Paul J. Doyle, a member of the Board of Directors of the Eire Society of Boston, was among 113 people who received the prestigious Cheverus Award from Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley at a Solemn Vespers Service on Sunday, 4 December 2016 at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston.

Doyle has long been involved with Hospice Care and the St Vincent de Paul Society. A parishioner of the Immaculate Conception Parish in Weymouth, he has been a CCD teacher and lector and has participated in many parish fundraising activities.

The awards are given annually to individuals for their dedicated service to the Church and God’s people. A criterion given to pastors suggests that nominees be laypersons who have served their parish over an extended period of time, doing so in a quiet, unassuming, and even unrecognized, manner.

Doyle’s nomination for the award was submitted by his pastor, Auxiliary Bishop of Boston, John A. Dooher and approved by Cardinal O’Malley.

The Cheverus Award was instituted by Cardinal Séan O’Malley in 2008 during the bicentennial year of the Archdiocese of Boston. The Cheverus medals are annually conferred upon select recipients from throughout the Archdiocese on or around the Solemnity of Christ the King.

The oval-shaped, silver medal bears the image of Bishop Jean-Louis Anne Magdelaine Lefebvre de Cheverus, the founding Bishop of Boston, who led the diocese from 1808 until his return to France in 1824 (he died in 1836 as the archbishop of Bordeaux). Bishop Cheverus’ coat of arms and episcopal motto diligamus nos invicem (let us love one another) appears on the reverse side of the medal.

Cardinal O’Malley has previously said that one purposes of the award is to “put a spotlight on those people whose hidden contributions to the life of the Church often go unnoticed.”

For more information on the Cheverus Award and the 2016 list of recipients, see the website for the Archdiocese of Boston at http://www.bostoncatholic.org/CheverusAwards/.

Photos courtesy of George Martell/Archdiocese of Boston.

John P. McGuire 12/4/16