Originally published in The Gateway Issue No. 33 (September 2011)
Daniel Linehan and his wife Anne reared twelve children, of whom four were boys. Their home was in the village of Tullylease, Co Cork, Ireland. In the years following the children were to be scattered, some going to Australia, some to the U.S.A. Michael, the future Brother Matthias, was born on 14th November 1892. He grew up with his brothers and sisters in a happy and religious atmosphere. He attended the local school. One day, when Michael was in his fourteenth year, a recruiter visited the school and that evening Michael told his mother that he wanted to be a Brother. The parents decided to consult the principal of the school. He advised them to send the boy to the De La Salle Brothers. A letter was sent to the Brother’s formation centre at Castletown, Co Laois, and as a result Michael was enrolled in the Juniorate on January 18, 1908.
After a year and a half in the Juniorate, Michael started the Novitiate in June 1909, was clothed in the Lasallian habit in August and given the religious name of Brother Amor Matthias. He was deeply impressed by his formators and throughout his life he never deviated from the Lasallian ideals he learned from them.
On the completion of his novitiate he joined the scholasticate, which was also in Castletown. Here for a year and a half he followed the course of studies that prepared candidates for the King’s Scholarship examination. In those years it was the custom for young Brothers to volunteer for the Lasallian missions either in the USA or in the Far East. Brother Matthias volunteered for the East and was accepted. After a brief holiday at home he set sail for Singapore and joined the community of fifteen Brothers at St. Joseph’s Institution.
Brother Matthias spent eleven years in Singapore. There he learnt the art of teaching and developed good study habits. He was a conscientious teacher and all his class-work was prepared methodically. “He was a good teacher” writes a Brother who knew him well “He knew what he taught and knew how to impart his knowledge.” During his years in Singapore he made his final profession of vows, on December 12th 1920.
In June 1923 he was transferred to St. Francis Institution, Malacca, Malaysia. Attached to the school, at the time, was an orphanage. A Brother who was a pupil in St Francis in those days recalls: “The first time I met Brother Matthias was in 1924. Brother Barnitus was Director and he was Sub-Director. What a splendid pair! Both were lovers of the poor and the orphans and had great sympathy and understanding in regard to them. Brother Matthias taught the Senior Cambridge classes and a very successful and much-loved teacher he was. He was strict and insisted on discipline and hard work but this was tempered with justice and kindness.” This is a refrain that would be heard time and time again.
After only one year in Malacca, Brother Matthias was appointed to the community of St. Xavier’s Institution, Penang. A Brother writes “In December 1924, about a week before Christmas, I arrived in Penang from Singapore. We were just out from England. At the harbour waiting for us were Brother James and Brother Matthias. We went in a fleet of rickshaws to St. Xavier’s. That evening at supper we were a small group ranging in age from 84 to 19, and yet our conversation involved the whole group. The one who seemed to have the ability to involve everybody was Brother Matthias. Two or three days after our arrival he took ship for Europe and the Second Novitiate, but before going he was called to the home of one of his pupils who was dying, and was able to baptize him then and there.”
So in 1925 Brother Matthias returned to Ireland and was able to visit his family after an absence of twelve years. After a brief holiday he was sent to Carlsbourg in Belgium to acquire a good spoken knowledge of French in view of making the Second Novitiate. From August 1925 to May 1926 Brother Matthias followed the Second Novitiate programme at Lembecq-lez-Hal. He did so with the calm thoroughness that marked all his life.
After his return to Malaya in 1926, he was appointed again to the staff of St. Xavier’ Penang. A member of the community at that time tells us “He made himself responsible for a good community spirit, joined us in all forms of physical exercises—tennis, swimming, football, athletics, hill-climbing, excursions – he was game for it all. He organized our holidays so that there would be maximum enjoyment. He encouraged study during the holidays and during the weekends and he joined the younger Brothers for a course in mechanics and typewriting which he had planned. He was always approachable, kind but not weak and he had wonderful commonsense. Sometimes there were setbacks in school by reason of hasty and unwise decisions of those in charge. Without criticizing the latter, Brother Matthias would set about putting things right and re-establishing good relations. When people had to be told unpleasant things, he was the one usually chosen to break the unwelcome tidings, not that he was cold-headed or indifferent, but he believed that people should know the truth, however unpleasant.”
In 1927 he suffered very much from eruptions on the skin. He consulted doctors and underwent treatment but nothing seemed to help. It was eventually discovered that the ailment was due simply to the heat of the tropics. Brother Matthias made light of it but the condition would not go away.
