HolyRedeemer.co.uk
Title
Our Most Holy Redeemer
Description
From its consecration in October 1888, the Church Of Our Most Holy Redeemer has been a bastion of the Catholic tradition of the Church of England. Beginning as a mission church founded from St Philip's, Granville Square, on the site of the Countess of Huntingdon's Spa Fields Chapel, the building was not to be of the popular 'cheap Gothic' type, but rather 'stately and impressive, uplifting the minds and hearts of those who dwelt beneath its shadow'. And so the first vicar, Father E.V. Eyre, recruited the architectural talents of John Dando Sedding, architect of several notable London churches including Holy Trinity, Sloane Street: the church interior was modelled upon Brunelleschi's famous church of Santo Spirito in Florence and the exterior given the feel of an Italian basillica, with its gabled front, generous eaves and deep cornice as well as the Latin inscription, 'Christo Liberatori' (To Christ The Redeemer).
Externally, the church has changed much from its initial appearance with the addition of the clergy house and campanile on the south side in 1906, and that of the Institute building, containing the parish hall and what were once nuns' cells and rooms for the 'bettering of the poor', on the north side in 1916. The plans for both were drawn up by Henry Wilson, who had collaborated with Sedding on the original design and who went on to oversee all the subsequent additions for nearly 50 years, thus giving the building a remarkable unity.
The worship and ceremonial, although from the Book of Common Prayer, had a distinct 'Roman' feel. Indeed, a none-too-complimentary view of the church's 10th anniversary services in 1898 was published in the volume 'The Roman Mass in the English Church: Illegal Services Described By Eye-Witnesses'. However, Father Eyre fought against this 'tendency to think of our own English form of Catholicism as though it were not simply such, but almost a distinct faith and religion, 'Anglicanism'.' The use of vestments, incense, bells, candles and due reverence to the Sacrament were then and are still now seen as in accordance with the infinite glory, power and majesty of God. This sense of dignity and beauty is obvious throughout the building itself, the fittings and the worship.
