The largest tranche of ordinations to the diaconate for this year will take place tomorrow in the dioceses of Down and Dromore, Connor, and Cashel and Ossory.
The Bishop of Down and Dromore, the Right Rev Harold Miller, will ordain Craig McCauley, Andrew McCroskery, William Press and Marie Walshe to serve as curates in Banbridge, Newtownards, Knockbreda and Kilkeel respectively.
In St Anne's Cathedral, Belfast, Bishop Samuel Poyntz, acting for the Bishop of Connor who is indisposed, will ordain Ron Elsdon, Elizabeth Henderson, Paul Jack and Terence Kerr for the curacies of Ballymena, Ballymacash, Jordanstown and Antrim. Ian Coulter will be ordained in St Canice's Cathedral, Kilkenny, by the Bishop of Cashel and Ossory, the Right Rev John Neill.
Of the nine ordinations, six will be to the stipendiary ministry and three to the auxiliary ministry.
Today in Dublin there will be parish fetes at Taney, St Matthias's, Ballybrack, and All Saints', Grangegorman, while in Galway the St Nicholas Garden Fete will take place at the rectory on Taylor's Hill. The Archbishop of Armagh, Dr Robin Eames, will preach at the 150th anniversary service in Calry Church, Co Sligo, while in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, the Dun Laoghaire Choral Society will give a concert in aid of the restoration of St John's Church, Sandymount, Dublin. The Friends of St Canice's Cathedral, Kilkenny, will have their a.g.m. which will be preceded by Evensong and followed by a talk from the Rev Dr Adrian Empey on "Piers Butler - An Irish Borgia".
Tomorrow RTE will broadcast Morning Service from Drumcliffe, Co Sligo, the burial place of W.B. Yeats, where the rector is Canon Ian Gallagher. In St John's Church, Clondalkin, Dr Raj Rajkumar, a CMS Ireland mission partner from south India, will undertake the final preaching engagement of his visit to Ireland.
In Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, the Vanburgh String Quartet will give a recital at 5 p.m. as part of the Christ Church Arts season, while in Cork the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Walton Empey, will preach at the closing service of the Festival of Flowers in St Fin Barre's Cathedral. Summer services have resumed in Templeconnor Church, Clonmacnois, where until the end of August there will be a celebration of the Eucharist each Sunday at 4 p.m.
On Tuesday the Standing Committee of the General Synod and the Executive Committee of the Representative Church Body will meet in the newly refurbished Church of Ireland House in Rathmines, where the bishops will also gather. In St Stephen's Green, Dublin, there will be a "Carnival to Break the Chains of Debt" at lunchtime. This will be the final Irish event of Jubilee 2000 to celebrate the collection of 750,000 signatures in favour of the cancellation of world debt.
In Dublin on Wednesday Andrew Johnstone, assistant organist of Christ Church Cathedral, will give a recital in St Patrick's at 6.30 p.m. In Christ Church the girls' choir will sing Evensong, which will be followed by a prize-giving, while at 8 p.m. the friends will hold their a.g.m. in the Chapter House.
The season of summer concerts, presented by Musica Hibernica, has already begun and on Thursday the first concert of June will be held in Christ Church, Clifden, Co Galway, where the Morrby Choir from Gothenburg, Sweden, will perform works by Mozart, Ellington Homulius, Ahlen, Purcell and Bellman. On Friday the choir of St George's Church, Belfast, begins a period of residency in Wells Cathedral, which will continue until July 26th.