St Mary Magdalen

Introduction

The church is a Romanesque style Roman Catholic church built in 1906-1907 to the designs of Thomas Axtell.

History

Bishop Collins laid the foundation stone on 23 August 1906, and the church opened on 19 September 1907. Thomas Axtell of Ryhope, an engineer, designed the church, and his contemporary and near identical church of St Joseph, Sunderland opened about a month later. The cost of both churches was about £3,000, and both are notable for their use of moulded concrete blocks cast on site. In 1921 the apse was part panelled and a new high altar was installed as a war memorial, and in 1909 the south chapel received an altarpiece. The sanctuary was re-ordered in 1971, from which time the nave benches are also considered to have been added and the west gallery extended.

Architecture and furnishings

The church is built of cast and moulded concrete blocks, rock-faced externally, with Welsh slate roofs. The interior has a high chancel arch with hood mould and a sanctuary apse that is panelled to its lower parts. The high altar, installed in 1921 as a First World War memorial, has simple stone supports with marble detailing to their front. The aisle apses serve as north and south chapels, and the Gothic timber altar piece to the latter has a central painted panel of Our Lady flanked by and incorporating a stained glass apse window at either end.

The plan is an aisled continuous nave and sanctuary with apses to the nave and aisles, an aisled west porch and a south-east sacristy. The exterior is in the style of a Romanesque basilica, with round-headed windows with sloping sills, prominent kneelers and a pitched roof of slate with a stone cross finial to the nave gables. The east end has Lombardic friezes to the gable, below which the tall sanctuary apse has five windows in panelled bays and a half-conical roof. The lower aisle apses are of similar form with three windows and the gable verges have Lombardic friezes.

The north and south walls are of six bays divided by pilaster strips with pairs of windows with drip moulds in each bay to both the pent-roof aisles and the clerestories. The south-east sacristy has a pitched roof and a gabled west end with a three-light mullioned window and a small rectangular porch. At the east end of the south aisle wall there are three round-headed doorways to the sacristy building, with a continuous hoodmould, each fitted with an original six-panel door. The nave floor is boarded, with carpet to the aisles, and the benches to the nave and aisles have square ends and roll mouldings.

The tie-beam and crown post roof is carried on moulded corbels with arch braces to the collars. A central easel painting of Our Lady flanked by three inset paintings of the Apostles forms the reredos. The five round-headed lights of the east window have stained glass and the dome has a ribbed ceiling. The west choir gallery has been extended forwards into the west nave bay.

Sacraments and pastoral care

The parish runs a 200+ Club lottery with a £1 per week per number entry, offering weekly, monthly and annual prize draws, and its profits support parish funds.

Visiting

The Pilgrim Virgin Statue of Our Lady of Fatima and Relics of Ss Jacinta and Francisco visited the parishes of St Mary Magdalen, Seaham Harbour; St Michael, Houghton-le-Spring and St Cuthbert, Seaham on Thursday 26 May 2022.