Irish Parish radio Collection

These pages present my collection of replies from Irish parishes, of their parish radios (church radios), which I have heard on 27 MHz-band here at my home in Naantali, SW Finland .

It has been a great pleasure to find these small local church-radios from the radio-wavelengths, to identify them, and to make many contacts to Irish priests and other parish people!!!

The letter-replies I got back from Ireland are so kind, beautiful and unique that I decided to make a web-page of my collection. For sure this is unique web-page, like Fr. Shane Crombie from Tullamore Parish wrote me: "Harri! Congratulations! Such a wonderful and unique project: they say there is a website for everything; now it is true!!"
It has been fun to give parish people a big surprise that their low-power radiosignal skipped even to Finland, 2000 km away! This is very rare and possible only for some time because of the peak activity of the present solar cycle in the sun, which affects to radiosignal's reflections in the ionosphere above the earth.

Updated 21.4.2016:

   All signals are now gone and disappeared - perhaps for many years!! I identified 216 churches!

     Here is an audio -example (3 min / mp3) of St Colmcille Church, Churchtown South, Cloyne Parish, County Cork. It is a recording
     of the parish notices at the end of the Mass. Churchtown South and Cloyne are mentioned twice. Recording from Sun 1.11.2015.

     Two new churches found from the past files from 2012 and 2013
      27755 kHz SS Peter & Paul Church, Balbriggan Parish, Co. Dublin. Found from my 2012-recordings!
      27125 kHz Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Sligo Cathedral Parish, Co. Sligo - Tuned 23.10.2013 mp3-clip

     On Sunday 1st November 2015 I identified these churches :
      27801 kHz Church of the Assumption, Killeeshil Parish, Dungannon, Co. Tyrone, Northern Ireland
      27395 kHz St. Anne’s Church, St. Anne’s and Carraroe Parish, Sligo, Co. Sligo
      27405 kHz Church of the Miraculous Medal, Clonskeagh Parish, Clonskeagh Dublin 14, Co. Dublin
      27185 kHz St.Joseph & St. Benildus Church, Newtown Road, Waterford City, County Waterford, Ireland
      27671 kHz St Mary Queen of Peace Church, Glenravel Parish, Ballymena, Co. Antrim, Northern Ireland
      27305 kHz Our Lady of the Wayside Church, Bluebell Parish, Dublin 12, Ireland
      27225 kHz St. Brigid´s Church, Knockbridge Parish, Knockbride East, Co. Cavan, Ireland
      27278 kHz St Bartholomew's Church, Dromcollogher & Broadford Parish, Dromcollogher, Co. Limerick, Ireland

Latest replies:
- Letter from Father Eugene Sweeney from Church of Our Lady Queen of Peace, Loughgall Parish, Maghery, Co. Armagh,
   Norhern Ireland. Also bishop-cards and Cathedral-cards. Father Sweeney is now working for Eglish Parish and he just found my old
   letter and replied to me. Very nice surprise! I heard this church only one time during funeral Mass.

- Letter from St. Brigid´s Church, Knockbridge Parish, Knockbride East, Co. Cavan, Ireland. It was written by the member of their
   parish pastoral council, Mr John Clarke.

- Letter from St. Anne’s Church, St. Anne’s and Carraroe Parish, Sligo written by Rev, Patrick Lombard

- Letter from Killeeshil Parish, Dungannon, Co. Tyrone, N.Ireland from Fr. Pat Hannigan

- Kind e-mail from Sligo Cathedral, St Mary's Presbytery from secretary Fiona Foley. She confirmed I heard St Anne's Church, Sligo

- Short e-mail from Rev. Gabriel Lyons with verification for my mp3-clip, Glenravel Parish, Co. Antrim, N.Ireland

- Kind letter from Beaumont, Dublin 12, Parish the Nativity of Our Lord Church written by Conor McCann (Parish Pastoral worker)

- Kind letter from Navan Road, Parish of Our Lady Help of Christians (Dublin 7) written by secr. Marian Rooney

- Nice reply from Italy, Parrocchia SS. Trinitá, Milano written by Don Mario Longo: Letter, Newsletter 1, 2, festa della divina Miser.
   Audio-clips from Chiesa della Santissima Trinità (9.3.2014): Clip1 - Clip2 - Clip3

- Nice replies from Clonaslee Parish, Co. Laois: A letter from Fr. Thomas O'Reilly and webmaster Paddy Bates who kindly scanned
   my letter (and Jim Solatie's letter) to Clonaslee parish's webpage (www.clonasleeparish.com)

- Donnybrook Parish (Dublin) replied with a letter (envelope) written by Mgr. Lorcan O'Brien. My letter is mentioned in their newsletter!

- I have a reply from parish priest from Australia. I heard Fr Denis Ryan from Robinvale Parish, Victoria, Australia having a Mass in
St Michael the Archangel in Belfast. He was in holidays in Northern Ireland and he had one Sunday Mass celebration there. He wrote
me a kind little letter. Fr Ryan is now working as deputy priest in many parishes in Australia.

Parish radio is kind of a radio station, which broadcast all the Masses and events from the local church, live, on 27 MHz CB-frequency. This service is for the local people who are not capable to arrive to the church (elder and sick people). It is not allowed to broadcast any other content, only live public church-events.

I have now identified all together exactly 216 different churches from Ireland and Northern Ireland. I have sent to almost all parishes a recording on a CD of what I have heard - and I have asked them to write me back a letter with some printed material, if they have. The letter-reply would be a nice memory of this special signal-skip via ionosphere - and looks much better and personal than e-mail.

In my letters I wished to have a confirmation from them, that it was really their church which I have heard. My contact and CD has been a big surprise for many - to reach Finland with their small transmitter. But I think many of them have not believed that this is possible - and no reply back.

However, the result of this is that I have about 80 letters back with beautiful material of Irish parishes. This is an unique collection in the world of this kind. (However, my friend in Austria, Patrick Robic has even bigger collection of replies with cards - mine are letters).

I have scanned here all the letters and other material, which I have from Ireland. It has been a great plesure to give them a surprise of their signal skipping to Finland - and to have a contact to priests and other parish people!

However, most of the parishes have not replied. So, if you find your parish in the list of my collection, but not replied yet, please do so. I will mail you a CD with a return postage!

I am convinced that the parish priests and workers in Ireland and Northern Ireland are very very busy. Almost all of them have Masses every day and they have to carry marriages, child christenings and espacially funerals (which are also aired as well). So, I do not wonder so many of them have not replied.

By listening live Masses from Irish parishes I have learned a lot of Ireland and the Catholic church. It is interesting to read about the history of the individual churches, the founders, parish work and the little villages (with strange names).

In the year 2008 I visisted many chruches in Ireland with my wife - in the way by train from Dublin to Galway. Unfortunately at that time I did not know the existence of parish radios in Ireland.

The first signals from them I heard in autumn 2011 on several weekends, then in autumn 2012 shortly and very often during October 2013 - March 2014.

Here I explain how and why this signal-skip is possible. This is rare - and possibly all signals will disappear for many years after this autumn 2014! Nobody knows for sure. All depends on the sun's activity in the sky.