Parish Church of St Mary and St Petroc facts for kids

The Parish Church of St Mary and St Petroc is a Catholic church in Bodmin, Cornwall, United Kingdom. This church used to be part of a monastery called the Abbey of St Mary. Monks, known as canons regular, lived and prayed here a very long time ago, starting in the Middle Ages.

History of the Church

The town of Bodmin gets its name from the Cornish words meaning "home of monks." Long ago, in the early 500s, a hermit named St Goran lived here. A hermit is someone who lives alone for religious reasons.

In 518, an Irish monk named St Petroc came to Bodmin. He was looking to start a monastery nearby. He eventually founded one near Padstow. Sadly, in 981, Viking raiders attacked and destroyed that monastery. Because of this, the monks moved their community to Bodmin.

The Abbey's Story

The Priory of St Mary was set up by a group of monks called the Canons Regular of the Lateran in the 1100s. It became the biggest monastery in Cornwall.

However, in 1538, a big change happened across England. This was called the Dissolution of the Monasteries. During this time, many monasteries were closed down by the king. The buildings of St Mary's Priory were torn down. Only the church building was saved and started to be used by the Church of England.

For a long time, people in Bodmin could not openly practice the Catholic faith. This changed in 1845 when a Catholic priest named William Young bought land in the town. He built a new Catholic church and a house for the priest, called a rectory.

At first, church services were not very regular. But in 1881, the Lateran canons, the same group of monks from before, were allowed to return to the area. This was their first new monastery in the United Kingdom since the Dissolution. They came back under the guidance of the Bishop of Plymouth, William Vaughan.

A small group of these monks came from Italy. They restarted the priory with Dom Felix Menchini leading them. By 1884, their new community had grown to 20 members. Dom Menchini officially became the prior, which is like the head of a monastery. He also became the Novice Master, teaching new monks. He was also in charge of Catholic missions in Bodmin and Truro.

As more monks joined, they played a big part in helping the Catholic people of Cornwall. The community grew so much that in 1953, their house was upgraded to an abbey. An abbey is a larger and more important monastery.

Work on a new church for the monks and the town began in 1937. But it had to stop because of World War II. The church was finally finished in 1965. It was built next to the seminary, which is a school for training priests, for the English part of their Order.

The Parish Today

In 1976, the monks had to close the abbey because their numbers became too small. They gave the abbey buildings to the Diocese of Plymouth. The complex then became part of the Roman Catholic Parish of St Mary and St Petroc. This parish now covers a large area of North Cornwall. It includes churches in Wadebridge, Padstow, and Tintagel. The old cloister, which was a covered walkway in the monastery, was turned into private homes.