Church of Old St Mary, Stoke Newington

The Old Church of St Mary, Stoke Newington, is unusual as it dates to the time of Queen Elizabath I. Few churches in this land are Tudor; that family name is better associated with the demolition of ecclesiastic structures, not their construction. Although replaced in the 1850s by a grander parish church in an older style, Old St Mary’s was thankfully spared.

Between 1645–1656, it was served by known puritan Thomas Manton before he moved onto greater things at St Paul’s, Covent Garden. While at Stoke, he was regularly invited to Westminster to preach before the Parliament. He was an expository preacher, working through James, Jude and parts of Isaiah, yet he could also preach ‘to the times’, addressing his thoughts to his days’ circumstances. Some of his chosen titles would apply well enough to the godless England of four hundred years later:

Meat out of the Eater; or, Hopes of Unity in and by Divided and Distracted Times

and

England's Spiritual Languishing; with the Causes and the Cure

Stoke Newington would then have been a quiet backwater, not part of today’s sprawling metropolis. Yet what a privilege to have heard so great a preacher set forth God’s word in so considered and orderly a manner. Now it is an arts centre, a place where the urban middle-classes can gather to celebrate their culture and practise their yoga. Some would consider this an improvement, but I don’t.