Fr Kevin Conway SMA

Fr Kevin, the son of Liam and Anne Conway has four brothers and three sisters. 

Fr Kevin’s primary education was in Glenmornan and Altishane Primary Schools and he did his secondary schooling in St Colman’s, Strabane (now called Holy Trinity). After leaving school Kevin went for further studies and then worked for some time. 

In 2000 he decided to study for the priesthood for his home diocese of Derry. He entered St Patrick’s College, Maynooth completing his Degree in Philosophy studies and gaining a Degree in Pastoral Theology. However, having also had contact with many priests of the SMA (the late Fathers Tommie Blee and Michael McGlinchey were from the parish) Kevin felt a calling to missionary priesthood. After a long period of discernment he made the decision to leave Maynooth and applied to enter the SMA formation programme.

His first port of call was the International Spiritual Year programme at Silang, Philippines where Fr Gus O’Driscoll SMA, a brother of the Provincial Leader, was in charge. After completing his one-year programme he was assigned to Fr Ollie Noonan SMA in Lodwar, Kenya for a pastoral year. He then moved south to Kenya’s capital city, Nairobi, where he joined other SMA seminarians – from several African countries as well as India and Poland – for theological studies.

He completed these studies in 2010 and was appointed to minister as a Deacon in the SMA parish – Our Lady of the Rosary & St Patrick’s, Walthamstow, London – in the diocese of Brentwood where he was under the guidance of Fr John Brown SMA (a fellow Tyrone man, from Carrickmore).

He was appointed as the assistant priest  of Our Lady of the Rosary and St Patrick’s on 1^st December 2013.