Beware a Church bearing gifts
PARISHIONERS in the Lorna Doone village of Oare in Somerset are considering legal action to prevent the Church of England selling off their vicarage. In 1967, a local landowner donated land upon which parishioners paid for a new rectory to be built. The land was offered by Mrs Seal, occupier of The Manor, and a covenant that still stands today at the Land Registry was put on stating it was given for the purpose of ‘building a private residence or Rectory/parsonage’. A peppercorn sum of £145 was paid for the land.
The parish villages of Oare and Culbone are admittedly small, but the existing rectory has for decades been home to retired vicars, rent-free, at the end of their careers, who take weekly services—a unique post that costs the Church ‘almost nothing’, claims church warden Geraldine Woollacott. However, the Diocese of Bath and Wells has prevented villagers from advertising for a new vicar since 2019 and has rented the rectory out privately, although a decision on its sale has not yet been formally reached.
‘I appreciate the Church has problems—too many properties, too many small congregations. However, if the rectory is sold, any pastoral care would have to come from Porlock, half an hour away across the moors. The vicar would, I’m sure, visit as often as she can, but, if ours is added to her roster, she’ll have nine parishes to attend and nobody can cover that amount of ground,’ explains local Jeremy Payne, who is leading the campaign against the sale. ‘It wouldn’t be the same as having a vicar in the community, particularly for the elderly and infirm.
‘Fundamentally,’ he adds, ‘I don’t think anyone has a moral right to sell a gift from the community for the community. You might even look at it as theft. The Church claims a consultation process is ongoing, but it’s been two years and we all lodged our objections long ago.’
We are ‘committed to rural ministry’ and ‘there are no plans to… change the pattern of worship,’ says a diocese spokesperson, pointing out that most villages of this size are already linked with other parishes and that the diocese does go the extra mile to cater to countryside communities, even appointing a chaplain to hedgerows, pilgrims and wanderers last year. Another consultation period—for proposals to speed up the process by which dioceses can sell parsonages and close churches, regardless of the views of their communities—has been extended.
The 15th-century Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Oare is the setting for the infamous wedding at the end of R. D. Blackmore’s novel (the author’s grandfather was rector in 1809–42) and the neighbouring prenorman St Beuno’s in Culbone is among the smallest and hardest to reach in England. It’s a beautiful place to live and, in a literary sense, the whole area ‘punches above its weight’, says Mr Payne. ‘As well as Lorna Doone, this part of Exmoor produced Coleridge’s Kubla Khan; Ada Lovelace lived here, too.’