A €2.5m parish centre proposed for Tuam in County Galway has been given the green light.
Galway County Council has given planning permission for the proposed
development on a site between the town’s cathedral and the Mercy
convent.
Fr Stephen Farragher, who as administrator of the parish
for several years until last month was responsible for spearheading the
plan, said the centre would provide a much-needed resource, as the
existing parish centre on the Dublin Road is too small.
He said that the parish cannot cope with demand for the use of rooms
and offices and had to rent rooms in hotels for large diocesan
gatherings, which have become more common as lay involvement in the
affairs of the archdiocese increases.
The fact that the parish has up
to a hundred children being prepared for first communion every year and
that it is now part of a cluster of parishes whose parish councils need
to meet regularly are two of the factors that have made the present
facilities inadequate.
The parish centre will incorporate an existing coach-house that will
be used as an exhibition space and museum for chalices and other
artefacts related to the archdiocese.
The day chapel will be open until 10:00pm each evening and will
contain stained glass windows, which were removed from a chapel in a
disused hospital.
The initial design for the centre was modified in response to issues
raised by planning officials who were uneasy with the parish architects’
first designs.
The parish had initially envisaged a two-storey
building but will now be part single storey with a single-level chapel
and foyer in the front and a two-storey section at the back to
accommodate a hall and meeting rooms.
The council officials sought what they termed a design that would be
more sensitive in architectural terms to the ecclesiastical complex in
which will be built.
The planners are understood to have attached seven
conditions to the development, including a requirement for an
archaeological assessment of the site before building gets under way.
Apart from serving parish and diocese needs, there are hopes that the
museum exhibition in the centre will become a focus for visitors to the
town and Fr Farragher said the centre would give people a sense of the
past and the future.
“The building has been designed for the parish of the future while
being mindful and reminiscent of its past and heritage,” he explained.
Fr Farragher said that €1m had already been accumulated towards the
cost of the project but that considerable fund-raising would still be
necessary.
With his transfer to become PP of Ballyhaunis announced in last
month’s reshuffle of Tuam clergy, the task of seeing the project to
completion falls to his successor, Fr Francis Mitchell.