Sacred London

Places of religious significance. Worth a visit for the architecture, the art or the history.

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St Ethelburga's

One of eight churches in the City older than the Great Fire, blown up in 1993 and rebuilt as a centre for peacemaking.

ChristianityMedieval

A guild church of the late fourteenth or early fifteenth century, and one of only eight in the City that are older than the Great Fire - it stood far enough east for the fire to stop short of it, and far enough out of the way to survive the Blitz. It is very small, about fifty-six feet long and thirty high, and three sides of it are now twentieth-century office blocks. Until 1932 even the tower was hidden, behind two shops of about 1570 and 1613 with a tunnel of a porch running through to the door.

Henry Hudson and his crew took communion here in 1607, the morning they left to look for the North-West Passage.

In April 1993 an IRA lorry bomb in Bishopsgate destroyed it. What stands now was rebuilt and reopened in 2002, not as a parish church but as a centre for reconciliation and peace - which is why a medieval guild church in the middle of the financial district runs training in mediation, holds conversations between faiths, and keeps a Bedouin tent in the courtyard behind for them.

Where
78 Bishopsgate, EC2N 4AG
Nearest station
Liverpool Street · 3 min walk

Open Monday, Tuesday and Friday, 10:00-17:00.

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Data is compiled from public sources including OpenStreetMap, under the ODbL. Hours change often, so check before making a journey.

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