Kathy Clubb is a freelance author and home-educating mother, based in Melbourne.
Fr James Tierney recently celebrated the 60th anniversary of his priesthood and he was kind enough to speak to this author about his life and his third most cherished project, a children’s series called the Bush Boys.
Fr Tierney began life as an Anglican and after graduating with a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics, Geology and Physics, he obtained a Diploma in Education, from the University of Sydney. He was also a staff sergeant in the Sydney University Regiment.
After his conversion to Catholicism in 1955, Fr Tierney was ordained a priest in 1964. He began to specialise in family catechetics, and he later joined the Australian College of Education with a Programme for Apostles of Christ in High School.
Fr Tierney’s passion for catechetics led him to establish the Cardinal Newman Catechist Centre in 1974; his 60th anniversary of priesthood coincides with the 50th Anniversary of the centre’s founding. The centre, now operating as Cardinal Newman Faith Resources Incorporated, was originally set up to provide resources for catechists in the State School system.
It also became the avenue by which Fr Tierney could supply his valuable materials to Catholic families. It is very popular with Catholic home-schoolers and Fr Tierney has always been very supportive of those families who home educate.
Fr Tierney’s magnum opus was the first Catholic Family Catechism published in 1981, which was welcomed throughout the Catholic world as a simple way to pass on the faith to children. At the time, Cardinal Silvio Oddi, then the Prefect for the Congregation of the Clergy, expressed his hope it “will be widely used in all the English speaking countries.” Bishop Peter Elliott once told Father that his catechisms had a “distinctive Aussie flavour.”
The Catholic Family Catechism takes the classic question-and-answer format, emphasising the importance of trying to commit catechism to memory. Father took his lead from Pope John Paul II in the encyclical, Catechesi Tradendae: “The blossoms of faith do not grow in the desert of a memory-less catechesis.”
Fr Tierney went on to write other works, including A Catechism about Catechisms and the Australian Bush Catechism of Camping, as well as many handouts on topics related to catechesis. But is it his fictional Bush Boys titles that have been an enduring favourite among young Australian Catholics since the release of the first book in 1990.
The books, now seven in all, are uniquely wholesome, Catholic and entertaining. The characters, many of them from large, home-schooling families, are intended to provide a solid example of virtue without seeming too good to be true. In Fr Tierney’s words, there is “enough mischief to make them interesting.”
A unique aspect of the books is their focus on Australian bushcraft. They are full of practical advice with diagrams and explanations to help young people navigate the bush independently and safely. They show that prevention is better than cure by including first aid advice.
When this author asked Fr Tierney about the main lessons he intended children to draw from his books, he said that apart from teaching children to live out their faith in a natural way, he wanted them to learn how to “do-it themselves”—to be adventurous in a safe way.
Another strong focus is on teaching children good leadership skills, and Fr Tierney points to the example of Sir William Slim, a British military commander who was also the 13th Governor-General of Australia. Sir William fought in both the First and Second World Wars, and so inspired Fr Tierney that he reproduces some of Sir William’s famous quotes about leadership in the prefaces of his books.
While the Bush Boys books at first seem more suited to boy readers, the reviews in the back of the books show that girls also love them. Certainly, the stories include some very adventurous “bush girls” too! Despite that, the stories show that men and women have complementary, rather than competing roles, in line with Catholic teaching.
The believable characters, bushcraft lessons, and even some detective work all combine with everyday Catholic life (grace before meals, Sunday Mass) to show young people that Catholicism really is the greatest adventure.
This overall impression is echoed in a letter Fr Tierney received from a school principal who read the original Bush Boys aloud to his class. He wrote that, “the children were able to identify closely with the characters, they were impressed with the obvious practicality of the advice and information in the story, and the style approximated their own.”
After 60 years of priesthood, Fr Tierney also has some advice for young priests: provide good formation for your parishioners, especially for altar servers; take seriously your role as teacher, sanctifier and guide; and be constantly vigilant when it comes to attacks on orthodox doctrine.
The “Bush Boys” books and other faith resources are available from www.cardinalnewman.com.au or from the Faith Resources Centre at 15-21 Collins Street, St Marys NSW 2760. For the double Jubilee, the first 6 “Bush Boys” books are being given away free of charge, except for postage, and the final Bush Boys Book, New Bush Boys Rescue is available for $25 including postage.