After weeks of scarcely any rain at all, the heavens opened on our Biennial Church Service on Sunday afternoon, 23rd September. Just under 100 Knights, their friends and their families attended the service at the lovely old church of St Mary's in the beautiful village ofThorpe.

There has been a church on the site of St. Mary's for hundreds of years as it is known that there are the remains of a temple to Mithras under the present Church's floor. According to the Church's own website, it is impossible to say for sure exactly when the Church was built, although portions of the building are of venerable antiquity. In 1963 a Roman cinerary urn (an urn used to hold the ashes of someone who has been cremated), dated to 120 -150 A.D., was discovered buried in the Churchyard, establishing that this site has been of religious significance for nearly 1900 years. Evidence of a flourishing community, with no doubt a church or chapel to attend to its spiritual needs, can be found prior to 675 when five dwellings were known to have been given by King Frithuwold (The King of Surrey ruling under King Wulfhere of Mercia) to endow Chertsey Abbey. The beginnings of the church we see today may have been instigated by Abbot Hugh in 1110. The walls of the Church are of mixed heritage and built of flints and rubble with clunch (lumps of rock predominantly chalk and/or clay based, bedded in mortar and used to form the walls) & sandstone dressings. The roof is tiled. Thorpe, or 'Torp', meaning village in Old English is listed in the Domesday Book of 1086.

Permission for the Province to use the Church had been given by the Minister, Fr Damian Miles who opened the service by warmly welcoming everyone. The service was conducted by the Provincial Prelate, Rev. David Allonby and the Address was given by the Provincial Prior of Dorset & Wiltshire, Rev. John Railton. The lessons were read by the Provincial Prior, Michael Banbury, and Sub-Prior, Pat Crossan, and the Provincial Vice-Chancellor, Chris Cradock, read the Precepts of the Order. The carefully chosen hymns, which were not only very appropriate to the Christian Precepts of the Masonic Knights Templar Order but all very well known, were lustily sung by the congregation led by the Surrey Provincial Choir under the baton of Glyn Harvey.

Following the service the congregation adjourned to the Church hall where the 'Ladies of the Church' had prepared a magnificent, really tasty and enjoyable buffet tea.