02 May 2012

Gothic reflections on the Green

Sunset in Knocklyon this evening (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2012)

Patrick Comerford

If May Day marks the beginning of summer, then summer is late in arriving in Dublin. The skies were grey as I headed into the city centre late this afternoon to meet Jim Thunder, a lawyer from Arlington near Washington DC, who is a direct descendant of the great Gothic revival architect Augustus Welby Pugin.

Jim and his wife Ann are on short visit to these islands to mark the bicentennial the birth of his great-great-grandfather in 1812. In the past week they have managed to visit Pugin’s home in Ramsgate, and hope to return again to visit the Pugin churches in Co Wexford.

We have a shared friendship with Professor Kevin Whelan of Notre Dame University.
We talked and talked in Staunton’s on the Green, about his great-great-grandfather and my great grandfather, James Comerford, who worked on the Pugin, Pierce and McCarthy churches in Wexford and Dublin.

Jim recalled speaking at Notre Dame’s Architecture School on Pugin in 1998. The only Pugin artefacts on permanent display in the US are a dinner-plate and a spoon his father donated to the Snite Museum in 1995.

Gothic reflections ... the Unitarian Church reflected in office windows in Saint Stephen’s Green this evening (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2012)

Back out on Saint Stephen’s Green, the clouds were still grey, but there was enough sunshine to catch reflections of the Unitarian Church on the west side of the Green in the ground floor windows on the south side.

I walked on through Cuffe Street and Kevin Street, past the former Moravian church, and on to the Cabbage Garden behind the Iveagh Trust flats at the top of Cathedral Lane, near Saint Patrick’s Cathedral.

This small park, between Kevin Street and New Street, amounts to little more than half a hectare. It gets its name from the tradition that Cromwellian soldiers cultivated cabbages on the site in the 1650s.

After the Caroline restoration, the site was used for burials from 1663, and in 1666 this small corner of old Dublin was entrusted by the Dean and Chapter of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral to the parish of Saint Nicholas Without for use as a cemetery.

The old gravestones in the Cabbage Garden date back to the 17th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2012)

At that time, the Huguenots of Dublin began using the Lady Chapel in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral as their place of worship. Part of the Cabbage Garden was designated for Huguenot burials from 1681 to 1858, and many members of well-known Huguenot families, including the La Touche merchant and banking family, are buried here, alongside merchants and tradesmen from the Liberties.

The cemetery was closed to burials in 1878, and in 1897 Lord Iveagh proposed redeveloping the garden as a public recreational facility. However, his proposals never saw the light of day.

Dublin Corporation developed the existing park in 1979/1980, and there was some further redevelopment in 1998.

From New Street, I walked on up to Harold’s Cross, before catching a bus to Knocklyon, in time for a beautiful sunset behind Glenvara Park.

Church of Ireland experience of deacon interns shared in Edinburgh

Anglican participants at the Edinburgh consultation on the diaconate (from left): Canon Patrick Comerford, Revd Frances Hillier, Revd Sarah Gillard-Faulkner, Bishop-elect John Armes, Elspeth Davey, Church Relations Officer, SEC

The Church of Ireland was represented by Canon Patrick Comerfordof the Church of Ireland Theological Institute at a recent Seminar on Deacons, the Diaconate and Diakonia. The seminar in Edinburgh was organised by the Diaconate Working Group (DWG) of the Scottish Episcopal Church (SEC) as part of the Porvoo Communion consultations on the diaconate and diakonia ministry.

The seminar was chaired by the Bishop–elect of Edinburgh Very Revd Dr John Armes, secretary of the Diaconate Working Group.

The participants included the Right Revd Mark Strange, Bishop of Moray, Ross and Caithness, representatives of the four Anglican Churches on these islands – the Church of Ireland, the Scottish Episcopal Church, the Church in Wales and the Church of England – and representatives of a number of Churches in Scotland, including the Church of Scotland, the Methodist Church, the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland, the Salvation Army, and the United Reformed Church.

Bishop Armes said the seminar had been called because the Scottish Episcopal Church, as a member of the Porvoo Communion, is committed to exploring diakonia and diaconate, and in the light of the 2009 consultation in Oslo, is committed to exploring the meaning of diakonia and what to do about diakonia and diaconate.

The seminar was an exercise in extending this discussion by listening to the experiences of the other member churches of the Anglican Communion on these islands and the experiences of the other denominations in Scotland.

Canon Comerford spoke of the new ministry training programme at the Church of Ireland Theological Institute, and of the experiences of third–year ordinands who had been placed in parishes as ‘deacon-interns’ in their third year.

The Revd Deacon Frances Hillier said most permanent deacons in the Church of England tend to be NSMs, and tend to be in caring professions. Although some are canons and she is a bishop’s chaplain, they cannot be archdeacons.

Bishop Mark Strange said a number of people feel called to a different type of ministry in the community that is not tied up with being priests. He asked whether there is a role for deacons where it is not assumed that they are going to go on to being ordained priests.

The Revd Sarah Gillard–Faulkner described her experience as a deacon in the Church in Wales as being ‘a lone voice.’

The Revd Tony Schmitz spoke of a developing understanding in the Roman Catholic Church of ‘diakonia of altar, diakonia of word and diakonia of caritas.’

The Porvoo Contact Group meets in October, and a similar seminar will be called in Edinburgh again in preparation for the Porvoo Consultation in Dublin in March 2013.
This report was published on the Church of Ireland Theological Institute on 2 May 2012