The Church of Ireland has been, to say the least, somewhat ambivalent about the forthcoming millennium. The absence of a comprehensive programme of ecclesiastical events or a major church initiative to celebrate this significant occasion has bewildered some of the faithful.
However, information is now available about one important event. In 2000, Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, will host an international ecumenical conference in celebration of Christian liturgy past, present and future. Entitled "Ceilliuradh", the festival will run from July 18th-24th, when themes of music, art, architecture, scripture and theology will be explored in the context of seminars, practical workshops, lectures and daily worship.
Among the speakers from Britain will be the Bishop of Salisbury, the Rt Rev David Stancliffe, Prof John Harper, director-general of the Royal School of Church Music, and Dr Anne Loades, a theologian in the University of Durham. John Bell from the Iona Community will take part, as will the Rev Nicholas Frayling, Vicar of Liverpool, the liturgist Michael Hodgetts, and Christopher Walsh, director of the Institute for Mission and Liturgy in Sarum College, Salisbury.
Alan Barthel will travel from the University of Toronto, where he is professor of church music, the Rev Rick Fabian from the parish of St Gregory Nyssen, San Francisco, and Kevin Seasoltz from Collegeville, Minnesota, where he is professor of liturgics.
Among the local speakers will be the Dublin theologians Anne Thurston and Maria Jansson, and the director of music in Christ Church, Mark Duley.
The conference will also be a festival with a wide range of concerts, worship activities and fringe events for both resident and non-resident participants.
Details of the conference may be had from the Braemor Institute, Church of Ireland Theological College, Braemor Park, Dublin 14, phone (+353-1-) 492 3695, fax (+353-1-)492 3082, email tgordon@tcd.ie
This evening the KUFM choir from Karlstad in Sweden will give a concert of sacred and secular works by, among others, Bach and Purcell, in St Patrick's church, Greystones, in aid of parish funds.
Tomorrow the Bishop of Tuam, Dr Richard Henderson, will visit the Omey group of parishes, based in Clifden, where the rector is the Archdeacon of Tuam, the Ven Anthony Previte. In Dublin the services in Christ Church Cathedral will be sung by the choir of St Peter's Church, Prestbury, while in St Patrick's Cathedral, the Eucharist and Evensong will be sung by Lyra Davidica. In St Mary's parish church, Howth, where the rector is Canon Cecil Hyland, the Bablake School Choir from Coventry will sing at the morning Eucharist. Summer services continue in Templeconnor Church, Clonmacnoise, where the Eucharist will be celebrated at 4 p.m.
The choir of Croydon parish church will sing Evensong in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, on Wednesday and Friday. On Thursday evening the St Barrahane's Church Festival of Classical Music continues in Castletownshend, Co Cork, where there will be a recital by Catherine Leonard (violin) and Julian Milford (harp).
For all visitors the Representative Church Body Library's exhibition, "Dublin City Churches Revisited", continues in the Dublin Civic Museum, 58 South William Street, Dublin 2 - beside the Powerscourt Town House.
The exhibition of archives, manuscripts, photographs and printed material from the library's collections celebrates the evolution of the Church of Ireland parish churches in Dublin's inner city. The Civic Museum is open 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Tuesday to Saturday, and 11 a.m.-2 p.m. on Sundays and admission is free.
The installation of the Very Rev Dr Robert MacCarthy as Dean of St Patrick's has been arranged for September 11th.