St Mary's, Headley

We are eking out these last few church explorations, so it was some time ago that I managed to get into St Mary’s, Headley, on the east of the diocese. The church was entirely rebuilt in the 1850s and although the Sacrament is reserved the overall impression is less of a church in the Catholic tradition than of a slightly brutal Victorian rebuild humanised by various eccentric bits and pieces, not least the wood panelling which surrounds the interior. One of the more striking of these items is the screen across the tower commemorating Revd Theodore Phillips, vicar 1916-41, but who seems to have spent most of his time as an amateur astronomer, rising to President of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1927 and making the best observations of Jupiter of the time. The panels of the screen are decorated with the Zodiacal signs, which must be a fairly unique feature within Anglican churches. The new parish room, with its transplanted window of St John the Baptist, is rather a nice (albeit non-liturgical) space. The churchyard has something entirely opposite – a grotto made from fragments of the old church, including the 1855 font moved there after a new one was installed inside the church. At first glance I thought it might be an attempt at a holy well, but there’s not a drop of water, alas.