A busy night in the Brown Cow playing darts, dominoes and Connect 4 helped us raise over £400. Our thanks to all the organisers and players. The open day brought visitors who had not been before and seemed appreciative of the church and our plans. They have joined our mailing list so we can keep them up to date with progress.Until we get a large grant we are focusing on sorting out the major damp problems in the church. We are starting investigative work on the outside of the church - checking drainage away from the building and moving on to removal of the cement render. We are hoping for some grant money to support this. We have a grant from the Veneziana Fund to conserve the Anglian cross fragment. York Archaeological Trust will be involved in that work over the next couple of months. The fundraising we are doing now will go towards these projects. If you would like to be kept informed of our progress, and haven’t already given us your details, please contact us via e mail or by ringing Liz Clegg (secretary )on 01229717661. Your details will only be used by us for sharing what’s happening. You can find other updates in the benefice magazine and by following our Facebook page.
If you visit the church you'll be able to find out more about the Heritage Project and the repairs and renovation we hope to do. There's an exhibition at the back of church of photos and history about St John's and the site at Hall Waberthwaite. This will be there during the summer, but because one of our main problems is damp, we won't be able to leave it there during the winter. Look out for photos of the mansion which once stood where the new churchyard is now and find out John Wesley's opinion of the local residents!We have a bid under consideration by the Heritage Lottery Fund at the moment. We are cautiously optimistic.....
