Farewell, Fr Enda. Welcome, Fr John

Fr Enda, Parish Priest since 2008, has been appointed to the parish of St Andrew's, Westland Row. There will be a farewell reception in his honour on Thursday, 6th October, in St Mary's GAA Club, Saggart, at 8 pm. Tribute will be paid to him then for all his good work among us. All parishioners are welcome to attend.

Fr John Gilligan, Parish Administrator, St Andrew's, Westland Row, since 2007 (see here) has been appointed Moderator to our two parishes. He will be given a public welcome at the reception above mentioned in St Mary's GAA Club.

For an explanation of the term 'Moderator', see par. 4 of Dublin's Priest Appointments 2008, the same document that announces the appointment of Fr Enda to Saggart (here).

The work of each team [i.e. Team Ministry in a 'Pastoral Area' made up of a group of parishes] will be coordinated by a priest Moderator.  His role will be one of primus inter pares [i.e. first among equalsl], since each of the Team Members has an equal responsibility within the entire pastoral area. Each of the priest members of the team will celebrate Mass in each of the parish Churches and is bound to fulfill the duties and obligations of a Parish Priest referred to in cc. 528-530, 543. In addition, each Priest is also responsible to the Archbishop and to the faithful of the Parishes.    

For more information see the Newsletters for the 11th and 18th September. In the latter there is a very important notice from the Parish Pastoral Council entitled  'Potential Sale of Old School Building, Saggart'.

Tiptop Work! Renovation Complete with Repair of Tower Pinnacle

Back Again in its Place : The Repaired Finial (foreground, right)  5.9.2016

Many parishioners were unaware of it, maybe, while others were, though saying nothing about it. What are we talking about?  A small piece of unfinished business from the great work done on the exterior of St Mary's from late autumn 2014 to Easter 2015. Once you became aware of it, it just would not go away, and remained there to detract somewhat from the magnificent overall effect left by the rest of the work. We have a lovely church tower capped by a fine crenellated parapet with four pinnacles rising high at each corner. On top of each pinnacle there is what is called a 'finial' which, in our case, is in the form of a stone ball (click on above photo to enlarge it). Now one of these finials must not have been attached securely enough into the top of its pinnacle and had to be taken down for repair sometime in April of last year. Months went by, those who had noticed its going waiting patiently for its reappearance. Summer came and went. 2016 came and was going swiftly by.  Still no sign. The knowledgeable Christy Keane assured those who inquired that the matter was being dealt with and to just hold on a bit longer. Every day as one drove through the village, a glance up at the church tower revealed whether there was any news. Was there ever going to be any great news at all, one wondered ever more sceptically.  So then, what great joy it was when yet another weary glance up at the sky on Thursday, 25th August showed that, yes, yes, it had come back! 

Now we can show off the finally completed work with great fanfare. For photos of the entire work of external renovation see here.  For the story of the 'missing' finial, see here.  (To change slide at your own pace, click on the screen for a desktop or touch it for a tablet.)

Ordinations 2016

When you visit a hotel at this time of year, especially at weekends, you are likely to come on a wedding reception. Or, by a very remote chance, you may come on a celebration of a different, though equally joyful kind, i.e. an evening reception for a priest ordained earlier that day. Ordinations, frequent in the past, are a rare occurrence today, leaving parishioners less and less likely to witness a ceremony that is as solemn, moving and, of course, happy as a wedding. We had the privilege of experiencing what it is to have an ordination in our parishes when Seamus McEntee was ordained on 3 June 2014 in the Pro-Cathedral (see here for a report of the ordination -- the only one for Dublin that year -- and  here for some photos taken after Fr Seamus's Mass of Thanksgiving in Rathcoole, Saturday 7th June).

Nine students who had studied in Maynooth (or done part of their studies there before going to Rome for theology) were ordained for their various dioceses or religious orders during June and July. The photo below shows two of them, Conor McGee (diocese of Meath) and Jaimie Twohig (Pallottine community or SAC, Society of the Catholic Apostolate -- see the website here for Shankill parish which they have charge of). It was taken at a reception in the Clayton Hotel, Cork, following Fr Jaimie's ordination on Saturday 16th July in St Joseph's Church, Little Island. Fr Conor's ordination took place on Sunday 19th June in Tullamore (see here for a report and photo). Also in the photo is Donal McMahon (of this parish), who accompanied Conor and Jaimie for part of their studies in Maynooth.

There were no ordinations to the priesthood for the Dublin diocese this year; there were eight ordinations to the diaconate (on the 4th June -- see Archbishop Martin's homily here). But ordinations to the religious life certainly hit the headlines: on Saturday 9th July in this, the 800th year since the order's foundation, eight Dominicans were ordained priests in St Saviour's Church, Dublin (read a report here).

Feel free to visit Maynooth College over the summer. In the cloisters of St Patrick's House, on the west side of the main quadrangle, you will see photos, ordination year by ordination year, of students going back to the early decades of the 20th century. Though we may not attend many ordinations these days and though very few of us have (as formerly quite a few had) a priest in the family, still we are all very likely, at least, to have a priest in our family tree. Look out for him, then, in his class photo.

Finally, I'm reminded of the poem Gerard Manley Hopkins (buried in the Jesuit plot in Glasnevin) wrote after attending (or even officiating at?) a wedding.  He wishes happiness for the married couple and then thinks of his own vocation. Read it here.

PS   We wish Fr Jaimie's SAC confrère Brendan McCarrick every happiness and blessing next Sunday 24th July. He will be ordained in Sligo just a week after Jaimie!  Doesn't match the Dominicans but still . . .

Fr Conor McGee,  Fr Jaimie Twohig,  Mr Donal McMahon