Christianity from the 43 bus 9. People History

Continuing a journey through London on the 43 bus route - with a Christian eye.  The whole series is viewable on the '43 bus route' tag below.

St Mary's Church, Islington has a bus stop so it is hard to ignore from the 43 bus.  Were it not for that, though, it might be thought to be just another of a plethora of churches along the route.  It lacks the grandeur of Union Chapel, not far up the street.  

But this church has more history via its people than any short blog could ever tell.

Think Charles Wesley, for example.  The hymnwriter of such predominance that even in the fragmented Western church worship patterns of the 21st century all of us still sing his hymns in some form.  Charles, together with George Whitfield, were invited preachers by the minister of this church and preached regularly.  Complaints were made to the Bishop of London, and it was here that both of them were forbidden to preach in Churches.  Instead they adopted the open air preaching already embraced by John Wesley and the rest is (Methodist) history.

A hundred and fifty years earlier, this was the Church where Robert Browne was the preacher, the generally recognized founder of Congregationalism and therefore in some ways the inspiration for the Pilgrim Fathers setting out for the New World.  They were dubbed Brownists.  So that's two denominations that owe their identity somewhat to this parish church.

But Anglicanism too has history here.  The first black African priest was ordained here in the 1700s, that's right, the 1700s..  The man who later became the first Bishop of Nigeria was trained here.  The founder of the Lord's Day Observance Society was vicar here before becoming Bishop of Calcutta.  The England cricketer - later Bishop of Liverpool - David Sheppard was a curate here while still playing cricket for England!

And the list goes on.  This is not a church building to turn the head on a 43 bus, but its story surely would.

Christianity from the 43 bus: 8. Gigs and God

 Continuing a journey through London on the 43 bus route - with a Christian eye.  The whole series is viewable on the '43 bus route' tag below.

Like many London churches our church building sees its fair share of concerts and the like.  As a beautiful space in the community church buildings lend themselves to this, especially as other London venues are likely booked up or prohibitively expensive.

Both our building and its concerts pale into insignificance over against the monumental Union Chapel Islington.

This Congregational Church started life in a typical North London way - as a 400 seater chapel for the expanding suburb.  Islington grew at a phenomenal rate in Victorian days and so did the chapel, eventually being rebuilt with four times the original capacity.

It is one of the greatest surviving examples of the rise of non-conformity in Victorian England.

How has it survived?

Well, it cannot claim too much credit for that because at one point the Chapel's plan was to demolish itself.  A local outcry saved it.

From that came the notion of using it for entertainment and notably music.  Big time.  In this respect, being in Islington clearly helps.  Although it leads to several strange anomalies. 

The theology of the Chapel is wildly liberal, but that doesn't actually make for much of a congregation.  Ironically its founders largely derived from people leaving the parish church in order to operate on sounder Biblical principles.

In a kind of full circle it is currently used for the development of Gospel Music having previously been more 'out there' in its content.  It is just an amazing story; more fascinating than spiritually heart-warming, but undoubtedly a reflection of Islington past and present.

Link: You can watch a fascinating video of the Chapel's story here