The Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, will join the 150th anniversary celebrations at a York Parish Church on Sunday 7th May.
Dr Sentamu will join the 10.30am service at Clifton Parish Church (CPC) and will be interviewed by Vicar the Revd David Casswell about his life and his calling to ordination (the 7th May is the Church of England’s Vocations Sunday, celebrating God’s call to people of all ages and backgrounds to serve the world and the church).
CPC’s youngest member (two months old on the 7th May) will be baptised during the service.
The Church of St Philip and St James was built and consecrated in 1867 to serve the growing community on the north side of York which came to incorporate the village of Clifton.
It was a ‘daughter church’ of St Olave’s (Marygate) and St Michael-le-Belfrey; for this reason stained glass windows depict Saints Olave and Michael as well as Philip and James (the two saints to whom CPC is dedicated) with Jesus Christ in the centre.
“Archbishop Sentamu will be joining 200 of us for lunch,” said David Casswell.
“It will be a great thing – we’re celebrating our own church being ‘planted’ 150 years ago, and we in turn have ‘planted’ churches further out at St Mark’s, Rawcliffe, and at Clifton Moor, so the DNA keeps being passed on!”