St Agnes, Kennington Park (geograph 3630998)

St Agnes, Kennington Park, is an

Anglo-Catholic Anglo-Catholicism comprises beliefs and practices that emphasise the Catholic heritage and identity of the various Anglican churches. The term was coined in the early 19th century, although movements emphasising the Catholic nature of Anglican ...

church in south

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

in the

Diocese of Southwark The Diocese of Southwark is one of the 42 dioceses of the Church of England, part of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The diocese forms part of the Province of Canterbury in England. It was created on 1 May 1905 from part of the ancient Dio ...

, though it is under the episcopal oversight of the

Bishop of Fulham The Bishop of Fulham is a suffragan bishop in the Diocese of London in the Church of England. The bishopric is named after Fulham, an area of south-west London; the see was erected under the Suffragans Nomination Act 1888 by Order in Council dated ...

. The church is situated in the Borough of Southwark placed behind

Kennington Park Kennington Park is a public park in Kennington, south London and lies between Kennington Park Road and St. Agnes Place. It was opened in 1854 on the site of what had been Kennington Common, where the Chartists gathered for their biggest "mons ...

and near the Oval Cricket Ground. The nearest tube stations are

Kennington Kennington is a district in south London, England. It is mainly within the London Borough of Lambeth, running along the boundary with the London Borough of Southwark, a boundary which can be discerned from the early medieval period between the ...

and

Oval An oval () is a closed curve in a plane which resembles the outline of an egg. The term is not very specific, but in some areas (projective geometry, technical drawing, etc.) it is given a more precise definition, which may include either one or ...

. The first church on this site was designed by George Gilbert Scott Jr. and could seat 1,000 people. The church was bombed during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

and rebuilt by Halliday and Greenwood, to a design by

Ralph Covell Ralph George Covington Covell (6 May 1911 – 16 December 1988) was an English modern architect, active during the post-war period to the early 1970s. Early life and family Ralph was born in Lee, London, on 6 May 1911, the son of George William ...

, in 1956.

Architecture

The original building started construction in 1875 in a

Neo-Gothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

building by George Gilbert Scott Jr., who also worked on three of the Cambridge colleges. "The fittings of the present church are from the old, including the triptych reredos by

Temple Moore Temple Lushington Moore (7 June 1856 – 30 June 1920) was an English architect who practised in London. He is famed for a series of fine Gothic Revival churches built between about 1890 and 1917 and also restored many churches and designed ch ...

said to be based on the golden reredos in the Church of Our Lady,

Oberwesel Oberwesel () is a town on the Middle Rhine in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis (district) in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the ''Verbandsgemeinde'' Hunsrück-Mittelrhein, whose seat is in Emmelshausen. Geography Location Oberwesel lies ...

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

, Germany". The current church houses a

baptistry In Christian architecture the baptistery or baptistry (Old French ''baptisterie''; Latin ''baptisterium''; Greek , 'bathing-place, baptistery', from , baptízein, 'to baptize') is the separate centrally planned structure surrounding the baptismal ...

under the west gallery and organ loft, a

Lady Chapel A Lady chapel or lady chapel is a traditional British term for a chapel dedicated to "Our Lady", Mary, mother of Jesus, particularly those inside a cathedral or other large church. The chapels are also known as a Mary chapel or a Marian chapel, an ...

in the north-east side, an office and meeting space along with a church hall, all contained within a small churchyard. The main body of the church includes a

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

and

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may terminate in an apse. Ove ...

under a continuous pitched roof.

Worship

St Agnes is a

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...

parish church in which worship follows the

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

tradition.

Mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different elementar ...

is celebrated every weekday - except Wednesdays and Saturdays - in the

at 10 am, with weekly Sunday

Solemn Mass Solemn Mass ( la, missa solemnis) is the full ceremonial form of a Mass, predominantly associated with the Tridentine Mass where it is celebrated by a priest with a deacon and a subdeacon,"The essence of high Mass is not the music but the deacon ...

and Feast days.

Music

St Agnes houses four instruments, including a two-manual choir organ built by N.P. Mander between 1960 and 1961 which is situated in the

organ loft Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

. There is also a

harmonium The pump organ is a type of free-reed organ that generates sound as air flows past a vibrating piece of thin metal in a frame. The piece of metal is called a reed. Specific types of pump organ include the reed organ, harmonium, and melodeon. T ...

from 1903 in the Lady Chapel that is used for Festal services and during Christmas. In May 2018, a new four-manual nave organ using a Hauptwerk set-up was installed. It includes 67 stops and thumb pistons on each division. From 2015 to 2021, the

director of music A music(al) director or director of music is the person responsible for the musical aspects of a performance, production, or organization. This would include the artistic director and usually chief conductor of an orchestra or concert band, the di ...

at St Agnes was the composer and organis
Matt Geer

Clergy

Fr Paul Ensor was inducted as the Vicar at St Agnes, Kennington Park in March 2013. The honorary Assistant Priest is Fr Simon Acland, son of the

New Zealand National Party The New Zealand National Party ( mi, Rōpū Nāhinara o Aotearoa), shortened to National () or the Nats, is a centre-right political party in New Zealand. It is one of two major parties that dominate contemporary New Zealand politics, alongside ...

politician Sir

Jack Acland Sir Hugh John Dyke Acland (17 January 1904 – 26 January 1981) was a New Zealand politician of the National Party. Early life Acland was born in 1904 in Christchurch. His parents were Sir Hugh Acland (1874–1956), a prominent surgeon ...

References

{{coords, 51.48333, -0.10702, display=title 1875 establishments in England

Anglo-Catholic church buildings in London Church of England church buildings in the London Borough of Lambeth Kennington Ralph Covell buildings