St Michael and St John, Clitheroe - Roman Catholic
St Michael and St John,
Lowergate,
Clitheroe
Lancashire
Inside the church
Cemeteries
The church has/had a graveyard.Church History
It was founded in 1797.
The Stonyhurst Fathers began to take an interest in the few Catholics of this old market town after their arrival in the neighbour hood in 1794. It is related that in 1797 the congregation of Catholics consisted of twelve poor people. Fr. John Laurenson of Stonyhurst hired a small building and said Mass here in November 1797. As the congregation increased, a larger chapel was built, but the mission was served from Stonyhurst until 1842. Father J. Holden became the first resident priest in 1843. The congregation had increased to about 800 and a new church was built. This was opened in 1850 by Bishop Brown. Father T. Seed was Rector of the mission at this time. A beautiful new Lady Chapel was opened in 1884. The dedication of the church to St. Michael is a revival of the old dedication of the chapel in Clitheroe Castle, close to which the present church is situated. The parish is close to the Yorkshire border and serves an extensive part of the Ribble valley, which is in the Leeds diocese. In the baptismal registers the first Irish names occur very early, considering that Clitheroe is a rural town and some distance from the coast.Taken from "Salford Diocese and its Catholic past", a survey by Charles A. Bolton, a Priest of the above Diocese. Published 1950 on the First Centenary for the Diocese of Salford.
Maps
The church is located at OS grid reference SD743417. You can see this on maps provided by:- this church marked on a Google map. (Use this to report a corrected location)
- Old Maps
- Streetmap.co.uk.
- multimap.com.
- www.magic.gov.uk
- Google maps showing nearby churches with satellite image option.
This site provides historical information about churches, other places of worship and cemeteries. It has no connection with the churches themselves. For current information you should contact them directly.
Help required
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