Probus News Magazine - June 2019 Edition

Church roof appeal Last year, during the WW1 Exhibition, many visitors came into Probus church for the first time. They all expressed amazement at the size of the building.

Seen from the higher ground of The Square, our parish church doesn't appear very big but walk down the path, through the north door, and the size becomes clear. The church of St Probus and St Grace is one of the largest village churches in Cornwall and has the tallest tower. Why does an ordinary village like Probus, once much smaller than it is today, have such a large church?

Records show that Anglo-Saxon King Athelstan founded a monastery here in 930 A.D. and the church is in the Domesday Survey of 1086. The circular shape of the site indicates an even older Christian site. The church had a college and was an important place of learning for centuries. There was a right of sanctuary here, one of only four places in Cornwall. Our present building dates from the 1400s, with a tower completed by 1530 but we have the names of vicars dating back to the 13th century. It is not only a village church but the church of a large parish, where in the past large numbers of people worked on the many farms and in associated trades.

What does this mean for us in the village today? It means we have a place to worship God with over 1000 years of prayer behind it, a building where the people of Probus have been married, had their children baptised and been buried for generation after generation and still do. It means a quiet place, where a constant stream of people come to write prayers on our Prayer Tree. It means a building full of history, not only of the church but of Cornwall itself, an architecturally significant building which is 24