The Anglican Church of Luxembourg, which currently uses the Konvikt Centre on Avenue Marie Therese in Luxembourg city centre, is to move its Sunday services to the Church of the Holy Spirit in Cents for a trial period from Sunday 6 November until Sunday 26 February 2017.
The decision was taken by the Chaplaincy Council, with the Bishop, the Rt. Rev’d Robert Innes, and the Acting Archdeacon and Bishop’s Chaplain, Canon Meurig Williams, kept informed.
The issue of moving from the Konvikt Centre has been regularly discussed and researched within the church for around 25 years, and especially in the last few years, when it became clear that the Catholic authorities planned to redevelop the entire site; the Konvik Centre is going to have a change of use. Although it has been very recently decided by the Ville de Luxembourg that the chapel should be conserved rather than demolished, the surrounding buildings, including the entrance and offices around the chapel will be redeveloped within the 3 to 4 years. Around 25 years ago a task force looked at these issues and suggested moving to Steinsel church, but this was decided to be too far from the city centre.
At the end of August new legislation was introduced by the Government of Luxembourg which is likely to take effect in January, which makes the issue even more urgent.
The Catholic Church in Luxembourg is engaging in a process of restructuring its entire parish system and in the next few weeks will be rolling out a programme setting out their plans. At the present time the Catholic authorities do not want to commit themselves to retaining the chapel in the Konvikt Centre as a place of worship. The Church of Cents is expected to be one of the small number of church buildings which will be designated as a permanent place of worship.
In a message to members of the Anglican church, Revd Chris Lyon stated that at the moment there is no other possibility of church accommodation in the centre of Luxembourg which suits their needs. The Ville de Luxembourg owns 17 church buildings which are used by the Catholic Church; but of the 9 of these which are within the centre of the city, the buildings most are either already very well used by different groups, or they have no meeting/small group/sanitary facilities of the kind which are essential to the Anglican Church in Luxembourg, which needs meeting rooms for Junior Church, coffee, etc.
The times of Sunday services in this trial period will remain the same (09:30 and 11:00). The Catholic congregation at Cents holds no services on Sundays, but they do have a mass on Saturday evenings.
The trial period is in the most difficult period of the Church’s year, when it has several large scale services and events, including Remembrance Sunday, Christingle and Christmas, which will enable the Church to test as fully as possible whether the church at Cents suits their needs. They have already experienced the building on a grand occasion – the Te Deum service last June – but that was in the summer; the experience of winter could be very different.
The congregation will be involved in a consultative process, with a meeting open to all; the decision, to be made at the end of January, will be taken by the Church Council, and the Bishop.
