DUE to water ingress and the overwhelming cost of repairs Cashes Green Methodist Church in Stroud will close its doors for the final time on Sunday, May 10, 2015.

But the congregation are not going quietly.

The morning worship at 10.30am, conducted by past Minister the Revd Andrew Prout, now living in Hertfordshire, will celebrate the 114th Anniversary of the Church which has served the community from 1901.

The final service at 3pm will be a short Service of Thanksgiving. Led by their current Minister the Revd. Dr. Simon Topping the worship will include a brief reflection from Gloucestershire Superintendent Methodist Minister the Revd. Dr. James Tebbutt.

This will be followed with tea and refreshments.

Dr.Topping says, “We hope this will provide an opportunity for friends of Cashes Green to come and share in a celebration of the life and witness of this church since it was founded all those years ago”.

In 1901 the Primitive Wesleyan Methodist community, had been meeting in a shop in Cashes Green lent by local builder Mr. H White. It had a thriving Sunday school of some 40 children from a local community of around 650 people.

After the stone laying ceremony on Thursday the July 4, 1901, the church building project undertaken by Mr H.

White of Cashes Green cost £400 and was opened on Thursday, October 3, the same year by a Mrs W Godfrey to a “large assembly”.

Reports suggest the tea at 5.30pm saw “100 people present”.

The Opening Services of Celebration continued until almost the end of the month.

Various guest preachers were invited and the local MP a Mr C. P. Allen chaired a lecture called “Our Church and Social Questions” session which “was fully reported in the local press”.

Formally registered as a place of worship on June 29, 1907, on the February 23, 1934, the church was Registered for Marriage Services.Shortly afterwards Charles Ferris and Miss Gladys Lewis became the first couple to be married in the church.

Due to the expansion of the Sunday School and community work over the years there have been various improvements and building projects.

These included increasing the length of the chapel by 13 feet plus a new pulpit and communion table along with the reconditioning of the organ.

A large classroom with a folding partition, a spacious stage and dressing room and kitchen area were also some of the ventures.

In 1993 the church pews were replaced with 60 chairs, 29 given in memory of previous worshippers.

The Revd. Ian White, the then Chairman of the Bristol Methodist District conducted a special service of dedication on December 15, 1993.

Senior Steward at Cashes Green Terry Jones (90) says the final services will bring back many memories. “Cashes Green Methodist has been my church all my life, so it is with great sadness we witness the closing of our church”.

Many of the congregation will transfer to either St. Albans Stroud or to St. John’s Randwick.

Both are Local Ecumenical partnerships with the Church of England.

Cashes Green Methodist Church is part of the 47 church family of the Gloucestershire Methodist Circuit.