Another move for Methodists

Press, 4 June 1982, Page 13

Another move for Methodists

By

JOHN WILSON

A long chapter of Methodist history in Christchurch came to a quiet end on Sunday, May 23, when the last services were held in the 110-year-old, fire-damaged Cambridge Terrace Methodist Church, just east of Colombo Street near the Town Hall. ..

The church had its birth as the central church of Primitive Methodism in Canterbury. The Primitive Methodists, one of the sects into which the Methodist Church was long divided, were characterised by a strong emphasis on lay people in the life of the church and by greater independence of thought and spirit. • • '• 'C: Primitive Methodist families were meeting for worship in Christchurch as early as 1860, but the congregation did not gain its own place of worship until 1872. In that year the Rev. Robert Ward,

who had arrived in New Plymouth in 1844 in his late twenties and spent the years since pioneering . Primitive Methodism in several North Island towns, came to Christchurch to set the congregation on a firm footing. Mr Ward bought the site on Cambridge Terrace in 1872, and by the middle of 1873 the church, which could seat 200, was ready for opening. Its opening was performed on Sunday, June 8, and was followed on the Tuesday evening by' a soiree in the Oddfellows Hall at which there was “an elegant and plentiful tea for many hundreds of people.” 1 The circuit of which the humble wooden church was the centre, was . originally "

very large, stretching from Greendale in the south, west .to Hororata, and north as far as Kaiapoi. Through the years, the Cambridge Terrace church helped several other Primitive Methodist circuits establish themselves in Canterbury, while remaining itself the centre of Primitive Methodism in the province.

With the 1913 Methodist union, the Cambridge Terrace congregation became a circuit of the united church. In 1929, a brick Sunday school was built behind the church itself.

The next major step in the church’s life was its becoming, in the 19505, the headquarters of the Christchurch Methodist Central Mission, the social service arm of the Methodist Church which had established itself in Christchurch in 1939. In its early years, the Central Mission rented-premises in Cathedral Square, holding its services in • the Crystal Palace theatre.

By the 19505, the rent on these Cathedral Square premises was becoming too great a drain on the Central Mission’s funds and the decision was taken to move, with the agreement of the Cambridge Terrace congregation, to the new location. The mission began worshipping in the Cambridge Terrace church, and doing its social work from a house it

bought nearby, at the beginning of 1955. In 1957, the - Methodist - Conference approved an agreement to * amalgamate between the Central Mission and the Cambridge Terrace Circuit. The amalgamation became effective in February, 1958.

In the 19605, the mission acquired further property on Cambridge Terrace to facilitate its work.

Recently, the buildings on these properties, including the church, have fallen victim to fires, thought to be suspicious. The. mission decided it would not be good stewardship of its resources to spend large sums repairing the buildings on Cambridge -Terrace when the mission was already closely associated with the Durham Street Methodist church. With the final services on Sunday, May 23, in the Cambridge Terrace church, the mission ended its activities there, transferring them to Durham Street.

The Cambridge Terrace site is now to be cleared of its present buildings. Architecturally, the church, building was sadly diminished when a new front was put on the building. Before that, its wooden frontage had an appealing if somewhat crowded arrangement of roundheaded windows, two close together on a small, projected gabled porch. The round-headed windows on the sides of the building can still be seen. The church is to be taken apart carefully and reerected at Ferrymead as a church hall. Dismantling of the building — expected to take some time — began on May ■ 26. The Methodist Church is to retain the property on Cambridge Terrace for future development.

Moving from its 110-year-old wooden church has been one big step for the Central Mission this year. Another is to come later in the year when the Rev. W. E. Falkingham, who has been associated with the mission since 1950. is to retire from his post as superintendent of the mission. His 32-year stint spans three-quarters of its life in ChrWhurch.