Author: Lauren Harte

A great morning at St George’s where we welcomed Preston, Ross, Noah, Dan, Stuart and Ben (pictured below) as fully fledged choristers. This sees the end of their training as probationers under Maeve Falconer as the new probationers begin this Friday. Maeve has been auditioning in the past few weeks and there are plenty of new probationers who will need shown the ropes by our new choristers.

We also saw two new head choristers, Hector and James (pictured below) added to the ranks, as Patrick and Jonah have moved to the back row with Carrington and Ben. Again, more future choral scholars, to be trained by Maeve and David.

One new chorister was unable to attend this morning due to a prior commitment, but Jamie will be installed within the coming weeks.

The Parish Choir had a fabulous afternoon on Saturday at a workshop held by former chorister, Edward McMullan. The counter tenor from The Sixteen was home for a short stay after performing a concert in Derry last night and before rushing home to his day job as counter tenor lay clerk in Westminster Cathedral. Edward (Eddie) put the choir through exciting warm ups physical, mental and vocal before working through the Five Part Mass setting by William Byrd.

The choir responded really well creating an incredible sound. The climax came when Eddie also sang with them, a group united in utter musical expression. Eddie is delighted that the choir continues to sing such repertoire and we look forward to welcoming him back to direct a choral evensong for the Choral Scholar Training Choir.

The choristers preparing for the harvest service in Dromore Cathedral on Sunday, October 16th . Music included Blessed be the God and Father and For the beauty of the earth. David enjoyed getting reacquainted with the organ, a Trevor Crowe rebuild. In true style, the service was followed by a tea in the cathedral hall.

Sunday, October 9th saw our Harvest Festival. Bishop John McDowell, the Bishop of Clogher was our guest preacher at our Choral Eucharist at 11am. The setting was Sumsion in F and the Anthem ‘For the beauty of the Earth’ by Rutter.

Just some of the decorations in church for our Harvest Festival.

The choir this afternoon was made up of students from many schools across Belfast, from BRA, MCB, St Malachy’s and Wallace High. Thirty students started a new programme of monthly Evensongs, in which students will learn the repertoire that they might come across as university choral scholars. The sound was very strong and solid, for many it was the first evensong they’d encountered. Next month, October 23rd sees the second such evensong, where the students will sing Morley, Stanford in Bb and Beati quorum via, also by Stanford.

St George’s is holding a mission from next Saturday, September 10th until Sunday September 18th as part of the church’s 200^th anniversary.

The mission will be led by a team from the Community of the Resurrection in Mirfield, Yorkshire. The team is made up of Fr John Gribben CR and five theological students, Sebastian Hamilton, Alex Hobbs, Philip Kennedy, Steffan Mathias and Waldermar Nion.

Fr John is originally from Willowfield in east Belfast and was ordained in the Church of Ireland in 1975. Since 1979 he has been a member of the Anglican monastic order, the Community of the Resurrection in Mirfield.

The week will take the form of a teaching mission on the theme Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever, with morning sessions at 10.30am Monday-Saturday (except Wednesday 14^th when the session will be at 11am) and evening mission services Sunday–Friday at 7.30pm, followed by refreshments.

There will be children’s events on the Saturday afternoon, September 17, from 2-4pm.

The team will be commissioned by Archbishop Alan Harper, former Archbishop of Armagh and a former Bishop of Connor, at 11am on Sunday September 11.

The rector of St George’s, the Rev Brian Stewart, said: “Everyone is most warmly welcome to the events of Mission 2016 and we would ask you to pray for is success and particularly for Fr John, Alex, Philip, Steffan, Sebastian and Waldermar.”

For further information contact stgeorgesoffice@btconnect.com or ring 028 9023 1275.

Former parishioner and Servers Guild member Iain Jamieson was instituted as Rector of the Drogheda, Ardee and Kilsaran Unions on Thursday, September 1st.

He was previously Curate assistant of Ballymena (Kilconriola) and Ballyclug in the Diocese of Connor.

Some members of St George’s attended to support Iain and our own Rector, Brian Stewart preached the sermon. We pray for Iain as he enters this new phase in his ministry.