St Mary’s Church, Stockport

Submitted by Alan Marsden on Tue, 14/10/2025 - 00:00

St Mary’s at Stockport is the town’s parish church. Although much was rebuilt in the nineteenth century, the chancel (the most eastward section of the building where the ‘altar’ is found) dates back to the fourteenth century, and even contains the tomb of the vicar who oversaw its construction. When the restorers of 1813, 1848 and 1882 inspected the chancel, they must have thought it sufficiently stable, or useable, or pleasant to leave it alone, while the rest of the building was replaced and reformed.

Although Christianity in the United Kingdom is currently weak, it has a fine heritage going back over 1800 years. Not all that happened in the past is with keeping, however; not everything that is old is worth retaining. We must choose which features of our Christian legacy are to be preserved, and which are to be ditched and replaced. For example, in our choice of songs or music, the structures of our services, or the way our local churches are run. Let us not think we are independent of those who have gone before, receiving for ourselves afresh the lively oracles of God as though we were unique, the product of some fresh Pentecost. Neither must we slavishly ape our predecessors and forbears, assuming that their models and examples are indispensable and inerrant, never to be altered. Tear down what does not conform to God’s word, and preserve at all costs that which does.