Open Churches

The Open Churches Trust gave a road show at St George’s Church in Portsmouth a few weeks ago. The OCT is a trust dedicated to open for public use, enjoyment and education the thousands of beautiful places of worship often kept locked as protection from theft and vandalism.

From being a bit of a sceptic about leaving our church open to the general public (whoops! I slipped into the “our” and “them” trap – our church belongs to all!) I came away feeling that I wanted to throw open our front doors there and then.

Of course there can be problems and these have to be addressed. However the Insurers (Ecclesiastical) remain convinced that a locked church presents more of an insurance risk than an open one and their claims records prove this; so much so that they offer a 5% premium discount to any church which commits to leaving its door open for all or part of a day.

Naturally we have to be careful. The church should be manned if left open during school holidays and after school hours each day. Church watch should have an alarm system. We must take great care about the vulnerability of those on church watch. We must protect any valuable items with an alarm system.

We should provide a guide to the church, preferab on a small portable board pointing out the artistic merits of the church and its artefacts. Our Church Open sign should be well in view and always be placed when the church is open. If we leave access to the chapel open we must monitor it as it is out of general view and thus tempting to a vandal or thief.

The question we must ask ourselves is ‘who are we locking out when we lock our church?’

Tony Rice-Oxley