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NEWS - MAY 2008

THIS MONTH
The preacher on May 4th will be Canon Neil Cutliffe, rector of Monkstown. A service marking Christian Aid week will be held on May 11th , Pentecost, when the preacher will be the Revd. Roy Cooper, President of the Methodist Church in Ireland.

Concerts will be given by Camerata Pacifica from the USA on May 3rd as part of the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival and by the Philharmonic on May 17th. Visitors to the Cathedral this month include a group of Larne MU members who are coming for a Prayer Walk. Tours are being conducted for groups from Oklahoma Cathedral, Regent Street Methodist, Newtownards, St Bartholomew’s and Gulliver’s tours.

Sir Nigel Hamilton, Head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service and former Assistant Chief Constable Freddie Hall and members of the RUC-GC committee will be having meetings with the Dean.

The Dean will be attending the institution of the rector of St Colman’s Dunmurry, the launch of a series of postage stamps on British cathedrals at St Paul’s Cathedral and a charity lunch at the Belfast Harbour Commissioners which is a fund -raiser for the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, and to train a young surgeon in transplant surgery and to provide a medical facility in Barbados which is a memorial to Belfast barrister, John Thompson, QC, who died as a result of an accident whilst sailing in a trans-Atlantic race in 2007.


CATHEDRAL FESTIVAL ‘08
On June 7th and 8th Belfast Cathedral Festival will celebrate the 104th anniversary of the consecration of the Cathedral on 2nd June 1904. There will be tours of the cathedral and organ recitals on the saturday morning, a Gift Day when the Dean and Chapter members will have the barrel below the Spire of Hope and an evening concert at 8.00pm when Phillipp Dawson and other soloists will join the Cathedral Choirs.

On June 8th, Rt Rev Dr Gordon McMullan will be the preacher at the Festival Eucharist at 11.00 when the music will reflect that of the consecration. A Festival Evensong will mark the centenary of Ralph Vaughan Williams and the hymns of Cecil Frances Alexander. Please do plan to be present. Further details will be available shortly in a Cathedral Festival ‘08 newsletter.

FROM ALPHA TO OMEGA
A booklet “From Alpha to Omega” written by the Dean is now available at the Stewards’ Desk. It gives a short account of the meaning of thirty symbols and where they are to be found in the Cathedral. The cost is £2.

AT ST PETER’S
Bishop Tony Farquhar and Bishop Patrick Walsh will celebrate the 25th aniversary of their episcopal ordination this month.

CATHEDRAL STAMP
The cathedral is included in a special series of stamps being launched by the Post Office on May 12th. The Dean is hoping to attend the launch in St Paul’s Cahedral, London. The stamp shows the choir and sanctuary.

PRAYER BOOK IN TIME CAPSULE
Last month the Dean was present with the Lord Mayor, Councillor Jim Rodgers, and the Minister for Social Development, Ms Margaret Ritchie, when a time capsule was buried on the new St Anne’s Square Development to the rear of the cathedral. Various artifacts from the businesses and organisations around the development were placed in the capsule. A prayer book from the cathedral was donated and included.

EASTER GENERAL VESTRY
There was a very good attendance at this year’s Easter General Vestry.
Following prayer, the Dean gave his address in the introduction to which he spoke of the reponsibiities of organising the worship of the cathedral. The Dean said, “The accountability for the organisation of worship is laid upon the rector by the bishop in accord with the laws of the Church. It is a delegated responsibility by the bishop in which a bishop will not, indeed cannot, interfere, unless it is proven that the rector is in breech of the Canons, the rubrics (instructions for worship) or the doctrine of the Church of Ireland.

“This however, does not affect the basic premise, that any of us, whether ordained or lay, who is involved in any capacity in the presentation of worship, or in the exercise of any other ministry in the parish, does so through the ministry of the bishop in a line of accountability via the rector. Consequently, our behaviour, our demeanour, within and outside our faith community must reflect responsibly, that relationship under the teaching and statutes of our church.

“If you are a member of the choir, a lector, a eucharistic assistant , an intercessor, daily prayer reader, teacher of the Gospel to children or adult, you are sharing in my ministry and in the ministry of my fellow-ordained colleague, and through that channel with the ministry of the bishop. And in this wholistic relationship, you are accountable to me for the fulfilment of that ministry entrusted to you and I to you, so that we can enable you to fulfil it responsibly and with the grace of the Holy Spirit.

