Following the announcement of the appointment of a public relations officer by Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, comes news that the director of communications for the Church of Ireland, Ms Janet Maxwell, has taken up her post in Church of Ireland House, Dublin.
Ms Maxwell will be a member of the senior management team in Church House and will have executive responsibility for the church's communications strategy and for co-ordinating its public relations, media relations and publishing activities.
She will work closely with the Central Communications Board and its subsidiary bodies, the Literature Committee, Broadcasting Committee and Internet Committee. The director of communications will have an all-Ireland role and will be supported by a media officer, who has yet to be appointed, and who will be based in Belfast.
Ms Maxwell is a native of Dungannon who read history in Trinity College Dublin, from where she subsequently graduated with an MBA in 1987. Since the early 1990s she has worked in South Africa and, more recently, been head of the School of Media and Performance at Technikon Natal, a national third-level institution, which she represented on the Journalism and Government Communications Standards Generating Bodies.
Ms Maxwell also has experience of business journalism in Ireland, Australia and South Africa as well as practical experience in public relations, media management, publishing, training and administration.
Meanwhile, the Church of Ireland community in Trim and Athboy, under the leadership of the Dean of Clonmacnoise, Dr Andrew Furlong, is the latest group in the church to establish its own website, ww.cathedral.meath.anglican.org, which they hope will be seen as innovative and thought-provoking.
Tomorrow the Bishop of Tuam, Dr Richard Henderson, will visit Killala Cathedral, where the Dean is the Very Rev Ted Ardis. The cathedral is dedicated to St Patrick who is believed to have founded the diocese between the years 434 and 442, and it has been both a cathedral and a parish church.
The parishes of Dunfeeny, Crossmolina, Kilmoremoy, Castleconnor, Easkey and Kilglass are grouped with the cathedral, and the Dean is assisted in his parochial responsibilities by the Rev Doris Clements, who is a priest in the auxiliary ministry.
The services in St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, from Tuesday until the following Sunday will be sung by the Close Chorale. On Thursday the lunchtime organ recital in St Ann's Church, Dublin, will be given by Simon Harden, the Organ Scholar of Trinity College Dublin. Admission is free.
The Irish Council of Christians and Jews will host a public lecture on Thursday at 8 p.m. in the Progressive Synagogue, Leicester Avenue, Rathgar, Dublin 6. Dr Edward Kessler, founder and director of the centre for Jewish-Christian relations in Cambridge, will speak on "Jewish-Christian Relations: the State of Play Today".