At that time the juniorate, novitiate and scholasticate were all located in Pulau Tikus, a secluded spot on the coast some distance from Penang. It was felt that the Juniors in particular needed a more structured programme. Brother Matthias was sent to Pulau Tikus to take charge. The change was immediate: the boys had to dress properly, good manners were emphasised, cleanliness insisted on and a definite and clear timetable drawn up to regulate the Juniors’ day. The next year Brother Matthias was given charge of the Novitiate. After only nine months in this position, however, he was moved to Manila and after a five months’ stay he was sent to St. Joseph’s College, Hong Kong, as Sub-Director. He arrived 21st September 1929 and began teaching immediately.
The Director of St Joseph’s was the well known Brother Aimar who was just then building the magnificent College that for so many subsequent years was to dominate the skyline of Kowloon. On the completion of the building in 1932 Brother Aimar became the first Director of La Salle College and Brother Matthias replaced him as the head of the community in St. Joseph’s.
He was now forty years of age and in the bloom of life. He was to be Director of St. Joseph’s College for three years. In all he only spent six years in Hong Kong but his memory is held in benediction there by old boys of those years. One such recalls: “He gave every encouragement to sports during his tenure of office and St. Joseph’s achieved laurels and fame in swimming, volley-ball, basket-ball, soccer and athletics. At the same time the college scored notable successes in the academic field, winning many distinctions and honours in the matriculation examinations.”
As late as 1977 still another Old Boy wrote to him. “You remember our First Fridays when we went to the chapel for Benediction. I was the outstanding choirboy and loved to sing the various hymns in Latin! I remember also the Hall where we had so many cowboy films on Saturdays. And I also remember you emptying my pockets bulging with marbles! One episode I will never forget. One day three of us conspired to do no homework that evening. But next day I was the only one who showed up without homework and two of my companions told Brother Xavier that I had gone on strike. I was sent down to your office to explain and you just got out the cane and gave what you considered due to me! Those were the days.”
A Brother who came to Hong Kong from Ireland in 1932 pays tribute to Brother Matthias. “I spent two of the happiest years of my life with him in St. Joseph’s. He spared no effort in training me for my work. He was strict but kind and fatherly. During the long holidays he organized lessons for the young Brothers in the subjects they had to teach. He himself would give lessons in mathematics and Latin, while Brother Xavier taught us Physics, Brother Hubert Chemistry, Brother Aubert English and Brother Vulbas Joseph French. We had games twice a week and he himself would join in with great gusto.
He was deeply religious and his regularity at all chapel exercises was exemplary. He loved prayer, the Mass, Our Lady and St La Salle.”
He also had a great love for the poor. Quite a large number of pupils were exempted from paying school fees or had them substantially reduced. Really deserving cases had their midday meal free in the school canteen. Every year he had a collection among pupils for the Home for the Aged run by the Little Sisters of the Poor. Contributions were in the form of clothing, food and cash. The class that collected most was given a half-day to take the goods to the Home and distribute them. For many years, the Old Boys’ Association, in which he took a deep interest, continued this laudable custom around the Feast of St. Joseph.
In 1936 Brother Matthias returned to Malaya and was appointed Director of St. Xavier’s Institution, Penang.
A Brother writes “The Brothers of St. Xavier’s, many of them new arrivals from Ireland, Germany and Canada, were delighted at the appointment of Brother Matthias. He brought an atmosphere of humanity, happiness and freedom to the community. Games received a new impetus and he himself joined in.”
After only two years as the head of St. Xavier’s, to the despair of the community, Brother Matthias was appointed Director of the Novitiate in Pulau Tikus, and thereafter was sent to a fill a number of posts until recalled to Penang again at the end of 1941. The fact is that the Visitor, Brother James, had great confidence in Brother Matthias and in view of the imminent danger of a Japanese invasion he wanted to have him close by.
The four war years that followed were dangerous and difficult for the Brothers. Brothers of British nationality were imprisoned. Irish and local Brothers were for the most part allowed to remain in their communities and if they taught school at all it had to be in Japanese. A lot of the Brothers suffered from hunger and malnutrition. The schools in the main were taken over by the occupying troops. St. Xavier’s was occupied during all the years of Japanese rule and the community there had to seek refuge in Pulau Tikus.
Brother Matthias was put in charge of the novices and then in charge of the scholastics, and indeed the whole personnel. Every piece of arable ground was cultivated to produce food. Brother James Dooley, in his homily at the funeral Mass for Brother Matthias summed up his role during those difficult years: “The Japanese occupation of Malaya was a particularly difficult time for Brother Matthias. He was responsible for the formation of a group of young men, who, owing to the war situation, could not be promoted to the next stage of their religious and pedagogical formation nor could they be transferred elsewhere. There was an acute shortage of food and clothing. There was the obligatory study of the Japanese language without adequate teachers or text-books. Hardest of all, frequent interrogations, harassment, searches by the ever-suspicious authorities and the worrying uncertainty as to what would be the outcome of the occupation. But Brother Matthias lived through those nightmare years in his calm, unruffled and prayerful way. Only those close to him knew what the calm and confidence he inspired cost him!”
