About Us | Mangotsfield

What happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard…

Pastoral care – we have a pastoral care team that provides support for the congregation – this includes phone calls and home visits.

We are part of a joint Ministry Support Team with Zion United Church, which seeks to strengthen the ties within the community and to provide guidance and encouragement.

Mission Statement

Worshipping

Welcoming

Growing

OUR HISTORY

“Mangotsfield and Castle Green United Reformed Church”

As its name suggests, the Church was formed (2008) when two congregations called ‘Mangotsfield’ and ‘Castle Green’ combined. The new Church meets in the original Chapel in Cossham Street, Mangotsfield.

‘Cottage Meetings’ began in the village in 1808. The Bristol Congregational Itinerant Society (founded in 1811) provided preachers and leaders for a Sunday School, who walked the six miles or so to and from Bristol. In 1816 Revd William Thorp (Minister of Castle Green Congregational Church in Greenbank, Bristol) formed a Church here. As membership increased, the cottage premises became too small; the Chapel was built; it opened in 1827. In about 1851 Mr Handel Cossham, a well-known colliery proprietor and public benefactor became very interested in the Church and his dynamic personality infused new life into all the activities.

There was a remarkable occurrence in 1905 when the Church disapproved (by 34 votes to 23) of the Sunday School procession stopping outside public houses (presumably to sing hymns); the result was that the “The Expelled Teachers and Scholars of the Mangotsfield Congregational Sunday School” paraded through the village to protest, bearing a large banner! The Church became part of the new ‘United Reformed Church’ in 1972 with most of the Congregational and Presbyterian Churches in England and Wales. In the 1890s, the city of Bristol was extending rapidly beyond Fishponds towards Downend and Staple Hill. Trams ran only as far as Fishponds, but there was a railway station at Staple Hill. A Deacon of Redland Park Congregational Church in Bristol (a large Church with over 500 members) had a boot factory on Soundwell Road, Staple Hill. He thought that a place of worship was needed nearby; the result – the Staple Hill Congregational Church (subsequently United Reformed), founded in 1893. This Church closed in 1996, and several members began to worship at Mangotsfield.

The origins of Castle Green Church lie within the walls of the old Bristol Castle back in the reign of James I – possibly by 1613. The earliest records have not survived, so 1652 became the accepted year of foundation. Dissenting Ministers and church members suffered a great deal of persecution in the 17^thcentury; the Castle Green Minister Revd John Thompson was committed to Newgate Prison and died there from gaol fever. Three Independent/Congregational church buildings were erected in the area of the Castle, the third in 1815- some nine years into the ministry of Revd William Thorp (he it was who helped to found the church at Mangotsfield). This third building was sold in about 1900 and the proceeds deployed to build a new Church in Greenbank, an emerging and thriving district some two miles from the city center.

This fellowship, which also became part of the United Reformed Church in 1972, closed in 2008; most of its congregation then decided to worship in Mangotsfield. A few months earlier, the Mangotsfield Methodist Church had closed, and some of its members also decided to worship in the United Reformed Church. The present congregation comprises a mix of the ‘resident’ congregation, people who came from other Churches, and those who have joined since 2008. From 2010 the Church is delighted to be part of an arrangement with Zion United Church, Frampton Cotterell.