Our Lady Help of Christians is a

Grade II* listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

catholic church in

Tile Cross Tile Cross is an area in the east of the city of Birmingham, England. It lies within the historic county of Warwickshire. It is a small area with a shopping centre on the borders of Stechford, Marston Green Marston Green is a large suburba ...

, Birmingham. Built in 1966–67 and designed by

Richard Gilbert Scott Richard Gilbert Scott (12 December 1923 – 1 July 2017) was a British architect, born in London, the son of Giles Gilbert Scott and great-grandson of the great Gothic Revival architect George Gilbert Scott. He was educated at Harrow, Chart ...

of Giles Scott, Son and Partner. The church is active with Sunday mass at 09:30 and 17:00. The nearby Our Lady's Catholic Primary School is associated with the church.

Architecture

The church was designed by

, son of renowned architect Giles Gilbert Scott. It has a subtly polygonal T-shaped plan which allows a forward altar surrounded by the congregation. Above the altar the roof is partly formed by extraordinary curved serrated ribbed trusses of

reinforced concrete Reinforced concrete (RC), also called reinforced cement concrete (RCC) and ferroconcrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion of reinforcement having hig ...

, faced externally with copper cladding. Inside the stained glass is by John Chrestien. The church demonstrates many of the ideas enshrined in ''De Sacra Liturgia'' of 1963 and the Catholic Church's pronouncements on forward altars and centralised planning made in 1964, but it is no mere auditorium of worship; every element is carefully conceived, demonstrating and integration of architecture, engineering and stained glass art. The building featured in the book, ''100 Buildings, 100 Years'', published by the Twentieth Century Society in 2014.

Organ

The church has a Rowntree & Brennan II Box Organ dating from 1975. A specification of the organ can be found on the National Pipe Organ Register.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tile Cross, Our Lady Help of Christians

Our Lady Help of Christians Mary, the Help of Christians ( la, Sancta Maria Auxilium Christianorum) is a Roman Catholic title of the Blessed Virgin Mary, based on a devotion now associated with a feast day of the General Roman Calendar on May 24. John Chrysostom was the f ...

Grade II* listed churches in the West Midlands (county) Roman Catholic churches completed in 1967 20th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in the United Kingdom