{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2021}} {{Use Hiberno-English|date=August 2021}} '''Cornelius "Con" Lucey''' (1902–1982) was a [[Roman Catholic]] [[bishop of Cork and Ross]].
==Youth and education== Cornelius Lucey was born 15 July 1902 into a farming family at Windsor, [[Ovens, County Cork]] near [[Cork (city)|Cork City]].<ref name=car>{{cite web|title=Most Rev. Cornelius Lucey|url=https://www.corkandross.org/priests.jsp?priestID=398|publisher=Diocese of Cork and Ross|accessdate=29 May 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160806113824/http://corkandross.org/priests.jsp?priestID=398|archive-date=6 August 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref> He attended Ballinora Primary School and played for the local GAA club. He studied at [[St Finbarr's College, Farranferris]], the diocesan college. He graduated from [[St Patrick's College, Maynooth]] with BC and BCL, and obtained MAs at [[Innsbruck University]] in 1927–29 and then [[University College Dublin]] from 1929 to 1930.{{citation needed|date=August 2021}}
==Priestly ministry== Lucey was ordained a [[Priesthood (Catholic Church)|priest]] in 1927.{{citation needed|date=August 2021}}
He held the chair of [[philosophy]] and political theory at [[St. Patrick's College, Maynooth]] from 1929 to 1950. Alongside [[Peter McKevitt]], he was one of the founders of Christus Rex, a priestly society devoted to social issues, on which he was a prominent commentator.<ref name=car/>
==Episcopal ministry== In November 1950 Lucey was appointed titular bishop of Sila and auxiliary bishop of Cork with right of succession, and was consecrated bishop the following January. Upon the death of [[Daniel Cohalan (bishop of Cork)|Bishop Cohalan]], in August 1952, Lucey became Bishop of Cork.<ref name=car/>
In 1958 the [[Diocese of Ross, Ireland|Diocese of Ross]] united with the Diocese of Cork. Shortly after his appointment as Bishop of Cork And Ross, Lucey embarked on a plan to build five new churches in the rapidly developing suburbs of Cork. The five new churches were named after the five Glorious Mysteries of the Rosary.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.olcmayfield.ie/index.php/parish-history |title="Parish History", Our Lady Crowned Church, Mayfield, Cork |access-date=30 November 2016 |archive-date=30 November 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161130184453/http://www.olcmayfield.ie/index.php/parish-history |url-status=dead }}</ref> During his tenure, he founded a total of thirteen churches in Cork.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=RXsTDQAAQBAJ&dq=Cornelius+Lucey&pg=PT248 O'Callaghan, Antoin. ''Churches of Cork City: An Illustrated History'', The History Press, 2016] {{ISBN|9780750968645}}</ref>
He founded the St. Anne's [[Adoption]] Society in 1954. His outspoken sermons, often given at [[Confirmation (Catholic Church)|confirmation]]s, made him something of a thorn in the side of the establishment. His views on matters of faith and morals were conservative, and he was involved in a controversy in the 1960s, when he withdrew the diocesan faculties of Father James Good, a lecturer at [[University College, Cork]], for publicly dissenting from the teaching of [[Pope Paul VI]].
In 1965 Bishop Lucey started the Cork diocesan [[Catholic missions#Contemporary missions|mission]] to [[Peru]], where many priests from Cork ministered. The last of the Irish missioners returned from [[La Esperanza, Peru|La Esperanza]] to Ireland in 2004.<ref>[https://www.catholicireland.net/cork-ross-mission-peru-marks-50th-anniversary/ Macdonald, Sarah. "Cork & Ross marks Peru mission’s 50th anniversary", ''Catholic Ireland'', 15 May 2015]</ref>
==African Ministry in Retirement== Lucey retired as bishop in 1980. He went to the [[Turkana District]] in [[Kenya]] to work as an ordinary [[curate]] with Fr. James Good, who had gone there some years earlier. Good later described the last two years of the Bishop's life and his reaction to Turkana customs: :The parish priest of Lorogumu was an advanced [[Catholic liturgy|liturgist]] and (among other things) had introduced [[general absolution]] along with an entrance rite to Sunday Mass in which six ladies [[Turkana clothing|clad (or unclad) à la Turkana custom]] danced to the altar before the priest. I panicked but Bishop Lucey got his way and was duly installed as curate in Lorogumu, under Fr Tony Barrett, a [[Kiltegan]] priest who was an expert in [[Turkana language]] and custom. It was a perfect combination: one might describe it as a perfect marriage of minds and of mutual admiration. At a later date I asked Bishop Lucey how he liked the Lorogumu liturgy and he replied 'very beautiful'.<ref>James Good" [http://www.alliancesupport.org/news/archives/002404.html Setting the Record Straight] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081120132950/http://www.alliancesupport.org/news/archives/002404.html |date=2008-11-20 }}", ''[[Irish Catholic (newspaper)|Irish Catholic]]'', 7 August 2008</ref>
==Death and legacy== After nearly two years in Kenya he became seriously ill. He was flown back to Cork in May 1982, and was diagnosed with leukaemia. He died on 24 September 1982 at [[Bon Secours Hospital, Cork]].
In 1985, as part of the [[Cork 800]] festival, a site between [[Grand Parade, Cork|Grand Parade]] and South Main Street was developed into an [[urban park]] named "[[Bishop Lucey Park]]".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.corkpastandpresent.ie/places/grandparade/bishopluceypark/|title=Bishop Lucey Park|work=Cork Past and Present|publisher=Cork City Libraries|accessdate=17 March 2011}}</ref>
==See also== * [[:Category:Alumni of St Patrick's College, Maynooth|Alumni of St Patrick's College, Maynooth]] *[[Peter McKevitt]]
==References== {{reflist}}
{{Subject bar |portal1= Biography |portal2= Catholicism |portal3= Ireland}} {{Roman Catholic bishops of Cork and Ross}} {{authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lucey, Cornelius}} [[Category:Roman Catholic bishops of Cork]] [[Category:Roman Catholic bishops of Cork and Ross]] [[Category:Alumni of St Patrick's College, Maynooth]] [[Category:Alumni of University College Dublin]] [[Category:Deaths from leukemia]] [[Category:Participants in the Second Vatican Council]] [[Category:1902 births]] [[Category:1982 deaths]] [[Category:20th-century Roman Catholic bishops in Ireland]] [[Category:Christian clergy from County Cork]] [[Category:People educated at St Finbarr's College, Farranferris]]