Lifestyle and behaviour
“Lifestyle and behaviour is part of the exercise of ministry within the faith community. That too is reflected in our Anglican understanding of ministry in the ordination services, and this in turn has to apply to those sharing in that ministry. Regrettably for the rector, on the few occasions where the disengagement of a member from a specific area of ministry is inevitable - whether for the peace of Jerusalem - or another reason, it befalls to the rector to deal with such situations, and from my limited experience, it is never easy. But that is part of the ordination service also, “To premonish...”

“The clergy will be giving some thought and prayer to finding ways of upholding in worship the various ministries to which I have referred above. One of the examples occured to me was in reference to the choir. We commission the choristers when they join the choir but not in my time here have we had a service of commissioning or re-commissioning of the adult members of the choir. We are due also under diocesan regulations to revise the list of eucharistic assistants and obtain the bishop’s authority for these folk. We are required to do this annually. Should we recognise this liturgically? As an old master of mine was apt to say - answers please, but on one side of a post card!

“If you feel you would like to be considered for inclusion in any of the worship or other roles in miniistry in the Cathedral, would you kindly first contact Canon Close. Who knows but the prompting you may be feeling may be the first step the Holy Spirit is encouraging you to take on a much longer journey? Only time and prayer will tell.”
The remainder of the Dean’s addres may be found in “The Dean writes” in this issue of “The Cathedral Digest”.

The following were nominated and elected :
People’s Warden - P. Forster; Dean’s Warden - K. Patterson
Select Vestry: S. Allen, M. Callender, G. Clifford, R. Cox, S. Hawkins,
M. Hempton, G. McGaughey, C. MacLaughlin, M. Massey, Wm. Miskimmin, C. Murray, G. Preece

Parochial Nominators: M. Callender, P. Forster, G. McGaughey, C. Murray. Supplementals: M. Hempton. A. Martin, K. Patterson, G. Preece

Diocesan Synod: D. Alexander, Wm. Blair, G. Preece, P. Stopford
Diocesan Supplementals : R. Cox, G. McGaughey, J. Mahood, T. Pateman.

BOARD BUSINESS
At the April meeting of the Board of the Cathedral, Gillian McGaughey was appointed as Secretary and Ken Patterson as Hon. Treasurer. The FWO for the first three months of 2008 had increased by £2161 to £10,966. It ws agreed to sand and reseal the wooden floor areas of the cathedral, and to undertake a professional survey by Harrison and Harrison of Durham, the builders of the cathedral organ. A working party was appointed to review the Articles of association of the cathedral board in the light of recent legislation. The working party to comprise: Gillian McGaughey, Michael Robinson, the Cathedarl Registrar and Canon Nesbitt. The Dean is ex-officio a member of all working parties.

The Dean commented on the increase of tours of the catedral - some 23 so far this year and that 32 cruise liners would visit the port. The policy was to develop the cathedral as a place of spiritual pilgrimage and not just as a tourist attraction. The Dean outlined the media policy of the cathedral, and sought the Boards support of a working party he was appointing to oversee the relocation of the archives to the strong room in the Cathedral Centre. The Dean outlined the programme of coming events and services in the Cathedral.

The Bishop of Connor welcomed Maragret Massey and Phyllis Forster to the new Board and the Board recorded its gratitude for the services of Alan Martin and John McAllister.

CHOIR
The choristers and several members of the choir attended the RSCM Choral Festival was held simultaneously in the Chapel of Trinity College, Dublin and in the Cathedral. Blainaid Murphy, Director of the Palestrina Choir,conducted in Dublin while in Belfast the conductor was the international organ recitalist, Gordon Blackburn. The theme this year was ‘Risen, Ascended, Glorified’. At the closing services the Very Revd John Flatherty, Administrator of St Mary’s Pro-Cathedral, preached in Trinity while the Bishop of Connor was the preacher in St Anne’s.

CATHEDRAL COMMUNITY
Terry and Brenda Pateman’s grandson Harry was baptised in Southshields by the late George Bustard’s nephew.

Congratulations to Cameron McGaughey  for wining his BB Company’s award for Bible knowledge for the second successive year.

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