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At the funeral of Tadg O’Sullivan (59) and his son Diarmuid (23), “the shock, numbness, devastation” of their deaths were recounted and Tadg’s eldest son, Mark (26), was “impossible to imagine ”.
About 100 mourners attended the service for Tadg and Diarmuid on Friday and only 25 close relatives and friends entered the church due to Covid-19 regulations to sympathize with and support the grieving widow and mother, Ann O’Sullivan.
Tadg and Diarmuid died in what is believed to be a suicide pact on Monday, and took their own lives after shooting Mark in what he believed to be a dispute over the inheritance of the farm owned by Ann.
Outside the church, another 30 or more lined the path to the 19th century cut limestone church on the outskirts of Castlemagner village. Many were young people, friends and contemporaries of Diarmuid, still mired in silence by the enormity of the family tragedy.
Others waited in their cars parked in the parking lot across the road and got out of their vehicles to line the driveway and pay their respects when the two coffins were carried out of the church and placed in two hearse to make the short drive to the St Brigid Cemetery on the other side of town.
The tragedy earlier this week has plunged a community into darkness and left people struggling to make sense of it all, mourners heard.
Canon Toby Bluitt told mourners who attended the service at St. Mary’s Church in Castlemagner that it was difficult to put into words the sense of pain and misunderstanding their deaths had caused in their local community.
In his homily, Canon Bluitt said that the reading of the Gospel of Saint Luke on the Passion of Christ speaks of a darkness that hangs over the world and that that same darkness has engulfed not only the O’Sullivan family but also the local community in Castlemagner.
“The normally quiet local area was covered at this time of year with a myriad of colorful autumn leaves. . . it became a hive of activity and the autumn light was. . . for a while . . . a very distant memory, ”said Canon Bluitt.
“The shock, the numbness, the devastation, was impossible to imagine and the news of the loss of three lives was incomprehensible. . . Like all of you, I too am struggling to make sense of this life-changing tragedy. “
Joining Canon Bluitt at mass was Fr. John Magner, who performed the last rites for the three deceased at his family farm in Raheen between Kanturk and Castlemagner and also ministered to Ann while neighbors comforted her.
‘Overwhelming’ pain
Describing the pain that had engulfed Castlemagner as “overwhelming”, Canon Bluitt welcomed the mourners and said they all joined local Bishop William Crean of Cloyne in offering their deepest condolences to Ms O’Sullivan.
He recalled that Mr. O’Sullivan worked in the automotive industry in nearby Buttevant for more than 40 years and, based on his own encounters with him, found him “very accommodating, friendly and happy in his chosen field.”
He said that Diarmuid had gone to school in nearby Ballyhass and later Kanturk and, like Mark, had socialized at Castlemagner before going to study Accounting at the Cork Institute of Technology, where he finished his studies in June and was due be conferred online next week.
“One could imagine that life was full of possibilities for him; It could also be said that both Tadg and Diarmuid touched the lives of many people along the way as they traveled through life. Their lives and deaths have changed them all and they will never be the same again. “
“So today … gathered in our grief, we don’t minimize the loss of their lives by trying to come up with easy answers, because there are no answers … But there are some things we do know in the midst of our grief.
“We know that this was not God’s will. . . that the Lord’s Prayer teaches us that ‘Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven’; God’s will is not always done on earth, as this week’s tragedy reminds us. We know this was not a “wake-up call”. . . nor did it happen so that we can learn something. “
Lined streets
Prayers were said for Tadg and Diarmuid, as well as for all emergency services and all who helped in any way during this tragic event, as well as for the people of Castlemagner that they continue to be a Christian and caring community.
Subsequently, the people of Castlemagner lined the streets of the small north Cork village when the remains of Tadg and Diarmuid were carried by two hearse to St Brigid Cemetery for burial.
Mark O’Sullivan, a law student who graduated from the University of Limerick and then did a postgraduate course at University College Cork, will be buried after a funeral mass at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Kanturk at 3.30pm. Saturday with the funeral. put it later in an undisclosed location.
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