St. Ives Parish Church Cornwall:

Why we need your Donations

Hello, I’m the person at St Ia church who takes care of the finances, and I just want to say a few things about how great it feels to be a parishioner at St Ia. Our congregation, my friends, support this beautiful house of God, and have the privilege of care for our wonderful, ancient building.

SAVING THE PAST

The current church of St Ia was begun 600 years ago, in 1410 and was consecrated in 1434.  (There is evidence of a much older church on the same site). Just to put the church in context, England was in the middle of the Hundred Years War with France, and in 1415 Henry V fought and won the Battle of Agincourt.  Joan of Arc led the French against the English; the Ming Dynasty ruled a totally closed China, the Shoguns ruled Japan; the Turkish Ottomans had almost destroyed the old Byzantine Empire and only 60 years earlier the Black Death had wiped out millions of people.  In St Ives, craftsmen were hauling massive granite stones one on top of the other to construct our church.  One of our parishioners, Helen Jenkins has written a fascinating book about the church, whic is on sale with our cards, under the tower for £4.95

MAINTAINING THE PRESENT

But, glorious as our building is, it is not a museum; it is a place of worship for God.  We who belong to the church don’t spend all our time in the building; we leave it ready to take God into our community.  If you come into church to visit or join us for services, you will see our exhibition showing how we want to develop our Parish Rooms as a facility for our whole town, the young and old, people of faith or none.
 
We are very conscious that being in St Ives, where our winter population of around 16,000 can swell to double that during holiday times, we have a church to offer our visitors also.  Often when people are away from their daily grind and enjoying the fabulous Cornish coast, they think more deeply about where their life is going, what their relationships are all about. We try to keep our church open for holiday makers as well as local people, to come in and pray, light a candle, look up to the ceiling at the medieval carvings of the saints and apostles, or just sit quietly and think.

MAKING THE FUTURE

Our Bishop, Tim Thornton, wants us to grow our church, to reach out and befriend all God’s
people.  Often the public have strange ideas about “the church” having lots of money,
owning lots of land and property.  The fact is we struggle to support ourselves, there are no
hidden billions.  We donate to pay clergy salaries and pensions, train people to take on new
ministries and support charitable work locally, nationally and internationally.  All this
and custody and responsibility for our wonderful medieval church, comes with a big price
tag.  There is just so much money we can raise on our own. 

HOW TO DONATE

If you feel able to help us and would like to make a gift, either a one-off or a regular
amount, please click on the downloads.  You could simply come to the church and put
money in our donations box, as many visitors so generously do already.  You could also
write us a cheque and send it to the vicarage address.  However you give, whatever you
give, we promise to use it wisely to care for the church, to take Christ into our town
through our Parish Rooms Project, or support our needy sisters and brothers through our
own charitable giving.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING THIS

St Ives Parish Church is Church of England (C of E) which is part of the world wide Anglican communion.

How to Donate

For single donations, click on the paypal link below

For regular donations, then the form below is the simple way to instruct your bank to pay money
into the St Ives Parish Church’s  bank account.

• You may cancel any time
• If you give by this method already then this is the way to INCREASE or DECREASE  your gift, because a new Standing Order Mandate cancels a previous one.

PLEASE DOWNLOAD AND PRINT THIS FORM AND FILL IN ALL THE REQUESTED DETAILS.WHEN YOU HAVE COMPLETED IT  PLEASE GIVE IT TO YOUR BANK TO PROCESS ON OUR BEHALF.

Download Bank Mandate Form

If you are a UK tax payer then you may be able to gift-aid your donation. This increases the value of your contribution to the church by 25%.

PLEASE DOWNLOAD AND PRINT THIS FORM AND THEN FILL IN ALL THE REQUESTED DETAILS. WHEN YOU HAVE COMPLETED IT  PLEASE GIVE IT TO THE CHURCH TREASURER.

Download Gift Aid Form