The pages give a brief history of the founding of Forestville and Davidson Parishes.

We are indebted to Mr Jack Fox , whose booklet "The Evolution and History of Forestville Catholic Church" was used as the basis for the material on Forestville, and to Mr Bruce Walsh for the material on Davidson.

Thank you both.

From July 2006 the two parishes have been joined together and are now known as FRENCHS FOREST CATHOLIC PARISH.

Fr Gailey, the first Parish Priest of Forestville passed away on 4 November 2005.  These are a few details of Fr Gailey's long service to the Church.  May he rest in Peace.

Born: 16^th March 1915, in Leichhardt, Clement Arthur William Gailey, a son to Francis Frederick and Ann Veronica (nee Hatch) Gailey. 

Primary Schools: Christian Brothers Burwood, Lewisham, Strathfield.

Secondary Schooling: Fort Street State School – Leaving Certificate

First Seminary: St Columba’s College (Seminary), Springwood.

Second Seminary: St Patrick’s College (Seminary), Manly.

Ordination date: 25 July 1942 at St Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney.

Assistant Priest: 17/12/1942 St Raphael, Sth Hurstville

Assistant Priest: 22/09/1943 St Joseph, Rozelle

Assistant Priest: 21/12/1946 Wollongong Diocese

Assistant Priest: 16/12/1949 St Patrick, Sutherland

Assistant Priest: 01/02/1952 Parramatta Parish

Assistant Priest: 01/02/1954 St Michael, Lane Cove

Assistant Priest: 01/08/1956 St Dominic, Flemington

Administrator: 01/04/1958 Woy Woy Parish

Assistant Priest: 01/12/1958 St Brendan, Annandale

Administrator: 02/02/1959 St Brendan, Annandale

Priest in Charge: 19/12/1959 Forestville Parish

Retired: 28/03/1986

Fr Clem died in hospital at Lithgow on 4 November 2005 aged 90 years.

Fr Clem’s funeral took place in Our Lady’s Chapel at St Mary’s Cathedral on Thursday 10 November 2005 at 1.30pm and was well attended, followed by an interment at Rookwood Cemetery. Fr Gailey requested a Latin Tridentine Requiem Mass for his funeral. The Mass was duly celebrated by a member of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (not of the Society of St Pius X) and was presided over by Bishop Julian Porteous who also gave the homily.

The homily now follows:

Funeral Homily

Fr Clem Gailey

In this Mass we commend Fr Clem Gailey to the Lord whom he has served with singular devotion. Fr Clem was ordained here in this Cathedral in 1942. He has been a priest for sixty three years. It was his personal wish that his funeral Mass be celebrated here at St Mary’s. His deep Catholic instincts caused him to desire a funeral in the Cathedral Church. A Cathedral Church is the church of the bishop, successor to the Apostles. Fr Clem in this wish reflects his sense of unity with the apostolic core of Catholic faith.

It was his wish, also, that the Mass be celebrated in the Tridentine Rite. His love for the traditional liturgy which he celebrated for the first twenty five years of his priesthood made the latter years of his priestly life a personal burden for him. A quiet, gentle, retiring man, Fr Gailey treasured this form of the Liturgy of the Church. He loved the Mass and had great devotion to the Blessed Sacrament.

The Tridentine Mass carries a deep sense of reverence for divine mysteries. The Latin language, long the language of the Church in its sacred actions, was dear to him. In this Mass today we honour his wishes and also allow its dignified reverence to carry our prayers for a devout priest.

The Mass is simply the heart of our Catholic faith. Its liturgical expression has long been the source of unity and catholicity. It is a burden on the hearts of us all to witness the way that the Mass is to be celebrated as ordained by the magisterium becoming a source of division. We all believe in its essential meaning – it is the one sacrifice of Jesus Christ; it is the central act of worship of the Church. We must dedicate ourselves to finding paths to a full restoration of unity under the successor of St Peter.

