This large brick-heavy church in Bethnal Green nearly wasn’t allowed to be built thanks to early 20th-century sectarianism.
This part of London started developing at the end of the 1700s, and what is today Old Ford Road was originally called Jews Walk. The church sits on the corner with Victoria Park Square, and at the time, the site was occupied by a couple of large houses.
Just 30 years later, Jews Walk was the less awkwardly named North Side, and a Congregational Chapel had been built next to where the Catholic Church would later appear.
The chapel was big, with a capacity for 2,000 people. That later became a Mission Hall for 500 people, and where a few large houses had existed, the whole area was quickly filled up with smaller houses and shopfronts.
However, in 1901, a French Catholic organisation, the Augustinians of the Assumption (Assumptionists) were invited to set up a base in the UK after their eviction from France. After moving around a bit, they finally managed to buy the corner plot in Bethnal Green and started building a church.
Today it might seem odd, but the arrival of a group of French Catholics in London was not entirely popular. The vemently anti-catholic Protestant Alliance took legal action, citing an old law left over from Papist persecutions that banned the establishment of Catholic religious communities in England.
Initially, the Alliance lost, on a technicality – they petitioned the wrong court, but they tried again at the correct court. This time, they lost properly after the Magistrate ruled that as other Jesuit ministries in England were legal, the Assumptionists could be as well.
Their legal position secure, the Assumptionists brought a large plot of land for a permanent church.
The architect was Edward Goldie, and the builders were Messrs Goddard & Sons of Farnham & Dorking. Construction started in 1911, and the church was opened on 22 June 1912 by Cardinal Bourne. However, it was not formally consecrated until 1962.
Oddly, they didn’t take over the existing Mission Hall, but cleared the housing on the corner for the church, and then built a priory on the site of the Mission Hall, which opened a year later.
That does mean that it presents a rather forbidding solid brick facade along the main road, with the main entrance around the side. Despite the dark exterior, the interior is considerably brighter.
A tall open space and at last the light floods in from the high windows – only partially stained glass, as presumably funds didn’t stretch to completing the whole lot. I prefer the mix, as an all-stained glass window church can be a bit gloomy at times.
As befitting a Catholic church, there are confessionals to the sides, and the Stations of the Cross are almost the only decoration on the walls.
A nice touch is the arts-and-crafts-style pews, with carved detailing along the edges. With a large Irish population in the area when the church opened, the clover design is obvious.
As you leave, you’re face-to-face with the gift shop. Yes, really.
