Opinion: St Faith's gets status it deserves

St Faiths Church, Ohinemutu. Photo/file

It's been announced St Faith's Church has been listed as Wahi Tupuna by Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga.

All I can say is, finally!

The church is an iconic landmark in Rotorua and wholeheartedly deserves the status.

Under the Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Act 2014, Wahi Tupuna identify places that are important to Maori for their ancestral significance and their associated cultural and traditional values.

In the proposal, put forward by the church's vestry, it said St Faith's encompassed "many layers of history for Ngati Whakaue and wider Te Arawa from the burial of Hinetekakara by Ihenga around the 14th century ... to the efforts of many of their descendants who created the church as it stands today".

It was a few months ago that I wrote the story saying the application had been made for the church to become Wahi Tupuna.

While it was of course positive news, I remember thinking, 'how did it get to be 2016 without St Faith's becoming a heritage site?'

The reason was simple enough, there were fears the status would impact what could be done with the church in the future.

Those fears have abated and the church has now been granted a status worthy of its history and the history of the ground it stands on.

One of my earliest memories of Rotorua was when my family came here on holiday.

We did all the usual stuff - luging, Rotorua Museum, Blue Lake (Tikitapu) - but what I remember most was walking into Ohinemutu and seeing St Faith's through wisps of steam, unlike any church I had seen before.

It stood there, with its structure and location seamlessly melding Maori tradition and Christianity and even though I was a child, I knew it was special.

Fifteen years later and I've seen a lot more churches but I am yet to see anything akin to St Faith's.

Religious or not, the church is one of those places that stay with you and we will continue to see visitors and locals flock to its doors in prayer or just appreciation for years to come.

As Wahi Tupuna St Faith's Church, forever watching over Ohinemutu, has finally been given the mana it deserves.