Mallow Union Newsletter
St. James’ Mallow, St. Mary’s Doneraile, St. Mary’s Castletownroche
December 2020
Rector in Charge: Canon Alan Marley
087/3128976
Email: alan.marley@ucc.ie
Pastoral Care: Rev. Tony Murphy
087/8327347
Email: tmurphy@tmahr.com
Website: www.mallow.cork.anglican.org
Facebook: Mallow Union of Parishes
Lay Readers: Avril Gubbins 022/24267
Emmanuel Adebisi 022/20477
We take this opportunity to wish all our readers a Happy and Peaceful Christmas and all good wishes for 2021.
We thank everyone in the parish for all there help and support in 2020 and we especially thank all those who took our services during the year Canon Alan Marley, Rev Tony Murphy, Avril Gubbins, Emmanuel Adebisi, Helen Burke and Canon Peter Rhys Thomas. We will be sad to see Canon Alan and Rev Tony leave us but we look forward to welcoming Rev. Meurig Williams in the New Year. (Don’t have the date yet)
St James’ Candlelight Concert goes online
It’s the time of year when people are starting to think about Christmas. Christmas in Mallow for many people starts with the Christmas Concert in St James’ Church. This year due to restrictions we have had to think outside the box and come up with a plan.
It has always been a community event and we want to keep that in mind so this year we are doing a live Facebook Concert on Friday the 11th of December. By having the concert that night we are keeping the tradition of the second Friday in December. The aim is that we can all be safe in our own homes enjoying the concert with our families or if restrictions allow maybe watch with friends or neighbours. There will be no panic for tickets everyone is invited.
We have even thought of the mince pies. Linda has agreed to make mince pies which will need to be pre-ordered from Susan Brennan 086/3530401. For collection on Thursday the 10th 4pm-7pm or Friday the 11th 12noon to 2pm at St James’ Church. Mince pies will be €2 each or €8 for 6. We want to create a festive atmosphere in our homes. All proceeds from the mince pies will go to church funds and we will also have a Gofundme page on Facebook if people wish to donate to the church fund. (You can also make a donation to the parish by sending it to Jackie Nagle or giving it to any of the church-wardens). You can make cheque payments payable to Mallow Union of Parishes.
The concert will be presented from St James’ Church but all performers will be recording their pieces at home. Cór Mhagh Ealla is busy preparing for the concert. It’s not an easy task for any choir to practice this year. This year’s concert will take a look back at some of our previous concerts. I hope you will join us on the night. It has been a hard year on everyone but this is our chance to come together while staying apart and start Christmas with what has now become tradition for many in Mallow. Have your candles and mince pies at the ready and create your own candlelight atmosphere in your own home.
Even though we are apart we would like to bring everyone’s photos together so we invite you to share your photos on social media using #StJamesChristmasAtHome
Zoom Bible Study continues on Wednesday nights at 8.15pm if you want links to this please email Canon Alan Marley.
Historic Graves
Thanks to Mr John Tierney Archaeologist and two local ladies St. Mary’s Castletownroche graveyard and church has been recorded and photographed. This is hugely beneficial to anyone with interest in local history and family
research. It is now on the website www.historicgraves.com so you can explore from the comfort of your own home.
Congratulations to Doris Adam and Kelly Uwumarogie who were married on Saturday 24th October in St. James’ Church Mallow.
Congratulations to Emma Brennan and Gladys Sherlock on their graduations.
Thanks to Jennifer Hartnett for all the work she put into the Welcome Tapestries she made for each of the three churches. They look amazing.
Sympathy
We extend our sympathy to the family of Bertie Daly who was laid to rest on the 11th October in his beloved St. John’s Buttevant. Our thoughts and prayers are very much with his sister Louise; and with Sydney, Jane, Jenny, William, Jonathan, Sara his nieces and nephews in this time of sadness and bereavement. A private funeral has taken place and at some time in the future, we will rightly gather to celebrate and give thanks for Bertie’s life.
Also we extend our sympathy to Anne Lysaght and family on the death of her sister Joan Meschede who passed away recently in France. She will be cremated and laid to rest with her husband in France.
Our thoughts and prayers are with the Nagle family on the death of Margaret. To her husband William, and daughters Margaret-Jane, Jacqueline, Elizabeth and son William & Margaret’s sister, Elizabeth Ludgate; with all the members of the wider family and Margaret’s many friends, during this time of sadness and bereavement. May she rest in peace and rise in Glory.
Our thoughts and prayers are with Mary St Leger and family on the death of her great aunt Eliza in Canada.
Our thoughts and prayers are also with William Forde and family on the death of his cousin Eddie Forde in Glenville.
