 1940 recall with pleasure and gratitude his carefully prepared classes, his gentle manner and his patience with the slowest among us. His English classes were a joy, and he nearly succeeded in making Greek enjoyable. Above all he was admired for the quiet and unobtrusive example of the priesthood he gave at all times. When he had to reprimand us, it was done in such a kindly way without an angry word, that the correction was all the more memorable and salutary.
After nine years on the Blairs staff, he returned to his diocese and to the parish he had loved in his curate days. He left St. Peter and Paul’s in 1948 for the larger charge of St. Joseph’s, Dundee where he remained till he was appointed Bishop of Galloway. For the last three years of his ministry in Dundee, he was Vicar General to Bishop Scanlan, a man he came to admire greatly and from whom he learned much about the administration of a diocese.
On the Feast of the Purification, 1952, Bishop William Mellon, Bishop of Galloway, died. Five months later, Monsignor McGee was informed that he had been chosen to succeed to the vacant bishopric, and was given the date when the appointment would be made public. It was a shock to this quiet retiring man to have to face the limelight for the rest of his days; at least he could have a few quiet days with his own thoughts, so he slipped over to Ireland, and would return after the appointment had been announced. The Irish papers carried the news, so the new bishop was surprised when an Irish priest, at whose home he called to arrange to say Mass, said to him. “Father McGee, eh? From Dundee, right? There’s a Father McGee from Dundee just been appointed a Scottish bishop. Is it your brother, by any chance?”. “No, Father, he’s not my brother”. And he left it at that!
The Feast of Saint Martin of Tours was chosen for the consecration of the new bishop. An old tradition tells that Ninian visited Martin in Tours as he returned to Scotland from Rome, and the old link was remembered. The principal consecrating bishop was Archbishop William Godfrey, the apostolic delegate to Great Britain who was assisted by Bishop Scanlan and Bishop Edward Douglas who had served on the Blairs staff with the new bishop.
He took over a diocese that had been greatly enlarged four years previously when ten Ayrshire parishes were absorbed by Galloway as a result of the creation of the new dioceses of Motherwell and Paisley. It soon became obvious that Dumfries, the cathedral town and the residence of the bishops since the restoration of the hierarchy in 1878, was too far removed from the main population of the diocese. So, realistically if reluctantly, Bishop McGee moved his residence to Ayr, while retaining St. Andrew's, Dumfries as his cathedral. But on the eve of the Ascension, 1961, a disastrous fire destroyed the noble cathedral and it was decided, after much heart-searching, that one of the Ayrshire churches would be designated as being nearer the new episcopal residence in Ayr. The church of the Good Shepherd, Ayr, built four years before, thus became the Cathedral of the Good Shepherd.
The episcopate of Joseph McGee was a rich one in development and in church-building. He established sixteen new parishes, and very closely supervised the planning and the style of every new church. Architects up and down the diocese soon came to respect his expertise and appreciated his informed interest in all they were called on to provide. In addition to the new parishes, hardly a church in the diocese did not enjoy careful and tasteful renovation.
When the Second Vatican Council was called, the bishop could not foresee just what an eventful, even revolutionary, experience it would prove to be.
While he was sorry to have to be away from his people for long periods, he nevertheless saw the coming council as a useful and interesting interchange of views at the highest level. That was how most people viewed the council as it opened in 1962. But as the council went on, we saw him warming to the very honesty of the debate. He saw what was developing as a tremendous challenge to the Church, a rich opportunity offered to all Catholics. Never a revolutionary, never a hothead, he welcomed the wider vision that had led Pope John to call the council, and encouraged his priests and people to see the Holy Spirit at work in the Church.
He proved to be a very balanced and wise President of the Liturgy and Church Music Commissions. Prior to that he had been chairman of the committee that produced the Saint Andrew Hymnal in 1962. It was, inevitably, published too soon to introduce us to the adventurous new styles and borrowings that are commonplace nowadays. However in its day it served a need in Scotland, and it only happened because Bishop McGee saw that need and took steps to supply it.
For about twenty years he was Ecclesiastical Adviser to the Guild of Catholic Nurses. This he took very seriously, and he found inspiration in the dedication of the nurses to their nursing work and to their Catholic faith. The medico-moral problems that beset Christian nurses in our days are most grave and worrying. Bishop McGee sought to keep abreast with the authentic teaching of the Church and to transmit it to guild members. The many books on medical problems that sat in his bookshelves bore testimony to the fact that his work as adviser to the nurses was more than an honorary title.
Then there was the constant, daily, routine work of the running of his diocese; most days uninteresting and ordinary, yet all totalling up to a rich and abundant dedication to God through work for the Church.
In May, 1979 he celebrated the Golden Jubilee of his priesthood, and the clergy and people packed the cathedral in Ayr to share his Jubilee Mass and to show their affection and respect.
With the approach of his seventy-fifth year, he began to think of retirement, and offered his resignation to the Holy Father; this was accepted on 4th April, 1981.
When his successor Bishop Maurice Taylor was appointed to succeed him he went to live in a delightful little house in Prestwick provided, for him by the diocese. He was always available to the new bishop for advice and guidance while keeping discreetly in the background. The choice of his successor was to him a matter of great delight and he settled into a quiet and happy retirement that would allow him more time for prayer and reading.
He was extremely happy in his retirement and never happier than when the priests of the diocese called to see him. His mental capacities remained clear and unclouded, his health generally good. And while the suddenness of his death came as a shock to his host of friends, one can be grateful that he was spared a slow and incapacitating illness. He would have accepted it had it been God’s will, but he would have hated being a burden to others. He would have had all the care in the world from Miss Dailly, who had been his devoted housekeeper for over thirty years; but it was not to be.
His Requiem Mass in his Cathedral of the Good Shepherd, was attended by the Scottish Hierarchy, more than a hundred priests, representatives of civic life, and a great crowd of laity from all over the diocese. Bishop Taylor preached a very moving homily, thanking God for the integrity, scholarship and the leadership of his illustrious predecessor. Cardinal Gray prefaced the Mass with a personal tribute.
He was buried in the public cemetery in Ayr.
When elected bishop he had chosen a simple yet telling motto for his coat-of-arms. “In Nomine Christi”. All his life his one aim was to work for Christ, to make his master better known and better loved. He now enjoys in peace the reward promised to those who serve their master faithfully to the end. May his gentle soul rest in peace.
This obituary was printed in the Catholic Directory for Scotland of 1984.