ST Patrick's Day is on Wednesday this year and so the disruption of the ecclesiastical round in Dublin, where the scale of the celebrations seems to grow by the year, will be less than when the festival falls on a Sunday.
Nonetheless, Christ Church Cathedral will be largely inaccessible until the parade has passed and so there will not be a celebration of the Eucharist at lunchtime.
In St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, the patronal festival begins tomorrow when there will be a Festal Sung Eucharist at 11.15 a.m. and choral evensong at 3.15 p.m. The preacher at both services will be the Dean of York, the Very Rev Raymond Furnell. On St Patrick's Day there will be a Festal Eucharist at 10 a.m. and choral evensong at 4 p.m. which will be broadcast by BBC Radio 4.
In the other great Patrician centre, Downpatrick, the major festival service will be at 11.30 a.m. when representatives of missionary societies and groups from all denominations will come to Down Cathedral, where the preacher will be the Rev George Kavoor, principal of the Church Missionary Society Training College in Birmingham.
In St Patrick's Memorial Church, Saul, at 10 a.m. the Precentor of Down Cathedral, Canon Brian Mayne, will celebrate the Eucharist and the preacher will be the Archdeacon of Down, the Ven Ken Good. RTE will broadcast the Eucharist from St Colman's Cathedral, Cloyne, sung by the Carrigaline Singers, directed by Ian Sexton, assistant organist of St Fin Barre's Cathedral, Cork, while in St Fin Barre's the dean will preach at the Civic Service for St Patrick's Day.
Tomorrow RTE will broadcast a service for Mothering Sunday from Mountmellick, where the rector is the Rev Olive Donohoe. In St Fin Barre's Cathedral, Cork, at 4 p.m., there will be an ecumenical service in connection with Cork Peace Week.
This will be conducted by the dean, Dr Michael Jackson, and the preacher will be Mgr Patrick Devine. At Evensong there will be a memorial service for Archbishop McAdoo, sometime dean of Cork, at which the preacher will be Fr Michael Hurley SJ.
The Rt Rev Edward Darling will attend Mass in St John's Cathedral to mark the opening of Limerick Civic Week which will end on March 21st with the celebration of the Eucharist in St Mary's Cathedral.
In the "Faith for a New Millennium" series of Lenten addresses in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, the preacher will be the Rector of Howth, Canon Cecil Hyland.
On Tuesday the Rev Scott Peoples will be instituted to the incumbency of Lucan and Leixlip by the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Walton Empey. Mr Peoples, who has been rector of Portarlington since 1991, succeeds the Rev Bruce Pierce, who is now chaplain in the new hospital in Tallaght.
An interesting piece of memorial silver has recently come to light. It is a two-handled silver cup which was presented to the Rev Richard Powell when he left the parish of St Catherine, Dublin, after 22 years as curate, to become rector of Rathdrum. The cup, which has been identified by Douglas Bennett, secretary of the Company of Goldsmiths, as the work of the Dublin silversmith George West, has a handsome inscription on one face while the other is decorated with an engraving of the west front of St Catherine's Church, Thomas Street.
Through the good offices of the Dublin firm of solicitors Maxwell, Weldon & Darley, the cup has been placed on permanent loan in the RCB Library where the parish records of St Catherine's are kept.