The Padre: The True Story of the Irish Priest who Armed the IRA with Gaddafi’s Money

by Jennifer O'Leary

For almost two decades, Father Patrick Ryan evaded intelligence agencies across Europe and was, for a time, one of the most wanted men in Britain. In The Padre, award-winning investigative journalist Jennifer O’Leary exposes the exploits of this notorious former Irish priest and active IRA supporter. Revealing sensational details divulged to her during exclusive secret meetings with Ryan, the book lifts the lid on the true extent of the priest’s involvement with the IRA and its campaign of terror across Europe, Britain and Ireland – from being a trusted link between the regime of Muammar Gaddafi and the IRA, to his involvement in improving IRA explosive devices, which made possible the almost successful assassination attempt on Margaret Thatcher and her Cabinet in Brighton. The Padre tells the truly remarkable story of this man of the cloth, who, decades on, is still unrepentant about his ruthless zealotry in pursuit of money, weapons and assistance for the IRA’s violence. Indeed, his one regret is that he wasn’t even more effective. ,

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Biography, Ireland, Politics, Irish Literature, Audiobook

272 pages, Paperback

Published October 2, 2023

Reviews

[Colleen Browne · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I found this book to be interesting and well-written, I found it to be a disappointment for a few reasons. The first noticeable problem I had was when O'Leary explained why the population in the North turned against the British army. Her explanation was that they realized that the deployment would only be short-term. That does not even pass the laugh test. Troops were deployed to quell the violence that had overtaken the North. The violence was Unionist violence against Nationalists were were peacefully demonstrating for equal rights. They were being beaten with boards that had nails sticking out of them, beaten up, and the RUC was usually ignoring what was happening. When it became clear that the troops were there to support Stormont and their Unionist allies who were purpetrating the violence, Nationalists turned against them; not an unreasonable response. That is one reason for my rating.

I was disappointed not to learn Ryan's motivation behind why he worked with the IRA or anything he did. There was not even an attempt to explain why he joined the priesthood or anything else in his life. It seems that there must have been a reason for his becoming a priest or becoming active in IRA bombing. People rarely take up these things without a reason. At the end of the day, the reader cannot assign any form of a motive to Fr. Ryan and is one reason a person would read the book. It read more like a news report. Sure enough, she is a journalist and a fairly good writer but when she undertook to write a book, she should have delved deeper so that the reader can have a better understanding.

[Niamh · Rating 2 out of 5]

My main reason for reading this book was due to Ryan's upbringing in Tipperary. I haven't heard much late 1900s IRA stories before this from South of ireland, most of what Ive read so far has been based around the North. Overall I found I skimmed this a bit but still a learning activity all the same.

[Giulia Citrolo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found the structure of the chapters quite erratic and in general not always easy to follow, but I really appreciated how she managed to always flash out the victims of the attacks, turning them into people rather than just numbers and names. In general an educational but tough read.

[Patrick Downey · Rating 4 out of 5]

very very good read, especially for a non fiction history book. patrick ryan’s story is incredible and o’leary does a great job of depicting the Troubles as a serious political struggle (that i would have supported) against a tyrannical government, but also as a movement that caused serious amounts of harm to innocent civilians along the way. she did a great job of capturing ryan’s story within the greater context of the conflict between the IRA and the british government and the impact it had on the people of Northern Ireland

Quote:
“That’s human nature at its best or worst. We are all flawed entities.”

[John White · Rating 4 out of 5]

An engaging, well researched and fairly balanced book about an odious individual. Well worth reading if you have more than a passing interest in 'The Troubles'.

[Jamie Smyth · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.8 Smackaroos

Honestly a bit disappointing.
The story is really interesting, and one I'm happy to have learned.
O'Leary just goes on too many West Brit tangents. A very one dimensional view of history.
You can say that yes, Ryan was a bad dude, while also showing both sides of a conflict.
Any book that paints Thatcher as a reasonable human is automatically a bad read.
I feel an extended Wikipedia page on Ryan would be a better substitute to this book.

