Bishops move to head off heritage threat

by Murray White
IN AN attempt to placate architectural conservation organisations Catholic bishops will set up diocesan heritage groups to preserve outstanding architecture while maintaining liturgical progress.
The move, announced during the bishops' conference last week, reveals the Catholic hierarchy's growing concern over calls by Government-funded English Heritage to end church exemption from planning permission requirements.
Together with other conservation groups, English Heritage has been mounting a fierce campaign against the right to reorder churches a right enjoyed by Catholics and Nonconformists.
"The bishops recognise the difficulties of changing archtectural treasures," Nicholas Coote, Assistant General Secretary of the Bishops' Conference said.
"One needs to take account of outside interests in the community, but in the end the church is a place of worship," he stressed.
The proposed new diocesan sub-committees . coming under the umbrella of the bishops' Art and Architecture Committee will bring on board members of local heritage groups and councils to work alongside Catholics in making decisions over reordering work.
Secretary of the Art and Architecture Committee, Jennifer Demolder, hoped that these voluntary measures would satisfy Department of Environment calls for Churches to tighten up regulations, and that legal changes would not be necessary.
English Heritage, the leading voice for protecting architectural treasures in the country, says its worry is that future liturgical reforms may see large-scale losses of architectural treasures.
Major sub-divisions, demolition, or the removal of major structural elements such as altars and statues, should not be allowed, said an English Heritage spokesman.
"Items central to the historic character of the church should be a matter for everyone to have a say in. This country's heritage is not exclusively Protestant," he continued.
The bishops are especially concerned about the future development needs of the large numbers of churches built towards the end of the last century.
Local heritage groups have objected to reordering plans for some of these grand Victorian designs.
The bishops have been negotiating for several years with the Department of the Enviroment to preserve the rules that keep the churches out of listed buildings requirements.
Until now the Department of the Environment position has been that Catholics exercise selfdiscipline in reordering of the insides of their churches.
Rules under the Church of England Pastoral Measures make it more difficult to carry out changes to Anglican churches.
Mr Coote said that liturgical reordering since Vatican II was not at the whim of the bishops, but came as a request from the Vatican.