On a busy corner of Station Street in Woodstock, you will find St Mary the Virgin Anglican Church. In it lies more than a century’s worth of history.
In June the church will celebrate its 165th anniversary.
Woodstock was originally called Papendorp after Pieter van Papendorp, a Dutchman who settled in the area during the mid-1700s.
Robert Gray, the first Bishop of Cape Town, and his young Victorian clergy landed in Table Bay in February 1848 and were soon reinforced by others.
Before their day, there had been, at the most, three priests at a time to serve the whole area between Camps Bay, Mowbray, Maitland and beyond.
As such, they had no time to minister in Papendorp.
But realising the need to change this, on 7 June 1848, Gray obtained a grant from the then Cape Government of the 56 square roods of the Bellen Alliance farm that included Van Papen’s old home.
The building needed refurbishment to make it habitable, and ministry only began in October 1849 in what was first named Papendorp District Chapel and then St Mary the Virgin’s Mission Chapel.
The first St Mary’s was designed by Sophy Gray. Colonel Hope Graham of the 29th Foot (Worcestershire Regiment) from the nearby Castle laid the foundation stone on 29 June 1859.
The church was opened by Dean Douglas on 24 January 1864 and consecrated by Gray on 6 June 1865.
“Today the church is a beacon of hope and healing for many in the area,” explained Archdeacon Donovan Meyer, the priest at the church.
He said that although the church only has between 45 and 60 congregants currently they are “dedicated” and believe it’s them that have kept the church going for the past 164 years.
“We have the dedication of a faithful few. We can compare them to the faithful few that surrounded Jesus after his death and how the church grew from them. There are so many people connected to this parish. It’s the presence of God in this place and the history surrounding this area that has kept it going for so many years.
“People are few, but they are committed, faithful, dedicated, and hard-working. They will make sure that this place is around for another 100 years.”
Ministering at the church since 2015, Meyer believes God called him to serve there.
“Coming from ministering in Manenberg and dealing with conflict and violence daily and the trauma and how that affected both myself and my family, moving here was a healing balm. I felt that this was a place where God needed me to become whole again and to heal.”
He explained that to celebrate the church’s anniversary they will be hosting a parish dance on Friday 28 June at Nico Malan Hall at Groote Schuur Hospital.
A Thanksgiving service, led by Thabo Makgoba, Archbishop of Cape Town, will be held on Sunday 9 July at 09:00.
The priest added that all proceeds will go toward the refurbishment of the church’s roof.
“To maintain this old building is a challenge. It is not only the church on this property, we have a hall, cottages, and the rectory. These buildings all date back to the 1800s. We are dealing with rising dampness in all the buildings.”
According to Meyer, they need about R400 000 to fix the roof.
“There is not a flow of money if you look at the 40 to 60 congregants not much money can be derived from them. We rent out the parking bays to businesses in the area. We also rent the cottages to help sustain the upkeep of the building.
He added: “We did some patchwork on the roof. However, this is not sustainable. We managed to survive the recent storm. No tiles came off the roof, but we have leaks. The entire roof needs to be repaired. Our pipe organ, which dates back to 1901, also needs repair work which will cost about R300 000.”
Meyer said his vision is to revive the children’s ministry. He explained that this organisation dissolved during the Covid-19 pandemic.
“I want to see the vibrancy of young people. I would like to see that part of the ministry growing. Because if we can’t nurture that group this parish will die. We do encourage the older folk in the parish to help grow that ministry so that we can look back in a few years and say that the church is flourishing.
“I also want to grow the growing interfaith relations. That is important because we don’t live in a vacuum, where there are no other faiths around us.”
