Tristan : Tristan to Receive a Very Special Visitor
Submitted by Tristan Times (Juanita Brock) 11.09.2005 (Current Article)

Monsignor Michael McPartland is, as this is being written, on his way to Tristan da Cunha aboard the SA Agulhas. As the Roman Catholic Prefect Apostolic for the South Atlantic Islands from Antarctica to Ascension, Monsignor McPartland has responsibility for all Roman Catholic congregations in the 10Million square mile parish.

Photo (c) J. Brock (SARTMA - TdC) Monsignor McPartland

TRISTAN TO RECEIVE A VERY SPECIAL VISITOR

By J. Brock (SARTMA – TdC)

Monsignor McPartland

Monsignor Michael McPartland is, as this is being written, on his way to Tristan da Cunha aboard the SA Agulhas.  As the Roman Catholic Prefect Apostolic for the South Atlantic Islands from Antarctica to Ascension, Monsignor McPartland has responsibility for all Roman Catholic congregations in the 10Million square mile parish.

While on Tristan da Cunha Monsignor McPartland will perform baptisms, confirmations and, possibly marriages.  He will also offer encouragement and instruction to the lay ministers, James Glass, Derek Rogers and Anne Green.  There is also the matter of the priest’s house, which has already been shipped to Tristan but due to the hurricane has not yet been built.

All things going well, Tristan should have a priest for St. Josephs Roman Catholic Church soon.

The three weeks Monsignor spends on Tristan will help him to realise the isolation that remoteness has on the Island’s Catholics.  Indeed, the Host and Holy Water have to be delivered in great quantities – always by sea – sometimes by people who need dispensation in order to accompany the shipment.

When the Agulhas returns from Tristan to Cape Town, Monsignor McPartland will have paid the first visit of a Prefect Apostolic since the Late Monsignor Tony Agreiter did so in 2001.