Abbey Church of St Mary and St Petroc

The Abbey Church of St Mary and St Petroc stands in Bodmin, Cornwall, on the site of an old monastic community. Its origins go back to the Middle Ages, when St Petroc’s monastery moved here after Viking raids. The present building began as the Priory of St Mary, founded by canons regular in the 12th century. After the Dissolution in the 16th century the priory church became an Anglican parish church. In the 19th century Catholic worship returned when Lateran canons reopened a priory here. The church is worth the journey because it marks a rare survival of monastic life in Cornwall. The canons who rebuilt it in the 20th century came from Italy under Dom Felix Menchini and Dom Jean Giraud. Their community grew from a handful to twenty members by 1884, then became an abbey in 1953. The new church, completed in 1965, stands next to the seminary of the English province. Inside, visitors find a modern Catholic church built beside the old seminary. The abbatial cloister has been turned into private houses. The parish still covers a wide area of North Cornwall, with churches in Wadebridge, Padstow and Tintagel. The building shows both the endurance of faith and the changes wrought by history.