October 31st, 2021

Adamstown Parish Newsletter,

Weekend of Sat 30th & Sun 31st October 2021   

Volume 22.  Number 41

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ADAMSTOWN LOTTO DRAW POSTPONED

Please note that the Adamstown Lotto draw due to take place this Monday 1st Nov, has been postponed to next Monday 8th November, as a mark of respect to the late Tom Furlong, who worked with the Lotto Committee for many years.

 May his gentle soul rest in peace.

ADAMSTOWN ATHLETIC CLUB

Adamstown Athletic Club – Open Cross Country in Adamstown, Sunday November 14th 2021.

Start time 12.noon. Races;

Tiny tots u-9 Girls & Boys 500m

U-10 & U-11 Girls & Boys 1000m

U-12 & U-13 Girls & Boys 2000m

U-14 & U-15 Girls & Boys 3000m

U-16 & U-17 Junior Girls & Boys 3000m

U-9 to U-17 medals for first 10 individuals.

Junior Girls & Boys medals for first 3 individuals.

GAA ROUNDERS 2021 ALL STARS AWARDS

ADAMSTOWN ROUNDERS – 2021 ALL STARS

Huge congratulations to the following Adamstown ladies

from Adamstown Rounders Team who were awarded GAA Rounders 2021 All Stars Awards

The Pitcher All Star goes to Joanne Murphy

The Ladies Award for Short Stop goes to Anne Marie Dunphy

The Third Base Award goes to Maura Staples

The Second Base Award goes to Leann Delaney

Well done ladies and well deserved, continued success.

RECENT DEATHS

Our community was deeply saddened to hear of the death of Tom Furlong (Jun), Castlelodge on Thursday last. We offer our heartfelt sympathy to his wife Lou, sons Dara and James, parents Tom and Angela, sisters Niamh, Majella, brother Fr.  Odhrán, extended family, neighbours and friends. Tom’s funeral Mass was celebrated in St. Abban’s Church on Saturday Oct 30th with burial afterwards in the adjoining cemetery.  May his gentle soul rest in peace.

The death also occurred on Thursday last of Bríd Ryan, Nash, Gusserane, Bríd was a much loved teacher in Adamstown National School for many years. Our deepest sympathy to her husband Pat, son Colm, daughter Emer, grandchildren, sisters, brothers extended family, neighbours and friends. Bríd’s funeral Mass was celebrated in St. John the Baptist Church, Gusserane on Saturday 30th October, followed by burial in the adjoining cemetery.

May her gentle soul rest in peace.

CEMETERY COMMITTEE NOTICE

The Cemetery Committee have received with thanks a further €95.00 towards the cemetery upkeep.

A BIT OF HISTORY – Changing times in Enniscorthy

(Dan Walsh – The Echo Newspaper, November 2006)

Like every other town and village in Co. Wexford, incredible structural changes are taking place with old buildings being replaced with new, and open spaces converted into concrete environs.  However, changes have taken place before. Maybe not in our lifetime, but in that of our forefathers of a few generations earlier. One of the pioneers of change was an Enniscorthy man, William Fortune. His builder and contractor business was run from Lower Church Street and he was recognised as a man of tremendous business acumen. He was the proprietor of a steam sawmills on the river Slaney where the Riverside Park Hotel stands since 1998. The hotel restaurant known as “The Alamo” incorporates a two-storey stone building that served Fortune well, and for many years afterwards was part of Wexford County Council enterprise. On the old maps a small canal serves the building. Materials were supplied and finished goods exported using the cot trade on the river Slaney.

He once employed eighty tradesmen at his premises on the lower end of Abbey Quay, now known as The Promenade.

In 1905, William Fortune obtained a certificate of merit at the Co. Wexford Feis Industrial Exhibition held in New Ross.

Many buildings around Enniscorthy built by Fortune and his team are still in existence today, testimony to a talented businessman whose heydays stranded the late 19th and early 20th century. Browneswood House, and its gate-lodges, was built for £4,000 and completed in 1896.

Enniscorthy Post Office, which opened its doors for the first time on May 4th 1903, cost £2,653 including fitting out costs.

St. Aidan’s Presbytery, commonly called ‘The Manse’ was completed in 1909. Also to the credit of William Fortune is a convent at Bunclody, the AIB Bank at Slaney Place, additions to St. Senan’s Hospital, a dispensary and residence at Clonroche and alterations to Bolger & Co (now Dunnes Stores) at Rafter Street, Enniscorthy.

He was a remarkable man of vision and action and saw

many changes to the townscape of Enniscorthy and other places, albeit miniscule in the light of present day development.

TRÓCAIRE EAST AFRICAN HUNGER CRICIS APPEAL

SATURDAY 6th & SUNDAY 7th NOVEMBER 2021

The Irish Bishops Conference have asked for this special collection take place in all Parishes the weekend of Sat 6th & Sun 7th November 2021. Already affecting over 30 million vulnerable babies, children, women and men, the scale of this hunger crisis is unprecedented. Yet with the world’s focus on local issues and concerns, and resources for humanitarian response more thinly spread than ever, the plight of those in East Africa remains largely hidden. Trócaire teams are responding and on the ground ready to provide more life-saving assistance in East Africa and in other countries similarly affected, but we can do so much more with your support.  Please be as generous as you can.

