Dear Friends,

I write this letter having spent all of two nights in the new Bishop’s House at Troysgate, Kilkenny. Inevitably I am surrounded by total administrative and domestic chaos, but it is good in particular to see again old friends in the form of books I have not seen since packing up in Cork last June. Other old friends in the form of portraits of my predecessors now hang on the walls, having been brought here from where they had been stored since the vacation of the old Palace, which is constantly in view at the top of what is now my garden. One finds here, even after forty eight hours, an appropriate sense of continuity of ministry and even  a certain experience of the great cloud of witnesses surrounding one. In due course it will be a particular joy to make use of the excellent chapel facilities which are being provided here. My occupancy of this house brings I know to a conclusion a long and not always easy chapter in the history of the dioceses, but I am confident that this residence will provide a happy and hospitable home for me and for my successors for many years to come. As I fell asleep on my first night here I almost found myself dreaming of my ‘friend’ Richard Ledrede, the famous fourteenth century bishop of Ossory of whom I spoke at my enthronement in Kilkenny – I wondered how he felt as he became the first occupant of the site of the previous Bishop’s House reputedly sometime in the 1350’s!

And so one reflects on the continuity of ministry, despite changes in style and context to meet the needs of the times. A new chapter in ministry will soon begin in Kilcooley, with the arrival of the Reverend Ian Cruickshank, at present curate of Bray, Co Wicklow, as incumbent early in the summer. The Board of Nomination was most blessed to be able to complete its task after deliberations lasting less than three weeks. On a broader canvas, we look forward to an exciting new chapter in training for ordained ministry in the Church of Ireland when in the near future full details are announced of the proposals to transform radically the present model of training and the Theological College itself. A taster concerning these changes is to be found in a separate article in this magazine and you are asked to read it attentively.

However great the changes that surround us, some priorities remain the same. Above all, perhaps, is the disciplined and committed observance of Holy Week, the Christian Week of weeks, which starts just about a month after you will read these words – so you have time to prepare. I have long been convinced that keeping Holy Week should be an absolute priority in every parish, that it should be a time of imaginative, compelling and reflective liturgy and – if I may put it so – magnetic preaching. Truly the way Holy Week is kept is something of a measure of the spiritual temperature of the life of a parish. As I approach my first Holy Week in the dioceses I therefore pray and beseech you all to give time to keeping it properly, to have a sense of real expectation about it in your parishes, to use it in every corner of the bishopric as a time of refreshment and renewal. To do this effectively would have a far greater impact among us than many a great scheme or supposed new idea. As I myself can travel the Holy Week journey in but one place, I propose this year to preach day by day in Wexford on the subject of Judas, which has long fascinated me and where I feel much traditional Christian thinking has been limiting and unhelpful..

But for the moment, continue to try to keep a good Lent and relish the opportunity for nourishment which the sometimes strangely titled sweet feast of Lent actually provides, if we get our priorities right. And by the time I write to you next month, I hope to be able to say that I have at last been liturgically involved in every parochial unit in the dioceses, and that every box of books in this house is finally open! For the warmth of your welcomes and your encouragement of my endeavours in these recent demanding but challenging months I have been so profoundly grateful

MICHAEL CASHEL + OSSORY

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