The Diocese of Mutare & The Carmelites in Zimbabwe - the Irish ...

Bishop Lamont was a very cultured man, sometimes too cultured perhaps for us here,
especially when he quoted metaphysical poets and Shakespeare when we were having our
cornflakes. He had a profound love for the Church was extremely pained to the point of
becoming physically ill when reading negative reports on the Church. He was an assiduous
reader of The Tablet in which his letters frequently appeared. He read the weekly Vatican
newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, with great care, sometimes leaving it conspicuously in our
College community room with a page opened on an article he thought we should all read. He
read constantly. He borrowed books, read them quickly, and unlike many a Carmelite, he
returned them promptly.
Even though he and the Carmelite Order in the past may not always have seen things in
the same light, he was very proud of his membership of the Order, and the Order was proud of
him. It was his wish to be buried, not in episcopal robes, but in his Carmelite habit. He
treasured the contemplative dimension of the Order. Particularly dear to him were daily Mass,
the Liturgy of the Hours said in community, until weakness and his deafness made this
impracticable. He loved the Rosary, frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament and the Stations
of the Cross.
It was never easy to convince Bishop Lamont that he was wrong on practical matters, or
on theological affecting the role of bishop. Though he was a great enthusiast for Vatican II and
its teaching some, however, would find his interpretation of the Council’s doctrine on the
episcopacy rather maximalist.
He mellowed a good deal in his last years. Enjoying good health for most of his life, he
found the weakness of recent months very difficult. After a fortnight of very distressing illness,
he reached the perfection that God had planned for him in this life on last Thursday.
How do we sum up his life? We don’t – the final judgement must be left to God. In the
end all human achievement except love is as straw in God’s eyes; we all must come in the end
to rely not on what we have done, but solely on God’s mercy. Standing at this point in time we
can genuinely give thanks for having known and having lived with a great personage, one who
was also had real human weakness as well as one hugely endowed with gifts that he used for
the service of the Church and Zimbabwe. Go dtuga Dia suaimhneas dá anam misniàil.
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