page_title: St Edmund Church, Godalming
section_title: Parish, other churches and administration
hierarchical_section_title: St Edmund Church, Godalming / Parish, other churches and administration
caption_attribution_description: St Joseph's Church, Portsmouth Road, Milford, Borough of Waverley, Surrey, England. The Roman Catholic parish church of Milford.
context_page_description: St Edmund's Church is the Roman Catholic parish church of Godalming, a town in the English county of Surrey. It was built in 1906 to the design of Frederick Walters and is a Grade II listed building. The church stands on a "dramatic hillside site" on the corner of Croft Road just off Flambard Way close to the centre of the town.
  The Catholic Church had no presence in the ancient town of Godalming—known for its Protestant Nonconformity—until the end of the 19th century, and the parish of St Edmund's has always covered a large rural area of southwest Surrey. Since the church was founded in 1899 Mass has also been said at various other locations, from purpose-built churches to converted barns and halls, in the surrounding villages; and St Edmund's continues to support a daughter church at nearby Milford. Hospitals, convents and Catholic schools are also within the parish, and a large Polish community has been served by Polish-speaking priests for many years.
  The "fine, if austere" church is built of local stone and overlooks the town. It is one of several churches in the area designed by the prolific architect Frederick Walters.
context_section_description: Godalming parish is one of seven within the Deanery of Guildford, one of 13 deaneries in the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton. The parish covers a large area of southwest Surrey—about 100 square miles (260 km²)—but was originally even bigger, spanning a vast rural area from Hindhead in the southwest to Cranleigh in the northeast. In its present form it is bounded by the parishes of Guildford to the north, Cranleigh & Bramley to the east, Haslemere to the south and Farnham to the west. There are now three Catholic congregations within the parish: St Edmund's has a daughter church at Milford, and there is an arrangement for Mass to be said at the Anglican church in Farncombe.  As of 1999, monthly Masses were also said at Ladywell Convent on the southern edge of Godalming and at the Hydon Hill Leonard Cheshire Disability Hospice in Busbridge.  The church also serves Milford Hospital, formerly the Surrey County Sanatorium. There was another daughter church at Elstead until 1985, and Masses open to the public have sometimes been offered at the chapel of Barrow Hills School, a Catholic preparatory school between Godalming and Witley. During the 1920s, public Mass was occasionally said at Captain Rushbrooke's private chapel at Cosford House in Bowlhead Green.
  Haslemere was the first parish to be carved out of the original St Edmund's parish.  A Mass centre was founded there in 1908, but no church building was provided initially—the back room of a pub was used for worship.  In 1924 it was allocated its own parish and priest, and the present Church of Our Lady of Lourdes was completed in August of that year (again to the design of Frederick Walters). Bramley was in Godalming parish until 1955; the present Church of St Thomas More dates from 1959 and is now part of a joint parish with Cranleigh.
  St Joseph's Church is in Milford, a village south of Godalming.  A parishioner at St Edmund's donated land, formerly an orchard, next to his house in 1957, and fundraising began: parishioners were asked to donate to a building fund which was also used to pay for the now demolished church at Elstead.  Construction started in 1967 and continued into 1969; the local firm of David Fry were the building contractors, as they were more than 60 years previously at St Edmund's.  The church was designed by Henry Bingham Towner and Partners and has a simple design with a tower to one side, clerestory lighting and seating on three sides around a central altar.  It was consecrated on St Joseph's Day, 19 March 1999.
  In Farncombe the parish priest of St Edmund's says Mass for the local Catholic population in the Anglican Church of St John the Evangelist.  The need for a Mass centre in the north of the parish was first discussed in November 1971, and after extensive consultation with the Anglican community a trial Mass was held at St John the Evangelist's on 11 March 1973.  Its success was repeated when further trials took place in summer 1974, and the Bishop of Dorking Kenneth Evans formalised the arrangement in November that year.
  Money from the weekly building fund started by Fr Denis Hawkins in 1964 was used both for St Joseph's Church in Milford and for the construction of a permanent church in Elstead, a village between Godalming and Farnham.  Before World War II, a resident of Elstead named Colonel Fitzgerald petitioned Bishop of Southwark Peter Amigo to ask for Mass to be celebrated in the village.  Canon Hyland of St Edmund's Church agreed to send a curate, and Fitzgerald himself fitted up the upper storey of a barn to create a temporary chapel.  This was used until 1953, when a hall formerly owned by The Royal British Legion was converted into a chapel.  This building was dilapidated even then, though, so in 1968 a prefabricated building was purchased and became the Church of Our Lady of the Assumption.  It was also used as a hall.  A shortage of priests in the 1980s meant the church could no longer be served, and the last Mass was said in 1985.  The building stood until 1992, when it was demolished and replaced with a detached house.
  In 2015, no
caption: St Joseph's Church, Milford (built 1967–68) is a daughter church within the parish.
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