The Rector writes……

In some churches, the period between 1st September and 4th October (St Francis Day), is observed as ‘creation time’. It often coincides with harvest thanksgiving. However creation time is about much more than thanking God for the fruits we enjoy from land and sea, important though this is. It is about our stewardship of the earth, our care of the environment and our respect for all living things.

One organisation that promotes environmental awareness within the churches in this country is Eco-Congregation Ireland. Their vision is to see churches throughout Ireland adopt an eco approach to worship, lifestyle, property and finance management, community outreach and contact with the developing world.  I recently spent a few minutes browsing their website. It makes for some very interesting reading. One section includes an environmental check-up for your church. It covers such areas as incorporating environmental themes in our services, using energy saving light bulbs in our buildings, promoting native species of plants and shrubs on church land to encourage wildlife, as well as much more. Take a few minutes to read through it and I guarantee you will look at our church buildings, churchyards and other properties with new eyes. The great thing about it is that everything is easily achievable. It is not about massive effort or a total change in behaviour or expensive adaptation projects for buildings, but about small gestures that are part of an attitude of mind, that come together to make a difference. Please look it up and if it inspires you to talk to me further about it, don’t be reticent about coming forward. A couple of years ago I preached a sermon on this topic and as a result someone very kindly put up some bird boxes in both Frankfield and Douglas! Look closely and you will see them there still today hopefully waiting for some occupants next spring.

On Tuesday 24 October, as part of our collaboration as Douglas Churches Together, we have invited the Revd Elaine Murray from Carrigaline to speak and stimulate discussion from her own experience of being involved with Eco-Congregation Ireland. The meeting will be held, by kind permission, in the Library in Douglas Village Shopping Centre and will start at 11.00am. It will last about an hour. We hope that together as churches in this part of Cork, this event will prompt us to do something individually and corporately. This is not an attempt to form a committee or arm twist people into taking on a job! It is an opportunity to think about environmental issues with a Christian context and to ask questions and contribute to discussion. If some individual projects come out of this, so much the better. I hope to see many of you there.

Yours in Christ,                 Adrian.

 

 

St. Michael’s National School News.

We are all delighted to be back to school this September with 61 pupils and 10 wonderful new junior infants.  They have all settled in very well and made lots of friends. They are already writing numbers and learning pre-reading sounds. We are excited to be starting our Aistear programme in the junior room where the pupils will be experiencing more play based learning. The older pupils have already begun to prepare for their debating competitions and are becoming very confident speakers.

We are hoping to be recognised as an active school this year and receive our flag so we can be seen running laps of the school every day to keep fit.

Next Friday we begin our hurling training at the Rockies. After school swimming is already underway and we have bought lots of new play equipment for active break times. Ms Phoebe Chow from the Cathedral has begun teaching singing to all classes this term.

The middles classes (1st to 3rd) will soon be learning to knit which is a good way to improve fine motor skills. We are hoping to find some parish knitters to help with this also.

The senior room are looking forward to attending the Annual School’s service in Bandon at the end of this month.

We are grateful to the parish for allowing us to use the hall for the few weeks we will be waiting for the temporary accommodation for our new class. We hope the construction will be underway very soon.

Finally, we welcome Ms Alison Quill to the staff. She is the new learning support and resource teacher.

St Luke’s School News – We extend a very warm welcome to our 26 new Junior Infants and six new pupils who joined various other classes in the school. We also welcome some new members of staff; Ms Crowley, Ms Collins and Ms Dinaj. We wish Mr O’Shea well as he goes on career break.

Claire Jermyn and Emily Whitaker, both transition year students from Ashton will be working with us as part of their Community Action Work this term. We hope that they will be very happy working in St Luke’s.

Congratulations to the following pupils who were presented with prizes at the end of term service in June:

Val Jago Shield: Leon Sahm, Samuel Johnson and Brendan Geary

Runners-Up: Kian Le Roux, Katie Wilson and Isaac Sutton

Flack Trophy for Handwriting: Jessica Abule

Gash Squaddy of the Year: Jessica Young

Bean Uí Chaoimh Shield: Jack Kingston

Runner-Up: Sophie Marry

Coombes Shield for Sportsmanship: Cian Dorgan

Gradam Mháire Roycroft (Pupil who contributed most to school life): Julia McCarthy

We look forward to a very happy and productive year ahead.

 

 

Parish Bowls Club: The Bowls Club reopened in September after the summer break. They meet on Wednesday evenings in the Canon Packham Hall. The play is competitive but very good humoured! Parishioners who are interested in playing bowls are always welcome. Please contact the club secretary Jack Forde (Tel. 4291299).