Fr Gailey served as Assistant Priest in a number of parishes over a seventeen year period before becoming Priest in Charge of the new Parish of Forestville in 1959. He began with literally nothing, living initially with the Augustinians at Manly Vale. He struggled over many years to establish the parish – obtaining a presbytery and building a first church, dedicating so much time and effort to provide a school relying upon volunteer labour highly organized into teams working on weekends, and finally completing a second Church  in 1967. Fr Clem showed great administrative capacity as he devoted his energies to establishing a viable parish community, and was able to engage the generous support of the parishioners anxious to provide the necessary facilities for a fully operational parish. He was singularly successful in completing this task.

He would see his original parish divided to establish the parish of Davidson in 1975. After twenty seven years as Parish Priest Fr Gailey retired in May 1986. He had dedicated the bulk of his priestly service to the parish of Forestville. Today we acknowledge his steady, pioneering priestly work in Forestville, a work that others found easy to build upon.

A priest’s life can be measured in terms of his practical achievements, but it is the hidden work with individuals that cannot be assessed or calculated. A priest is firstly a man of God. The oft quoted words of the Letter to the Hebrews captures the role of the priest standing before God on behalf of his brethren: “Every High Priest has been taken out of mankind and is appointed to act for men in their relations with God” (Heb. 5, 1). A Priest is set apart – his ordination, his embracing of celibacy, his devotion to the Divine Office, his faithful celebration of the Sacred Mysteries, his silent prayer - all express this particular “being set apart”. A priest orients his life in a very particular way around the service of God. A priest is the instrument of the action of God, particularly in the Sacraments. A priest carries the burdens and struggles of his brethren and intercedes before God on their behalf. He carries in his heart the needs of his people. He lifts up his hands before the Lord on behalf of his brethren.

The Prophet Jeremiah (3, 15) gives the promise of the Lord that he will give the people “shepherds after my own heart”. A Priest as true shepherd configures his heart to that of God. He senses the pulsing love of the Lord for his people. The priesthood is not the possession of the priest, he knows that he shares in the one priesthood of Jesus Christ. Christ alone is the Eternal High Priest. A priest unites himself with Christ the Priest. He acts in persona Christi capatis.  Christ becomes the principle of his being. A man of prayer, a priest is drawn more and more into the divine mysteries that he celebrates. He becomes more and more one with the salvific work of the Lord realized particularly in the Holy Mass.

We honour this faithful priest today. A man who loved and lived his priesthood. A man who was close to the Blessed Virgin Mary – never missing his daily rosary. In this Mass which he deeply loved, we commend him to the Lord whom he served with steady conviction and great simplicity of spirit.

May the Lord grant him eternal rest and receive him into his Kingdom.

Wednesday, November 09, 2005

Our first Parish Priest Father Clem Gailey

Forestville starts off as part of MANLY Parish

Initially Manly Parish covered the whole of the Manly Peninsula and all of the French's Forest -Belrose area.

Regular Mass was not celebrated in the district during those early years. There were however, some Masses celebrated in private homes on an irregular basis starting about 1918.

These Masses were celebrated by Father Mc.Donald who needed to travel on horse-back to reach distant parts of his far flung parish.

Now part of BALGOWLAH Parish

In 1929, following other redistributions of Manly Parish to the north, Balgowlah Parish was formed from within Manly Parish, and as the districts of French's Forest and Belrose were placed within the changed boundaries, they became part of the Parish of Balgowlah.

The first Parish Priest of Balgowlah Parish, was Rev. Father Bond who remained so until 1932, when he was replaced as Parish Priest by Rev. Father Whelan. The next change of Parish Priests took place in 1936, when Rev. Father Wall became Parish Priest. Without assistant priests to help, Fathers Bond, Whelan and Wall were unable to celebrate regular Masses within the distant and sparsely populated districts of French's Forest and Belrose. Whenever possible however, Mass was offered in the Soldier's Memorial Hall at the corner of Starkey St and Warringah Rd Forestville, but never more frequently than once a month and always on Saturday morning.

