Pew Sheet – 16th February 2025

The Rector writes ‘As I mentioned in the email of 8th , our Annual General Meeting is on 1st May. This is often called the ’Easter Vestry’ as it must happen within 20 days either side of Easter Day, which this year falls on 20th April. Everyone may attend this meeting but only those who are ‘registered’ may vote at it, or take office. Most of you are already on the Register (and you can check with the Churchwardens if you’re not sure) but if you’re new to the parish, you might like to fill in a registration form (again, see the Churchwardens for one of these forms).

The Vestry Register Book will be set out for viewing and for updating in the Parish Hall at 7:30pm on Monday 17th February. The notice is currently on the doors of both churches.

At this meeting, the list of Vestry people gets added with new parishioners who have completed forms and it also gets updated for parishioners who have died or left the parish (as currently you can only be registered in one parish). I will be reminding you again nearer the time of the 1st May meeting but if you’d like to have a voice and vote in the parish at that May meeting, then you need to be registered before 17th February. Don’t forget … your voice matters! ‘

Dates for your Diary

February

17th Register of Vestry Persons update 7:30pm Parish Hall

19th 3pm MU meeting Parish Hall

7:30pm Zoom online talks ‘The Music of our Praise ‘

22nd CDYC Inflata Bounce and Airtastic

March

5th Ash Wednesday Services in St Mary’s Church

10:30am and 7:30pm

7th World Day of Prayer, 3pm Service in St Mary’s Church

12th Lenten Workshop on Prayer, 8pm St Mary’s Church

19th MU Meeting 3pm Parish Hall

Lenten Workshop on Prayer, 8pm St Mary’s Church

23rd MU Lenten Lunch in Parish Hall after 11am Service ,

Donations to the MU Overseas Fund.

26th Lenten Workshop on Prayer, 8pm St Mary’s Church

This year’s Confirmation Service

will be at 11am in St Mary’s Church on the Day of Pentecost 8th June

Concluding next Wednesday!

The Music of our Praise –

The wonderful world of music for worship

The last of three Online Talks by Bébhinn Ni Mheara,

Musical Director of Carrigaline Union

7:30pm Wednesday 19th February. All welcome.

The Zoom Link was on the Pewsheet email but please email parish@carrigalineunion.org if you didn’t get it.

Wednesdays in Lent

March 12TH, 19TH & 26TH

8pm at St Mary’s Church, Carrigaline

Sessions will be led by Carrigaline Union

Healer/Prayer Team and will include, Creative Prayer

Communal Prayer, Contemplative Prayer and Coffee!

All Welcome!

MU Meeting

at 3pm in the Parish Hall on Wednesday 19th February

‘History of Meals on Wheels in Carrigaline/Crosshaven’

with Bobby Lambe and Mary Meade.

Refreshments and chat to follow – all welcome!

Music Notes 16-02-2025

Hymns at St Mary’s

10 All my hope on God is founded

649 Happy are they that love God

500 Would you walk by?

257 Christ is the world’s Redeemer

The poet Robert Bridges (1844-1930) is the writer of the texts for two of our hymns today: All my hope on God is founded and Happy are they that love God. Bridges was born in the north of England, educated at Eton and later at Oxford. He spent time travelling in the Middle East and in Germany before training as a doctor in St Bartholomew’s hospital in London, graduating in 1874. He gave up practicing medicine seven years later after a bout of life-threatening pneumonia and retired to a village in Berkshire where he became involved in the music and worship at the local parish church.

He had always been interested in poetry and became a great friend of the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins and was responsible for publishing the poetry of his friend after his death. Bridges also had a great interest in music and was friendly with many of the prominent composers of his day such as Stainer and Stanford. He produced a hymnal for the village church in Yattendon and went on to become Poet Laureate in 1913. We will hear some more of his poems during the Tenebrae service on Good Friday including O Sacred Head, sore wounded.

Robert Bridges believed hymns should be elevating and serious and lacked patience with those texts which ‘were designed to make the worldly man feel at home’ – something to think about for those of us who choose hymns for services!

Bébhinn 087 228 5965

Random Notes CDLXXXII

Back to Africa

Some of you will remember that our project in Kilimanjaro finished up in August of 2024. Since then, we’ve been trying to secure follow-on funding to expand the project. Neither Ali nor I wanted the project to end where it did, and we worked hard with colleagues in Norway, the UK, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Uganda and Rwanda to put together a proposal for a suitable follow on.

Two and a half weeks ago we received the wonderful news that Horizon Europe had awarded us €5 million for our new project. Again, we’re using mobile technology to track pregnancies and births and postnatal care. But this time we have 15 times the funding and we can cover health centres in selected regions in 4 countries. To give you a better idea of the scale, we plan to purchase up to 1,000 tablet computers to cover up to 200 health centres.

But it’s not just about the money and the technology. The ULTRA project in Kilimanjaro demonstrated that an electronic system could work and be sustainable with suitable training. Also, we showed that it could be fully supported by a team in the country rather than from Europe. This new project, called LINDA-FAMILIA, is much more ambitious. We’d like to show that technology can make a difference in controlling disease spread and supporting vaccination programmes amongst pregnant women and babies. We don’t need to spend so much time worrying about the computers and we can actually spend most of our time worrying about the people who matter the most!

We’re also working much harder to get the Ministries of Health in the four target countries to commit to using our system. We were promised a lot in Kilimanjaro (Seán was present for that meeting!) but the promises never translated into action. Also, there’s a tendency to see €5 million as a “jobs for the boys” scheme which it most certainly is not. So, we have to be careful about how the money is spent.

LINDA-FAMILIA literally means “lovely family” and the focus is very much on improving the health of families. Ali and I plan to visit Ethiopia and Tanzania just before Easter to start preliminary work. I will of course be providing updates in future Random Notes. Wish us luck!