A CELEBRATORY service of evensong will welcome the new Anglican bishop of the diocese that covers Kilfenora, to the village’s ancient cathedral on Sunday next, May 22. 

The Right Reverent Michael Burrows, whose diocese has recently been expanded to encompass Tuam, as well as Limerick and Killaloe, will be ‘enthroned’ in Kilfenora Cathedral, in a history-making ceremony, at 4pm.

It follows the formal installation, on May 1, of the Catholic Bishop of Galway and Kilmacduagh and Apostolic Administrator of Kilfenora. Bishop Michael Duignan was formally installed in a ceremony at Galway Cathedral. 

Sunday’s ceremony will be a celebration of song and welcome and refreshments will be served in the cathedral after the service. Everyone in the community is welcome to attend. The last enthronement took place in 1981, when Bishop Walton Empey, who was later COI Archbishop of Dublin, came to Kilfenora Cathedral. The bishop’s throne was donated in that year for the deremony, and will be used again on Sunday.

Bishop Burrrows was previously Dean of Cork and Bishop of Cashel, Ferns and Ossory. He is Chair of the Church of Ireland’s Commission for Christian Unity and Dialogue, Chair of the Board of Governors of the Anglican Centre in Rome, Co-Chair of the Church of Ireland-Methodist Covenant Council, and Patron of the Irish Guild of the Church (Cumann Gaelach na hEaglaise) – the Irish language society of the Church of Ireland. He is married with four grown-up children, and a keen railway enthusiast and organist. He will also be enthroned in Clonfert Cathedral on Thursday, May 19 at 7.30pm.