This video is from Easter Sunday, the first of our weekly services in Youghal. It's just a couple of clips to give you a taste - some music, part of a gospel presentation we gave, and a little bit from Mervyn, the Irish church planter we are working with.
Monastery
Seth's dad was coming to Europe for a business trip anyway, so stopped in for a few days. Today we went out to the middle of nowhere to see a working monastery. It was one of the first in Ireland to be built after Catholics gained back most of their freedoms in the 1800's. For 300 years before that, Catholicism had been suppressed by the English and things like monasteries were not allowed. Inside, the most prominent places were given to Mary, but there was also a shrine to St. Thérèse of Lisieux:
Why is that noteworthy? Well, it just so happens that her earthly remains, or "relics", are touring Ireland as you read this! If you'd like an itinerary, click here.
Fire
Jessica's folks got home from visiting us to only to discover that they had had a house fire. It sounds like a couple of the rooms upstairs are pretty much gone, and most of the rest have damage. Please pray for them as they get things sorted out with the insurance company and try to salvage whatever they can and deal with the loss of what they can't.
Cobh
Jessica's parent are staying with us right now, and besides playing with Daniel, we've also had time to explore our area some more. One of the places we visited was Cobh (pronounced "Cove") which used to be called Queenstown, and was the last stop of the Titanic before it sank. It was also a major port for emigrants during the potato famine. In those days, so many people wanted to leave that they started using boats that were not really seaworthy, which earned themselves the title of "coffin ships". Cobh lost a lot of it's importance when airlines started becoming affordable, but we did see a nice cruise ship in the harbor. It's a beautiful town, and we had some great fish and chips while we were there.
EasterEaster is always a wonderful day for the church, but this Easter was especially significant for our church in Youghal - it marked the beginning of weekly services in Youghal! Pray that the church would be firmly planted and that God would open doors and shine brightly through His people!
Tourism
That's mostly what we've been up to the last few days. Jessica's friend Melissa went home yesterday and now Seth's uncle and cousin are with us over the weekend. Since my last post, we've been to Blarney castle (yes, we kissed the Blarney stone to get the "gift of gab"... is it working?), and Lismore, the Irish home of the current Duke of Devonshire (but he usually stays in his house in Britain). We also took a walk along the cliffs by the sea in Ardmore. But you really ought to just look at the pictures in the gallery!
Waterford
Yesterday we took Jessica's friend Melissa to see Waterford. The first thing we tried to see was closed, but of course, the main attraction there is the Waterford Crystal factory, and none of us had seen it before so we were pretty excited. Unfortunately, Waterford Crystal is no more! The company went out of business recently and was purchased by an American investment group that has decided to close the Waterford factory. Apparently, they intend to continue making crystal in Germany or something like that, but it just doesn't seem right to make Waterford Crystal anywhere else!
Anyway, even though the tour and show room were closed, they did still have the employee gift shop open so they let us go in there and we got a couple of the last pieces made in Ireland - at employee prices!
The rest of our day was spent trying to find other things to do, and we ended up stumbling on a very cool castle ruin as well as a quaint little coastal town with an ancient stone tower built by monks and an amazing hiking trail that ran along cliffs by the ocean. It was a good day after all!
Darwin
The movie Seth pre-screened yesterday is called "The Voyage that Shook the World". It's a documentary about Darwin produced because 2009 is the "year of Darwin" - the 200th anniversary of his birth and 150th anniversary of the publishing of "The Origin of the Species". Although the movie is produced by a Christian organization, it is not overtly Christian or creationist - it simply looks at Darwin's life and work in the light of modern science. Overall it is very well produced (although I thought it was a bit dry at times), and it treats Darwin fairly while at the same time casting real doubt on the validity of his conclusions. I think it will be a useful pre-evangelistic tool for Christians to use. It won't come out until June, but if you'd like to see a trailer, click here.
Dublin
Today Seth is going to Dublin with a couple of our teammates to see a pre-screening of a film that we may be using later for ministry in the area. If it's good, I'll let you know :) Since Seth hasn't been to Dublin yet, he's pretty happy about the opportunity to be there!
Jessica's friend and former college roommate came in from the States yesterday, and we are thrilled to get to spend time with her!