[Bradley Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.7 - finished this book within a week of starting it. Loved the way it is written as an interview with Patrick Ryan whilst chronologically revisiting some of the worst acts of violence during The Troubles. Also appreciated how the victims were described and humanised and weren’t just another number or statistic.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pros: Excellent story and a really easy read, full of lots of historical information to set the stage of this story which I would not have known about otherwise.

Cons: This story is not big enough for this size book, a lot of the information in this book felt like filler and exaggerated wording to increase the word count.

Overall: worth a read if you are interested in an amazing story.

[Peter Anderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

A troubling read…

There are two points that I’d like to make about this book:

Firstly, it is clearly very well researched and well written. Ms O’Leary is obviously a very skilled journalist.

Secondly, the subject of the book, “Father” Patrick Ryan, is as despicable person as you could ever happen to meet. It’s his appalling lack of compassion for those murdered as a result of his actions and his apparent “gutless” endeavours not to be actually involved in the “republican cause”, leaving it to others to do the actual fighting that made this book such a difficult read.

Towards the end of the book Ryan is quoted as saying:

“The only regret that I have was that I wasn’t more effective; that the bombs made with the components I supplied, didn’t kill more. That is my one regret.’”

All I can say is it’s a real pity that he was never made to face justice for the criminal acts he committed.

Can I recommend this book? NO!

Regards,
Peter

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was disappointing. I almost gave it 2 stars. The subject is fascinating - the story is unique and full of intrigue, but O’Leary doesn’t deliver that in her narrative. A tale of a Catholic priest, who went from being a missionary in Africa to becoming a procurer of weapons, bomb parts, and cash for the IRA— winning the trust of Gadaffi and Libyan intelligence, has a lot of interesting potential. Instead, O’Leary fails to help us really understand Father Patrick Ryan. Although she interviewed him for the book, she doesn’t interrogate the incongruity of a person dedicated to a religious life, who also wants to help the IRA obtain weapons, money, and explosive components. Instead, she makes simplistic and broad statements like the fact that he poached rabbits and skinned them for his family to eat when he was growing up, showed that he had a ruthless nature. She also doesn’t seem to understand why Catholics in the north turned against the occupying force of British soldiers. Her explanation for that made me shake my head.

O’Leary inserts odd/awkward and irrelevant tangents that frustrated me. The first 3 paragraphs of Chapter Twenty (A Very Wicked Man) talk about Queen Victoria visiting Kilkenny in 1861 and how that visit bankrupted the owner of Muckross house. Why? Because Patrick Ryan was in Kilkenny in 1989 and he bought a raffle ticket that won him a ticket to America. Then she tells that the British talk about extraditing him from the US, if he goes there. Does he go? What happens with that? We don’t know because then she briefly covers Ryan’s unsuccessful 1989 European Parliament campaign bid.

The ending of the book just kind of trails off and abruptly stops. There is no assessment, no final summing up.

[Reilly · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don’t know much about The Troubles. This book was an interesting and informative overview of The Troubles in Ireland, Northern Ireland, and continental Europe. The author interviewed the subject, Father Patrick Ryan, and let him tell his own story. The author supplemented Ryan’s story with research and historical context. As such, the book highlights certain episodes – acts of violence, political meetings, assassinations, prison breaks, etc. – while letting Fr. Patrick Ryan explain what he was doing at the time.

I take Father Ryan’s quotes (a lot of the book) with a grain of salt. It really reads like an old man telling you about how cool and influential he used to be. I kept thinking of the way a college professor characterized Winston Churchill’s account of WWII: “So then I told Joey to shut up and listen to the plan that would save us…”. Father Ryan depicts himself as cool under pressure, charismatic, suave, always in control, winding people around his finger, a badass lone wolf operator, a crusader for Ireland. He notices tails on him. He predicts problems for operations. His hindsight is 20/20 and he never would have made the mistakes that other people made. He’s his own boss and doesn’t work for or become indebted to the IRA. He has no bosses. He lives on his own terms. He played an important role in IRA history, no doubt.

