How to save your church from closure

As we join the Sunday Telegraph's. Save Our Churches campaign Ed West and Mark Greaves report on how parishioners can keep their churches open Adrastic shortage of priests over the next few years means that, inevitably, churches in England and Wales will have to close. But dioceses often decide the fate of parishes without a genuine attempt to consult the laity and sometimes the decisions they make are wrong. So ordinary Catholics should try to make their voices heard, even if Church officials do not want to hear them.
ENGAGE WITH THE BISHOP The bishop is the prince of his diocese and all power lies with him. Letters to Rome are almost entirely pointless: Vatican officials can intervene if the procedure has not been followed correctly but they cannot make the bishop change his mind.
Some Canon Law experts claim that parishioners must provide their consent before a church can be closed. In practice. though, bishops can ignore the views of parishioners quite easily.
FIND OUT WHY IT'S BEING CLOSED Dioceses should be accountable and transparent. They should not only explain why a church is being closed but should publish any reports or figures which they have used to make their judgment. So, for instance, if surveyors have assessed a building then their report should be made available to everyone. In some cases parishioners are told that their church requires millions of pounds of repair work; later they discover that some of the repairs have already been carried out and that the rest of the costs were vastly over-estimated.
AVOID ANGRY RHETORIC It is easy to get infuriated by the intransigence of some Church authorities. But campaigners should beware of using over-heated language it will only harm their cause. Accusing diocesan officials of being greedy, malicious, deceitful, or being part of a vast conspiracy, is definitely not going to help save a church from . closure.
TRY SPOT LISTING Many Catholic churches are not listed even though they should be. In several recent cases parishioners have managed to save their church from demolition by applying to English Heritage to get it listed. Dioceses do not generally like this, even though the listing is merely a recognition of value and can help in funding repairs. But it takes power away from the diocese, which can no longer demolish the church and then build afresh (which often seems like the most trouble-free option).
BE IMMIGRANT FRIENDLY Two churches in the centre of Hull were heading for closure until their congregations were boosted by an influx of immigrants from eastern Europe and South Asia. That situation is being repeated across the country, especially in city centres which had previously been emptied of Catholics. And a buoyant congregation will persuade a diocese to keep a church open even if nothing else will. If there are new immigrants in the area, make sure the diocese takes advantage of it and organises foreign-language Masses.
SEEK OUTSIDE FUNDING The Catholic Church is very bad at seeking funds from outside agencies. The biggest source of cash is the joint English Heritage and Lottery grants scheme: it hands out £25 million a year to churches in England alone. In March, for instance, All Saints Church in Barton-upon-Irwell, Manchester, won £481,000 to heal damage caused by dry rot.
Another important source of funding is the Listed Places of Worship Grants Scheme, which reimburses VAT spent on repairs to listed churches and pays out £12 million a year in England. Other sources include county trusts as well as the National Churches Trust.
Our Lady Star of the Sea, built in the shape of a ship's upturned hull in Anglesey, north Wales, was closed in 2004 for safety reasons. Earlier this year campaigners won £150,000 from Cadw, the Welsh equivalent of English Heritage, to help repair the electrical system and make the building waterproof.
BROADEN USE OF BUILDINGS Similarly, the Church is not canny about broadening the use of its buildings to bring in extra cash. Anglicans are much better at it. partly because they are happy to use their churches in ways quite distinct from worship.
St Paul's Church in Bow, East London, closed in 1991 because of concerns over its safety; parishioners feared it would be sold and converted into flats. But the church council raised £3.3 million to redevelop the building and, incredibly, managed to fit into the building's four floors an art gallery, a café, a gym (with specialist therapy for the disabled) and even a sauna.
Another example is the tiny corrugated-iron church of St Mary's in County Durham. which has unbolted its pews to create the only youth club in the area. And two other Anglican churches St Bega's in Eskdale, Cumbria, and the church of St Mary and St Radegund, Whitwell, Isle of Wight double up as post offices for their local communities.
Rebecca Payne. a Church of England policy officer, points out that schemes such as these do not necessarily solve a church's financial problems you can't deal with a millionpound repair bill simply by installing a couple of bench presses in the presbytery. But at least the the wider community relies on its church then it is more likely to campaign against its closure and raise money on its behalf.
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