Based in Brussels, Belgium, Fr. Michael Begley, CSSp, is the current Executive Director of the European Spiritan Center for Cooperation and Development (Kibanda) and the European Spiritan Solidarity Fund (CESS). He is also the Editor in Chief of the quarterly Kibanda News Bulletin.
Previously, he served for five years as the Director of the Spiritan Office for Mission Advancement (SOMA) and the Spiritan Foundation in Houston, TX in the USA, and before then, worked for thirteen years as the Director of SPIRASI and the Center for the Care of Survivors of Torture at Dublin in Ireland.
Prior to these appointments, he ministered for eight years as the Father-in-Charge and Director of the Tangulbei Divisional Primary Health Care Program in Kenya amongst the pastoralist Pokot. Earlier, he was stationed at the USA River Junior Seminary and the Njiro Hill Senior Seminary for the then East African Foundation in Tanzania for five years as a lecturer /formator/ rector. Between 1979 and 1981, he was the National Coordinator of Services for hearing impaired and deaf persons at Banjul in the Gambia.
Apart from his formative 12 years of third level multi-disciplinary training in communications, clinical psychology, international humanitarian assistance, philosophy, public health medicine, and theology, he subsequently gained considerable experience in the educational, developmental, and healthcare sectors, including University education. In this respect, he has previously lectured at the faculty of Tropical Medicine and International Health at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, the Faculty of Public Health Medicine, and International Health at UCD, and the Faculty of Health Services Management (MBA) at the Smurfit School of Business Studies at UCD Ireland.
In addition to recorded media communications in multiple countries, he has served on more than 18 regional, national, and international Boards and Committees and has published 15 academic articles, 13 needs assessment, strategic planning and review reports, and various other texts on topics as varied as the care and rehabilitation of survivors of torture, living with deafness, suicide prevention, seeking asylum, and international developmental projects.
Moreover, Fr. Begley has extensive experience in a large variety fund-raising methodologies and engaging with national and international NGO’s, EU, UN organizations and Foundations in the USA and has been a Board member of UNIF-USA since 2012.