\n A spokesperson for the Friends of the Old Newton Parish Church\u00a0said: \u201cWe knew the church was coming on the market, but not when. There was no \u2018for sale\u2019 sign erected, nor anything on social media locally.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n In an efforts to raise funding, the community group\u00a0received help from the Scottish Land Fund and the Community Ownership Support Service.\n<\/p>\n
\n The community group said they wanted time to research Community Right to Buy which would help prioritise a local bid, but\u00a0needed extra time to prepare an application.\n<\/p>\n
\n A spokesperson added: \u201cOur community petitioned the Church of Scotland with hundreds of emails asking that they hold back the sale for a Community Right to Buy bid. But the Trustees refused.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n In September last year, The Old Newton Church was sold to Busan South Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church of Korea.\n<\/p>\n
\n Newton Parish Church was sold in 2024 (Image: Rightmove) One year on from the sale,\u00a0the community group said it remains\u00a0“deeply unhappy” about the way its\u00a0bid was treated.\n<\/p>\n
\n A spokesperson added: \u201cThe way this was handled was abysmal with initial lack of time, then lack of information, lack of trust, and indeed lack of honesty between the church and this community.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n A Church of Scotland spokesperson said:\u00a0\u201cThe Church has a strong track record of engaging with community groups over the sale of its buildings and is in regular contact with other organisations including Development Trust Association Scotland and the Scottish Land Commission.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cSince the conclusion of the Presbytery Mission Planning process, the General Trustees of the Church of Scotland have instructed the sale of 31 church and hall properties to community bodies on an off-market basis.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cPresbytery Mission Plans, which detail proposals for when church buildings will be released for sale, have been in the public domain for several years now and our experience is that local communities are generally well aware of them.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cThis is apparent because where an off-market transfer has been successful, the community body has made an early approach to the General Trustees, even before the formal sales process has started.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cGeneral Trustees staff are currently handling over 60 live cases where exclusivity has been offered, but the terms of the deal have not yet been finalised, and have dealt with more than 100 enquiries from community groups.\n<\/p>\n
\n Read More:<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cIt is important for the general public to understand that whilst the community may benefit from the use of a church or hall building, it is the congregation who solely bear the hefty costs of insuring, maintaining and servicing a building.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cDelays to the sales process place a significant financial and human resource strain on local congregations until they are sold, therefore sometimes it is not possible to extend periods of exclusivity, or delay a sale once approved.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cThe Church of Scotland received a number of offers for Newton Church, including from the Friends of Old Newton Church.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cThe offers were discussed in detail by the General Trustees at their full board meeting, with their preferred option (and the highest bid) being an offer from another Christian organisation.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cWe recognise that for the Friends their unsuccessful bid was disappointing, but as a charity, our decisions must be in the best interest of the national and local church.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cWe hope that some comfort can be taken from the fact that this decision allowed the building to remain open as a place of worship, in line with the central mission of the Church of Scotland in sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n Community Land Scotland – a charity which acts as a\u00a0national voice for community landowners in Scotland – has called for church building sales where there is a community interest, to be in a 10 to 12 month timeframe, in order to give communities a fair chance to consult, plan and raise funding.\n<\/p>\n \n Linsay Chalmers, Director of Communities and Operations at\u00a0Community Land Scotland,\u00a0said: \u201cThe Newton Kirk group has spoken out now and it seems like another strong example of a community which is unhappy with the Church authorities, and the obvious strength of feeling in their comments echoes the feelings of many groups across Scotland.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cMany of the groups don\u2019t want to speak publicly. But we continue to hear strong complaints from communities who feel they haven\u2019t been given adequate time to prepare their plans and to raise the money for the purchase.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cSome churches are sold amicably to the community, but many groups are very disappointed that there are few concessions to the time required. The buildings often go to the highest bidder irrespective of community connection.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Friends of the Old Newton Parish Church claim that there was an initial lack of time for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":393632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8816],"tags":[748,1102,4884,712,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-393631","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edinburgh","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-edinburgh","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-scotland","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115138442712642049","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=393631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/393632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=393631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=393631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=393631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}