In a remarkable interview last week, after a Dublin court hearing, in which the motorist who killed her husband was jailed for six and a half years and disqualified for 10 years, Mullingar woman, Ms. Jane Fitzsimons said that despite all that occurred last year, she has no anger or hatred towards the man involved, and prayed for him every day.
During the interview on the Newstalk 106 lunchtime show, it emerged that the mother of the young man who killed Eamon Cronin (50), an official working with Permanent TSB in Baggot St., Dublin, was known by the late Mr. Cronin, and she had asked him several years before, to pray for her son, about whom she was very concerned.
“I remember we prayed for him,” Ms. Fitzsimons said, though they did not know him, and she did not know the link until recent days, after learning who his mother was. She met her in court a few days earlier.
Ms. Fitzsimons described how her entire life had changed forever, when her husband, to whom she was married for nineteen years, failed to return home after being out with friends and then she learned he had been killed in a traffic accident.
“I remember thinking to myself. ‘Lord, I have to trust you. I will praise and thank you, no matter what. I know Eamon is in heaven with you. He had faith in the Lord, and once you have your faith in God, you know where you’re going,” she said.
You have a problem if you don’t. I have had tragedies in my family before, and I just knew where Eamon was going. It is my faith that keeps me going, faith in the Lord.”
That faith is something which has clearly sustained you through an awful time?
Ms Fitzsimons: Yes, absolutely. Faith is the thing that sustains me, with my family and Christian friends. And prayer. My faith is a legacy from Eamon, because he had that Christian faith. It is not religion, it is a relationship with the Lord, which is different, a relationship like me talking to you.”
Losing your husband was such a terrible shock, but when you found out how he died, that it wasn’t an accident as such, but that somebody should not have been on the road at all, was your faith tested?
“I really thought of the bigger picture, that where drink and drugs are involved, there’s a huge implication in it. I don’t think somebody in their right mind would go out and do that.”
How do you feel towards Desmond Callopy, the man who killed your husband?
“I forgive him. Absol-utely, totally forgive him. And I feel there’s a bigger picture to this. That’s my faith. I trust in the Lord. I pray for him (Mr. Callopy), pray for him every day. I prayed for him this morning, and prayed for his mam, because I met her yesterday.”
“There’s a bigger picture to this, because my husband knew her. She was the cleaning lady in Baggot Street branch of TSB. I would have only found this out of late. I remember Eamon talking about her. Eamon used to come home and say she was a ‘real salt of the earth’ woman. And we had prayed for her son, as she asked. So it’s all the pieces fitting together. His mother asked Eamon for prayers for him. She was concerned about her son and would have chatted to Eamon, and we prayed for him. So, there’s a bigger plan. The Lord has a bigger plan, and a bigger plan for Desmond Callopy. I just pray that this man will take a different path in life than he was taking,” she said.
Are you satisfied with the court sentence and hopeful that prison might rehabilitate him?
“Yes, I am satisfied and I hope and pray for him. I pray each day that people will come to him who can help him. There is hope in all of this.”
Many people will be amazed that you are not more angry and do not have more hatred towards him, for taking the person closest to you in the world from you?
“No, I try to see him through God’s eyes. When I see him through God’s eyes, that gives me the compassion. I don’t have any hatred at all. You can’t have hatred. It is like a poison.”