In 1946 a new Visitor, Brother Barnitus, was appointed to succeed Brother James. Brother Matthias was asked to be Director of St. John’s Institution, Kuala Lumpur. He remained there for two years, greatly liked and respected by the Brothers, lay teachers and boys.
By 1948 the skin-trouble from which Brother Matthias had suffered so uncomplainingly for years, became so aggravated that he begged to be sent to a cold climate. He was sent back to Ireland and there, after some weeks at home, he was appointed to teach in the scholasticate. From 1949 to 1951 he was in charge of the young Brothers studying in the training college in Belfast. His heart was still in the East, however, and in 1951, he returned to Malaya and spent the next two years as Director of the scholasticate in Pulau Tikis. A scholastic at that time tells us “Just before the end of the novitiate we were told that Brother Matthias was going to be our Director in the scholasticate. We also heard from some of his former novices that he was very strict and punished all mistakes. This frightened us a good deal. So when we went to the scholasticate we were on our best behaviour, but as time passed we began to realize that our Director was not at all the kind of man he had been painted. We found him very kind and gentlemanly. When he did have to reprimand us it was always in a calm and gentle way with a smile on his face.”
Brother Matthias’ skin trouble, which had almost disappeared during his stay in Ireland, now returned as virulently as ever, so there was nothing for it but to return to Europe for good. And so it was that, at the age of sixty-one, he left the East where he had laboured so successfully for forty years. On his return he was appointed Director of the scholasticate in Strawberry Hill, London. This was a hostel for the young Brothers following the teacher-training course in St. Mary’s Training College, Twickenham. There was a mixture of English and Irish scholastics.
“At last we have a Director for Strawberry Hill” Brother Gilbert, the Visitor, exclaimed some time later. “With Brother Matthias,” said one of the scholastics “we know where we are twenty-four hours of the day”. “He trusted us” said another scholastic of those days. “He was himself a transparently honest and sincere person. His goodness might be taken advantage of from time to time but there was never on his part any bitterness. His gentleness and kindness always worked in the end. And he was a genuinely holy man.” His Sub-Director of those days tells us “I regard him as a saintly, gentle Director. He seemed to be always in close union with Our Lord. His visits to the Blessed Sacrament were frequent and prolonged and he rarely returned from town without some flowers for the altar. When he entered the chapel, after genuflecting to the Blessed Sacrament he would always make a respectful bow to the statue of the Most Blessed Virgin.”
He was truly a good religious – a man of deep calm and quiet piety. He had an air of recollection and of absorption in the matter of things spiritual that was inspiring. His piety was not so much something he taught in conferences or lectures, but something one can see from his gentleness, his silence and his thoughtfulness. He never complained. He was very close to our Holy Founder in that he saw in all things the will of God and accepted them as such.
Upon the transfer of the scholastics from Twickenham to De La Salle Training College, Hopwood Hall, Brother Matthias was appointed Sub-Director of the novitiate in Castletown. He taught Christian Doctrine, French and English to the novices. His notebooks are full of information on the meaning and pronunciation of English words and he took great pains with the reading of the novices. “Good diction was of the utmost importance for future teachers,” he maintained, so he gave elocution lessons.
One of his novices recalls: “Brother Matthias was my sub-director of Novices in 1958/59. He was the first to introduce us to the literary grandeur of figures of speech and we learned about such exotic figures as alliteration, oxymoron and hyperbole….together with examples of usage. Two of his spiritual exhortations remain with me. He would frequently say ‘all for God’ and remind us that we were ‘fools for Christ’s sake’.”
Brother Matthias followed the exodus of the novitiate to Faithlegg in 1970 and to Loughrea in 1972. On the closure of the novitiate in Loughrea in 1974, Brother Matthias, now over eighty years of age decided to call it a day! He was transferred to Miguel House in Castletown, where he was to spend the last years of his life. His Director of that time tells us “In punctuality, regular observance, obedience to authority, he was faultless. Never once did I hear him utter a complaint. On the contrary he was at a loss how to express his gratitude to the Sisters and staff in Miguel House and to the District which had provided such a comfortable residence for the old Brothers. He had always the Rosary beads in his hand. He suffered considerably from ill health but never spoke of it. The Sisters and doctor had to find out for themselves for whenever he was asked how he felt he would invariably reply ‘fine’!
In his last years, now in his mid-eighties, he grew progressively weaker, but for as long as he could he came to the dining room for meals and followed all the chapel exercises. Not until the very end did he have to stay in bed. He quietly breathed his last on August 16, 1979.
