THE ESSEX CHURCHES SITE
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St Michael, Thorpe le Soken
Click on the 'play' symbol in the second image to see all my photographs of this church as a slide show, then click on any image in the slideshow to see it large in a new page.
Alternatively, if you don't have flash enabled, you can go straight to the set for this church on flickr.
I first came here about a year ago. Thorpe is a largish, prosperous village, and this is a big, ugly church, largely rebuilt in the late 19th century from red brick, rubble, puddingstone and ragstone, with a huge tower and big aisles poking beyond the nave. In such a large, busy village it seemed impossible that the church was not accessible, but it was locked, and there was no keyholder notice. I noticed that it was a Forward in Faith church. I thought about phoning the minister, but the last two Forward in Faith vicars I had tangled with were both mildly hysterical, and one had since been imprisoned, so I resisted the temptation and headed westwards to Weeley.
Shortly after writing about this experience on my website I was contacted by the minister here, who seemed a very reasonable chap, so I looked forward to going back. I returned on the occasion of the 2014 Historic Churches Bike Ride, quaintly rebadged in Essex as 'Ride and Stride'. It was my first church of the day. I disembarked at Thorpe-le-Soken station, which is a good mile or so from the village, and headed north, arriving at about a quarter to ten. Now, the Essex bike ride starts at ten o'clock, so I wasn't too surprised to find the church still locked. The parish website says that the church is open every Saturday from ten o'clock anyway. So I waited. Ten o'clock came. No one appeared. Five past ten. I began to get impatient. Two old boys were cutting back the undergrowth in the churchyard, so I asked them if the church was going to be taking part in the Ride and Stride event. They didn't know - It turned out that the minister was away and no one had put their names on the rota. However, one of them was a churchwarden, and he had his keys so he let me into the church.
I stepped into a rather gloomy interior, all of its 19th Century restoration, but obviously well-used and loved, at least on Sundays. I contrasted it with one of my local Forward in Faith churches at Mendlesham in Suffolk, which has quite a different feeling from being open all the time. The man who let me in was very affable, and we chatted for some time. I got the impression that he didn't consider that any church which was not FiF was really a proper church. When I said I was a Catholic he replied, somewhat revealingly, 'oh, so you've gone the whole way'. I haven't gone anywhere, I wanted to reply, but I didn't.
The star of the show here is the screen in the south aisle. It has a 15th Century inscription explaining that a 15th Century guild ale paid for it, a bit like the one at Cawston, but this one is better than Cawston's. I thanked the kind man, put a pound in the box and I headed on to Kirby le Soken.Simon Knott, September 2014
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