What an unusual year we have had everything has been different for people. Mother’s Union members have all been busy in their own ways keeping in touch with each other and supporting people. Zoom meetings have been used to keep in contact which is good but nothing quite like meeting in person and sharing fellowship. Hopefully next year things will start getting back to normal. Hopefully everyone has received their Autumn/Winter mailing keeping you informed of everything and thanks to Hilary Dring our DIOCESAN president for keeping us in contact. Greetings and good health to everyone at Christmas.
A THOUGHT FOR ADVENT
Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle
and the life of the candle will not be shortened.
happiness never decreases by being shared.
may the humility of the shepherds,
the perseverance of the wise men,
the joy of the angels
and the peace of the Christ Child be
God’s gift to us and to people everywhere
this Christmas and always.
Amen
St. Fin Barre’s Cathedral
St. Fin Barre’s Cathedral celebrated the 150th Anniversary of the Consecration of the Cathedral by Bishop John Gregg on 30th November 1870. An online ceremony was broadcast from the Cathedral on the 30th November 2020. The Very Rev. Nigel Dunne, Dean of Cork read out greetings from President Michael D Higgins and from An Taoiseach and the Wardens also read out greetings for the Archbishop of Armagh and Dublin. If you would like to see more about these celebrations you can go the website: churchofirelandcork.com.
Some people may have missed the following if they didn’t receive the November newsletter.
Annual General Meeting
This year we had to do our meeting differently due to Covid-19. The Secretary of the Vestry Linda Deane sent out nomination forms to all registered vestry members to be returned with nominations. Then there was a Zoom meeting thanks to Canon Alan for hosting this. Jackie Nagle Treasurer presented the accounts and Linda Deane talked about the voting forms that were to be posted out. (Thanks to Linda Deane and Diana Buckley for sending out the forms to the registered members and getting them returned in a very short time scale. They were posted on the 8th October and back and counted on the 12th October) Thanks to everyone who joined the meeting and to Jackie and Linda for there work and to the Canon Alan, Linda and the Churchwardens for counting the votes.
The following were elected for 2020/21
Rectors Wardens: Peoples Warden
Hazel Ladd (Castletownroche) Diana Buckley
Mary St Leger (Doneraile) Catherine Harold Barry
Victor Wolfe (Mallow) Chris Bond
Andrew Gardiner (Rectors Glebe Warden) Susan Buckley
The Select Vestry Members are as follows: William Bartels, Emma Brennan, Susan Brennan, Maurice Clancy, Linda Deane, Myrtle Forde, Avril Gubbins, Aoife Ladd, Ina Lillis, Jackie Nagle, Ruth Sherlock and Jane Wharton.
Synods people 2020/23:
Ruth Sherlock, Linda Deane, Chris Bond and Victor Wolfe.
Supplemental Synods people:
Emmanuel Adebisi, Diana Buckley, Ina Lillis and Emma Brennan.
Nominators 2020/23:
Susan Brennan, Linda Deane, Victor Wolfe and Susan Buckley.
Supplemental Nominators:
Jackie Nagle, Diana Buckley, Chris Bond and Ina Lillis.
A short Zoom meeting was held on Thursday 15th October. Jackie Nagle was elected Treasurer and Linda Deane Secretary. Thanks to them for taking up the positions again.
Note from the Treasurer
I would like to thank all the parishioners for their donations, generosity and support of the parish over the last year. As always, it is very much appreciated. The support enables the parish to carry out its ministry and work, especially during this difficult and challenging time. A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to everyone.
Thank you.
Jackie Nagle (Treasurer)
Mallow Christmas Message 2020 from Rev. Meurig Williams
I am just about to embark on a journey of over a thousand kilometres: from the town of Nivelles, just South of Brussels in Belgium, to Mallow in County Cork. I’m excited and looking forward very much to meeting many of you very soon. But as I prepare to make this journey, I’m acutely aware that many hundreds of thousands of Irish people may not be able to make it home this Christmas. That will be a huge cause of sadness and frustration to so many families and loved-ones. Christmas 2020 will be like no other – one we’re unlikely to ever forget.
Travel – and the hardships and heartaches that go with it – is at the centre of the story we celebrate, this Christmas and every Christmas.
Mary and Joseph were ordered by the occupying Romans to travel from a distant province to be registered at Bethlehem, so that no-one slipped under the radar and avoided paying taxes to the Emperor, Caesar. The wise men followed a mysterious light from a far country, unsure about what they might find. And the shepherds left their fields and their flocks, coming down off the surrounding hills, to make their way to the manger.
