Rev. John McNair was born in Glasgow on the 20th March, 1901, and attended St. Aloysius' College before going to St. Mary's College, Blairs, in 1917, to begin the course of studies that would eventually lead him to the priesthood. His training in philosophy and theology was received at St. Peter's College, New Kilpatrick, between 1920 and 1926. On the 29th May, 1926, he received the priesthood at the hands of the Most Rev. Donald Mackintosh, Archbishop of Glasgow, in St. Andrew's Cathedral.
Father McNair's first appointment took him to Lanarkshire, where for three years (1926-1928) he was a curate at St. Joseph's, Blantyre, and in that parish, his genial personality and friendly disposition endeared him to all and helped to assuage for many parishioners the mental distress caused by the appalling industrial depression which fell so heavily on the working classes of Lanarkshire in those unhappy days.
The next nine years (1929-1937) were spent in St. Mirin's Parish, Paisley, where Father McNair was a prominent and active member of that team of priests, working under the guidance of the celebrated Father Justin White, which made St. Mirin's Parish, Paisley, one of the most vital Catholic communities in the old Archdiocese of Glasgow.
The next appointment (1938-1940) was to St. Joseph's, North Woodside Road, a very busy city parish with a Catholic population of about nine thousand souls, where he served as senior curate under the late Provost James P. Kelly. The difficulties of running a large and congested parish were soon enormously increased by the outbreak of the Second World War. Father McNair had never been very robust but, at St. Joseph's, there began the serious deterioration in his health which was to become progressively worse. Father McNair suffered in silence and even his fellow priests in the parochial house did not suspect that his invariably cheery conversation at breakfast very often followed a night of wakefulness and pain: this they only discovered afterwards.
When it did become obvious that Father McNair was a sick man, he was transferred to the less strenuous parish of St. Augustine's, Coatbridge, but after a short time there in 1941, he was forced to spend the greater part of two years on sick leave. He recovered sufficiently to take up light duties and in 1944 he was appointed chaplain at the Good Shepherd Convent in Dalbeth, where he remained until 1948. In 1949 he went as chaplain to the Sisters of Charity at Kingussie and, apart from three years (1952-1954) spent at St. Vincent's Hospital, Pinner, Middlesex, he remained there until 1959, when he was appointed chaplain to the Sisters of St. Joseph of Newark in their convalescent home at Rothesay.
During these last eight years at Rothesay, Father McNair enjoyed nothing more than meeting the visiting priests and laity who brought him news of the Catholic life of Glasgow and the West of Scotland, which remained the absorbing interest of his life.
For several months past his health caused deep concern and, despite the devoted attention of the Sisters of St. Joseph, it grew steadily worse until, quietly amid the prayers of the Sisters and some priest friends, he died on the morning of Tuesday, 21st November, 1967.
The Solemn Requiem Mass was celebrated in St. Andrew's Church, Rothesay, on Friday, 24th November, 1967, and Father McNair was buried there in the town cemetery. May he rest in peace. |
