27th June 2010

Fr Michael Tierney and Sister Celeste (Ina Bowe) Events

CHURCHTOWN HOSTS TWO IMPORTANT EVENTS.

Churchtown village will form the backdrop to both a book launch and a very special plaque unveiling ceremony on Sunday next 27th June. The book entitled "Father Michael Tierney MSC, a Priest with a Mission" will be launched after second mass at 12.45pm in the Booney House in the village. The book which will be launched by Gerry Murphy is written by local historian Denis J Hickey and chronicles the life and work of Churchtown born Father Tierney. This extraordinary man not only built schools and churches on two continents, but was also in 1909, responsible for founding the Irish Foundation of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart in Dyke House on Cork's Western Road which later became the Sacred Heart College. A plaque was unveiled on Churchtown's Pillar of Honour last year to Fr Michael and his brother and sister who were also in religious life.

The second event at 2.00pm is a tribute to Ina Bowe otherwise known as Sister Celeste, MBE. Sister Celeste, a Daughter of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul spent some time as a Nursing Sister in Cork, Dublin, and Pinner, Middlesex, before accepting a move to St. Joseph's Rosewell, Scotland, to work with severely intellectually challenged children. In recognition of her selfless devotion and of her introduction of the (then) revolutionary concept of normalisation in this field, Sister Celeste received the MBE from Queen Elizabeth II in 1975. Sr. Celeste was severely ill at the time but bore her illness with a stoic resignation. She died the following year in her 46th year. A bronze plaque will be raised in memory of Sister Celeste on Churchtown's Pillar of Honour on Sunday next in the presence of several members of the extended Bowe, Ducey, Ambrose and Lehane families, representatives of the Daughters of Charity, and Mercy Orders and some of Ina's classmates from Churchtown.

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