John Charles McQuaid - University 1914-1925

University 1914-1925

He studied at University College, Dublin where he was awarded both a first class honours BA in 1917 and MA in Ancient Classics in 1918. His MA thesis was 'A Roman of the Early Empire: Lucius Annaeus Seneca' He was awarded an honours Higher Diploma in Education in 1919, while acting as prefect in Blackrock College, 1918–1921. The prefecting system was borrowed from the Jesuits. Future priests would interrupt their studies, usually before beginning theology, to serve as junior masters in the Colleges. This was seen as providing very good work experience. He then started theology studies in Kimmage, Dublin and was ordained on 29 June 1924.

McQuaid was immersed in the theology of the French church through his studies. He retained close intellectual links with academic developments in France throughout his life. McQuaid also trained at the Gregorian University in Rome where he completed a doctorate in theology. In November 1925 he was recalled to Ireland to serve on the staff of Blackrock College. As a result he was unable to complete his course in Biblical studies.

Rome made an immense impact on the young priest. He would refer again and again in class to the great churches there. It deepened his attachment to the papacy, especially to St. Pius X, his favourite pope.

McQuaid acquired a distrust of the secularism ushered in by the French Revolution, a theme constantly found in his writings. His theological training was in the repressive intellectual atmosphere that followed the suppression of Modernism in the Catholic Church. Later he was not to be affected by the "new" theology that developed after the Second World War in France and Germany and which contained the seeds of the Second Vatican Council.

McQuaid's MA thesis on the life and philosophy of Seneca, the philosopher-statesman of first century Rome illustrates some important aspects of his own character and concerns. He characterized Seneca as a pre-Christian moralist living in an age of immorality, sinfulness and confusion. "It is a great sign of strong virtue to abstain from pleasure when the crowd is wallowing in filth, to be sane and temperate when it is vomiting and drunk," he wrote. "But it is a much greater sign not to withdraw from the crowd nor mingle with it in all things. We can be merry without debauch." In a licentious age, Seneca commended chastity and upheld by his own example the natural sanctity of marriage. In days of brutal selfishness and callous cruelty, Seneca reverenced the slave and the outcast.

McQuaid compared the horrors Seneca experienced during Nero's reign with the growing troubles he saw in Ireland. Referring to "the stealthy fear that crept around Seneca", McQuaid argued that this was a feature of the Roman writer's life which "it seems only those can fully appreciate who have themselves undergone a period of unnerving terrorism".

McQuaid saw himself as living through "Senecan" times. In addition to the horrendous carnage of the First World War, the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and the slide towards guerrilla war in Ireland, there was an outbreak of Spanish flu in 1918 that killed an estimated 20 million people worldwide. Among them was Father Walsh, who had been McQuaid's novice master in Kimmage.