Standún's Station April 17 1996
April 17 1996
By Fr Padraig Standún
Down and out in Kentish Town
One of the people who impressed me most in my lifetime was Anton Wallich Clifford, the man who founded the Simon Community, naming it after Simon of Cyrene, who helped Jesus carry his cross to Calvary.
Every time I followed the Stations of the cross during Lent, it was the modern day Simon(s) I thought of, rather than the man roped in at short notice to help Jesus to Golgotha. Today there are branches of Simon in many cities and towns. They try to provide shelter and companionship for people who are homeless and feel there is nowhere else to turn. These are often people barred from hostels and bed and breakfasts because of drink or drugs or mental health problems.
I only knew Anton Wallich Clifford for a very short time.
In that fateful Summer of '69 I spent August in Kentish Town where Simon had two old houses across the street from each other. Anton, his wife Marie Therese and about ten others shared life with a moving population of homeless people.
The day the British army entered Derry I was in a different kind of 'derry', a derelict building in Kentish Town helping a Corkman and a Manchester man drink a bottle of VP wine, my logic being that the more of it I drank, the less was left in it for them. They were two great characters, full of stories from the war and from the lives they had lived and left behind. Manchester Fred had a big white beard and a halo of wispy hair. I'd have got him to play Moses if I ever had a say in casting a film. I won't give the Corkman's name in case he would be recognised. He had been an RAF fighter pilot and would regularly take trips to some old soldier's meeting place and return with money and wine to treat the rest of us. Maybe we were breaking all the rules but we were certainly having a good time.
One night a Mayoman newly arrived from Huddersfield asked me if I had ever met a priest called Máirtin Lang, and told me if I ever did to tell him I had met Donnelly (name changed).
As a student priest I was rather impressed to have the name of a priest of my diocese held in such regard so far from home. The day came seven years later that I was Máirtin's (who was born and reared in Castlebar) curate in Carraroe.
I felt at home in the world of Simon, going on soup runs at night, selling clothes in the secondhand shop, collecting leftover food from the markets for the pot of stew/soup continuously on the cooker.
I have often thought that worse could happen me than to end up on the streets. Despite the cold and the poverty there is a comraderie and a freedom there that I have seldom met anywhere else. I think that Anton Wallich Clifford was the most openminded person I have ever met, the least judgemental. He always seemed willing to learn. If one scheme, one method, didn't work you tried another. There was no time for regrets or might have beens. You got on with it.
The founder of Simon died a relatively young man. He is not an official saint of any church, but he is certainly one of my saints.
Connaught Telegraph - News - April 1996
