CHURCH OF IRELAND NOTES
For Saturday 16th February 2002
From: The RCB Library
Email: RCB Library
Clerical Reminiscences Published
The Church of Ireland, certainly since disestablishment, has not been particularly active in memorialising its bishops, priests or laity through the medium of published memoir, autobiography or biography. Many of its personalities, of course, were far from memorable but others whose life and times would have merited attention, were quietly forgotten. Natural modesty, an overstated reserve, priestly reticence and, at least in the early decades after partition, a deliberately low profile were some of the reasons for this. However, times are changing and, as a number of recently published memoirs have attested, there is considerable interest in the life and times of the Church of Ireland as viewed from a personal perspective.
The latest memoir to appear is Believe it or Not by the Revd Patrick Semple. It is, on one level a series of reminiscences of his life - childhood in Wexford, school days in the King's Hospital, work and play in Dublin, vocation and training, and the parishes and ministries in which he served in Belfast, Stradbally, west Wicklow and Dublin. But on another level this is an account of the changing face of Ireland and how Church of Ireland communities adapted to that change. It is a journey from the world of the protestant socials and sporting clubs of the 1950s to an engagement, both socially and religiously, with the wider Irish society in the final quarter of the 20th century. Along the way there are explorations of faith, politics and society enlivened by good humour and plain speaking.
Believe it or Not is published by Columba Press at Euro 12.99.
Today (Saturday) the Church of Ireland Marriage Council will hold a conference in All Hallows College, Dublin, on
"Yours, Mine &
Ours" which will discuss second relationships and their implications for couples, step-families and children. The conference will begin at 10.00 am and is scheduled to end at 4.15 pm.
In Dublin tomorrow (Sunday) morning the preacher in the "Virtues and Vices" series of lecture sermons in the Chapel of Trinity College, Dublin, will be the philosopher, Dr John Gaskin. At Evensong in St Patrick's Cathedral there will be the first in a series of Lenten addresses. The preacher will be the Archbishop of York, the Most Revd David Hope, who will speak on "Temptation".
On Tuesday the third in the current series of lunchtime history lectures which have been organized by Christ Church Cathedral and Dublin City Council will begin in Christ Church at 1.15 pm. Dr Bernadette Williams from the Department of Medieval History in Trinty College, Dublin, will speak on "The Mendicants and the Anglo-Norman Church".
The annual Travers Smith Lecture in St Bartholomew's parish, Dublin, will be held on Tuesday at 8.00 pm in the Parish Room, Clyde Road. The speaker will be the Revd Kevin Moroney, Chaplain-Tutor in the Church of Ireland Theological College and Priest in Charge of St John's, Sandymount, whose subject will be "High Meets Low. Anglo-Catholicism in Ireland".
A Lenten seies of addresses organized by Rathfarnham Parish and the Church of the Holy Spirit, Ballyroan begins on Thursday in Rathfarnham Parish Church at 8.00 pm. The general theme is "Living Together in a Multi-Faith Society" and the first address will be given by the Vice-Principal of the Theological College, Canon W.J. Marshall, who will speak on "Christianity in the Light of Major World Faiths".
On Friday the Primate, Dr Robin Eames, will be in Co. Mayo where he will preach at a service to mark the 200th anniversary of the parish of Straid, Foxford.
Church of Ireland Notes appear in the Irish
Times whose web site may be found at
http://www.ireland.com/ |
