Jubilee pilgrimages abound as matches are sidelined

Religion wins out over sport tomorrow. All Gaelic football and hurling matches are suspended as the country takes to the hills, wells, rocks, racecourses and football pitches in a jubilee pilgrimage.

It is the National Day of Local Pilgrimage, part of the year 2000 jubilee celebrations. Nearly every parish in the country has something organised to mark it.

The GAA has assented to a request from the Catholic Church to suspend matches tomorrow to enable people to take part. It will therefore be what many believe is the first May Sunday without a Gaelic match since the GAA was founded in 1884.

In Wexford the Catholic bishop, Dr Brendan Comiskey, and the Church of Ireland bishop, the Right Rev John Neill, will lead a pilgrimage to Ferns. It begins with a service in St Aidan's Cathedral, Enniscorthy, at 2.30 p.m. and ends with Evensong in St Edan's Cathedral, Ferns, at 5.30 p.m. Both bishops will also issue a joint pastoral.

In Dublin members of the Catholic, Church of Ireland, Presbyterian and Methodist Churches will set off at 2.30 from sites in Baldoyle, Bayside, Howth Summit and Sutton, visiting sacred places on the Howth peninsula before converging at the Sutton foreshore, around 4.30 p.m.

There will also be ecumenical pilgrimages in Drumcondra, at the Stardust Memorial Park, a Matt Talbot pilgrimage in the inner city, to the holy well in Athy, and the High Cross in Moone.

Celebrations will take place at GAA pitches in Limerick, Clonfert (Ballinasloe) and Elphin (Sligo), as well as Waterford and Lismore dioceses.

A pageant tracing the history of the diocese of Ardagh and Clonmacnois begins at 10 p.m. tonight in St Brigid's convent, Ardagh, Co Longford.

Choirs from throughout Cloyne diocese will gather in Cork racecourse to sing a concelebrated Mass at 3 p.m. tomorrow, while at sunset tonight, 9.27 p.m., a vigil fire will be lit at the Curragh racecourse in the Kildare and Leighlin diocese.

In the west thousands of people from the Achonry diocese are expected to walk to Knock, while in Killala every parish is being asked to bring a stone from a local holy site to put on a cairn inside the abbey at Moyne.

In the North the Bishop of Down and Connor, Dr Patrick Walsh, will lead a pilgrimage to Our Lady's shrine at Moneyglass. Mass will be celebrated at Corrdinna Mass rock near Omagh, and in the Meath diocese there will be a pilgrimage to Portloman, near Mullingar.