The Right Rev Thomas McMahon, the former Roman Catholic Bishop of Brentwood known for his anti-nuclear activism and the controversial remodelling of Brentwood Cathedral, has died aged 89.
A vice-president of the Catholic peace organisation Pax Christi since 1989, McMahon participated in protests outside international arms fairs and the US embassy in London. He opposed nuclear weapons, differing from many English and Welsh bishops who followed a more ambiguous line. In 1999 he exposed the gap between the government's ethical foreign policy claims and arms sales to Indonesia, and in 2006 he opposed replacing the Trident missile system.
Despite his liberal activism on peace issues, McMahon adhered strictly to traditional Catholic teaching on abortion. In 2004 he joined the US-based anti-abortion group Helpers of God's Precious Infants in picketing a Marie Stopes clinic in Essex.
McMahon faced criticism for spending millions on a neoclassical makeover of the Cathedral Church of St Mary and St Helen in Brentwood between 1989 and 1991, designed by architect Quinlan Terry. He maintained the funds came from an anonymous donation.
Born in Dorking, Surrey, to Irish parents, McMahon was educated at St Bede's Catholic grammar in Manchester and trained for the priesthood at Saint-Sulpice in Paris. Ordained in 1959, he served in Essex parishes before becoming chaplain to Essex University in 1972. He was appointed Bishop of Brentwood in 1980 at age 44.
