When the history of the Redemptorist religious order in Ireland comes to be written there ought to be a large entry for someone with the very un-Irish name of Mario Martinez.
Before his well-earned retirement, the New Yorker of Spanish extraction had for many years used his Midas touch in myriad fundraising projects, mostly in projects involving the Catholic Church.
Mario was employed by The Community Counselling Service which has been working for 50-60 years raising funds for all kinds of people and organisations within the Church. It is now a worldwide organisation, raising over $1 billion last year!
In early 1970, however, Mario was living in London and overseeing the CCS operation in Britain. He had been to the south of Ireland - working with Bishop Cashman - and the fledgling troubles in Northern Ireland were very much in the news.
When CCS director Jack Foerst asked him to travel to Belfast for a particularly difficult assignment, it was a request Mario had been dreading. From the beginning, it was always going to be difficult.
His task was to raise £100,000 - a colossal amount by today’s standards - for the Redemptorists to repay a debt incurred in the building of a seminary in Dublin called Marianella. Many Redemptorists were bitter about the whole Marianella project which was built to accommodate a rise in vocations which never came.
“There was a lot of conflict within the Order,” recalls Mr Martinez.
“They were all very good and dedicated men, but this was all new to them. They didn't become priests to raise money - they were very great missionaries and still are - but they found themselves with a problem they had never confronted with before. And then along came this fundraising campaign and a lot of them just didn't know what was going to happen next.
The trials and tribulations of west Belfast life in the early 70s lived up to Mario's expectations.”
“I was scared,” he laughs now at 31 years distance. “The notion that I was going up there didn't exactly thrill me.”
But come he did and while he did encounter some hairy moments, the experience was one he would never forget.
“Yeah, there was the (fire)bombing of the bus outside Clonard Monastery and a lot of little incidents which don't appear in the book, but I can look back at that period and I can say that I feel blessed and honoured to have been there, to find an organisation to pull them together to find the best in themselves, and to go out and do this.
“The money was only a symbol of how people felt about the Redemptorists and, essentially, the goodwill that I found there amongst all people - and it wasn't just a matter of Catholics giving to Catholics - there were a lot of people who attended meetings in hundreds and some of them were absolutely extraordinary.
“I have worked in fundraising for many years, I have never worked in an area where the people were so dedicated and so straightforward.”
In the end, Mario helped raise not £100,000 but £500,000 – a huge sum in the 1970s.
The story of the vast undertaking is told in Hell, Fire and Damnation written by Mario himself and in which he pays tribute to the Redemptorists from all over Ireland, even those who were reluctant in the beginning - and especially to Fr McGrath, Brother Paschal Doherty, Fr Burns, Brother Ignatius and to the communities they served.
Mario’s story is a fascinating look at how the human spirit can triumph in the face of adversity.
Hell, Fire and Damnation by Mario Martinez is published by Barny Press.
