Those Who Knew Paul

Come Let Us Adore Him
By Stephen Ryan, MJ

When Paul made his Cursillo in Phoenix, Arizona in 1966, he was presented with the ideal of attending daily Mass from that moment on. But for Paul, daily Mass had already long been a reality in his life. Miles Jesu spirituality flows very much out of the Cursillo spirituality, that commitment to daily Mass and prayer, and so it was natural for Paul to become a member of the Miles Jesu family. In the last few hours of Paul’s conscious life, this profound and habitual friendship with God, especially in the Blessed Sacrament, and with his brothers in community whom he hadn’t seen in some months, was evidenced in a very beautiful way. It began with Paul and Don’s return to Phoenix on the 23rd of December, 1975.

When he returned home to the Miles Jesu community, they all went to Benediction together. Afterwards, Paul lingered to pray, as he had so often done before. But now it seemed hard to get him to leave the chapel. “Let me stay,” he begged quietly. He was becoming closer and closer to God. But that evening he was, as always, a pleasant and cheerful member of the community. He commented on some changes to the house that had been made in his absence. He enjoyed sitting and talking late. It was with reluctance that Fr. Duran eventually said, “Paul, when an Irishman and a Spaniard get talking, they never run out of things to talk about. But we all really had better get to sleep”.

The next morning, Paul was not in the chapel for Mass. As he was never late, Don and Fr. Duran went to his room to see what was wrong. They found him holding his head and when asked if he was in pain, he said, “a little bit”. He never complained, and they knew that he was in real agony. They helped him back to bed, but he would not stay and badly wanted to pray in the chapel. He was kneeling there when he had a series of bad seizures. An ambulance was called and, unconscious, Paul was rushed to the hospital. It was Christmas Eve.

Paul’s heroic acts of devotion at the end of his conscious life were not acts of desperation, of turning to Jesus when there was nowhere else to go. Paul went to the One Whom he loved first, most and always in his life – Our Lord Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, the source and summit of Paul Murphy’s faith. The desire to linger in the presence of Our Blessed Lord in chapel that evening, the drive to get out of bed the next morning and make his morning prayer and attend Mass with the community, all the while in much pain and suffering, were the natural effects of Paul’s love for Our Lord, and show just how far God had led his son Paul M. Murphy along the royal road of heroic virtue. “Let me stay” in God’s presence, Paul begged quietly, and so he did for his entire life.

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