Eastville Methodist Church

Here is a picture of Eastville Methodist Church.  I happened upon it whilst I was looking at some Flickr photos of old Bristol U.K.

This is the place at which my parents “plighted their troth” on Boxing Day in 1935 (?).  The photographer failed to show up that day, so Dad and Mum never had any wedding photo’s.

This is the place where my older sisters, Maureen and Jean were baptised.

This is the place where my twin sister and I were baptised in 1944.

This is the place where I did a bit of lay preaching in the 1960’s. Dad and Mum, who had left Eastville Methodist Church soon after WW II were glad to be there to hear me preach. 

But not a thing had changed in all those intervening years.  For all intents and purposes it was the same Church that they had known in their youth and early adulthood. 

Same people (but fewer of them); 

same organist and choirmaster (stuck in the 1930’s); 

same lack of vision; 

same desire to do nothing more than survive.

So it was little wonder that Eastville Methodist Church ceased to be.  The building was torn down in the 1970’s or 80’s.

Eastville has also changed. It used to be an area filled with white “respectable”, and nominally Christian working class people.

Now it is the home of immigrants from many nations and of many faiths.  They too are “respectable”, but this is not always appreciated by the few remaining “old timers”.

More’s the pity.