 The volunteer labour approach

The period of the early sixties, was one of greatly increasing enrolments in catholic schools in the Sydney Archdiocese. The Archdiocese also had many growing parishes who had the same type of financial problems as the young Parish of Forestville was experiencing. Quite a number of these parishes had undertaken school building programs using voluntary labour. Some men of the Forestville Parish made suggestions to Father Gailey about this type of undertaking, but Father Gailey was aware that many of these schemes had fallen by the wayside bearing very little fruit. Seeing the absolute necessity of building a school, he examined many of methods that had been used. Jack Fox and Stan Stumbles went with Fr Gailey, one Saturday morning in 1960, as far afield as Bass Hill to investigate one such school project.

One scheme recommended as being successful, was a team system at North Ryde Parish. A steering committee established to enquire into North Ryde and a few other projects reported that the North Ryde method should work at Forestville, where many qualified building tradesmen were among the newly arrived parishioners. In the light of this report, Father called a meeting in the Soldier's Memorial Hall, of all interested parishioners where all the projects could be outlined. The 170 men attending that meeting unanimously endorsed the North Ryde system and the teams method was adopted by Forestville. The meeting also resulted in a register of all building trades workers being made.

Starting the School

At Forestville, each voluntary project involved about 200 men, mostly fathers of prospective pupils, but also included men of goodwill other than those of the Catholic Faith. Men were divided into 8 separate teams, with one team working either Saturday or Sunday on a rotating basis throughout each project.

Each team had a qualified carpenter as its leader, and the first project had as foreman—overseer, either Ron Cook or Bill O'Brien, one of whom attended each day work was in progress. The workers only remuneration was a well earned rest and a chat over a bottle of beer at the end of each day's work.

The parish Grows up Quickly

To give some indication of the growth of the parish, it is interesting to note that the church in Warringah Rd, having been opened in 1958 with seating for approx. 300, and with one Mass each Sunday, had by October 1966 need to increase seating by the use of stack-a-bye chairs wherever they would fit and the weekly Sunday Masses had increased to six. The Parish School, that had opened in 1962 with 172 pupils, had an enrolment of 529 for the start of 1967 and the average number of baptisms in the parish were in excess often a month from 1964 onwards.

The opening of the school in Currie Rd., created a separation of the parish buildings that was undesirable, and many years elapsed before the parish was brought together on adjoining properties. The first move towards this end, came from Mr. and Mrs. Boileau, the owners of land alongside the school., namely No. 9 Currie Rd. upon which this new church stands. With the opening of the school, these generous people, seeing the difficulty the separation would cause the school pupils in attending the Church, and knowing land was not available to redress the situation, and themselves feeling hemmed in, made a very generous offer to sell to the church, As part payment they under took the exchange of a piece of Church owned land fronting Coolabah Cres, part of the recently purchased school block that was quite unsuitable for playground purposes. . This arrangement was accepted by Father Gailey and he moved residence into the house on No. 9 Currie Rd. during 1962. From then on, Father Gailey, the school pupils and staff were no longer inconvenienced by the separation of the buildings.

Our Second Church

The rapid increase in the parish population as shown by the above figures, was such, that by late 1966, serious consideration had need to be given to building a larger church, and more school classrooms. After much consideration, consultation and many sleepless nights by Father Gailey, Richard Mainwaring was again called upon to design a duel purpose building to be built at Currie Rd, to the east of the original school. This building was to be used as a second Mass centre at weekends and convertible to school rooms during the week. When the plans of this building were drawn up they were readily adopted by the Parish Committee and the Building Committee set about finding way and means of building it with voluntary labour and a cost limit of about $30,000. Plans were then submitted to Cardinal Gilroy for approval, who consented, but raised serious doubts or objections to a compromise building to serve both church and school. The new thinking stimulated by His Eminence, was that the new building should be a church (which in later years could become a hall) and the Warringah Rd. Church become an infants school.

