Welcome to the Catholic Parish of St. Brigid's, Marrickville

Folklore has it that after arrival in Australia, the Passionist Community occupied a small house on the corner of   Fletcher St. and Petersham Rd. , the site of the present   Hung Cheung  Restaurant. A short time later they moved to a residence in Despointes Street along side the newly built parish Church 

 The Passionists came to Australia at the invitation of Cardinal Moran, the Archbishop of Sydney.  He separated the present parish of St. Brigid’s from the  parish of   Newtown.  After taking a census of the catholics in the Marrickville area, the Cardinal in August 1886 decided to create the  parish placing it under the care of Rev. Fr. William Doyle.  The foundation stone of the Church as laid in October 1887 in Despointes St and the church opened a few months later. Shortly afterward, visiting the Passionists at Highgate, London on a trip to  Rome, the Cardinal negotiated withVery Rev. Fr. Vincent Grogan the Provincial of the Anglo-Hibernian  Province for a community to come to Australia  .

 The Cardinal believed this new foundation by the Passionists would take up again the unsuccessful foundation to the Aboriginals at Stradbroke Island forty years earlier.  Cardinal Moran believed the Passionists could take up pastoral care of a parish, but most importantly begin the work of preaching Christ Crucified throughout this new country.

 It was the Sunday afternoon in March 1888, that the first public Ceremony in connection with the establishment of the Passionist Community in Marrickville took place. The Cardinal Archbishop accepted the invitation to bless the new bell, which they had erected near the entrance to St. Brigid's Church. It was an occasion of an imposing religious display. A magnificent procession accompanied the Cardinal from the Church to the bell-tower in the grounds, led by one of the Passionists carrying a Processional Cross. The bell was then blessed and its notes sounded for the first time.

By the early 1900’s the population growth in Marrickville made it important to look to a new Church.  The growth of the Passionists Congregation also demanded a larger residence – there were 13 priests and five students by the 1890’s.  In 1915 Fr. Alphonsus Cohen was asked to come from the monastery of Mary’s Mount, Goulburn to purchase land for a new monastery and church.

Within a month the magnificent property "Shrubland" on the corner of Marrickville and Livingstone Roads was acquired.  Mr. Brennan of Brennan's Stores in Newtown  bought the property on behalf of the Passionist Fathers for 17,500 pounds and anonymously donated 500 pounds, leaving the parish to pay the rest.

Plans were drawn up to greatly enlarge the original Shrubland House and add the present magnificent Church and hall. Fr. Alphonsus worked tirelessly to reduce the debt and build the new monastery and church, dying in 1917 a year before the foundation stone was laid in 1918. The Church, without the façade or bell tower was opened in 1921.  In the 1950’s the façade and bell tower were added under the direction of Fr. Lawrence. 

During these years the  parish schools were built, through the generosity of  parishioners and under the pastoral zeal of Fr. Casimir. Dulwich Hill’s  St. Paul of the Cross Parish and Church was established and built and then the parish became independent in 1911, Tempe parish became independent in 1908. 

At the heart of the Parishes life has been the constant, committed voluntary service of generations of  parishioners.  From choirs to sodalities, from cleaning to singing, from music to maintenance, from visitation to gardening – St. Brigid's has been built on the love of  parishioners here for each other, and for their special care for the poor and the needy.  This has been particularly evident in the welcome given to succeeding waves of migrants and refugees who have come to Marrickville and stayed in Marrickville.  Our parish has been founded and re-founded a number of times on the faith and work of these new generations of parishioners from new lands.

While the parish has always been the most visible ministry of the Passionists at St. Brigid's, it has not been the only one.  The community of St. Brigid's has sent missioners and retreat givers the length and breadth of Australia - among the more renowned being Fr. Francis Clune, Fr, Philip Brosnan, Fr. Edmund Toohey, Fr. Norbert Hayne.  The community has provided confessors to the communities of religious sisters and brothers. Spiritual direction, pastoral counselling, the sacrament of reconciliation have all been available for thousands of people who have come to the monastery for guidance, advice and grace. For many years St. Brigid's was the student house for young men being educated as Passionist priests. 

Again for many years, and once again today, St. Brigid's has been the headquarters and central administration for the Holy Spirit province of the Passionists. It provides a home for  the senior, retired and ill religious.  Passionists living at St. Brigid's have worked as school chaplains, seminary professors, hospital chaplains, Marriage Tribunal officials and in administration, Mission procuration and Vocation Direction. Of no less significance than these more public ministries has been the quiet, hidden work of so many Passionist brothers who have laboured to support the community in prayer, cooking, cleaning, domestic work, farming (in the early days) and fund raising.  St. Brigid's Community has also been a sanctuary of prayer, study and penance. For countless years the religious rose at 2.00 in the morning to spend time in prayer, a prayer which continued throughout the day.

Around 1998 the first plans were drawn up to renovate and refurbish the monastery. The plans and possibilities have gone through many permutations over the years.  Buildings were to be demolished, buildings were to be extended, buildings were to be newly constructed.  The community was divided in two, the community has been reunited into one. The present buildings allow for residential accommodation for the Passionist Community, offices for Province administration, offices for  parish administration and accommodation for the many visitors who pass through  Sydney  on such a regular basis.

However, St. Brigid's is not the buildings and church however magnificent they are, nor the work that is done, however humble or inspirational it may be.  St. Brigid's is the lives and stories of all those dedicated men who have lived and loved and laughed and wept and worked and slept and sacrificed and suffered and died in order to keep alive the memory of the passion of Jesus through compassion and care for anyone in need – Alphonsus, Casimir, Francis, Lawrence, Joseph, Damian, Placid, Edmund, John, Paschal, Stanislaus, Gaudenzio, Gregory, Stephen, Philip, Norbert, Aloysius, Austin, Br. Damian, Linus, Br. Gabriel, Raymond, Wilfrid, Br. Stephen, Sebastian, John and the list goes on.

St. Brigid's is the lives of the countless people and families, well known and anonymous, who have been born her, gorwn up here, educated, worked, married and had families here, who have grown old and died here.  St. Brigid's is that countless host of unseen parishioners, now with God but who crowd the church every Sunday.

By our life together, our work and our prayer may St. Brigid's keep alive the memory of the Passion as an overwhelming sign of God’s love.