THE PCC of a village church in Herefordshire has been refused permission to reorder the interior — to include a new community library and children’s area — because the plans involve moving the font.
The Consistory Court of the diocese of Hereford ruled that relocating the 19th-century font away from the church entrance of St Mary’s, Almeley, would be contrary to canon law. Therefore, it refused to grant a faculty for the work.
The Diocesan Chancellor, the Worshipful Mark Ockelton, writes in his judgment that the church underwent a significant restoration in 1868, when box pews were removed and the current font was installed, alongside new woodwork.
Under the new proposal, the current pews were to be removed and disposed of, and replaced with chairs. An area in the south aisle was to be fitted as a community library, and another area in the west aisle was to be for children.
A new choir vestry was to be constructed as part of an extension to the east of the church. The north door would be reopened to provide a second exit through the new choir vestry. To the east, still in the north aisle, the font was to be placed (without its base) towards the corner of the building, leaving a space between it and the vestry “capable of holding about a dozen chairs if required”.
The purpose was to “update the facilities, to adapt to current liturgical practices, and to make the building usable for a wide range of functions”.
Currently, the font is close to the main entrance, and immediately visible.
The Chancellor writes: “Canon law has very few specific requirements about the placing of fittings in a church, but one of them relates to the font.”
He quotes Canon F1: “In every church and chapel where baptism is to be administered, there shall be provided a decent font with a cover for the keeping clean thereof.”
It also says: “The font shall stand as near to the principal entrance as conveniently may be, except there be a custom to the contrary or the Ordinary otherwise direct; and shall be set in as spacious and well-ordered surroundings as possible.”
The Chancellor had, he said, pointed out the legal difficulty of the proposal when the petition for reordering was first referred to the court for a decision. “It is clear that it took everyone by surprise. No constructive changes to the proposals were offered,” he writes, even after he pointed to this on his visit to the church.
It was “disturbing”, the Chancellor said, both “that the law relating to the placing of a font in a parish church was not something that was taken into account in formulating the proposals”, and that the canon seemed to have “escaped the attention of the then parish priest . . . the architect and the DAC”.
The canon was clear that the font must be near the main door. There were two exceptions to that rule: “If there be a custom to the contrary, or if ‘the Ordinary otherwise direct’.”
The petitioners identified no custom to the contrary at Almeley, the Chancellor said. The Ordinary for present purposes was the Consistory Court, and, “on ordinary principles of law and of judicial practice the Court would not direct departure from the law save for good reason, based on precedent if available.”
The Chancellor also pointed out that the law of the Church of England, whether contained in the canons or elsewhere, was part of the law of England. “It has a higher status than guidance, or liturgical practice, or good ideas.”
There were also good liturgical and symbolic reasons for the specific prescription that the font be as near as possible to the principal entrance, the Chancellor said. “Each individual becomes part of the church by baptism, so as baptism is spiritual entry to the Church, the font is in an appropriate relation to the physical entry to a church building.”
The PCC, however, was not prepared to consider using any other spaces close to the door for the font because those spaces were required for other non-liturgical purposes — a table-tennis table and a football table were mentioned. Its raised base was said to be a trip hazard, and its position “not convenient” for social occasions in church.
There were no unusual or exceptional circumstances going beyond the normal and expected consequences of placing the font near the main entrance that would justify an exception to the general rule, the Chancellor concluded. He was not persuaded that there were sufficient reasons that the placing of the font as prescribed by the canon should not apply. That meant that the reordering of the church would need to be looked at again as a whole.
The Chancellor declined to grant the present petition. The DAC would need to consider any new petition.
