A warm welcome to the website of the Parish of Our Lady of Good Counsel, Ballyboden, South County Dublin.

Ballyboden is situated at the foot of the Dublin Mountains. It is within the suburb of Rathfarnham, between Whitechurch, Ballyroan and the village of Rathfarnham.

Ballyboden Parish contains a significant part of South Dublin’s green belt stretching up to Kilmashogue, Glendoo, Kilakee, Cruagh and the Hellfire Club. As a result, unusually for a Dublin parish, we also have a number of farms in the area.

The Ballyboden area was originally part of the Parish of Rathfarnham which goes back to Pre-Reformation times. Terenure was the first parish to separate from Rathfarnham in 1894. The rapid increase in population in the Rathfarnham area from the 1960s on resulted in a series of new parishes separating in quick succession – Churchtown (1965), Ballyroan (1968), Tallaght (1972) and Ballyboden (1972).

The parish church was opened in 1981 and is currently serviced by the Augustinian Order.

It is part of a parish partnership that includes the Church of the Annunciation (Rathfarnham), the Church of the Good Shephard (Churchtown),the Church of the Holy Spirit(Ballyroan), the Church of St. Colmcille (Knocklyon) and the Church of the Divine Word (Marley Grange).

Current Priests of our parish:

Fr. Noel Hession OSA (Parish Priest)

Fr. John Hughes OSA 

Fr. Dick Lyng.

There are two historical artefacts in the Church that give us links with Christian communities in the far distant past. The Holy Water font beside the main entrance is from the original Augustinian Abbey in Tullow, Co Carlow. The Abbey was founded around 1300. The font was kept safely by the Gahan Family and was given to us by Thomas Kirwan, Abbey Street, Tullow.

The Bell in the Belfry of the Church was originally in the Church of Santa Maria in Posterula, Rome. It bears the date 1612 AD as well as the name of the reigning Pope Paul the Fifth.