 

 

 

Harvest Thanksgivings:

As advertised in last month’s issue, on Sunday 1 October we look forward to having Revd Kingsley Sutton, rector of Kilgariffe Union, with us as guest preacher at the Harvest Thanksgiving services in Frankfield at 10.00 and Douglas at 11.15.

The Harvest Thanksgiving service in St Michael’s in Blackrock will be held on Sunday 15 October. On this occasion, we are delighted to welcome Bishop Michael Mayes as preacher.

 

 

Anam Cara, the organisation that supports bereaved parents, is holding its next monthly Parent Evening on Wednesday 4th of October from 19:30 to 21:00 in the Clayton Hotel, Silver Springs, Tivoli, Cork. This event is open to all bereaved parents. For more information see anamcara.ie or call our Information Line on 085 2888 888.

 

 

Cork, Cloyne and Ross Clergy Conference This month the clergy of the diocese will again attend the annual conference in Ballylickey. The speaker, in this year of Reformation 500 will be The Rev Dr Jan Eckerdal, Diocesan Theologian/Canon Theologian in the Diocese of Strängnäs, Church of Sweden. The conference takes place between 9 and 11 October. In the event of a pastoral emergency, please contact the Rectory and messages will get to the clergy in West Cork.

 

Update on St. Michael’s Conservation Project:

Currently some conservation work is being carried out on the spire and tower of St Michael’s with the aim of waterproofing the “envelope” at the west end of the building. Years of water penetration of spire and tower has compromised metal fixings supporting the lath and plaster internal West wall. Parishioners will be well aware that in 2016 it was felt necessary to secure the massive Haines memorial on that wall with resin anchors. The Select Vestry has decided to address the issue of water ingress, drawing on generous grants from the Built Heritage Investment and Architectural Conservation Area Schemes. Under the guidance of Paul Hegarty (Fourem), the spire and crenellated parapet walls and finials of the tower will be repointed, the roof of the tower will be renewed, and leadwork where nave roof meets tower will be reconfigured. Raineys, have been awarded the contract for this work, and the duration (weather dependent) is six weeks.  It is not envisaged that the works will disrupt parish and school services in the church in any way.

 

Seafarers – A Call to all Knitters  Last July we celebrated Sea Sunday in Marmullane with a united service of appreciation for all seafarers and for the work of the Coastguard, RNLI and Mission to Seafarers.

We also launched a knitting campaign. The Mission to Seafarers in Ireland work on behalf of all seafarers. In addition, they gift beanie hats to sailors who greatly appreciate them, especially when their journeys take them far north in freezing weather. Encouraged by the Revd Hazel Minion, several parishioners have already started knitting. A collection of finished hats will be made towards the end of November.

 

 

Parish Bible Studies. Our parish Bible groups continue to be led by Florence Binions and we are grateful to her for all the preparation she puts into each session. This year the focus is on the Old Testament and looks at some of the major characters and events in their own right, while also understanding them in terms of the whole Bible. These groups meet on a fortnightly basis in Blackrock and Moneygourney. We thank those who host these meetings in their homes. They meet fortnightly as advertised in the parish and are a wonderful opportunity for learning together and for fellowship.

 

Venue: Joan Miller’s home, Ballintemple

Dates: Wednesdays, 4th, 18th October, 1st, 15th, 29th November

Time: 2.30 – 4.00 p.m.

Venue : Carol Boylan’s home, Moneygourney

Dates: Thursday, 5th,19th October, 16th, 30th November & Wednesday,13th December Christmas Fellowship.

Time: 7.30pm

Further information: Florence Binions 0861604544 or any of the clergy

 

A Fishy Business/Gosforth’s Fete (Theatre Supper Evening)

In this parish we will be holding a Theatre Supper Night in conjunction with Carrigaline Union on the 9th, 10th and 11th of November.  We are delighted to have cast both plays and a team in place building the set and we have a prompter.  We also have teams of people to help with serving of the supper and front of house.  As you can imagine, a lot of work goes into making a this a success and if anyone is interested in helping out in any way, please contact the curate.

 

 

Facebook Page – As many of you may be aware we have a parish Facebook page.  The address is https://www.facebook.com/douglasunionfrankfield  If you are on Facebook and have not done already, please ‘like’ our page. Keep an eye on it over the winter and we will try and make it interesting!

