St Matthew's Church is a local ecumenical partnership church building situated on Church Street in Rastrick,

West Yorkshire West Yorkshire is a Metropolitan counties of England, metropolitan and Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It borders North Yorkshire to the north and east, South Yorkshire and De ...

, England. The present church was built in 1798 and is a

Grade II* listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

. It is shared by the

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

and the

Methodist Church of Great Britain The Methodist Church of Great Britain is a Protestantism, Protestant List of Christian denominations, Christian denomination in Britain, and the mother church to Methodism, Methodists worldwide. It participates in the World Methodist Council. M ...

History

The parish of Rastrick dates back to the 14th century, when the first chapel was built not long after the Black Death of 1349, as a

chapel of ease A chapel of ease (or chapel-of-ease) is a church architecture, church building other than the parish church, built within the bounds of a parish for the attendance of those who cannot reach the parish church conveniently, generally due to trav ...

from Elland. Its first

curate A curate () is a person who is invested with the ''care'' or ''cure'' () of souls of a parish. In this sense, ''curate'' means a parish priest; but in English-speaking countries the term ''curate'' is commonly used to describe clergy who are as ...

John-de-Bretton was appointed in 1363. It was a small and humble building containing "the image of Our Layde, graven in wode, the image of St Matthew unto whom it is dedicated and there stood in the street nigh to the chapel door one cross of stone, very finely graven with fretted work." The Rastrick Chapel was a free chapel in pre-

Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major Theology, theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the p ...

England, that is to say, it was a place of worship over which the bishop had no jurisdiction. This chapel was demolished in 1602 and a new one was built in that same year. The present Georgian-style church was completed in 1797 and consecrated on 13 or 15 April 1798. According to ''History, Directory & Gazetteer of the County of York'' (1822), " he second chapelwas taken down and handsomely rebuilt about five and thirty years ago." A clock was installed around 1807, but was replaced by a new one in 1953, which was in turn replaced by the present clock from a church in the

Diocese of Carlisle In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associate ...

. The old

vicarage A clergy house is the residence, or former residence, of one or more priests or Minister (Christianity), ministers of a given religion, serving as both a home and a base for the occupant's ministry. Residences of this type can have a variety of n ...

was built in 1807 and enlarged in 1871, and the present vicarage was built in 1985. The church received its first stained glass windows in 1867. The modernisation of the church interior began in 1875 under the direction of

William Swinden Barber William Swinden Barber Royal Institute of British Architects, FRIBA (29 March 1832 – 26 November 1908), also W. S. Barber or W. Swinden Barber, was an English Gothic Revival architecture, Gothic Revival and Arts and Crafts movement, Arts an ...

, and a renovation and a re-decoration were carried out in 1935. In the

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the Choir (architecture), choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may termi ...

, the

communion table Communion table and Lord's table are terms used by many Protestant churches—particularly from Reformed, Baptist and low church Anglican and Methodist bodies—for the table used for preparation of Holy Communion (a sacrament also called the ...

was replaced with an

altar An altar is a table or platform for the presentation of religion, religious offerings, for sacrifices, or for other ritualistic purposes. Altars are found at shrines, temples, Church (building), churches, and other places of worship. They are use ...

and the inscribed tablets on the east wall were replaced with the

frieze In classical architecture, the frieze is the wide central section of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic order, Ionic or Corinthian order, Corinthian orders, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Patera (architecture), Paterae are also ...

depicting "Goodly Fellowship of the prophets and Glorious Company of the Apostles". The ceiling over the chancel received a painting depicting " Christ in Majesty". Most windows have Victorian stained glass. In 1907, Hugh Travis Clay (1875–1957) gifted the church a beautiful limited edition copy of the 1903

Prayer Book A prayer book is a book containing prayers and perhaps devotional readings, for private or communal use, or in some cases, outlining the liturgy of religious services. Books containing mainly orders of religious services, or readings for them are ...

prepared for King

Edward VII Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until Death and state funeral of Edward VII, his death in 1910. The second child ...

, he also dedicated the East window around 1889. On 9 November 1969, the Methodists held their first service at St Matthew's Church. A sharing agreement was signed between the Anglicans and Methodists in 1971, and since 2004, they worship together as one congregation.

Gallery

File:St Matthews Church Rastrick.jpg, St Matthew's in 1895 File:St Matthew Rastrick by Tim Green-2683168644 71699ca423 o.jpg, St Matthew's in 2008 File:Rastrick - St Matthew's Church - geograph.org.uk - 3137453.jpg, St Matthew's in 2012 File:Cross base in Rastrick Churchyard - geograph.org.uk - 77197.jpg, Medieval base of a Norman

high cross A high cross or standing cross (, , ) is a free-standing Christian cross made of stone and often richly decorated. There was a unique Early Medieval tradition in Ireland and Britain of raising large sculpted stone crosses, usually outdoors. Th ...

in St Matthew's churchyard File:Rastrick Cross drawing of 1893.jpg, Medieval base of a Norman high cross in St Matthew's churchyard, drawing, 1893 File:Rastrick Cross drawing of 1893 002.jpg, Medieval base of a Norman high cross in St Matthew's churchyard, drawing, 1893

References

External links

*
A Church Near You entry
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Matthew's Church, Rastrick Rastrick Rastrick Rastrick 18th-century Church of England church buildings 18th-century Methodist church buildings Georgian architecture in England Anglican ecumenism

History

Gallery

See also

References

External links