Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Empty church on Mattison Road (Previously St Augustine's)
Does anybody know what's happening with this empty church? I heard it was closing a while back. Would be a shame if the space wasn't used somehow...
Tags for Forum Posts: Harringay's churches, St Augustine's Church
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by the_anke on
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Hi... you could join http://spacemakers.ning.com and suggest it as a topic. We are looking at several Haringey spaces to do interesting things in.
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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This free event at the RSA at 1 on Thursday 30th on the renewal of St Martin-in-the-fields might be worth a look for anyone interested in social space making
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Permalink Reply by Old-Age-Emporium(OAE) on
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Given Harringay's remarkable success in ecclesiastical recycling over the past 125 years, it would be a pity if our Roman Catholic congregation of St Augustine of Canterbury, which so seamlessly replaced the Primitive Methodists in 1964, cannot be succeeded by some other more vibrant religious grouping for at least the remaining decades of this century.
This form of apostolic succession in serial monotheism has been a long established trend particularly here on Wightman Road. Some decades after the Anglicanism of St Peter's handed the baton to the Greek Orthodoxy of St John the Evangelist, the apparently fairly low Anglicanism of St Paul's became (post-conflagration) more liturgically Catholic than the Catholics of Mattison Road - even to the very welcome point of ringing out the Angelus Bell twice a day. Within that same decade the Orthodox Ashkenazi Synagogue of Hornsey & Wood Green gave way, mirabile dictu, to the gem of Wightman Road's Mosque. This most eirenic act of ecumenism was trumped only when that venue of the Old Religion (Finsbury Park's Ye Olde Crickette Ground) surrendered without bloodshed to the Televangelism of Transatlantic Softball.
Let us hear no more blether from our social spacemakers about invading the sacred spaces of Harringay. If we can't revive our Primitive Methodism or Catholicism, let's hand over our Mattison Road building to a truly fundamentalist faith such as that of the Most Rev Richard Dawkins at the Sign of the Selfish Gene.
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Alternatively, let's wait two years then see it get turned into flats. I wonder if it's actively up for sale...
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Not yet, apparently. It's still included as Harringay Parish Church on Westminster Archdiocese's website. Given that Fr Noctor retired only a month ago, I think it'll be some time before it's on the market.
As for flats, a small selection of very affordable homes would be a desirable CONVERSION - at least in the minds of any of us with any links with St Augustine's.
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Permalink Reply by PeterPiper on
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Great venue for an arts centre.
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Since those who like to bend the Lord's ear have taken over all our places of fun i.e. the cinemas and music venues in Harringay and Finsbury Park, the least they can do is give us somewhere to make our own entertainment.
Seriously though, it need not be 'either /or'.
The event I highlighted above is a case study for a working church which has "created a sequence of interconnected public spaces both above and below ground as well as a wide range of amenities for a diverse range of users, including the homeless, St Martin's core congregation, the local Chinese community and state of the art facilities for professional musicians."
Now come on, OAE, are you saying that Himself would not approve of that kind of social space?
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Absolutely not, at least not last time I had a word with Herself - which was a little time ago, admittedly.
But seriously I do think that a small selection of really affordable social housing facing directly onto that pleasant New River stretch would be a better conversion of the 'pennies of the poor' and the voluntary contribution of two denominations over more than a century. It might also be a better test of the social commitment of former St Augustine's Mattison and Duckett neighbours!
Unfortunately, central Church institutions (like 'developers') prefer to maximise the return on 'their' assets, so neither Fr Noctor nor his former congregation need expect to be consulted on the matter.
btw Liz, I don't think those savage gangs of Lord's Ear-Benders actually forced out the rival gangs of cinema-goers and music lovers from their venues. On the other hand the first Hollywood film I ever saw was in a disused 19th century Catholic church in the heart of the South Armagh countryside. That was in 1949. No, no celestial thunderbolts interrupted our enjoyment.
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Permalink Reply by Hugh on
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For those who can't picture this church in their minds, see my pictures on the Radicsl Catholic post via the tags under the main post above.
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