TWO NEW REDEMPTORISTS The Redemptorists welcome new family members 30 July 2016 was a day of celebration when Mark McMullan and Ryan Holovlasky professed their First Vows as Redemptorists in Clonard Monastery, Belfast. The new Redemptorists had successfully completed their Novitiate year in Toronto. Mark and Ryan have now joined the
Redemptorist formation community in Chicago to continue their studies. We ask you to keep Mark and Ryan in your prayers, as well as to pray that more men will discern the Redemptorist way of life. For more about the Redemptorists, please contact us at: vocations@ redemptorists.ie
DIAMOND JUBILEE OF ST GERARD’S, BELFAST
On 9 December, 2016 the Redemptorist Church of St Gerard on the Antrim Road, Belfast, celebrates its diamond jubilee. In 1951 a Victorian villa, Ben Eaden, came on the market when its owner, Major William Adeley, died. Originally part of the Belfast Castle estate, it was situated on a superb woodland site of 33 acres on the side of Cave Hill, overlooking Belfast Lough. The Redemptorists were anxious to acquire a site in this part of the city to build a retreat house as a replacement for Mount St Clement’s in Ardglass, Co. Down. Ardglass was the first Redemptorist retreat house in Ireland. In the years since its inception in 1947, it had proved phenomenally successful, but the old castle was in need of repairs and a site closer to the city was needed. In the political and social world of Belfast in the 1950s, any attempt by a religious order to acquire property usually met with stiff opposition. With the help of a local solicitor, the property was purchased for £14,000. The Adeley family left for England on 29 September 1951, and the
2
Redemptorists moved in the same day. The largest ground floor room of the mansion was converted into a temporary chapel, and it was canonically erected in September 1953 as a Redemptorist community under the patronage of St Gerard. The site, on a steep hillside, was not ideal for building, and concrete piles had to be sunk, some as deep as 40 feet. The church of St Gerard was dedicated on 9 December 1956. The upper Antrim Road was a comfortable middle-class area with few Catholics but, by the 1960s, the Catholic population was growing. In 1969, the Redemptorists agreed to take parochial responsibility for a new area carved out from the existing parishes. It was the first time the Irish Redemptorists had taken responsibility for running a parish. The first parish priest was Fr Thomas McKinley, with Fr Patrick McGowan as curate. The present parish priest is Fr Gerry Cassidy with Fr Pat McLaughlin as curate. A retreat house was eventually built on the upper part of the site in 1960, and was closed in 2007.
Mark and Ryan
A NEW REDEMPTORIST COMMUNITY IN DUBLIN
Following the closure of Marianella in January 2016, a new Redemptorist community was formed in Griffith Avenue, Dublin 9. It is made up of five confreres, including the Provincial Fr Dan Baragry. While one of the members works with the Travelling community, the Griffith Avenue community is very much a “house of welcome” for Redemptorists from around Ireland as well as those returning from the abroad. We wish the community every blessing in their new home.
The back garden
The new community