St Alban the Martyr - Brooke Street, London, UK
N 51° 31.176 W 000° 06.642
30U E 700449 N 5711566
This church is tucked away amongst the buildings between Holborn and Clerkenwell Road. It is easy to see but more difficult to get to.
Waymark Code: WMDPWF
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 02/12/2012
Views: 2
St Alban the Martyr is the Parish Church of Holborn, an
area of Central London between the City and the West End. The church was
originally built in 1863 but was partially destroyed during the Second World
War. The church was re-built, incorporating surviving features, in 1961.
"A Fortieth Anniversary of the consecration of a
church in 2001, in a parish founded in the Victorian heyday of Anglo
Catholicism, may seem a little odd. But the great church of S. Alban the Martyr,
Holborn in the heart of London, built by a leading architect of the day, William
Butterfield in 1863, was destined to last for only 78 years and on the night of
16th April 1941 was largely destroyed by firebombs.
When the war ended Adrian Gilbert Scott was asked to produce a new, more
economical design and he incorporated several features of the old building that
had survived the fire more or less intact, including the massive saddleback
tower, the east wall and the chapel built in 1891 to honour the memory of Father
Mackonochie, the first Vicar.
The new Church introduced the fruits of modern liturgical changes as well, the
high altar was free standing and the tabernacle built centrally into the east
wall. The new church was consecrated in 1961.
Until 1952, when it was united with the adjoining parish of St Peter's, Saffron
Hill the parish of S. Alban's was quite small and at the time of the original
church no fewer than 8,000 people were crammed into a space measuring roughly
500 by 200 yards. There were cows, too, kept for milking in a shed in Brooke
Street and it was a place of appalling destitution, a rookery of lodging houses,
children's brothels, workshops and thieves' kitchens.
Some changes are now evident! Dickens drew on his knowledge of the area for
Oliver Twist, where he describes it as "one of the lowest and worst that
improvement has left in the midst of London". Indeed the font of the church was
built on the site of one such 'thieves' kitchen' and it was to this church that
Fr. Mackonochie was licensed as 'Perpetual Curate" in 1863. Within a year he was
joined by the, yet to be, famous Fr Stanton in his first and only curacy,
serving the parish for 50 years and both Fr. Mackonochie and his successor Fr.
Suckling.
Within a short period the clergy supported by a growing band of lay workers, men
and women, made their mark on the moral and spiritual life of the area around
Baldwin's Gardens. In the first five years the number of baptisms and marriages
rose and Easter communions from 291 to 569; the collections from £541 to £1864.
The parochial machinery was elaborate and thorough in a very high degree and the
arrival of Sisters from Clewer in 1869 gave great emphasis to this deliberate
and sustained act of calculated sacrifice for the work of the Church. From the
beginning Fr Mackonochie made the Eucharist the centre of the worship of the
parish and "High Mass" at 11.0 on Sundays, which amid various permutations has
lasted until the present day.
With characteristic avoidance of fuss, he "surprised everybody and displeased
nobody, by appearing at the Altar, on a weekday morning after Trinity in 1865,
in a green chasuble". The use of incense followed the next year.
For music it was Gregorian pure and undefiled (as it was then understood) for
Psalms, Canticles and Office Hymns but modem devotional hymns were sung to tunes
of a modernity of style that sometimes verged on the rampant. An Oxford musician
referred to the St Alban's Tune Book, when writing to the organist as 'your
collection of jigs and groans'!
Fr Stanton was to make good use of these in his simple weekday mission services
to the poor of the parish where hymns and sermon were used to great effect and
also in the Three Hours Devotion on Good Friday (for the first time in the
Church of England) introduced here in 1864.
As the successors of the Tractarians began to express the reality of the Real
Presence in forms of worship intelligible and significant to all so persecution
by Church and State followed and in this battle the priests and laity of S.
Alban's led from the front.
Although now, like many another parish, we are without Sisters and 3 or 4
Curates it is on the firm foundations they laid that much of what we do now
rests. The PCC and a band of enthusiastic laity work with the clergy in
"ministering together and at Pentecost this year Lay Visitors were commissioned
by the Bishop of Edmonton for work within the parish.
Fr Mackonochie's emphasis on the Mass as the heart of our worship remains and
the daily lunch‑time mass in his chapel ministers to office workers in the area
as well as to S. Alban's regulars. The musical tradition continues and a new
work was commissioned to celebrate the Anniversary by Richard Popplewell.
Outreach in ministry and mission to the local area has benefited greatly from
the 1991 construction of S. Alban's Centre. Many local organisations and
charities have made full use of this meeting point and the Church and Centre
have served the wider catholic constituency in hosting the first Pontifical
Benediction for the newly consecrated Bishops of Ebbsfleet and SSC Synods.
The clergy are much involved with the parish school and each year the Children's
Holiday and the Pensioner's Holiday are held at our holiday home at Tankerton,
Kent ‑ a joy with its seaside location, own private chapel and reserved
sacrament (also available to other parishes and groups!)."
Source St Alban
the Martyr website.
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