Holy Trinity Church Ballywalter Newtownards County Down

Welcome to the website of Ballywalter Parish, which serves Holy Trinity Church Ballywalter and St. Andrew’s Church Balligan. Please feel free to browse the pages and find out more about this historic parish that can trace its roots back some 800 years.

Ballywalter Parish is part of the Diocese of Down and Dromore, which is part of the Church of Ireland, itself part of the worldwide Anglican Communion of over 70 million members. The main purpose of the parish is to support the advancement of the Christian religion by promoting the whole mission of the church, pastoral, evangelistic, social and ecumenical . We are open to, and engage with our community at all levels.

If you would like to join us for worship, you will be made most welcome. Morning service (11.30am) takes place at Holy Trinity (1st Sunday: Holy Communion, 2nd and 3rd Sundays: Morning Prayer, 4th or 5th Sunday: All Age service, as does the evening service (6pm) on 1st (Evening prayer), 3rd (Holy Communion) and 5th (Wholeness and Healing) Sundays of the month. On the 2nd Sunday evening at 7.00pm there is a freestyle service(HTB7)

On 2nd and 4th Sundays at 3.30pm, choral evensong takes place at St. Andrew’s.

We are open to and engage with our local community at all levels. We achieve this through regular public worship ,and through our community outreach programme. We have seven Sunday services per month (nine in a five Sunday month) (see Calendar).

In addition we have services on Ash Wednesday, and Good Friday, Holy Communion on the Thursday of Holy Week, Midnight Communion on Christmas Eve, and carols on Christmas morning. We celebrate Mothering Sunday, Easter and Harvest with Festival Services. We also have a very popular special evening of Christmas themed poems, readings and music with the Ballywalter Flute Band on the first Sunday evening in December.

Community groups use our church for special weekday and Sunday events including Ballywalter Primary School (Weekday Harvest Celebration), Royal British Legion( Remembrance and special events), Ballywalter and District Orange Lodges, Childrens’ Seaside Mission(CSSM) Ulster Society of Organists and Choirmasters(USOC)( specialist musical history and history of the organ.) On the Monday,Tuesday and Wednesday of Holy Week, we have Easter -themed meditations in the church which are open to all of any faith or none. This year, we also had an evening of music, poems and readings with a harvest theme, and, on Good Friday, a service called ‘Voices of the Cross’ which followed the events of Good Friday through the eyes of the people at the foot of the cross, interspersed with music and hymns for Good Friday. This proved to be a very moving and thought- provoking evening.

Our congregation warmly welcomes visitors, individuals and families who have recently moved to Ballywalter and the surrounding area. The church has a parish choir, All Age Singing Group, Mother’s Union, Community Bible Study, Going for Growth group, All Age planning group and Monday prayer Group, who meet regularly through the week for Bible Study, prayer and friendship.

In addition, community outreach is achieved through CSSM, the Girls’ Brigade, Community Bible Study, Going for Growth Group and our market stalls held on four Saturday mornings during July and August. Barn dances and Old Tyme dances also contribute to our social outreach. We also host a ‘Big Breakfast’ for Christian Aid for the whole community during Christian Aid week. New, this year we also held a very successful Childrens’ Holiday Club from 3rd-5th April for all the children in our community in p1-p7 age group. Everyone really enjoyed following the Quest for the Great Pearl (adults included!) and a rowing boat even found its way into the chancel of the church along with a pirates’ cave and a full size skeleton.

 

Download Holy Trinity Church Ballywalter vCard with Service Times

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Download Incumbent Rev Adrian Green vCard

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Diocese of Down & Dromore  

https://ballywalter.down.anglican.org/  

 

 

Holy Trinity Church, Ballywalter is situated close to the junction of Whitechurch Road and Dunover Road on the northern edge of the village. St. Andrew’s Church, Balligan is situated about 2 miles south of Ballywalter on Irvinshargie Road. There is a signpost to it about a mile south of Ballywalter on the road to Ballyhalbert.  

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The following words are contained in the Sentence of Consecration of Holy Trinity Parish Church, dated 24th September 1849: – ‘whereas the church in the Parish of Ballywalter is in ruins and the site inconveniently situated ……a new site acquired by an act of the Lord Lieutenant and Privy Council of Ireland’….

The ruins referred to above are located in Whitechurch Cemetery, just North-West of the present church. The east and west gables and part of the south wall alone stand to any height, elsewhere the walls are reduced to foundation or have completely disappeared; the surviving masonry is heavily overgrown with ivy. The building is probably substantially of the 13th Century, with some 15th century reconstruction, although some parts are dated earlier than 13th century. However, by the mid-17th century the church had fallen into disrepair (we know,for example, that in 1657 it had only a thatched roof). So early in Queen Anne’s reign it was decided to abandon the Ballywalter church (along with the one in Ballyhalbert) and build a new church to serve a Union of the three parishes –Ballywalter, Ballyhalbert and Innishargie. In 1704, the new church of St.Andrew, Innishargie was erected.

For well over a hundred years, St.Andrew’s was the centre of Church life in the area. However, during the early 19th century people began to realise that one church was not enough. Ballywalter, Ballyhalbert and Kircubbin, all in the Parish of St.Andrew, were growing in population and needed churches of their own. By an Act of Council, dated 29th June,1844, the Union of Ballywalter, Ballyhalbert and Innishargie was dissolved and they were declared separate and distinct parishes. In this re-division, the ancient Parish of Innishargie disappeared; but St.Andrew’s church still stands. (It is known as Balligan Church and the twice monthly services of Choral Evensong in that church form an important part of the spiritual life of Ballywalter Parish).

Thus “a new site was acquired” in Ballywalter, the foundation stone was laid in 1847 and the church, (consisting then of the main Nave, Chancel and Sanctuary only) was consecrated on 24th September,1849. It had a seating accommodation of 145.

The church was enlarged and restored in 1891, with the addition of the side aisle, organ and choir, porch and vestry to give us the church as we have it today.

The church is enhanced by the beauty of the stain glass windows which mostly date from this time.

The organ was built by Peter Conagher in 1891 and was tonally redesigned in 1964. It has two manuals and pedals

Specification:

Great: Open Diapaison 8, Stopt Diapaison 8, Principal 4, Fifteenth 2, Mixture 19,22 II Swell: Gedect 8, Gemshorn 4, Blockflute 2, Sesquialtera 17,19 II, Mixture 22,26,29 III, Contra Fagotto 16, Tremulant Pedal: Grand Bourdon 16, Bourdon 16.

Parish of Ballywalter – Clergy list and year of appointment

1437 – John O’Heran 1442 – James O’Biedran 1625/1626- James Hamilton 1657 – Anthony Shaw 1661 – Robert Pierce 1692 – David Maxwell 1699 –Hans Montgomery 1727 – Francis Hamilton 1729 /30 – John Mercer 1769 – William Lodge 1770 – Peter Windsor 1775 – Roger Blackhall 1790 – Holt Waring 1798 – William Boyd 1824 – Francis Ed.Lascelles 1844 – Hugh Wilson 1878 – John O’Reilly Blackwood 1884 – William McManus 1887 – John O’R Blackwood (2nd time) 1895 – John Alexander Greer 1901 – William Shaw Kerr 1910 – John B.A.Hughes 1921 – William Kelly 1925 – Mervyn Archdale 1937 – Cecil T Jackson 1974 – Cecil R Mitchell 1982 – Desmond Hanna 1990 –John R.L. Bowley 2014 – Susan C Bell