The present church was built between 1950 and 1954[1] and is a familiar landmark in the Broad Street Ward.[3] With the founding of the church dating to 1550, it is the oldest Dutch-language Protestant church in the world,[4] and as such is known in The Netherlands as the mother church of all Dutch reformed churches.
History
Edward VI Granting Permission to John a Lasco to Set Up a Congregation for European Protestants in London in 1550, attributed to Johann Valentin Haidt (1700–1780)Portrait of Willem Thielen, minister of the Dutch Church, 1634 by Cornelis Janssens van CeulenThe Dutch Church (1820) by Edward Wedlake Brayley from A Topographical and Historical Description of London and Middlesex
The original church was a monastic priory known as the Austin Friars, London, a contraction of "Augustinian Friars", founded circa 1253[5] by Humphrey de Bohun, 2nd Earl of Hereford (d. 1275).[6] The pretender Perkin Warbeck, executed on 23 November 1499 for claiming to be Richard of Shrewsbury, the younger of the Princes in the Tower, is buried in the church.[citation needed] The priory was dissolved in November 1538.[7] The City of London attempted to buy the church of the friary from the Crown in 1539 and again in 1546 but was rebuffed. In 1550, London's community of "Germans and other strangers" was granted the use of the friary church's nave;[8] the rest of the church was used as a storehouse, with the monuments sold for £100 and the lead stripped from the roof. The choir, tower and transepts were demolished in 1600.
The nave became the first official nonconformist chapel in England under its Polish-born superintendent John a Lasco (known in Poland as Jan Łaski) who had founded a preaching house for a group of Protestant refugees mainly from the Low Countries. The mostly Dutch and French speaking "strangers" were granted a royal charter on 24 July 1550 that allowed them to establish a Stranger Church and this was incorporated by letters patent from King Edward VI.[9] Upon incorporation, the church was named the "Temple of the Lord Jesus" and had four pastors: two for Dutch and two for the French-Walloon who by the 1580s began using St Anthony's Chapel in Threadneedle Street.
By 1570, the Dutch community was the largest group of expatriates in London, numbering 5,000 out of the 100,000 total population of the time. About half of the Dutch in London were Protestants who fled the Flemish Low Countries due to religious persecution. Others were skilled craftsman, including brewers, tile makers, weavers, artists, printers and engravers, who came to England for economic opportunities. Engraver Martin Droeshout, famous for his 1623 portrait of William Shakespeare, was among the Flemish Protestant emigrants who arrived in London.[1]
A century later, the arrival of William of Orange brought a second wave of Dutch emigrants to London. This second group included noblemen, bankers, courtiers, merchants, architects and artists.[1]
20th century
Interior view towards the EastThe foundation stone of the new church
In the night of 15–16 October 1940, just a decade before the Dutch Church celebrated its 400th anniversary, the medieval building was completely destroyed by German bombs. The church's collection of rare books including Dutch Bibles, atlases and encyclopedias had been moved out of London for safe-keeping one day before the bombing raid that destroyed the building. The church's manuscript collection and original charter are kept in the London Metropolitan Archives. The church's library collection is currently being digitalised, but, by April 2021, the online catalogue remained unpublished.
The foundation stone of the new church was laid on 23 July 1950 by the 10-year-old Princess Irene of the Netherlands. The new church, built to the design of Arthur Bailey, was completed in 1954. The new building is a concrete box frame, externally clad in Portland stone. It features 1950s stained glass by the Dutch painter Max Nauta, Hugh Ray Easton and William Wilson.[10] The church possesses detailed archives,[11] and is a popular tourist attraction.[12]
The church was designated a Grade-II listed building on 25 September 1998.[10] In 2000, the church celebrated its 450th anniversary; Prof. Keetie E Sluyterman at the University of Utrecht published a book about the church and its history, De Kerk in de City.[1][13]
21st century
The church remains active today, with weekly Dutch-language church services, confirmation classes, and meetings for various groups. The church also does outreach to the Dutch community in London, including ministering to the elderly. The church is home to two other UK registered charities: The Netherlands Benevolent Society (NBS) and The Dutch Centre. On 24 April 2015, Princess Beatrix of the Netherlands was honorary guest in the Dutch Church for a jubilee celebration to mark 150 years since the founding of the NBS. On the same day the Dutch Centre was officially opened by Laetitia van den Assum, Ambassador of the Netherlands to the United Kingdom, Liesbeth Knook, Chairman of the Church Council and Paul Beiboer, General Manager of London branch of Rabobank.
In April 2014, the minister of the church, Rev. Joost Röselaers, confirmed that the Dutch Church was able to perform weddings for same-sex couples.[14]
Jan Łaski or Johannes à Lasco was a Polish Calvinist reformer. Owing to his influential work in England (1548–1553) during the English Reformation, he is known to the English-speaking world by the Anglicised form John à Lasco.
