‘Addiction is not only the State’s problem, it’s everybody’s’ – Bishop

“Addiction is not only the State’s problem, it’s everybody’s,” Bishop of Waterford and Lismore Alphonsus Cullinan told those attending Mass marking the start of renovations at the site of a new female addiction recovery centre near Dungarvan, Co. Waterford on May 14.

Speaking to The Irish Catholic, he said “people of faith have to see Jesus is stronger than an addiction and can break the bonds, break the chains. We can’t just sit back and say, ‘oh, well, that’s the State’s problem’”.

Bishop Cullinan is the Patron for the new centre called Pobal Mhuire, which just receive planning permission to start renovating the two houses located on a six hectares site in Clashmore.

The centre expects to welcome around ten women at a time, and will be run by three Sisters from the Order of the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará. The main house is where the women and Sisters will live together in community, and the smaller house will become a ‘training centre’, so the women will not only receive help overcoming their addiction but also the opportunity to be reintroduced in society.

“There are so many people who are getting caught in addiction. They’re ordinary people and they have to have hope. In this year of the Jubilee of Hope, it’s a great time to start a project like this, a project of hope,” the bishop said.

Pobal Mhuire has been in the making for over a decade, and all started with an idea from Bishop Cullinan. But he “would like to think it was the Holy Spirit.” The bishop contacted John Carlin, President of Radio Maria, and they started working to make the centre a reality.

Bishop Cullinan said “it really is a series of providential things that led to the start of this, now the opening. It has to be renovated, a few little things, but… I think it’s going to be wonderful.” He said the renovations are mostly fire regulations and “hopefully” in around four months it should start running with a small number of women. “I think it’s going to be like a Cenacolo…. An Irish version of it.”