Société des Missions Africaines –Province d'Irlande

né le 27 mars 1907 à Hollyhill dans le diocèse de Ross, Irlande membre de la SMA le 22 septembre 1935 prêtre le 20 décembre 1936 décédé le 6 juillet 1965

1937-1952 missionnaire au Nigeria diocèse de Benin City 1952-1965 Irlande, retiré, malade, hospitalisé décédé à Dublin, Irlande, le 6 juillet 1965, à l'âge de 58 ans

John Sheehan was born at Hollyhill, Aughadown, Skibbereen, Co Cork, in the diocese of Ross, on 27 March 1907. He died in St. Ita’s hospital, Donabate, Dublin, on 6 July 1965.

John was a 'delayed vocation' to the priesthood. He left school having reached intermediate level. Deciding when he was 23 years old to become a missionary he went to the high school, Skibbereen (1930-1931) and then to Mount Melleray, Co Waterford, where he completed his secondary education and studied philosophy (1931-1933). Next he joined the S.M.A.'s seminary at Dromantine, Co Down, where so many fellow-parishioners had gone before him (including Peter Harrington [ordained 1912], Stephen Harrington [1922], Patsy McCarthy [1922], Florence McCarthy [1933] and Florence O'Driscoll [1929]) James was received as a member of the Society on 22 September 1935 and was ordained a priest by Bishop Edward Mulhern of Dromore diocese, at St. Colman's cathedral, Newry, on 20 December 1936. He was one of a group of eighteen ordained on that day.

After ordination John returned to Dromantine for six months to complete his theological course. He was then appointed to the vicariate of Western Nigeria, reaching his mission in October 1937. This vicariate was the first mission in Nigeria to be entrusted to the Irish Province, when in 1918 Thomas Broderick was appointed vicar apostolic. John disembarked at Lagos some weeks after the deaths of two Fathers (John Marren and Anthony O'Dwyer) in Jos prefecture, from yellow fever. As a result of this tragedy the medical authorities urged all missionaries to avail of a new inoculation against yellow fever which was available in Lagos. John was one of those who was inoculated, spending two weeks in an isolation block in Apapa (the serum used was of a 'live' variety and there was a danger of infection). After his discharge John travelled to Asaba, where Leo Hale Taylor, vicar apostolic of Western Nigeria, appointed him to Okene. Here, under the guidance of William Keenan, the superior, he began to learn the local language, to study local culture and to undertake supervised pastoral work. After completing this period of induction (tyrocinium), having passed his language examination, and having received faculties to hear confessions, John was appointed to Agenebode district.

Agenebode, at this time, was a residential station in the district of Ubiaja. Founded in 1897 under the patronage of the Sacred Heart, there was a catholic community of some 2,000 members and 1,300 catechumens, located in Agenebode and some forty secondary stations. Patrick's superior in Agenebode was Tom Greene, who had first come to the vicariate in 1927. A report from the 'visitor', Patrick J. Kelly (later to become bishop of the jurisdiction) in September 1938 recorded that :'Fr. Sheehan is one of our new arrivals of last year, and is getting very good training from Fr. Greene, who with no means of transport is trying to run a parish seventy or eighty miles long, and that is all the more difficult seeing that Agenebode is at the farthest-off corner of it'. In May 1940 John returned to Okene where Pat Braniff was superior. Okene district was less developed than Agenebode, with some 700 catholic members, 500 catechumens, and 22 secondary stations. In July 1941 John was re-assigned to Oka, while in March 1942 he returned to Agenebode where he was superior from April 1944.

John went on his first leave to Ireland in June 1946, after a tour of nine years (extended because of the world war). After his return to Nigeria, in October 1947 he was appointed first parish priest of Okpara Inland, situated in a rural district, some 20 miles from Warri. John built up this station so that by 1952 there was a catholic community of over 1,300 members and 700 catechumens and an average of 11 catholic marriages annually. In 1950 the vicariate was erected as the diocese of Benin City. When John's next home leave was due, in February 1952, Bishop Kelly informed the Provincial that John had developed heart problems and had almost died in Warri hospital. John returned to Ireland two months later, seriously ill. The diagnosis by the doctors was that he had suffered a stroke which caused permanent and profound damage to his brain. Thus, after fifteen years of fruitful labour in Nigeria, John was to spend the remainder of his life, some thirteen years, hospitalised in Ireland.

As a student John was quiet and reserved. He had a keen interest in Irish history. His obituary in the African Missionary noted that 'he was a gentle kindly man, a man with no guile'. During his long and tragic illness he suffered greatly. It is only in the light of faith that such suffering can be given a meaning; namely, that through the power of God it contributed to the spread of the Gospel in his beloved Nigeria as much as did his 15 years of active service.

He is buried in Wilton cemetery.