Historic Churches 2022

BCD SPECIAL REPORT ON HISTORIC CHURCHES 29TH ANNUAL EDITION 5 NATIONAL CHURCH AWARDS The first ever National Church Awards have been launched by the National Churches Trust to celebrate church buildings and the people who look after them. The awards are open to any church, chapel or meeting house in the UK and are free to enter. Winners will include churches from each of the four nations – England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – as well as UK wide. Nominations will be judged by a team of church and heritage professionals. The categories for the 2022 awards are church architecture (closing date 8 July 2022), church maintenance, church volunteers and church tourism (closing date 1 August 2022), and there is a special prize for the UK’s ‘Church of the Year’. Church Architecture is being run in partnership with the Ecclesiastical Architects & Surveyors Association and includes three categories: The King of Prussia Gold Medal for innovative, high quality church conservation or repair work Presidents’ Award (the ICBS silver chalice and patten) for the best new church building, including re- Insurance, for the best young talent working on churches today. Church Maintenance: The dedicated work of volunteers helping to keep church buildings in good condition is due to be recognised by the Nayler Awards for Excellence in Church Maintenance, run in partnership with the Pilgrim Trust. Church Volunteers : Judges for the Church and Community Volunteer Awards, run in partnership with the Marsh Charitable Trust are looking for examples of volunteer- led innovations that help churches benefit their local communities. Church Tourism: Churches that give a warm welcome to visitors are to be recognised by the Church Tourism Awards. Judges are looking for churches with stories to tell, who ‘go the extra mile’ in hosting visitors of all kinds. The National Church Awards will culminate in a high profile ceremony to be held at the historic Mercers Company Livery Hall in the City of London in October. Full details can be found at: www. nationalchurchestrust.org/awards2022. The launch of the National Church Awards (Photo: Andy Sillett) CHURCH CLOSURES IN SCOTLAND With many UK churches struggling as their congregations age and decline in numbers, hundreds of churches in Scotland are now set to close. In 2019 the Church of Scotland produced an internal review ‘Well- equipped Spaces in the Right Places’ which set out the scale of declining church attendance and increasing maintenance costs. The review noted ‘the tension between buildings as missional assets as well as items of cultural, architectural and historical importance’ and concluded that the ‘church’s charitable purpose is not the conservation of buildings’. It also established the principle that providing space for church attendance was ‘not appropriate in every case’. The Church of Scotland currently manages one of the country’s biggest property portfolios, including the largest number of listed buildings in Scotland, totalling 1,276 churches, as well as manses, halls and houses. During the first year of the pandemic local churches suffered an income reduction of some 15 per cent compared to the previous year, worsening the situation. In 2021 the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland asked presbyteries to draw up new mission plans, reducing the number of presbyteries (the ruling body for Presbyterian churches in a district) from 43 to 12 by 2024. Presbyteries have been encouraged to submit their mission plans by the end of this year. Those churches marked for closure will not shut immediately however, as many will have a five-year grace period which will allow time to explore other options for use. Approximately 80 per cent of Scottish church buildings are listed, but The 17th century Glasserton church of Whitorn, on the Wigtown peninsula, is listed category A and is currently for sale. (Photo: The Church of Scotland) the majority of those set for disposal will be B or C category rather than A. St Fillan’s, Aberdour is, however, category A, dating from the Norman period. It is one of 50 churches proposed for closure in Fife. According to an article in The Scotsman (5 June 2022) the villagers are fighting to save the building which is believed to be in sound condition, and 150 letters of objection have been submitted to the Fife presbytery. ordering, extensions or alterations to existing church buildings The Young Architect or Surveyor of the Year, supported by Ecclesiastical