A VILLAGE Methodist chapel could close unless it receives an injection of cash and more support from the community.

Freeland Methodist Church, a listed building which dates from 1807, is facing closure as just a handful of elderly and infirm parishioners are struggling to keep it going amid rising upkeep costs.

Freeland resident and church secretary Julie Hurst, 69, said the church needed physical resources as much as fiscal resources.

She said: “We’re a small and ageing congregation and the physical upkeep of a 200-year-old building is difficult.

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“We’ve had discussions with people from the circuit and we’ve decide we don’t feel it’s quite time for us to close; we feel we want to have a last ditch attempt.

“If we do go out we want to go out with a bang rather than a whimper.”

The chapel generates income from groups renting the church hall, such as the Freeland Orchestra, and from church collections, but it had to spend £3,000 last year on repairs to the roof and rising damp. It shells out a further £5,000 and £6,000 each year on running costs.

It has to foot gas and electricity bills and duties that individual churches have to pay to the Methodist Church.

Witney and Faringdon circuit minister Rev Paul Weir said: “Obviously the chapel has been a feature of the village for a long time.

“We’ve got quite a small number of aged members and it’s been very much a part of the community, but it’s quite a challenge to keep going because we need fresh people to come and be a part of it.

“There’s a group of very committed people who run it but many of them are quite elderly or not particularly well. We would like people to join in for the carol services at Christmas to start with.”

The listed status of the building makes repairs more expensive and community groups have drifted towards a brand new village hall next door, according to Rev Weir.

The West Oxfordshire chapel is facing a five-yearly inspection by surveyors in January to determine what further work needs to be done on the building, the cost of which could be the final straw for the church’s finances.

Witney and Faringdon Circuit Superintendent Ian Duffy said: “It’s a general thing within the circuit that we have a number of churches and a few elderly members trying to keep them open.”

Mr Duffy said he believed church congregations in general were in decline because Christianity hadproved something of a “turn-off” in recent years and people in villages that were becoming dormitory towns were largely more interested in “chilling out” at weekends than going to church.

Mr Duffy added: “Unless something dramatic happens we will have to close the Freeland church.”

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