CHURCH NOTICES

IN MEMORIAM

Sat 30th – Kathleen Rothwell, Groveside (A)

Sun 31st – Patrick & Kathleen Murphy, & deceased members of the Murphy family, Coolnagree & Babs Carr (A)

Sun 31st – Patrick Fortune, Doononey, (Month’s Mind)

Sat 6th Nov – Kathleen Kidd, Oldcourt (A)

Sun 7th – Willie & Hannah Coady, Oldcourt (A)

May they rest in peace.

Mon 1st November – Feast of All Saints

 Mass at 10.30am & 7.30pm

Tue 2nd November  – Feast of All Souls,

Mass at 10.30am & 7.30pm.

Feast Days this week:

Feast of St. Martin de Porres- Nov 3rd 

(St. Martin’s Magazine)

Part of Pope John 23rd homily at Martin’s Canonization.

“He excused the faults of others. He forgave the bitterest injuries, convinced that he deserved much severer punishment on account of his own sins. He tried with all his might to redeem the guilty; lovingly he comforted the sick; he provided food, clothing and medicine for the poor; he helped, as best he could, farm labourers and Negroes, as well as mulattoes, who were looked upon at that time as akin to slaves; thus he deserved to be called by the name the people gave him: ‘Martin of Charity”. Also “The example of Martin’s life is ample evidence that we can strive for holiness and salvation as Christ Jesus has shown us: first, by loving God, “with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind: and second, by loving your neighbour as yourself”

It is remarkable how even today his influence can still move us towards things of heaven. If only everyone could learn this lesson from the example that Martin gave us”

Sat 6th Nov – Feast of All Saints of Ireland

REFLECTION FOR NOVEMBER (Bede Jarrett OP)

We seem to give them back to you, O God, who gave them first to us. Yet as you did not lose them in giving, so we do not lose them by their return. Not as the world gives do you give, O Lover of souls. What you give, you do not take away, for what is yours is ours and also if we are yours. And life is eternal and love is immortal, and death is only a horizon, and a horizon is nothing, save the limit of our sight.

Lift us up, strong Son of God, that we may see further, cleanse our eyes that we may see more clearly; draw us closer to yourself that we may know ourselves to be nearer to our loved ones who are with you. And while you prepare a place for us, prepare us also for that happy place, that where you are we may be also for evermore.

POPE’S INTENTION FOR NOVEMBER

Evangelisation: We pray that people who suffer from depression or burn-out will find support and a light that opens them up to life.

A DAILY PRAYER FOR NOVEMBER

‘May He support us all the day long,

till the shades lengthen and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done.

Then in His mercy may He give us a safe lodging, and a holy rest and peace at the last’

(Bl John Henry Newman)

May your name be held holy among us all; may we pray always in your name; may we be grateful for you saving work, for your name means Saviour. May Mary help us in our life of service. Amen.

HALLOWEEN

The feast of Halloween or Samhain (as it is called in Irish) goes back a long way, back to pagan times, when its original purpose was to mark the end of Autumn and the beginning of winter. All the work was completed, the potatoes dug, the crops harvested. Animals in distant grazing fields were brought home. Consequently, merry-making was the order of the day (or night). All sorts of games and pranks were played. Apples, nuts and puddings added variety to the otherwise plain fare. It was regarded too as a time of magic and mystery, a time when the witches flitted about on broom sticks, and fairies, ghosts, and dead souls, all inhabitants of the ‘Other World’ came down here to visit us. One of the last Halloween customs to die was that of leaving a snug and tidy kitchen after bedtime that night. The Holy Souls who, according to tradition, called then, would find a welcome

A THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK – Author unknown

Not every child will be a lawyer or a doctor,

Teach children that it is ok to work with your hands

and build amazing stuff.

(Ireland’s Eye)

FROM AN ABBEY TO A JAIL

(Fr. Bernard Cotter, Irish Catholic)

As one named Bernard, I have always been fascinated by Clairvaux, St. Bernard’s suffix. I visited his place this year, discovering that St. Bernard christened the place (meaning ‘clear valley), and that the abbey once held over 800 monks. Before the French Revolution, this had gone right down to 20, and those 20 set about improving living conditions there for a more comfortable life. With the Revolution, these were tufted out, and the abbey proved a perfect locate for a maximum-security jail, which it has been for 200 years, to this day. Quite an interesting place to visit.

FIRE SAFETY IN THE HOME

Alarming facts! – On average 46 people die of fires in Ireland every year. Most of these deaths wouldn’t happen if there was a working smoke alarm in the home.

Fact – A recent survey found that there are over 300,000 Irish home with no smoke alarms fitted!

Fact: Smoke, not heat or flames, causes most fire deaths. It can take as little as minutes to die from breathing smoke.

If you do not have a smoke alarm, please don’t waste any more time get one this week, it could save your life.