Our Lady Help of Christians is a

Grade II* listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, H ...

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

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, near its border with Worcestershire. It is a small area with a shopping centre on the borders of Stechford, Kitts Green ...

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the Lis ...

. 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, Charter ...

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 Sir Giles Gilbert Scott (9 November 1880 – 8 February 1960) was a British architect known for his work on the New Bodleian Library, Cambridge University Library, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, Battersea Power Station, Liverpool Cathedral, and de ...

. 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, also called ferroconcrete or ferro-concrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion of reinforcement having higher tensile strength or ...

, faced externally with

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

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 The Twentieth Century Society (abbreviated to C20), founded in 1979 as The Thirties Society, is a British charity that campaigns for the preservation of architectural heritage from 1914 onwards. It is formally recognised as one of the National ...

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, Help of Christians () is a Catholic title of the Blessed Virgin Mary, based on a devotion now associated with a feast day of the General Roman Calendar on 24 May. John Chrysostom was the first to describe this title, in 345 AD. Don Bosco ...

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