AFTER nearly two years of fundraising, a damaged church roof that threatened the building's future has been repaired.
St Buryan Church needed urgent work to the tune of around £365,000 after it was discovered that the roof was on the brink of collapse.
The local community rallied round to raise the money, and after more than 60 fundraising events including cake sales and garden open days, applications for grants and hundreds of hours of construction work, restoration of the main roof has finally been completed.
Special celebrations will soon take place and the Reverend Bridget Guzek, who moved to the parish from Somerset in November last year, said she could not be more pleased with the way the community had pulled together.
"It's a tremendous achievement," she said.
"It's fantastic because winter was really hard. The roof leaked and it was so cold – we all just huddled together.
"Now it's a real success that we're getting going again – it looks wonderful."
Although the main part of the roof has now been finished and the congregation can once again worship in warmth, there is still much to be done, with a further £18,000 left to find in order to fix the roof of the tower.
Mrs Guzek said she was keen to point this out, and although the community had come a long way the project needed one "final push".
"We haven't finished raising the money," she said. "As the main roof is finished there's a danger people will think the fundraising is finished too; it's important we carry on."
However, after the tremendous effort involved in getting so far, with the small village of St Buryan raising well over £250,000 to fund the restoration, the traditional feast day, which usually takes place on Sunday, has been turned into a "whole weekend" – something Mrs Guzek said she felt was certainly justified.
Over the weekend, plans are under way for food, dancing and other activities to "thank everyone for such hard work" and enjoy the success of their fundraising campaign.
Funding co-ordinator Colin Roberts said he was proud to talk about the "Herculean effort" performed by the St Buryan village.
Everyone had "worked really hard to raise the money", he said, and he would not have been able to get charity support had the community not done so much to support the project.
As a result of its efforts, he managed to secure grants and donations from 20 different charities, including £40,000 given by the National Churches Trust.
"We were only one of eight parishes to receive the grant," he said.
"We have had individual donations from £1 to £10,000 – and have had support from places such as Canada and Australia as well as Cornwall.
"We even had a recipe book with recipes from members of the community – it has been sold all over the world," said Mr Roberts.
Anyone wishing to donate to help meet the remaining cost fo the work should log on to www.stburyanchurch.com
