HAVING survived fires in the 14th and 20th centuries, the dissolution of the monasteries, and acts of destruction during the Commonwealth, Selby Abbey has proved its resilience once again in securing a £1-million grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF).
The money, announced last week, will support a major repair programme and the Abbey’s project “the Origin Stories”, designed to “tell the largely untold story of its medieval origins”, an NLHF press release said. Programmes will include an opportunity to try traditional skills such as willow weaving, stained-glass work, and embroidery, as well as dedicated events for young people in monastic chants, graffiti workshops (using site hoardings), and training in biodiversity-enhancing gardening practices linked to the monastic gardens.
Established in 1069 as a Benedictine monastery, the Abbey was dedicated to Our Lord, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and St Germain, a French saint said to have visited England in the fifth century, where he preached and battled both heresy and the Picts and Scots. The founding story is that the first Abbot, Benedict, a monk at Auxerre Abbey, was inspired by a vision of St Germain. The tale is represented in the stained-glass St Germain window dating back to 1906, which will undergo restoration as part of the project.
Originally built from wood, the Abbey was rebuilt in the Romanesque and, later, Gothic style. Left intact, and serving as a parish church following dissolution, it has been extended and reconstructed over the centuries, with more than £40,000 (£6 million in today’s money) raised after a fire in 1906 (mourned as a “national disaster” by the Church Times).
The Vicar of Selby Abbey, Canon John Weetman, said last week that, with the help of the grant, “we will be able to ensure that this wonderful Abbey is preserved for future generations to enjoy. We will be able to involve many more people from the local community and beyond in discovering how the Abbey and the town came to be here, and how they developed during those early years of their history in medieval times.”
The grant forms part of a sum of more than £1.8 million allocated to places of worship in Yorkshire in the past six months. All Saints’, Hessle, a Grade I listed church in East Riding rebuilt in the 12th century, has been awarded £229,768 for its “Towering Presence” project. In addition to repairs that will save the 15th-century tower, whose spire is a local landmark, reaching up 145 feet, an arts programme is planned. The Vicar, the Revd Gemma Turner, whose earliest predecessor is listed in the Domesday Book, said that the church was “absolutely thrilled”.
South of Yorkshire, St Denys’s, Eaton, a Grade I listed village church in the diocese of Leicester dating back to the 12th century, has been awarded a £250,000 grant to support its restoration. This will form part of the larger “Eaton InSpired” project, which seeks to also install an accessible lavatory and baby changing facilities, improve biodiversity with swift boxes in the tower, and explore and present the history of the village and its ironstone foundations. The total project is £390,000, and there is still about £75,000 to raise.
The Revd Sue Bradley, who chairs the PCC and is the project leader, said that the money “makes all the difference to securing our beautiful historic church for the future and ensuring its removal from the Historic England ‘At Risk’ register.” Like Selby Abbey, the church is dedicated to a French saint. It is said that St Denys, patron saint of Paris, was one of seven missionaries sent to convert Gaul in the third century.
Last September, the NLHF announced that it expected to invest £100 million in places of worship over the next three years (News, 13 September 2024). Earlier this month, the director of Friends of Friendless Churches, Rachel Morley, announced that the charity would take seven redundant places of worship into its care in 2025 — more than it had ever taken in its 68-year history. It currently has 64 churches in its care.
