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We offer daily services and a cultural programme of talks, events and concerts. We seek to be a welcoming space for people to reflect, create and debate
From Sun 6 to 27 April
Breastplate will be displayed behind the altar of the Side Chapel and lit from below so that it glows from within, thereby revealing its feather-filled fragility and the talismanic contents of its pockets.
St James’s hosts inclusive services and a cultural programme. We seek to be a welcoming space for people to reflect, create and debate.
St James’s is a place to explore, reflect, pray, and support all who are in need. We are a Church of England parish in the Anglican Communion.
We host a year-round creative programme encompassing music, visual art and spoken word.
We offer hospitality to people going through homelessness and speak out on issues of injustice, especially concerning refugees, asylum, racial justice, and LGBTQ+ issues.
St James’s strives to advocate for earth justice and to develop deeper connections with nature.
We aspire to be a home where everyone can belong. We’re known locally and globally for our unique history and beauty, as well as faith in action, creativity and the arts, and a commitment to social and environmental justice.
We strive to be a Eucharist-centred, diverse and inclusive Christian community promoting life in abundance, wellbeing and dignity for all.
St James’s Piccadilly has been at the heart of its community since 1684. We invite you to play your part in securing this historic place for generations to come.
The work of St James’s, it costs us £5,000 per day to enable us to keep our doors open to all who need us.
A reimagined St James’s realised. A redesigned garden, courtyard and new building capacity—all fully accessible— will provide beautiful spaces for all as well as improving our environmental performance.
Whether shooting a blockbuster TV series or creating a unique corporate event, every hire at St James’s helps our works within the community.
St James's Church 197 Piccadilly London W1J 9LL
Directions on Google Maps
The Diocese of London and the Diocese of New York established a link in 2006. You can read about it here.
The aim of the link is for parishes in London to find partner parishes in New York for mutual enrichment, encouragement, learning and support.
Following a number of tentative meetings over a few years, St Bart’s and St James’s struck up a partnership in early 2022 with the then Rector, Dean Wolfe, as an enthusiastic supporter. In these three years, much has happened: clergy exchange visits, preaching, online courses for Advent, Lent and other gatherings.
Our own Associate Rector, Ayla has led on our partnership for St James’s, and has worked closely with the former Vicar of St Bart’s, now Acting Rector, Revd Peter Thompson, who preached here at St James’s in the autumn of 2023. We very often welcome congregation members of St Bart’s to St James’s – most recently this Palm Sunday. And, several of St James’s congregation have visited St Bart’s when they have been in New York too.
After Easter, three of the St James’s clergy: Lucy, Ayla and Mariama will visit St Bart’s as part of this exchange and will preach on Sunday 27th April and Sunday 4th May, speak at the St Bart’s Sunday Forum and at midweek services and gatherings. As part of this exchange, the American Friends of St James’s (a 501c3) will host some gatherings in support of the Wren Project. You can see the American Friends page here.
The programme includes an event at another of our partners from the parish, Christie’s, where our newly restored 1684 charter will be on display, a gathering hosted by our American Friends President Philip Bobbitt, (whose children were all baptised at St James’s), and a dinner at St Bart’s itself with our patron.
It will be a busy week for everyone and we ask for your prayers and support for the small team who have been planning the visit with St Bart’s: The Revd Lucy Winkett; The Revd Dr Ayla Lepine; The Revd Dr Mariama Ifode-Blease; David Loyn, PCC representative; Keith Best, congregation member and American Friends Secretary and Treasurer; Brian Willetts, Development Director; Carrie Oliver, Associate Development Director; Anna Auchter, Fundraising Officer.
The American Friends has its own Board, including members of St James’s congregation past and present, and chaired by Tai Heng-Cheng, who was able to help St James’s with the commissioning of Che Lovelace paintings to mark the baptism of Quobna Ottobah Cugoano.
We are incredibly grateful to St Bart’s and to all those in New York who are working hard to help St James’s. Some are old friends such as New York resident Matt Scheckner, who has known St James’s for over ten years, together with congregation members Alicia Fowler, Steve and Kathi Mahle and others, local St James’s business leader Charles Myers, and former Caravan volunteer, the actor Adjoa Andoh, (Adjoa will be speaking at the St Bart’s event), we’re surrounded by people who are encouraging and helping us strengthen this transatlantic relationship that has been unfolding in an organic way now for some years.
Please pray for this exchange, that it may be a time of mutual strengthening and deepening commitment. Please tell anyone you know in New York to come and see us at St Bart’s on those Sundays or get involved with the American Friends through the website. Please pray too that together we stay true to our purpose of proclaiming the inclusive love of the Creator God whose gift to us is the astonishing gift of life itself, interdependent with all creation.
