Irish Columban priest Fr Michael Sinnott who was freed from captivity in the Philippines on Wednesday is ‘a tough man who will not be discouraged from his missionary work’.
That is according to his Kilkenny colleague and friend Columban priest Father Martin Ryan who told the Kilkenny Advertiser that he was greatly relieved to hear that his good friend was released after 32 days in captivity.
Fr Michael Sinnott was handed over to the insurgent group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which in turn handed him over to government forces on Wednesday night just before nine o’ clock Irish time.
The 79-year-old Wexford-born missionary was abducted outside his home in the city of Pagadian on October 11.
However, Muckalee native, Fr Martin Ryan who also spent more than 50 years as a missionary priest in the Philippines says that Fr Sinnott intends to return to the city from where he was kidnapped.
“That is the news I received by phone this morning - that Fr Sinnott is going to go back to Pagadian. But I am not one bit surprised. He is a very tough man. I know him fierce well. He joined the seminary just a year after me in Dalgany in Cavan in 1948. Fr Sinnott is a very deeply spiritual person and he is very close to the Lord. His spirituality would have helped him enormously through his horrific ordeal,” said Fr Martin.
In a press conference Fr Sinnott said he had been well treated while in captivity although conditions were very primitive.
“The conditions in the parishes in the Philippines are primitive at the best of times. When I was there at first there were no real roads or no electricity, but that changed in more recent years. I’d think that Father Sinnott was kept in very primitive conditions during his captivity - but he is such a strong man that he would get through it,” said Father Martin.
Fr Sinnott was the third missionary priest to be kidnapped in the Philippines in recent years and one priest was killed during his ordeal.
“These kidnappings are becoming more common in recent years,” said Father Ryan. “I wasn’t in an area where they occurred as it is mostly in the Muslim areas. But Fr Rufus Hally was killed at the time he was kidnapped and there was terrible sadness at this time among the Muslin community as he was particularly good to them and they loved him in return. He was given a special Muslim wake following his death before his body was returned to the Christian community.”
Fr Sinnot was running a school for children with special needs prior to his kidnapping, and Fr Martin claims, “he did a great job at this school. It’s run by professional teachers and the children get great care there. This is the work that Father Sinnott loves to do.”
Father Martin retired a couple of years ago and returned to live in Kilkenny.
“I am retired from my missionary work now but I don’t think that Father Sinnott will ever retire. He puts his hand to the plough and he doesn’t take it off. I have great respect for him. I hope he comes home soon so that his family and friends can talk to him. It has been about two years since he has been in Ireland,” said Father Martin.
However, having spent so long in the Philippines himself, Fr Martin also has a few stories to tell and he is launching a book about his years in the Philippines and his years in Muckalee next week in Muckalee.
“My book is called From Muckalee to Mindanao and Back, Roundtrip and I took about nine months to write it. It tells of my years as a missionary and also it tells of the sports people of the local area. I interviewed a lot of people for this book and I discovered lady boxers in Coon and an under 18 darts world champion in Coon East,” he said.
Fr Martin’s book will be launched by Jimmy Rhatigan on November 22 next at the Community Hall in Muckalee.
