Battle lines drawn over Anglican churches

HISTORIC:St Cathrine's at Okaihau, built by and for the local community.

The Anglican Diocese of Auckland plans to sell two Mid North churches, in response to what it says are declining congregations and rising costs, but some at least are not prepared to let them go quietly.

A deputation, none of whom wished to be identified, representing St Catherine's at Okaihau and St Stephen the Martyr's in Kaikohe, told the Northland Age last week that they would fight the decision, and hoped that the two communities would rise up in their defence.

A report from Assistant Bishop of Auckland the Rt Rev Jim White, based on a draft that he said had been circulated to the Waimate North community earlier in the year, was accepted and approved by the Diocesan Council on May 28.

ALL TAKEN CARE OF: Maintenance inside and out doesn't cost the diocese a cent.

FOR SALE: St Stephen the Martyr's Church in Kaikohe, victim of falling congregations and rising costs. PICTURES/DEBBIE BEADLE

A Waimate North Mission District management group had been appointed to implement the actions approved, including the selling of St Catherine's and St Stephen's.

Critics of that decision, which they said was based purely on a highly offensive business model, pointed to the history behind the two churches, particularly St Catherine's, the fact that they had been built for and by their communities, that they continued to be maintained by the communities at no cost to the diocese, and the distasteful realities of selling them, complete with their graveyards, for some other purpose or development.

St Catherine's was completed in 1875. It was built, for the use of all denominations, on land gifted by Captain Henry Burleigh, using totara he also donated, that was pit-sawn by local settlers. It was erected by one Robert Neilson.

The church and its graveyard had been maintained and cared for by Okaihau families ever since.

The critics accepted that the church had subsequently been vested in the diocese, but did not believe that that inferred ownership sufficient to offer it for sale.

There was a further historic element in that the remains of some if the 11 British soldiers who fell to Hone Heke in the 1845 Battle of Puketutu, near Okaihau, were later re-interred there. It was also the last resting place of two local men who fell in the two world wars, and of as many as four generations of local families.

The foundation stone for St Stephen's was laid on January 12, 1923, and it was consecrated in March 1927. The adjacent hall, which is also now for sale, was built some 50 years later.

One of last week's delegation said it was hard to imagine how the churches could be utilised by a buyer given that they stood on hallowed ground, or how the buildings themselves could be moved, a process that would necessitate running heavy machinery over graves.

They also argued that if the diocese wished to divest itself of St Catherine's it should be offered to the Okaihau Pioneers' and Settlers' Association, although they insisted that morally it was not actually the property of the diocese, which therefore had no right to sell it to anyone.