A Titan of Toposaland

 

Bishop Taban, Fr. Tim Galvin, Fr. Sean Cremin
Nanyangachor, Sudan 2002
Mass for the opening of Good Shepherd Health Centre 

     The picture above is how I will remember him.  Fr. Tim Galvin was a St. Patrick Missionary priest for 45 years.  Forty years were spent in Sudan or South Sudan.  On 9th February 2023 he suffered a heart attack while being treated in Nairobi Hospital for an infection of his leg and passed away to go back to God.

     I first met him in 1991 in Kapoeta, Sudan.  I had flown into Torit to see about working there.  Unexpectedly, Khartoum withdrew permission for another plane to come back to pick us up.  I was driven with three other people to the border.  The four of us descended on Tim and his confrere, Niall Geaney, at midday just as they were getting ready to eat the stew they had fixed themselves.  The six of us cleaned the pot of every bit of delicious food.  What was more amazing to me was the genuinely warm welcome for the crowd of us with no advance warning.  In the middle of the afternoon, ten young Toposa boys came to haul water from the hand pump and sprinkle the hundreds of tree seedlings...mango, pawpaw, tamarind and neem.  Tim was way ahead of Laudato Si!  The priests' rectory had been taken over for treatment of TB patients so they were living in two rooms at the Sudanese Relief and Rehab Center.  It was dilapidated but they seemed happy to have a roof over their heads and a couple of solar lights.  We took a walk around the town and one of my confreres jokingly commented that it could only be improved by bombing!  They offered us another meal before we left for Kenya in a convoy of lorries at 9pm.

     The story of this man's life is remarkable, to say the very least.  I can narrate what I know from the time I arrived at his parish on Christmas Eve 1997.  It had been raining heavily.  Unbeknownst to me and the Development Director, Tim and Leo had sent a radio message not to travel.  Luckily, Ydo and I didn't get the message.  We took off from Loki Kenya, heading west through Narus, Sudan.  Then, we backtracked east over the Napalalang Plain.  We finally reached the newest parish in the Diocese of Torit at that time, located at a place called Lotimor, within spitting distance of Ethiopia.

Workshop Team
Lokai, Tim, Louse, Lucy
Ydo, Leo, Flora, Lopuke, Susan

Leo, Tim, Echom, Louse, Ydo March 1998

     

     These two titans of Toposaland were a marvel to behold.  They both knew the language and culture well.  They began by arranging workshops with village leaders, the civil authority and a Turkana facilitator.  Each leader had to bring another man, a woman and a youth to the workshop.  The team listened to what the people thought about the Catholic church and what they expected in the future.   People  thought the priests were a bit like God because they could read, write and find water in the ground.  They thought Leo was the church and would do everything for them.  Later, when Leo's health would fail and he had to leave, those same expectations were transferred to Tim.  When he couldn't satisfy everyone, they would falsely accuse him of totally ridiculous accusations and expel him from Lotimor temporarily. After realizing what they had lost, they begged him to return.

     The both of them were the best at trying to enculturate the message of Jesus.  There were many discussions.  They seemed keen to include my female and lay opinion, despite the fact that I knew almost nothing about the local culture.  We didn't have a church in Lotimor and the first liturgies were held in a shady clearing used for the workshops.

     On our first Holy Saturday, we began the nighttime Vigil on the far side of the river where the big fire was lit.  We didn’t have a Pascal Candle so Fr. Tim picked up a burning piece of wood.  He carried it across the river with all of us following him.  In that movement, we remembered the safe crossing of the Jews through the parted waters of the Red Sea.  At the other side, we had another pile of firewood which he lit in the same place that the goat had been roasted for the Nyakiriket (traditional Toposa prayers of petition) of the workshop.  We all sat in a semicircle facing the mountain in the east with the smoke from the fire drifting over us.  The Nyangatom always pray looking towards this mountain and so we did too.  Our small group of about 25 people included Toposa and Nyangatom from Sudan, Luhya, Turkana and Kikuyu from Kenya, an Ethiopian, an Irishman and an American.  We each took turns singing and sharing our traditional songs in Turkana, Swahili and English. After the liturgy of the Word, Fr. Tim blessed the water in a traditional calabash.  Then, George Loki, the eldest Toposa man, stood to offer the prayers of the faithful in the same way the prayers were offered at the Nyakiriket.  He proceeded to bless all of us with the new water.  During the consecration a full moon gently rose over the mountain behind Fr. Tim.  

     After Fr Leo had to leave, Fr. Sean Cremin joined Tim in Lotimor.  Not long after, several other missioners joined us and Tim became our most experienced leader.  

Lotimor - Susan, Lisa, Flora, Kathy, Tim

     Tim came into his own and was a great one to celebrate.  One November we were buying food for Thanksgiving in Nairobi as he had come to love our American tradition.  When he saw a jar of cranberry sauce on the shelf he plucked it up and put it in the basket.  I looked at the price, said it was too expensive and put it back on the shelf.  He said, "No it is not" and put it back in the basket!

     We celebrated the turn of the new millennium under the water tank in Lotimor.  While the rest of the world feared their computers would crash we were singing folk songs accompanied by my guitar under a twinkling canopy of stars.