And, although travel is limited for so many people this year, there is always a sense that we need to make some kind of a journey to celebrate the mysterious birth of the child who shows us what God is really like.
Some of us make that journey eagerly, as we wonder at the amazing love of God seen in the face of a tiny baby. Others of us have to summon-up a lot of courage, to overcome our fears or hurts or doubts; but, nonetheless, we sense that we are especially included in this amazing story. Others of us are struggling to get to Christmas this year because this Christmas is especially sombre and bleak: it’s an economic midwinter with all its uncertainties about jobs and money and livelihoods. For others of us it’s because our lives are overcome by grief and the loss of someone we love, lost cruelly and unexpectedly to this pitiless virus.
All this helps us to imagine how they will celebrate Christmas in many of the world’s desolate places where violence and hunger and injustice are the stuff of daily life. In my own Archdeaconry of France, which I’m preparing to leave, I will be thinking especially of people in the squalor of the makeshift refugee camps around the port of Calais, struggling to stay warm and dry, struggling to keep hope alive.
However we make our way towards Christmas day this year, we will probably arrive with a strange mix of questions, uncertainties, relief, hope and sadness. But may be the greatest gift we can bring is an enduring trust that we are heard and accepted as we are. Whatever we bring to Christmas day, however we get there, whatever words and symbols we can find to express all that we have, and all that we are, my prayer is that we cannot fail to be surprised by the inexhaustible love of God in the face of a tiny child.
Over these past few years, as I have lived and worked in France and Belgium, I have naturally wished people ‘Joyeux Noel’ – and, in my native Welsh, I will want to say ‘Nadolig Llawen.’ I hope to be wishing people ‘Nollaig Shona duit’ regularly in the coming years. However we say it, this comes with every blessing and my very best wishes for a happy, holy and peaceful Christmas.
Rev. Meurig Williams
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SPECIAL NOTE:
This year due to Covid-19 restrictions our numbers are limited to 50 in all churches (35 Castletownroche). Therefore, we have to ask you to book in for the Christmas Eve/Day services. Could you please text or contact one of the following to let them know you hope to attend that church. We know this is an unusual ask but we have to keep in line with Government restrictions.
Mallow 24th December 7pm Christingle Service 083/4873227 Chris Bond
Doneraile 24th December 11.30pm 086/8185290 Linda Deane
Castletownroche 25th December 10am 086/1547810 Diana Buckley
Mallow 25th December Christmas Day 11.45am 086/3419172 Victor Wolfe
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DIARY FOR THE MONTH OF DECEMBER
11th December Christmas Concert Online at 8pm
See back page for Christmas Services
SUNDAY READINGS
6th December (2nd Sunday of Advent) Violet
Isaiah 40: 1-11 Psalm 85: 1-2, 8-13 2 Peter 3: 8-15a Mark 1: 1-8
Castletownroche 10am H.C.
Doneraile 10am H.C.
Mallow 11.45am H.C.
13th December (3rd Sunday of Advent) Violet
Isaiah 61: 1-4, 8-11 Psalm 126 1 Thessalonians 5: 16-20 John 1: 6-8, 19-28
Castletownroche 10am M.P.
Doneraile 10am M.P.
Mallow 11.45am M.P.
20th December (4th Sunday of Advent) Violet
2 Samuel 7: 1-11, 16 Psalm 89: 1-4, 19-26 Romans 16: 25-27 Luke 1: 26-38
Castletownroche 10am H.C.
Doneraile 10am H.C.
Mallow 11.45am H.C.
24th December (Christmas Eve) White or Gold
Mallow 7pm Christingle service Emmanuel Adebisi
Doneraile 11.30pm H.C. Rev. Tony Murphy
25th December (Christmas Day) White or Gold
Isaiah 62: 6-12 Psalm 97 Titus 3: 4-7 Luke 2: (1-7), 8-10
Castletownroche 10am H.C. Canon Alan Marley
Mallow 11.45am H.C. Canon Alan Marley
27th December (1st Sunday of Christmas) White or Gold
Isaiah 61: 10-62:3 Psalm 148 Galatians 4: 4-7 Luke 2: 15-21
Castletownroche 10am M.P.
Doneraile 10am M.P.
Mallow 11.45am M.P.
3rd January (2nd Sunday of Christmas) White or Gold
Jeremiah 31: 7-14 Psalm 147: 13-21 Ephesians 1: 3-14 John 1: (1-9), 10-18
If you have anything to put in the January magazine please give to Diana Buckley before Thursday 3rd December and for the January Newsletter please give to Diana before Wednesday 6th January. Email: dianabuckley2@gmail.com or mobile 086/1547810 or address Bridgetown, Castletownroche.