Ampleforth: Fr Cassian Dickie has died

Fr Cassian Dickie

Fr Cassian Dickie OSB, Benedictine monk of Ampleforth Abbey, died peacefully in the Monastery Infirmary at Ampleforth Abbey on 1 October 2022, at the age of 81.

He was born in Aberdeen in May 1941 and attended Robert Gordon's College in the city. Between 1960 and 1962 he worked in the family pharmacy and then began training as a Chartered Accountant. He gained an MA in Medieval and Modern History from the University of Aberdeen and then a Dip. Ed. from the University of Edinburgh.

For the next twenty years he filled a variety of posts in very different settings: Assistant Master at St Mirin's Academy in Paisley (1969-1971); Lecturer in Liberal Studies at Peterborough Technical College (1973-1975); Head of Sixth Form, St Benedict's, Bury St Edmund's (1975-1980); and Assistant Head Teacher at St David's High School, Dalkeith. In 1973 he was also a prospective Liberal Candidate for Peterborough.

He was a convert to Catholicism and in 1988 joined the Benedictine community at Farnborough Abbey in Hampshire. He joined the monastic community at Ampleforth Abbey in August 1990 and was ordained priest in January 1996. For a short period of time Fr Cassian was Housemaster of St Aidan's in Ampleforth College, as well as being Junior Master and Master of Studies in the Abbey. Fr Cassian worked in the local parish in Kirkbymoorside before becoming parish priest of Our Lady and St Wilfrid, Warwick Bridge (1999-2002) and then parish priest of St Mary's, Knaresborough (2002-2005). In 2005 Fr Cassian was appointed prior of the community of Ampleforth monks at St Benedict's Monastery, Bamber Bridge. In 2008 he moved to St Austin's, Liverpool, where he remained until the parish was handed over to the pastoral care of the Archdiocese of Liverpool in 2012. In the last the ten years he lived in the parishes in Bamber Bridge, Parbold, and then Leyland.

In 2019 Fr Cassian underwent surgery for cancer, followed by chemotherapy. He returned to reside in the Monastery Infirmary at Ampleforth Abbey in May 2022, where he died peacefully on 1 October.

Fr Cassian's body will be received into the Abbey Church at Ampleforth at 6pm on Tuesday 11 October. His funeral Mass will be celebrated at 11.30am in the Abbey Church on Wednesday 12 October, followed by burial in Monks' Wood.