Tim, Susan Marty, Sean, Sr. Marilyn

We celebrated birthdays....

Christine, Susan, Tim, David, Sean, Marilyn

                                                                                 Tim's 25th anniversary of ordination in 2003 

     

International Women's Day - Susan, Faustina, Tim

     Tim was a fierce advocate for women. Every year he made sure that we celebrated the International Day for Women on March 8th.

     I remember half listening to a homily he gave once to the Diocesan Annual General Assembly.  In his methodically clear English, I was only paying scant attention as he mentioned tribalism, racism and clericalism.  But he saved the zinger for the end when he landed on sexism and decried the exclusion of women anywhere and anytime.

Catechists Nanyangachor 2008

     From the very beginning of Lotimor parish in 1997, there were two women catechists among the group of mostly men.  But Tim (along with the other priests) always worked diligently to include women in the pastoral education programs.  In just 11 years I would return to stand in the middle of five women who had finished the course work and would go on to train others.  Regina Lotyem stands to my right and I am sure she is grieving his passing with a broken heart.

 

     Since Tim was so good with enculturating the liturgy I took it upon myself to keep him up to date.  My mother was the Director of the RCIA (Right of Christian Initiation of Adults) in my parish at home.  One year she informed me that the Vatican had issued new liturgical changes to the Eucharistic liturgy.  I asked the priests if they had heard of these directives.  They had not.  So, I proceeded to inform them that the priest could no longer leave the sanctuary during the sign of peace.  Immediately, without skipping a beat, Tim replied, "We have no sanctuary."  I burst out laughing as my mind's eye could see him celebrating Mass in the bush.  He would sit on a canvas folding chair in front of a small, collapsible metal table.  On the ground, in front of this table, sat a bevvy of Nyangatom women in a semi-circle.  They wore only traditional skins with their feet stretched out straight in front of them.  Some were smoking their pipes while others would occasionally spit tobacco off to the side.

     Eventually all of us missioners ended up in Nanayangacor and the mission grew and grew...

Good Shepherd Health Centre

Tim, Lometo and Nurse Joseph in red

     Modern medicine had its limits.  One year, just before Christmas, a man named Lometo arrived with a serious bleeding disorder.  I was concerned there was a problem with his platelets being too low and I didn't have any way to transfuse blood.  We put him in the car for the long overnight trip to Loki Kenya.  The young doctor at the ICRC hospital was filling in for Christmas and lacked experience.  He feared Lometo had Ebola, told the driver to take him back to Nanyangacor and sent a copy of the blood count he had performed.  Lometo was very anemic and the last item on the report was the platelets at the very end.  The one piece of information I had hoped for missed the printing at the bottom of the page!

     I went to Tim, utterly downcast.  He immediately arranged a prayer service for this very sick man.  I started him on iron and steroids and prayed with all my heart he would survive.  HE DID!!! 

Primary school Fr Aleardo, Faustina, Marta

     Gradually over the years the primary school was built to include eight grades.  A new convent was built for the Maryknoll Sisters and a small house was built for me.  More importantly, the Development Education Team worked diligently to develop the skills needed for all of these changes to be fully owned and incorporated into the social life of these people.

Dedication of St. Leo the Great Church

Fr. Tim and Fr Sean

     The church was the last big structure to be built.  The dedication in honor of Fr. Leo Traynor took place on St. Patrick's day in 2003.  It was a wonderful parish celebration with guests and visitors from all over Toposaland. Fr. Leo's family came from Ireland.  Bishop Taban officiated.  Every one had a very good time.

Parishioners and Guests

The Traynor Family

John, Leo JR, Sean, Tim

 

    I left Nanyangacor in August 2003 to begin a new ministry in Kitale Kenya.  During those years, Tim gave me a copy of Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening by Cynthia Bourgeault.  It was an excellent guide to meditation that he had read after attending one of her seminars.  As most of you know, he was a deeply spiritual man. It was just what I needed at that point in my life.

      Tim and I kept in touch over the years, especially with medical problems in the bush that they could use some help on.  He had sent me a picture of his painful swollen leg on 2nd Feb, asking if it was the same problem he had struggled with a couple of years ago during the Covid pandemic.  I confirmed that it was and asked him a few questions.  When her replied, he told me that he had decided to go to Nairobi for treatment.  It had taken him a long time to recover from the last infection, he had a good priest in the parish and it was easier to travel to another country since Covid was waning.  I was very relieved to hear of his plans and told him he was making a very wise decision.  He sent me a text from Nairobi hospital the next day saying he was admitted under Dr. Saio, a very well known expert in infectious diseases.  So, the news of his death was shocking to all of us.  It seems he had some heart problem and died of a heart attack.  Thank God he was in the hospital and Fr. PJ was with him.  He was treated as well as could be expected and no one should wonder what more could have been done.

     I can only speak to a few years about the life he lived.  I hear that the Toposa want him to be buried in South Sudan because he did so much for them.  It has helped me to go back through the pictures and memories I have.  One person asked me if I would write a tribute.  This is cursory at best and only a small contribution from one point of view about the life he lived.  But I share it gladly, hoping it helps to add to the memories.  He was an inspiration for me and many others.

Ar dheis De go raibh a anam uasal.

May the Lord have mercy on his soul.