Tasteful St Oswald’s

St Oswald’s Church in the Westmorland village of Burneside I found perfectly tasteful, and dates back to the early 1880s. Victorian churches usually bore me: they are often unnecessarily gaudy, or lamb dressed as mutton, trying just too hard to look older than they are. Oswald’s is unfussy and rather discerning in its décor. Although the tower appears too short for the building, the internals are well apportioned and pleasing to the eye.

‘Taste’ in churches, as well as teabags, clothing and music, is subjective and differs one to another. A tasteful church for me might be dull to another, or pretentious to a third. There are some of who think the music at Salem Chapel too modern, while others think it old fashioned. Some have reckoned the preaching too heavy, others too light. Some consider us too Arminian; others too Calvinistic. Opinions will always vary, tastes will differ and ideas will compete. I have learned to live with others’ views with which I cannot myself subscribe, yet there are fundamentals upon which we must agree, or we simply differ and depart. With those who deny the resurrection, dilute the atonement, doubt Christ’s proper deity or denigrate marriage, we cannot walk. You may think St Oswald’s too dark, too plain, too busy, too this, that or the other. A better measurement might surely be: does it conform to God's Word and confirm Christ's glory?