 

 

Service and Sausages – We will be resuming our Service with Sausages on the 8th of October in St. Luke’s Church in Douglas at 6pm.  This is a fun service, mainly for primary school children.  Many parents have helped out preparing delicious juice and hot dogs for hungry worshippers following the service.  It is always nice to see new faces helping out and if anyone is interested in testing out their culinary skills, please contact the curate.

 

 

 

vestry meetingSelect Vestry Meetings

Frankfield Vestry Meeting will be held on Thursday, 5th October at 8pm in the Sunday School Room, Frankfield.  The September meeting did not go ahead, due to a lack of quorum, so urgent items of business need to be addressed.  Please make every effort to attend.

 

Douglas Select Vestry Meeting will take place in the Canon Packham Hall on Friday, 20th October at 8pm.

 

 

Parish Contacts:

Ven. Adrian Wilkinson, Tel: 4891539. E-mail: amwilkinson@eircom.net  (Day off Monday)

Rev. David Bowles Tel: 4358226. Email: dgd_bowles@yahoo.co.uk (Day off Saturday)

Rev. Hazel Minion, Tel:4361924.E-mail:hminion22@hotmail.com(Works Tuesday/Wednesday)

Parish Office Tel: 4369578. E-mail: douglasofficecork@gmail.com(Friday mornings only)

 

Parish Website: www.douglas.cork.anglican.org Follow us on twitter @DouglasUnion or on facebook            https://www.facebook.com/douglasunionfrankfield

 

 

 

Letter from The Bishop

Important Notice re Reformation500 Broadcast from St Fin Barre’s Cathedral

A national televised broadcast of an act of worship from our Diocese comes once in a generation. We have been given that opportunity. Not only will this be a broadcast of our own Diocesan Commemoration of this 500th Anniversary of the start of the Reformation, it will also be RTE’s (our national public service broadcaster) principal broadcast marking Reformation500 nationally.

As a Diocese we need to put our best foot forward and to do that we need every parish involved and in attendance, together with you. We need a full St Fin Barre’s Cathedral Cork for this on Sunday, 22nd October. The recording will begin at 4 p.m. and everyone will need to be in their seats by 3.45 p.m. at the latest (absolutely no latecomers admitted).

The Dean of Cork and I have been in extended conversations about all of this and he, together with the team at St Fin Barre’s, have already put an immense amount of work into this. Ultimately, however, it will be a team effort involving all of us.

We need a full congregation in attendance, of all ages (except perhaps very young on this occasion as recording a Service of this kind might be a draw on the patience of the very young), and ideally we need people who will join heartily in the Service and especially in the singing of hymns.

We’ve worked on the basis of the Diocesan Census of churchgoers over 18 to try to carve up the allocation of seats (obviously a reserve is being kept aside to cater for people who just show up, as well as for civic and ecumenical guests).

I do hope you can weigh in behind this unique call on us and opportunity to tell something of the Gospel, of our branch of Christianity and of our life here in CCR.

+Paul Cork

 

We in Douglas Union with Frankfield have been allocated 36 seats. If you would like to attend this special service, please give your name to the clergy on Sunday 1st October or phone the Rectory (leaving a message if the house is unoccupied) or email amwilkinson@eircom.net BEFORE midday on Tuesday 3th October. I have inform the Dean of our numbers by that date. I hope we will fill our allocation and have to ask for more tickets. Adrian

 

 

 

SERVICES THIS MONTH

1st

October

(Green)

4th

October

Wednesday

8th

October

(Green)

15th

October

(Green)

18th

October

St. Luke’s Day

(Red)

22nd

October

(Green)

29th

October

(Green)

St Michael’s

Blackrock

8.30  Holy Communion

11.30 Service of the Word

8.30 Holy Communion

11.30 Holy

Communion

8.30  Holy Communion

11.30 Holy Communion

8.30  Holy Communion

11.30 Morning Prayer

8.30  Holy Communion

11.30 Holy Communion

St Mary’s

Marmullane

9.45 Service of the Word

9.45 Holy Communion

9.45 Morning Prayer

9.45 Holy Communion

9.45 Holy Communion

Holy Trinity

Frankfield

10.00

Harvest Thanksgiving

10.00 Holy Communion

10.00 Holy Communion

10.00 Morning Prayer

10.00 Holy Communion

St. Luke’s

Douglas

11.15

Harvest Thanksgiving

11.00

Holy Communion

11.15 Holy Communion

11.15 Morning Prayer

11.00

Holy Communion

11.15 Holy Communion

11.15 Holy Communion