24 August 2015, The Tablet

Catholic Holocaust Memorial chapel to close

by Annabel Miller

A Catholic chapel and Holocaust Memorial dedicated to promoting interfaith prayer is to close. The Chapel of St Maximilian Kolbe, St Edith Stein and the Holocaust Martyrs, in the Horfield district of north Bristol, has had to close as weekly Mass attendance dwindled to about 12 people. A final Patronal Festival Mass was held last Saturday.

The chapel has been served by Fr Richard McKay, parish priest of St Nicholas of Tolentino in Bristol’s city centre. He expressed regret at the closure: “In the last two years, we have had a Holocaust Memorial Day service at the chapel led jointly by myself and Jewish prayer leaders. We intend to continue this at St Nicholas of Tolentino. We are committed to ‘keeping the memory alive’ of the Holocaust and other genocides – forgetfulness leads to inhumanity.”

The stained glass window [pictured], which portrays the saints to which the chapel is dedicated, is being moved to St Nicholas of Tolentino.


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