Monday, May 14, 2012

Sunday Mass saved in Carlow parish

A County Carlow parish that was in danger of losing its Sunday Mass will now continue to have it, thanks to a generous offer by a local priest. 

As previously reported,  St Fintan's Church in Ballinabranna parish was set to lose its Sunday Mass as parish priest Fr Tom Lalor had been in poor health and the local pastoral council took the decision to reduce the number of Masses by cancelling the Saturday Vigil Mass in Leighlinbridge Church and to cancel a Sunday Mass in Ballinabranna. 

At the time, the Chairman of the local Pastoral Council Pat Roche stated that the decision was made to ease the burden on parish priest Fr Tom Lalor, who had just returned to work after undergoing serious heart surgery.

Subsequent to this, a public meeting of concerned parishioners was held in Ballinabranna GAA club and a delegation was sent to the parish council to protest at the decision to end Sunday Mass.  

However, Mr Roche announced this week that there was good news for the parish after Carlow College priest Fr Conn Moloney agreed to take on the duty of saying the 9:30am Mass in Ballinabranna for the next year.

According to Roche, “In the past week, the parish council received an offer from Fr Conn Moloney, through the diocesan administrator for the diocese of Kildare and Leighlin, Mgr Brendan Byrne, to celebrate the 9:30am Sunday Mass in Ballinabranna.” 

“Fr Tom met Fr Conn a few days ago to clarify his offer. In addition to his existing commitments, Fr Conn is happy to say the Mass for the foreseeable future, as long as his circumstances remain unchanged. This will be reviewed after a year. The parish council is delighted to accept this generous offer.”