Not to say I didn’t enjoy this book. Jennifer O’Leary crafts a thrilling story here. Whether it’s history or historical fiction, I don’t know.

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating story about Fr Patrick Ryan’s involvement as a key player in helping the IRA. I enjoy the fact it is written almost as an interview with him, which adds authenticity to the story. He holds nothing back in his opinions of the British hierarchy.

I found his explanation of his negotiation techniques interesting. He landed himself in many situations where extracting Intel was required, and he had a way of doing that through methods he essentially learned while working as a priest.

Only downfall is that the book has a fairly abrupt ending, would have liked a bit more information on the years after his involvement ceased.

[Lauren Draper · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book more than I did... O'Leary is an excellent journalist, and this history was fascinating, but it felt at times like I was being told how to feel about the participants in the narrative, rather than told the history and allowed to make judgments. Perhaps because I listened to The Padre, I struggled to follow more than I would have had I read it, but I felt like the story was meandering, and sometimes the point of the info being shared was quite unclear. While it was interesting to read more about The Troubles, but I don't know if this is a good starting point for my understanding.

[Rick Bach · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting story based mainly on interviews with a priest who lived in Europe and worked for the IRA but unfortunately it's hard to warm to the protagonist who is very lacking in self awareness. I preferred Rory Carroll's book about the Brighton bomber which came out around the same time and which was a lot more rounded.

[MG · Rating 4 out of 5]

I heard the author being interviewed when the book was released which is why I bought it. The emphasis was on the fact that the author had managed to interview the subject of the title. I rate 4 as I thought it seemed to lack my expectation of material from the interview with Ryan. However the story was well researched (and included notes) and thus provided context to each chapter's focus.

[Bryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting book but it doesn’t have a great deal of substance. There’s an awful lot of background, scene setting waffle and padding. I’d be being generous if I said the essence of this was in less than 25% of it. Was the author paid by the word? Having said that there are some interesting things that I don’t recall reading about elsewhere.

[Paul M Mullan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting book which was more an interview that the biography I was expecting, difficult to keep up at times but came together well at the end! Certainly not like any catholic priests I’ve ever met.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting read. Well researched with no attempt made to justify or reason the chosen lifestyle. We all approach this topic with personal baggage. Be it pro or anti. So this made for an interesting read as it simply gave the facts as spoken by Ryan & a few others. Certainly worth a read.

[Andrew Young · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fairly decent, probably a bit too long. I’m reading too many books on the troubles

[Hayley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book was fantastic, long live irish liberation.

[Abbey Lanton · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book appears well researched, however, the delivery was lacking. Difficult to follow at times and needed more character building.

[Bob Green · Rating 5 out of 5]

A cold and emotionless book but that may be due to the person at the heart of this fascinating history of the troubles and a priest who ditched the collar to work for the IRA.

[Kiegan O'Sullivan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Appalling how involved a so called man of God with such a heinous period in Irish history. Overall, a recommended read.

[D D · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a dyslexic reader this was torture, the author must of used a thesaurus for every second word

[Stuart · Rating 4 out of 5]

Worth a read if you are interested in The Troubles. Former Priest Patrick Ryan is an in interesting character and a well known person in the movement.

[Colm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not as revealing or exciting as one might think. A decent read.

[Liz · Rating 3 out of 5]

not really a biography of ryan as much as his weaving in and out of ira operations.

[Tiarnán · Rating 3 out of 5]

a decent page-turner on one of the more eccentric figures in the Provisional movement

[John Lynch · Rating 1 out of 5]

RIP Fr Patrick. A great man that stood up for his people when it was neither convenient or easy.

[Iva · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good one, it’s a very factual retelling but it gives great context and historical background to the story of a nationalist priest.