1938 – 2024
Born: 14th March 1938
Entered: 15th July 1957
Died: 4th January 2024
Sr Clodagh Moran was born on 14th March 1938 to Tosi Moran and Maureen Moran nee O’Dwyer. She was the eldest of four sisters, two of whom predeceased her.
She entered the Religious Sisters of Charity on the 15th July 1957 and at her profession she received the name Sr Mary Fergal which she later changed to her baptismal name.
Clodagh began her various ministries in Donnybrook and then Seville Place. From there she was missioned to St. Anthony’s Herbert Avenue to train as a Montessori Teacher and then to Temple Street where she trained as a Paediatric Nurse. She spent the following 14 years in child care in St Joseph’s Kilkenny and in St Mary’s pre-school Merrion.
She was then missioned to pastoral care and sacristy in St Monica’s, Belvedere Place. She trained as a Masseuse and loved to use this skill with the post-operative patients in Caritas Convalescent Centre, and with sisters in nursing homes and communities. She served in this ministry while living in various houses, – Baldoyle, Lakelands, Stella Maris Howth, 28 Park Avenue and finally to Providence in St Mary’s, Merrion.
Her health began to fail and she requested to be missioned to a nursing home in 2021. She spent the rest of her days in Marian House Nursing Home, Glasnevin run by the Holy Faith Sisters while still being linked to Providence Community who supported her in every way. The Care and Nursing staff of Marian House were very good to her and she was very content there. She struggled with ill health requiring oxygen almost 24/7 in the last year and finally on the 4th January 2024, she died very quickly and suddenly which was a real blessing for herself.
It was only in November last 2023, that Clodagh handed Sr Phyllis Behan two sheets of paper and said ‘that’s what I want for my funeral’. When Phyllis queried the use of one of the hymns mentioned Clodagh, in her gentle but stubborn way said ‘that’s what I want’.
The song was used at the prayer service during the reposing in Corrigan’s funeral home on 7th January 2024. It was a gospel song titled ‘Put your hand in the hand of the Man’. It said so much about Clodagh and her life. A life that began with her parents Tosi and Maureen putting their own hands in the hand of the man from Galilee when they brought Clodagh to be baptised. That was the day she embarked on a life of faith, a faith that was nurtured and nourished in the family home and from 1957 in the Congregation of the Religious Sisters of Charity.
In July of this year 2024, she would have been 67 years in religious life serving her beloved Lord. The skills learned in her Montessori and nursing training were used well in the service and care of children, some of whom, now adults with children and grandchildren of their own were present at the reposing service and proudly call her ‘mother’ or their ‘best friend’. A fitting tribute for one who was known for her gentleness and caring spirit.
All of us will have our memories of Clodagh and over the few days surrounding her funeral, we heard such lovely stories about her as she touched people’s lives while she journeyed through her own life. Some of the condolences written speak so beautifully of her. One nurse who cared for her said that ‘she always had something good to say about you’; others declared her ‘an honourable woman’; a gentle soul; an ‘innocent’ in many ways.
She was generous to a fault as Aideen (Clodagh’s surviving sister) and ourselves can testify. New shoes, cardigans and other things would be readily given away to others, who, she said, ‘needed them more than she did’. She had a great propensity for chatting to people she met and in some cases these chats turned out to be long-lasting friendships.
As mentioned above, in her later years she learned massage and loved to do hand, shoulder or foot massage in Caritas Convalescent Home, for the older sisters in nursing homes and communities. She was musical too, played the keyboard and the guitar. Only a few days before she died, she played for the residents in Marian House. On another occasion, her nephew Killian visited and was instructed to take out her guitar and together they went to a resident whose birthday it was that day, and they sang Happy Birthday to her.
The funeral Mass was celebrated by Monsignor Ciaran O’Carroll in the Sacred Heart Church Donnybrook. Monsignor O’Carroll also spoke of how her spirituality shone through the readings she chose for her funeral Mass. The readings she chose spoke of her deep love of Christ, of her yearning to be shepherded by Him and her response was expressed in the Psalm ‘cry out with joy’. Our Lady too had a special place in her heart, and she proudly spread devotion to her through purchasing and distributing miraculous medals.
She was buried in St Mary’s Cemetery Donnybrook on the 8th January 2024.
She will be greatly missed. May she now rest in peace.
