Woodturner Brendan Bannon is keeping the Moate Church in the Knocks area near Lisnaskea alive.

The Buttermarket based craftsman is making high quality desk pens from the original antique pitch pine trusses in the former church which was built in 1815.

But for every pen sold Brendan, is donating £5 to Macmillan Cancer Care and £5 to the Holy Cross Church.

The pitch pine truss was donated by Martin Carey who has renovated the church to become his home. It is located adjacent to the traditional crowning place of the Maguire Chieftans.

Brendan explains, "I suppose it all follows on from the centenary of Holy Cross Church last year.

"I chatted with Martin Carey and a few others and decided it would be a good thing to do as well as keep the Moat Church alive,' said Brendan,, who remembers attending the church which then became a school, in 1965.

Dense, rigid and strong, Brendan felt this was a fitting material for the roof trusses of a church in a rural parish emerging fro mthe long dreary shadows of penal times.

The wood has almost miraculous properties of resistance to rot an decay and he says this hard and durable timber could be over 300 years old.

He hopes to make 1,000 pens,which have 22k golf/cobalt trim and Rhodium finish to order. They can be ordered from his studio at the Buttermarket or by e-mailing him on woodturningshop@tiscali.co.uk

The accomplished wood turner will spend many hours crafting the pens.

After selecting several pieces from the trusses Brendan will bore each of them before inserting brass pen tubes.

Then it is onto the lathe where the pens will be turned and shaped before they are assembled and polished.