Maguire, himself brought up in dire poverty, deployed charisma and tireless activism in the cause of the ‘unloved and unlovely’
for his government’s decision to pass voluntary assisted dying laws.
“It was like trying to catch a shooting star, and every time you felt you had a firm grip, you just had to close your eyes and hang on, with absolutely no idea where you’d end up,” she said.of James and Annie Maguire who had emigrated from Scotland. One sister died very young, another when Maguire was 11. He grew up in abject poverty, his father a brutal drunk who would beat his mother and spend the rent money at the pub, forcing the family to move house frequently.
“I wanted to work towards making the world a fairer place, to help people who were up against it to get ahead. It was also serendipity. It meant I’d have a home, and food, for the next few years,” he said. “For us kids, he was like a pied piper. He had a radical style in the way he presented himself, he could be like a stand-up comedian, holding an audience for long periods, and he had a great gift for explaining himself,” one former congregant told Williams.
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