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December 1st, 2006

The most welcoming churches in Britain

Ecclesiastical Insurance ran a competition to find the most welcoming churches in Britain. It is quite difficult to find out who won – I cannot find any information on the Ecclesiastical Insurance website so I assume they are keeping it a closely guarded secret for some reason. However, but doing some snooping round on the pages of the Ely Standard (as I am prone to doing) I discovered that the most welcoming churches in Britain are (in order of merit):

  1. St Andrew’s Church Kettering
  2. St. Mary’s Parish Church in the village of Shirehampton, Bristol
  3. St Mary with St Ethelreda and the Holy Trinity, Burwell and Reach, Ely (No website I could find)

Runners up included St Margaret’s Streatley and St John’s in Clayton, as well as St Barnabas, Adeyfield, St Catharine’s, Gloucester, St John the Baptist, Locks Heath, St Mary’s, Painswick, St David’s, Tudhoe, St Andrew’s, Westcliff-on-Sea and Today’s Community Church, Wigan.

There is a bit of a bias towards Anglican churches, probably because (if the announcement of the results is anything to go by) the competition has been run under a cloak of secrecy.

I haven’t been to any of the churches in question so I can’t comment on how welcoming they are when you turn up at the door, which is surely the important bit. The websites of the top two are OK but could do with a bit more work – the St Andrew’s one bright and breezy but a bit out of date, the St Mary’s one is up to date but could do with some pictures to liven it up a bit. The Ely churches don’t appear to have a website – not to the casual Googler anyway – which isn’t great for the third most welcoming church in Britain. This is of course all from the man who hasn’t got around to building his church website yet.

I’m going to be doing some posts in the next month or so on church websites. If you had to pick the most welcoming churches (anywhere) based on their websites which would you choose?

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12 Responses to “The most welcoming churches in Britain”


  1. Pam says:

    Would you like to have a look at our website? It’s quite new, but gets updated regularly. The address is http://www.scc-church.co.uk
    We are a friendly welcoming bunch, at least I think so, but then I suppose i’m biased.

    Pam

    December 1st, 2006 at 12:50 pm
  2. Emma says:

    If only more churches and organisations realised how important websites were for their welcome and for new members. When I was on school placement in London as part of teacher training I found a church to worship at through their website, and it was very welcoming: St Luke’s E16
    I also found a very enjoyable choral society through their website too…LSA Choral

    December 1st, 2006 at 2:03 pm
  3. Emma says:

    My attempts at HTML failed miserably. These are the websites anyway:
    http://www.stlukeschurche16.co.uk/
    http://www.lsachoral.org.uk/

    December 1st, 2006 at 2:20 pm
  4. Septuagent says:

    Or you could try “Our Little Local Cathedral” where the stewards, Bedesmen, Listeners, a Chaplain, and the Vergers often outnumber the visitors at this time of the year. People often run out crying, “Oh No ! – not another welcomer”, as they collapse sobbing on the grass.

    December 1st, 2006 at 4:06 pm
  5. Mary says:

    I must have missed that in the Ely Standard…

    However whilst on the subject of Ely, can I just say that the Dean of Ely Cathedral ate two portions of my banoffee pie last night, and highly recommends it! :D

    December 1st, 2006 at 4:48 pm
  6. Tiffer says:

    Can I just say that Ely Cathedral is lush, as is the Priory and canons houses.

    And that a friend of mine who was stewarding at an event at Ely Cathedral wouldn’t let the Suffragan bishop in, because he was told there was no re-admittance after a certain time – and he didn’t know the bishop from Adam. He was wearing purple shirt and collar – but my friend reckoned so could anyone. It turned out it was the bishops first week, and he was quite pleased at the level of security afterwards…

    Our Diocesan missioner once told me about a very not-welcoming church where upon entering you are met with the words “Big or small” in a very bored and apathetic way. This was apparently to do with the size print your service sheet was to be in – although I can imagine the confusion this must instill in baptism parties…

    December 1st, 2006 at 10:23 pm
  7. Mary says:

    Tiffer – Bishop John is lovely – fancy your friend not letting him in! (Mind you, I nearly ran him over as he was crossing the road in Ely the other week).

    I like the cathedral too – but you can keep “Scary Mary” in the Lady Chapel, more like something out of Dr Who!

    I may have mentioned this before, but I was “damned to hell” at a church I went to once, by a member of the “welcoming” committee! I would say that is the most unfriendly “welcome” I’ve ever had!

    December 1st, 2006 at 10:37 pm
  8. Tiffer says:

    What were you wearing/smoking at the time!?

    I’m sure he is lovely. Scary Mary is a lot better in real life than she is in Songs of Praise. From outside however she looks just like one of them bloody charismatics…

    December 2nd, 2006 at 1:10 am
  9. Sam says:

    Do have a look at this: St Mary’s Billingshurst

    Any advice on making it more welcome would be greatly appreciated!

    December 2nd, 2006 at 9:39 am
  10. Jack the Lass says:

    A friend of mine was once welcomed at his girlfriend’s church (it was the first time he’d gone there with her) with a woman flicking water into his face and trilling something about the water of the Spirit, or commanding him to be clean, or something like that. He walked out there and then, although I’m relieved to say that some time later he and gf did get married. Needless to say they now go to his church.

    December 2nd, 2006 at 7:03 pm
  11. Mary says:

    Tiffer – nothing to do with what I was wearing/smoking. I was about to commit the “unpardonable sin for which there is no redemption” of marrying a non-Christian. When I told her not to judge me as she will be judged for it – she told me the devil quotes the bible for its own purposes… and so she went on. She wasn’t happy even when she reduced me to floods of tears – “Its what I believe” was her justification. I wouldn’t have minded, but it was my first time back in church after a break of some years, and I was feeling pretty fragile anyway!

    Sam – I quite liked the site, although I thought it was a bit green (in colour as opposed to naive!). Also perhaps look at some of your wording – perhaps use “People” instead of “Staff” for instance? JMO.

    I know nothing about XHTML, so can’t link properly, but I quite like this church’s website:

    http://www.emmanuelplymouth.co.uk

    December 2nd, 2006 at 7:14 pm
  12. David Reimer says:

    Anyone reading this thread? If Dave W. is, and if his interest in doing something about/with/on church websites persists, this site might be some use. Maybe. I dunno.

    David R.

    December 10th, 2006 at 6:03 pm