Newsletter July 2025

Parish website:  www.traleedingle.ardfert.anglican.org    Email: stjohns.ashestreet@gmail.com

https://www.facebook.com/Tralee-and-Dingle-Group-of-Parishes-680304582052423/

Rector: The Rev Jim Stephens @ 087 0529107           stjohns.ashestreet@gmail.com

              The Rev Willa Goodfellow @ 083 3864483     willagoodfellow@gmail.com

St Johns Parochial School End of term and graduation service

This was held in the church on the 18th June. The young people led the service and it was lovely to hear the school choir in song again.

Best wishes to those who are moving on to new schools in the autumn and to the staff as they take a well-deserved break over the summer months.

The service in the church was followed by a Bar-be-que in the school grounds, which was prepared by Collette and Mary. This was enjoyed by The Children, Staff, Parents and Grandparents.

 

We also send our prayerful good wishes and congratulations to our young people attending many of the primary schools in the parish area as they also leave primary and prepare for secondary school in the Autumn.

 

Bishop Michael Will visit Kilgobbin and Dingle on the 20th July

 

Graveyard Services.

 

Kilflynn Church, This service has been going for many years and it was held on the evening of the 16th June in the Church grounds and was always followed by tea and conversation in the Church afterwards.

We are very grateful to the Kilflynn Development association with whom we have a license agreement for the Church for the way that they care for the Church and the grounds.

The Church is in reality the community centre for the area. If you happen to be in the area please take a walk in the grounds.

 

St Johns Brewery Road service will be held on Thursday the 10th July @7.30pm either in the St Johns Burial grounds or in St Brendans Church.

 

St James Dingle Ecumenical service will be held on the the 26th July @ 5pm.

 

The Tralee, Ballymac and Ballyseedy Service will be on Saturday the 9th August at 7.30pm in Ballyseedy Church. During these services we remember those who are buried in the grounds and those who grieve for them.

 

Pilgrims to Santiago de Compostella,

Congratulations to Rev Mike and Rita Holstein who walked the Camino in June and reached Compostela. Mike has included the following short report on their trip.

It was a wonderful achievement for them and Mike has contributed the following account of their journey.

 

Our Camino Trip:  We thank all those who encouraged us and prayed for us!  We applied 25 km from the Kerry Camino, so we started in A Coruna in NW Spain.  The Camino Ingles is 77 km going from A Coruna to Santiago.  We took 8 days to get to Santiago, staying at hotels along the way.  The landscape along the way was up and down hills with some level ground, through forests, along a couple streams, along the edge of farmland, and through a couple small villages. 

I have trusted the Lord to lead me in my life.  At least I thought I had.  My enthusiasm for taking the Camino Ingles walk was not as much as Rita’s.  It was a struggle to plan the flights and the hotels for our trip.  Rita worked diligently for a month to accomplish that. 

 

Before we left, a hymn on Sunday was “Father I know I always can trust You.”  That took on a whole new meaning for me as we were walking. When we started our walk after the first three days of walking, each night the Lord provided a cab driver who knew where our hotel was located.   There was no way for us to find where the hotels were from the Camino walkway.  

 

The next day we knew we were close, and the Lord provided us with a young lady who did some magic on her phone and told us where a cab would pick us up on the walkway.  The following day the Lord provided us with a young lady who called our hotel and speaking Spanish arranged for the hotel manager to pick us up.  

It was the next day that we learned to trust in a new way.  We knew we were close to our hotel, but there was no way to leave the walkway.  We were walking on a hill above and along a large highway.  We kept walking and got to the point where we were exhausted, going 10 km past where we thought we were supposed to find our hotel. 

We prayed for our Father to provide help, and as we came to a small house by a turn in the path away from the direction we thought we should go, we stopped in confusion and weariness.  At that moment the Lord provided two bikers from Portugal who asked us how we were, gave us snack bars (it had been a long time since we ate), took charge of us, sat us down, found a lady in a house close by to give us sugar water, located our hotel and called a cab, explaining (in Spanish) where we were (we hadn’t a clue) and when the cab arrived offered to pay for the cab  

 

We didn’t need them to pay for the cab, but we really needed their wonderful help, truly a gift from the Lord.  We got a picture and email address and heard from them later asking how we were.  From that point on, we had a very new sense of “Father I know I always can trust You!”  

We got directions to our last two hotels with a new sense of confidence and joy.  We carry with us a sense of wonder and thanksgiving for the Lord’s blessings along the way, in our exploration of Santiago, in the magnificent church in Santiago, and in the inspiring experience of the mass with the amazing Botafumero, (swinging of the incense) that touched our spirits in a very special way.  We also walked around the old and new parts of the city besides taking a tour to Finisterra on the Atlantic, so named by a Roman general who thought he had come to the end of the world

The blessing of the people we know at St John’s, the people we met, and the Lord’s provision along the way will always be a joy in our heart

Eoin Duignan Concerts in St James Dingle

These concerts run on Monday, Wednesday and Friday nights in St James Church Dingle beginning at 7pm

 

Parishioners in Hospital

If you or someone known to you is in any of the hospitals in Tralee, please let me know.

At present and because of GDPR the hospitals are not allowed to give patients names.

I will only be too happy to visit, as part of my role is to provide pastoral care to Church of Ireland patients in UHK and the BONS.

 

Sanctuary Sunday Prayer.

Lord Jesus Christ,

you call us to show hospitality and welcome to strangers.

Fill us with your compassion

for all who make difficult and dangerous journeys.

Be with all who have endured unspeakable trauma.

Help us work for the safety and well-being of all people.

Empower us to be your light  in every place where darkness reigns. Amen