Gougane Barra

During last months clergy conference we had a couple of hours of free time, so I made my way to Gougane Barra.  St. Fin Barre built a monastery here in the sixth century and it's not hard to see why; it is a beautiful and peaceful place...

But there is something about this place that goes beyond its beauty. Perhaps it's because of the centuries of prayer and Christian witness, perhaps it's the example of St. Fin Barre himself or maybe it is because this place predates our man-made church denominations. In the sixth century there were no Protestant or Roman Catholic churches in Ireland, that all came later (and all the pain / mess that came with it which continues to this day).  Last night at the Institution service for the new Rector in Bandon, Rev. Denis MacCarthy, there was a particular prayer before the Holy Communion that struck a chord with me:

As the grain once scattered in the fields

 and the grapes once dispersed on the hillside

 are now reunited on this table in bread and wine,

 so, Lord, may your whole Church soon be gathered together 

from the corners of the earth into your kingdom.  Amen.

All pictures taken using Nikon F100, Nikkor 18-35mm lens and Fujichrome Sensia 100 Slide Film (which has now sadly been discontinued).  

Clergy Conference

Most of the clergy - There are so many possibilities for suitably funny captions I'll leave them up to you...!

Nikon D70s, 1/160 sec, f6.3, ISO 200, 29mm (Click to enlarge)

On route to Gougane Barra (Click to enlarge)
Nikon D70s 3 photos at 1/400 sec, f10, ISO 200, 40mm

Glengariff shop (Click to enlarge)
Nikon D70s, /320 sec, f10, ISO 200, 35mm

Well the annual Cork, Cloyne & Ross Clergy conference has been and gone once again. The speaker this year was Bishop Michael Mayes who gave us some truly excellent insights into the interpretation of Scripture with genuine warmth, wisdom, humour and humility. One thing that he said that has stuck with me is that dissection is done usually to something that is dead and that if you dissect something that is alive you would end up killing it - and to bear this in mind when we try and dissect the Bible. In thinking about this I would further say that it should be a case of allowing God's word to dissect us - but of course we try not to do that too much becasue when we do we usually don't like all the ugly rubbish and selfishness in our lives that is exposed!

As always though my favourite part of the conference was the afternoon on the second day when we were allowed to escape! The sun came out and it was great to go around taking pictures ...