Pew Sheet – 4th July 2021

The Rector writes ‘ It is so lovely to be back using the actual physical Prayer Books in church! I had always felt so wasteful printing all those services out each week. Now we are back to just the readings, prayers and the collects in our Pew Sheet … and of course the all important Random Notes!

As well as using the prayer books for the liturgy, it was also a treat last week to be able to follow the words of the hymns in the Hymnal as the music was playing.

All baby steps I know but we are heading in the right direction. Although it does seem like we are not out of the woods just yet. The news around the spread of the Delta variant is worrying and I feel so sorry for all the people involved in the hospitality industry. They have suffered so much in the last 18 months. Whatever happens in the next few months I pray that we will face it with our usual mixture of good humour and Christian hope, for what else can we do?.’

Random Notes CCCLXXXVI

Returning from a trip to Cape Clear a few weeks ago, as the ferry gently ploughed through the swell of Roaringwater Bay, I wondered what exactly it was that I love about West Cork. With Fastnet and Mizen in the distance, the hundreds of islands asleep in the sun and gannet’s soaring above; seal’s taking a careful eye of the ferry – what were they thinking? Kilcoe Castle, with it’s orange glow, blinking in the sun.

Obviously, childhood memories of holidays bring a pleasing effect but there is something more about West Cork. The people are, and always have been a cosmopolitan mix from all over the world. On Cape, the dreary grey days of the Irish language being forced down the mouths of school-children visitors in the 1960’s and 70’s has changed. Irish is now “sexy”, and people choose to use a few words in the language, rather than being forced to do so. The goat farm is run by a German couple. The most prolific writer on the island is an American – Chuck Kruger; and the lady who runs the shop asks in a broad cockney accent “would you like a cowd bottle of white wiiine, from the fridge?”!!! The Anglo Irish world of Somerville and Ross merges with the lives of the O’Driscoll clan in an inextricable way. The O’Driscoll castles, Dun an Oir on Cape Clear, Dun na Long on Sherkin and Dun na Sead in Baltimore stand alongside British bastions like Drishane House and The Castle in Castletownshend. Then the two “golf balls” on Mount Gabriel that nobody really knows about.

Of course there is a deep dark side to the place. The murder of Sofie Toscan duPlantier and the many terrible stories during the War of Independence amongst others.

We are so lucky to have this beautiful, interesting part of Ireland at our fingertips. Joan Gollock was born in West Cork in 1921 and even in her 98th year she still loved the place. After a spell in hospital, and returning to a nursing home she said to her good friend, Jill Hingston, “We must book a trip down West soon”…..The lure of West Cork!!!