Jesus Circus

Ah, the sublimely inescapably inspiring architecture of churches. Even to a non-religious person like myself, there is majesty, serenity, grandeur in old churches and cathedrals.

This is psychological architecture, designed to impress, awe, overwhelm, create a sense of such utter inversion of scale and pomp that you feel insignificant, unworthy, irrelevant.

In short, desperately in need of redemption.

But in a secular era, what to do with a church building who’s congregation has dwindled, then evaporated?

Tear it down?

Could be. But finding an alternative use would be far better, and many churches both here and in Canada have chosen to house alternative religious groups. The old Church of St. Thomas the Martyr, right next to The Seven Stars ale house I wrote about earlier, now welcomes a Romanian Orthodox congregation.

But the stately spired sandstone church in the photograph has found an even more diabolically inventive congregation: a circus.

St Paul’s, overlooking Portland Square in Bristol, has been rebranded “Circomedia” (http://www.circomedia.com/)

The entrance archway says so in elegant wrought iron script.

Circomedia is a Circus School and event space.

Rent it for your wedding or business event.

Enroll your kids in circus school.

Or even get your Master’s Degree in Circus Arts from its Academy for Contemporary Circus and Physical Theatre, the only such degree offered in England and, possibly, the world.

From religion to circus.

Brilliant……….and some would say, not much of a change at all.