DUBLIN’S “BLACK Santa” is to come out of retirement to raise more money for charity in his usual pre-Christmas position outside St Ann’s Church on Dublin’s Dawson Street. It will be the seventh annual “Black Santa” sit-out by Canon Tom Haskins, who retired as vicar of St Ann’s and St Stephen’s earlier this year.
He will be assisted by his former curate the Rev Joyce Rankin. They will be there from 9am tomorrow until 6pm each day until Christmas Eve, except Sunday next when the sit-out will begin after morning prayer. Charities to benefit will include the St Vincent de Paul, Barnardos, the Samaritans and others working for overseas development. The six collections to date have raised over €130,000.
Meanwhile, it has been announced that Canon Haskins’s successor as vicar at St Ann’s and St Stephen’s will be the Rev David Gillespie (40), currently rector of Moy (Dungannon, Co Tyrone).
Born in Derry and educated in Faughan Valley High School there, Mr Gillespie worked as a journalist with Morton Newspapers before moving to Dublin in 1999, where he studied for the ministry at the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. He was ordained a priest in 2002. In 2001 he was appointed curate in Agherton (Portstewart, Co Derry) and in 2004 became rector of Moy.
St Ann’s and St Stephen’s are two of Dublin’s best known churches. Built in 1707, St Ann’s has included in its congregation such well-known Irish people as Dr Thomas Barnardo, Hugh Lane, Bram Stoker, Wolfe Tone and President Douglas Hyde. St Stephen’s is better known to Dubliners as “the Pepper canister”.
Both are active centres of worship as well as being venues for concerts and recitals.
