New Diocesan Chancellor for Dublin & Glendalough

Photo above – The Revd Robert Marshall, Dean Dermot Dunne, Archbishop Michael Jackson, Ciarán Toland SC and the Revd Stephen Farrell at the installation of Ciarán Toland as Diocesan Chancellor.

Dublin & Glendalough’s new Diocesan Chancellor, Ciarán Toland SC, was installed during Choral Evensong at Christ Church Cathedral on Sunday past, January 20. The Diocesan Chancellor is the presiding judge of the diocesan courts of both Dublin and Glendalough. Mr Toland was sworn in by Archbishop Michael Jackson in the presence of the Diocesan and Provincial Registrar, the Revd Stephen Farrell and the Deputy Diocesan and Provincial Registrar, the Revd Robert Marshall.

Ciarán Tolan is a practising barrister and Senior Counsel at the Bar of Ireland, is called to the Bar of Northern Ireland and regularly appears before the Court of Justice of the European Union and other international bodies. He practices in the field of public law, specialising in EU and constitutional law.

From Lisburn, Co Antrim, he studied law in Trinity College Dublin and for the Bar in the Honorable Society of King’s Inns. He maintains a particular interest in EU affairs and has been a frequent activist for European integration, the dissemination of information on European affairs, the education of Irish lawyers in European law and transparency and anti–corruption with the European Union.

Ciarán succeeds the Hon Mrs Justice Catherine McGuinness. She held the office for two decades and the Revd Stephen Farrell said in his sermon that she had been an exemplary Chancellor and Assessor to Diocesan Synods. “She is owed a debt of gratitude, both from these Dioceses and from the wider Church of Ireland. She continues to serve the wider Church on the General Synod’s Bills Committee, the Legislation Committee and as a judge of the Court of the General Synod. To wish her well in her retirement would be a little premature,” he stated.

Photo above – Ciarán Toland SC signs the declaration during his installation as Diocesan Chancellor at Christ Church Cathedral, watched by the Revd Stephen Farrell, Archbishop Michael Jackson and Dean Dermot Dunne.

The duties of a chancellor, Mr Farrell explained, were partly defined by precedent but were largely set out in the Good Book – the Constitution of the Church of Ireland. He said that Ciarán would be a natural chancellor. “His intelligence and forensic mind will be almost as important as his wisdom, independence and his integrity. I should add to this that he is also highly principled, kind and generous – but I’ve yet to see these qualities lauded as essential to the office,” he added.

The vocation of chancellor was the vocation of all who were engaged in the work of Church law, he said: to ensure the right ordering of the Church so that the Church is unhindered and even enabled to carry out its mission to the world. The work of the church lawyer is not peripheral to the church’s mission, it is there to underpin and strengthen it, he explained.

The preacher continued: “Although lawyers are the victims of almost as many unkind jokes as clergy, the truth is that law, properly understood, is not an alien imposition on a grumbling church but a way of securing two things for the common good within the church. The first is consistency: law promises that we shall be treated with equity, not according to someone’s arbitrary feelings or according to our own individual status and power. It gives to all of us the assurance that we can be heard. The second is clarity about responsibility: we need ways of knowing who is supposed to do this or that and who is entitled to do this or that, so that we can act economically and purposefully, instead of being frustrated by a chaotic variety of expectations and recriminations”.