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Bristol New Church (formerly Immanuel Church),
Cranbrook Road / Kersteman Road,
Redland, Bristol, Gloucestershire.

Cemeteries

We believe the Church did NOT have a graveyard.

Note: any church within an urban environment may have had its graveyard closed after the Burial Act of 1853. Any new church built after that is unlikely to have had a graveyard at all.

Church History

This Place of Worship was founded in 1899, but we understand it was closed in 2013.

The Swedenborgian Church was founded by followers of the philosophy and spiritual teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg. He was born in Stockholm in 1688, and during the latter part of his life engaged in an 'inner journey', during which he wrote various theological texts seeking to reinterpret the Scriptures. This was prompted by a vision of Christ, which he had whilst dining in a London inn in 1745, in which he was appointed by Christ to reveal the spiritual meaning of the Bible. He died in London in 1772, and in the following decade, followers of his works began meetings in London, and thus the first congregation was born.

The Bristol Society, according to Phil Draper's ChurchCrawler website, was founded in 1792. Their first permanent building was in Terrell Street, for which see elsewhere in this database. When it was closed for the redevelopment of its site by the Bristol Royal Infirmary, a new building was erected in Cranbrook Road, on the south east corner of its junction with Kersteman Road. Until 1921, it was called "Immanuel Church".

It is a rectangular building, with sides of four bays separated by small buttresses, each containing a pair of tall pointed-arched windows with horizontal glazing bars. The front has a porch-extension added in the 1960s, above which is a single pointed-arched window with 3 lights, and a cross at the apex.

The following notice in The London Gazette of 11th May 1900 (p.3010/11) records its registration for marriages:

NOTICE is hereby given, that a separate building named New Church Lecture Hall, situated at Cranbrook-road, Redland, in the civil parish of Bristol, in the county borough of Bristol, in the registration district of Bristol, being a building certified according to law as a place of meeting for religious worship, was on the fourth day of May, 1900, duly registered for solemnizing marriages therein, pursuant to the Act of 6th and 7th Wm. 4, c.85, being substituted for the New Jerusalem Church, Terrell-street, St. James, Bristol, now disused. Dated 4th May 1900.

The official name of the Swedenborgian Church is the 'General Church of the New Jerusalem', or more commonly, the New Church. When I first prepared this account, in 2013, the Bristol building was reported as having just a small congregation, and its premises were shared with the Celtic Catholic Church; however now, in 2018 I have discovered it closed later the same year. There is, however, an account of its final service on 27th October 2013 on the Ship of Fools (Mystery Worshipper) website.

See also Paul Townsend's Photographic Archive of Redland & Montpelier, where there may be more information, and photographs, and an article The Bristol Society of the New Church draws to its close in the October 2013 edition of New Church Lifeline.

Denomination

Now or formerly Swedenborgian.

If more than one congregation has worshipped here, or its congregation has united with others, in most cases this will record its original dedication.

Maps

This Church was located at OS grid reference ST5858375087. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• Bristol New Church (formerly Immanuel Church), Redland, Bristol shown on a Google Map.
• Places of Worship in Bristol shown on a Google Map.
• Streetmap.co.uk (arrow on map shows the Place of Worship's location) (verified 2018-10-15)
• Bing (Ordnance Survey option) (verified 2018-10-13)
• Bing Maps ('Bird's Eye' View) (verified 2018-10-15)
• Ordnance Survey "getamap" (NB some of the 'Change Map' options may require a subscription) (verified 2018-10-15)
• OpenStreetMap (Maps © OpenStreetMap contributors, CC-BY-SA) (verified 2018-10-15)
• A Vision of Britain Through Time - useful for Boundary Changes (verified 2018-10-15)
• www.magic.gov.uk (Modern Maps with various overlays) (verified 2018-10-15)

Resources

I have found many websites of use whilst compiling the information for this database. Here are some which deserve mention as being of special interest for Redland, Bristol, and perhaps to Local History and Places of Worship as a whole.

• The Church officiando's “Bible” - Phil Draper's ChurchCrawler (null) (verified 2018-10-16)
• Known by the legal name of the ‘General Church of the New Jerusalem’, the New Church (null) (verified 2018-11-20)
• “Iconoclastic and debunking but also committed to the ultimate value of faith…” Ship of Fools (Mystery Worshipper) (null) (verified 2018-11-20)
• What can I say? Paul Townsend's collection of photographs, old and new, of Bristol is spectacular, focussing on his Photographic Archive of Redland & Montpelier (null) (verified 2018-11-13)
• The monthly magazine of the General Conference of the New Church - New Church Lifeline (null) (verified 2018-11-20)
• Notices of Civil Registration of Places of Worship for marriages are published in the London edition of The Gazette. Hint: search for registrations from 1998 by choosing 'Church' notices, and the option 'Registration for solemnising marriage'. (verified 2018-12-11)

The above links were selected and reviewed at the time I prepared the information, but please be aware their content may vary, or disappear entirely. These factors are outside my control.