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Church of Ireland Notes from ‘The Irish Times’

Concert for Raphoe Cathedral

A unique blend of music will fill the Derry air next month when two of Ireland’s most historic Church of Ireland cathedrals – St Columb’s, Derry, and St Eunan’s, Raphoe – join together for a Spring Gala Concert. The concert, in aid of the Raphoe Cathedral Restoration Fund, will take place in St Columb’s Cathedral next Friday at 7.30pm.

Performers will include the Britannia Concert Band (under Musical Director Stewart Smith), St Columb’s Cathedral Choir (Musical Director Dr Derek Collins), the Raphoe Ulster–Scots Pipe Band (Pipe Major Mark Hassan) and two clergy of the diocese, the Rev Sean Hanily (button accordion) who will be accompanied by the Rev Nigel Cairns (organ). Guest soloists will include Robert Goodman (trumpet), Gail Quigley (oboe) and Martyn Goodman (trombone). The programme will include a variety of genres, with the music of Holst, Elgar, Vaughan Williams, Saint–Saens, Philip Sparke and many others.

The Spring Gala Concert is part of an ambitious campaign to raise €650,000 to pay for the restoration of Raphoe Cathedral. Work will begin just after Easter 2020 on phase one of the restoration, and will continue throughout the summer.

The Dean of Raphoe, the Very Rev Arthur Barrett, is hoping people from across the Diocese of Derry and Raphoe, and people of all faiths and none, will lend their support to the fundraising effort. He said the Spring Gala Concert would be an unprecedented musical event. Dean Barrett has described St Eunan’s Cathedral as a site of enormous spiritual, ecclesiastical and cultural significance – regionally and nationally. “Christian faith has flourished in Raphoe for over 1,400 years,” he said, “and the Cathedral Church of St Eunan has been there for 800 of those years.

In St Patrick’s Cathedral, Armagh, tomorrow (Sunday) at 4.15p there will be a recital by Mr William Forrest, Organ Scholar in St Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast, who will play works by William Mathias, Buxtehude, J.S. Bach, Hindemith and Charles–Marie Widor. 

On Tuesday evening at 7.30pm in the crypt of Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, there will be a table quiz in support of the Cathedral’s Past Choristers Association. All are welcome – for further information or to book contact Victor Coe at pastchoristers@christchurch.ie

On the Fridays on Lent Choral Compline will be sung in Sandford parish church, Ranelagh at 7pm.  This beautiful meditative service provides a welcome respite from the busy Friday rush–hour.

Appointments to two Clogher parishes have recently been announced. The Revd Elaine Dunne, who is currently priest–in–charge of the Omey union of parishes in the Diocese of Tuam, Killala & Achonry, is to be the next rector of the Ballybay group pf parishes which consists of Ballybay, Clontibret and Muckno in Co. Monaghan. Ms Dunne was ordained in 2005 and has worked as curate–assistant in the grouped parishes of Castleknock and Mulhuddart with Clonsilla and as assistant–priest in the grouped parishes of Santry, Glasnevin and Finglas, in the Dioceses of Dublin and Glendalough. 

The Revd Francis Rutledge, Bishop’s Curate in Christ Church Primacy, Bangor, in the Diocese of Down, has been nominated as the new incumbent of Magheraculmoney, Kesh, in the Diocese of Clogher. A native of Belfast, Mr Rutledge was ordained  in 1986 and served curacies in Holywood, Co. Down, and Willowfield parish, Belfast, and was subsequently rector of St Hilda’s, Belfast, and Carrigrohane, Co. Cork. He was briefly in  Donacavey & Barr in the Diocese of Clogher before his appointment to his present position at Christ Church, Bangor, which is a shared church with a Methodist congregation.

 

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