Gressingham Church

Gressingham Church in Lancashire’s Lune Valley is a most pleasant and ancient place. Dedicated to St John the Evangelist, it boasts a fine Norman doorway and chancel arch, as well as a whole host of interesting historical features. Box pews from the last year of Queen Anne, complete with foldable umbrella stands, allow the congregants to concentrate on sermons without their brollies dripping about their feet. 

It struck me as a place where reputations were built. A curious, north-easterly chapel has been filled by a large Victorian tomb belonging to George Marton, MP for Lancaster 1837-47, and resident of Capernwray Hall, which is now the Bible College. Even allowing for post-mortem reverence for the dead, the tomb’s claim that he was ‘universally esteemed and lamented’ is rather daring, considering his roles of landowner and politician. Such great ones are sometimes universally lamented, while their deaths are often esteemed. The Day shall tell whether Mr Marton Esquire was as deserving as his eulogy insists.

The church is pleased to display a list of its clergy, starting in 1270 with William of Gressington (sic) and High Faucon, and ending with Michael Hampson in 2012. The new, lady minister is yet to make her mark, at least as far as the board is concerned. Two other characters caught my attention. Anthony Lund served here from 1654 till 1675. So he was approved by Cromwell’s Triers, yet was found to be acceptable to the anti-Cromwellian regime which Charles II brought back in 1660.

A few generations earlier, Edmund Wingreave was appointed in 1499 and left his post, presumably on account of death, in 1547. So during his tenure, the Reformation took place. When appointed, England was a typical Roman Catholic nation; in the year he died, Edward VI ushered in the more radical reformation his father had only toyed with. Did these two men cynically bend with the wind, neatly accommodating each new government’s diktats and expectations, regardless of their contradictory nature? Or did they seek to keep their integrity as well as their jobs, shielding their parishioners from the excessive religio-political meddling? We cannot be sure of their reputations on earth, but mark this: God knew them well enough, and Christ knew if they were truly His. Gressingham must have been a pleasant place to minister, and a fine place to be entombed, but are its people rightly remembered?

God, unto whom alle hertes ben open, and unto whom alle wille spekith, and unto whom no privé thing is hid: I beseche thee so for to clense the entent of myn heart with the unspekable gift of thi grace that I may parfiteliche love thee, and worthilich preise thee. Amen.

The Cloud of Unknowing, 14th-century

Almighty God, unto whom all hearts be open, all desires known, and from whom no secretes are hid: cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee, and worthily magnify thy holy name: through Christ our Lord. Amen.

-Book of Common Prayer, 1547, 1662