Strangers' church was a term used by English-speaking people for independent Protestant churches established in foreign lands or by foreigners in England during the Reformation.
Cornelius Johnson was an English painter of portraits of Dutch or Flemish parentage. He was active in England, from at least 1618 to 1643, when he moved to Middelburg in the Netherlands to escape the English Civil War. Between 1646 and 1652 he lived in Amsterdam, before settling in Utrecht, where he died.
The Martyrs of Gorkum were a group of 19 Dutch Catholic clerics, secular and religious, who were hanged on 9 July 1572 in the town of Brielle by militant Dutch Calvinists during the 16th-century religious wars—specifically, the Dutch Revolt against Spanish rule, which developed into the Eighty Years' War.
Cornelis Floris or Cornelis (II) Floris De Vriendt was a Flemish sculptor, architect, draughtsman, medallist and designer of prints and luxury. He operated a large workshop in Antwerp from which he worked on many large construction projects in Flanders, Germany and Denmark. He was one of the designers of the Antwerp City Hall. He developed a new style, which was informed by Flemish traditions, the 16th century Italian Renaissance and possibly the School of Fontainebleau. His innovations spread throughout Northern Europe where they had a major influence on the development of sculpture and architecture in the 16th and early 17th centuries.
The Renaissance in the Low Countries was a cultural period in the Northern Renaissance that took place in around the 16th century in the Low Countries.
The Oude Kerk is Amsterdam's oldest building and newest art institute. The building was founded about 1213 and consecrated in 1306 by the bishop of Utrecht with Saint Nicolas as its patron saint. After the Reformation in 1578, it became a Calvinist church, which it remains today. It stands in De Wallen, now Amsterdam's main red-light district. The square surrounding the church is the Oudekerksplein.
Jacob Franquart or Jacob Franckaert the Younger was a Flemish architect, painter, print artist, draftsman, military engineer and poet. He is known for his altarpieces and publications on contemporary Italian architecture. He was employed by the court of the Archdukes Albert and Isabella in Brussels as a painter and architect. He was responsible for the design of ephemeral decorations and structure for important occasions at the court such as funerals. As an architect and decorator, he introduced the Baroque in the buildings of the Habsburg Netherlands. His style is sometimes referred to as the Italo-Flemish style and became very popular in Flanders in the 17th century. Only a few paintings are attributed to him.
Events from the year 1607 in art.
St Ann Blackfriars was a church in the City of London, in what is now Ireland Yard in the ward of Farringdon Within. The church began as a medieval parish chapel, dedicated to St Ann, within the church of the Dominicans. The new parish church was established in the 16th century to serve the inhabitants of the precincts of the former Dominican monastery, following its dissolution under King Henry VIII. It was near the Blackfriars Theatre, a fact which displeased its congregation. It was destroyed in the Great Fire of London of 1666.
The Kloosterkerk is a church on the Lange Voorhout in The Hague, Netherlands. The church and its accompanying monastery were first built in 1397. The church is known today as the church where Beatrix of the Netherlands occasionally attended services.
Austin Friars, formerly Austin Friars St Monica's School, is an independent day school, located in Carlisle, Cumbria.
The Haarlem Guild of Saint Luke was first a Christian, and later a city Guild for various trades falling under the patron saints Luke the Evangelist and Saint Eligius.
The Dutch-speaking Brussels Protestant Church or 'Dutch Church' was formally constituted in 1816 during the period when Belgium came under the Dutch House of Orange-Nassau.
George van Parris was a Dutch Arian, who was burnt at the stake in London having been excommunicated by his fellow Dutchmen for denying that Jesus Christ was God.
Austin Friars, London was an Augustinian friary in the City of London from its foundation, probably in the 1260s, until its dissolution in November 1538. It covered an area of about 5.5 acres a short distance to the north-east of the modern Bank of England and had a resident population of about 60 friars. A church stood at the centre of the friary precinct, with a complex of buildings behind it providing accommodation, refreshment and study space for the friars and visiting students. A large part of the friary precinct was occupied by gardens that provided vegetables, fruit and medicinal herbs.
The Grote Kerk of Dordrecht, officially the Church of Our Lady is a large church in the Brabantine Gothic style, and the largest church in the city. It was built between 1284 and 1470, though some parts are newer. It became a Protestant church in 1572, and remains an active church, now owned by the Protestant Church in the Netherlands.
The following is a timeline of the history of the municipality of Leiden, Netherlands.
Marten Ykes "Max" Nauta was a Dutch painter, especially noted for his portraits, and stained glass artist.
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