This concept was adopted, and work commenced on this Church-Hall Building on 22nd. July 1967. The same type of voluntary effort was employed and having now seen the need for maintenance free buildings, this new building was constructed of face brick inside and out and was roofed with tiles. Shortage of time and bricklayers, gave need for the brickwork to be about the only paid labour in the entire job.

Opening the Second Church

The ceremony of Blessing this Church began at 2. 30 pm on Saturday 9th. December 1967 with His Lordship Bishop Muldoon standing before the front doors of the church accompanied by a number of priests and a line of altar boys. After blessing the outside of the Church, he proceeded inside to bless the altar. After the blessing, Bishop Muldoon said the first Mass at the altar he had donated. This ceremony had taken place nine years to the day from the opening of the first Catholic Church in Forestville

Our newly completed Church , stands as a legacy of Father Gailey's foresight and generosity, as in the late sixties, when the parish was strapped for cash, he purchased, using his own finances, a large parcel of land at the northern end of Forestville Park. He had visions of one day building a high school on that land and had the title of it made in favour of the Parish of Forestville.

During the twenty seven years Father Gailey was Parish Priest of Forestville, he laboured long, hard and tirelessly for the spiritual well being of his flock. He had assistant priests some of the time, but spent many years on his own. Some of his assistant priests were, Father John Walter, Father Basil Rosen, Father Peter Bain, Father John Williams, who left to become an army Chaplain in Vietnam and Father Paddy Gillic. Father Gailey left the parish at Easter 1986 leaving behind a legacy of much hard work and many sleepless nights.

Now part of Broken Bay Diocese

Rev. Father Eris Tiemey succeeded Father Gailey as Parish priest of Forestville in May 1986 as the parish also moved to be part of the new Diocese of Broken Bay under the initial guidance of Bishop Patrick Murphy.

The New Presbytery

This building was completed in 1992 and is a very functional building, eventually providing accommodation for the assistant Priest, and offices for the joint operations of the two parishes - now joined under one Parish Priest.  Prior to the building of the new presbytery, the priests of the parish were obliged to live in the original homestead of the Boileau family. Jack Fox had worked on the construction of that building early in 1950 and was most familiar with its shortcomings. Being built in the immediate post war period of material shortages and size limits, it contained one bathroom and one bedroom. (It did have a small attic room and a hotch-potch room on the upper floor.). It was certainly not a fit place for two priests and a housekeeper to live. When asked his thoughts regarding its demolition, Jack replied, "I would rather see it demolished before the brick bus shed at Jamieson Square, that I had worked on at the same time, as the bus shed had more architectural merit."

Fr Tierney bacame a much loved Parish Priest and was very visible in the church and school.  His energy and enthusiasm enabled the parish to move into their third parish church.  When Fr Tierney retired through ill health the responsibility for pastoral care of both Forestville and Davidson parishes was given to Fr David Taylor, who was then the Parish Priest of Davidson.

The two worhipping communities of Forestville and Davidson remain as seperate parishes, but now operate under Parish Priest Fr David Taylor, and Assistant Priest Fr Clem Hill.   They have blended together many lay ministries and share the pastoral support through one Parish Pastoral Council.

The first building and original church was blessed and opened on 1 June 1975 with Cardinal James Freeman as the Officiating Bishop.

This building now serves as the Parish Hall and is known as the "Fr Paddy Gillic Memorial Hall" in honour of the first Parish Priest of Davidson, Fr Paddy Gillic who was appointed in December 1975.

In 1976 the "School of Religion" was opened in 1976, and this now serves as the foyer for the present church. Before the presbytery was built in 1980 Fr Gillic used this building as living quarters, with part of the building being used today as the Blessed Sacrament Chapel.