No ordinary priest

HE HUNG around street corners, socialised with drugs addicts and was known to most as

‘Deco.’ Not things you usually associate with members of the clergy, but Declan Blake is no ordinary priest.

Declan arrived in Finglas on July 7th 1990 to work alongside the four other priests in the parish. He was given special responsibility for the Dunsink, Wellmount and Deanstown areas, and immediately began knocking on doors.

“I suppose when I arrived, my whole thing was just to get to know the people. It was such a vast area. It was a huge area and I suppose at first I was saying,

‘How the hell will I ever get to know anyone, the area was so big.’ But I just said to myself,

‘You just have to make a start’, and that was it.

“I felt very much at home in the place from the beginning, I just felt very settled. I kinda sensed that community spirit too, people looking out for each other and their neighbours and so on.

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In order to get to know the young people in the area, Declan became involved with a number of schools and youth groups. He soon realised that many of the younger generation in the area weren’t involved in groups like these.

Using his own money, he bought a pool table and set up a drop-in centre in the local Scouts’ Den. He then took to the fields and street corners, to encourage people to use the facility.

“When I went there first I was saying,

‘How will I get to know the young crowd’, especially this group who were kinda caught up in stuff. There used to be groups all over the area, but there was always a group hanging around the back of the church and the side of the church and down the fields at the back of the schools. So I just went over and introduced myself.

“They’d a bit of a fire going and I remember just going down and at first they were wondering who I was and when I told them I think they were wondering was I really a priest, or was I spying or something, or trying to get information from them for the Guards.

“They were just suspicious because, well I suppose, a priest never went down the field to them like that. But that was it. I introduced myself and got to know them.

“I have to say, the very first time I was a bit anxious because I said,

‘This crowd could tell me to F off or get lost’, and I kinda was a bit anxious. But I felt it was just something I needed to do if I was going to try and reach out to them. And they became great friends. I knew so many of them so well. I just enjoyed their company.

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The group began to follow Declan wherever he went, mostly in an effort to hitch a lift in his car, but that rarely extended to inside the Church.

“Most of them didn’t go to mass, but that didn’t matter. I told them I wasn’t a bible thumper. I wasn’t going around preaching on the streets or telling them what to do. I suppose I just felt that they were all part of the community, and maybe they needed a bit more support.

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Declan soon became one of the gang. Proof of that was how he was addressed, not as Father Declan or Father Blake, but simply as

‘Deco.’

“I’d say the fact that I was from Dublin, I was fairly young, about 10 years older than them at the time, that did make a difference because I knew the score. I know what’s going on in life and I think the fact that I’d worked for five years before I went in, I think for me that made a difference, because you know what life is about.

“Most people I’d say didn’t even know my second name. The sacristan was the only one who ever called me Father Blake. He told one of the altar servers,

‘Go down and tell Father Blake there’s a phone call for him.’ So this lad came over to me and said

‘Where’s Father Blake, who’s Father Blake?’ I said,

‘Me’, and he said,

‘You’re not Father Blake’, and I said,

‘What do you think my name is?’, and he says,

‘Declan.’ And I said,

‘What’s my second name?’, and he said,

‘Father.’

Many of the young people who Declan befriended had problems with drugs, particularly heroin. He says his proudest achievement during his time in Finglas was establishing a Narcotics’ Anonymous meeting in the Church of the Annunciation that is still running to this day.

* This is an edited extract from Finglas – A People’s Portrait. The full text of the interview with Fr Declan Blake can be read in the book which is available in all good book shops priced at

?¬20.