17.10.2014
Minister for Education and Skills to launch Irish Archives 2014 on the theme: The Records of the Church of Ireland
The Minister for Education Jan O’Sullivan TD (pictured) will launch volume 21 of Irish Archives (the journal of the Irish Society for Archives, edited by Susan Hood and Elizabeth McEvoy) which this year is devoted to the records of the Church of Ireland.
The launch will take place in the Deanery of St Patrick’s Cathedral, with the kind permission of the Dean, the Very Revd Victor Stacey, on Tuesday November 4 at 6.15 pm. Minister O’Sullivan is the first person to hold this particular ministerial portfolio who happens also to be a member of the Church of Ireland.
The Church of Ireland does not always get credit for gathering records together and keeping them safe. This volume of Irish Archives aims to set the record straight by paying tribute to those who have looked after an array of parish collections, diocesan papers and miscellaneous manuscripts in local and central custody and by providing a platform for the current generation of historians and archivists to reassess and reconstruct some of the complex aspects of Church of Ireland identity.
Speaking on this theme, Minister O’Sullivan said: “Record–keeping does not always get the recognition it deserves. However, it is vitally important that we retain a documented link with our past in order to fully understand our present. Church records are a particularly valuable source of information and I am delighted to see those from the Church of Ireland get the recognition they deserve in this volume of Irish Archives.”
The Chairman of the Irish Society for Archives, Dr Raymond Refaussé (who is also Librarian and Archivist at the Representative Church Body Library) responded: “I welcome the Minister’s endorsement of the importance of archives and urge the government, of which she is a member, to appropriately fund this greatly valued but seriously under resourced sector of Irish cultural life”.