Churches in Britain

But if we think for a moment we shall see that it is not really so long ago as it might seem, because those centuries can very largely be spanned by the parish churches of England.  Some of our parish churches are quite new, as for example in the modern housing estates, but you will usually find in the neighbourhood the old parish church which was standing there when the housing estate was just green fields.  The date of our parish church is …. There are many churches, especially in the villages, which were built in the 13th century, that is, some seven hundred years ago, and they were by no means the oldest as we shall see.

In Northamptonshire there is a church at Earls Barton with a famous Saxon tower, 68 feet high. (1) This dates back to about the year 970 AD, and the tower was probably built as a watch-tower against the Danes.  It stands in the valley of the River Nene up which the invading Danes came from the east.  So with Earls Barton Church, built well over a thousand years ago, we have already more than halved the distance in time between today and the first Pentecost.

Also in Northamptonshire is another well known church, that at Brixworth. (2) Brixworth church was built about the year 680 AD.

Even older is the Church of St Martin at Canterbury. (3)  The Venerable Bede said that it was built during the Roman occupation of Britain, but whether this is so is not definitely known.  What we do know is this.  When St Augustine landed on the shores of Kent in the year 597 AD, St Martin’s Church was already being used as a royal chapel by Queen Bertha, the Christian wife of Ethelbert, the heathen King of Kent.  But he did not remain a heathen for long, for that same summer he was baptised by St Augustine in the Church of St Martin at Pentecost (Whitsunday).

Between 314 and 360 AD private Christian chapels were built, for example at Lullingstone Roman Villa in Kent, and a church may have been built at Silchester.