Here are some of your stories

There is a great deal recorded about St James's church, in Llangua, near the River Monnow in Monmouthshire. The records show when it was built, the lives lived within its walls, births and deaths and marriages stretching back centuries. What was never recorded is the long succession of people who tended to the building, who swept leaves and put out flowers, cleaned, tidied and weeded.

Last November, not long after the church was reopened after major restoration, floodwater from the river reached two feet inside the building, leaving a thick layer of silt as it receded. Anne Hayward — one of the two volunteers who keeps a regular eye on St James's — had tried to reach the church the day before and couldn't get through. When she finally made it, she assessed the damage, contacted the Friends, and the process of recovery began. Anne comes to it as a long-distance walker and a contemporary pilgrim, and when the chance to help care for a historic and peaceful place arose ten miles from home, she was keen to seize it. "My involvement at St James has soon become very much part of my life," she says.

Terry McCarthy visits St James's too. The visits are usually brief and routine: checking the visitor book, carrying out light cleaning, the occasional encounter with a visitor who has found their way there. But the place makes him think. He finds himself reflecting on the centuries of people who have worshipped here before him, and takes some satisfaction — in his own words — in knowing that

"in a minuscule way, I'm helping preserve that continuity."

Volunteering with the Friends turns out to mean many things, and no two people do it the same way.

Simon Bromley spent a career in fire safety — first with the Fire and Rescue Service, then the National Trust — and recently moved into semi-retirement with time to spare and expertise to offer. He's now working through fire risk assessments for Friends’ churches across North Wales, one by one, ensuring that buildings which have survived centuries of weather, war and neglect remain legally compliant in the twenty-first century. Recent changes to fire safety legislation created a significant new regulatory burden for small charities. Simon is helping to bear that burden, turning professional knowledge into a gift.

"Being able to use my fire safety experience to help keep these wonderful churches legally compliant has been immensely satisfying."

Catherine Starkey's contribution looks different again. In Worthenbury (where, she notes, everyone knows everyone) the Friends took on St Deiniol's church after it closed. Volunteers who had never attended a service stepped forward to unlock the door daily, to put the bins out, to provide flowers, to raise money through coffee mornings, to keep the churchyard maintained. When the gardener retired due to ill health and a new contractor meant less frequent cuts, families began tending the ground around their own relatives' graves. Everyone pitched in. "The church couldn't run as smoothly behind the scenes without all these little jobs that are undertaken quietly and without a fuss,” Catherine says.

And then there is Alex Egland, who came from California for her MA and ended up spending eight months as the Friends' office and events volunteer, writing church guides, laying out publications, piecing together archival documents from recent vestings. She describes sorting through council letters, newspaper clippings, invoices for labour and materials, finding it like assembling a puzzle, the complicated human story of a building's survival revealing itself piece by piece. "I can promise you," she says, "that these projects are truly labours of love." She came away with something she thinks about beyond the work itself:

“that meaningful impact does not happen overnight, nor does it appreciate shortcuts”.

She added: “If you joined the Friends within the last year, there’s a good chance that I put together the welcome pack that was mailed to you. We had so many people join over the holiday season that I spent a full eight-hour day solely making welcome packs to be sent out. Our deputy director apologised for the monotonous day's work, but I found so much satisfaction in knowing that these would be reaching each of you as your first formal introduction to our small but mighty organisation.”

It is these people — fire safety officers and pilgrims, administrators and retired professionals and farming communities — who truly are the Friends of Friendless Churches.

These beautiful buildings are old and patient. They know that a small core team of paid staff at the Friends can’t be everywhere at once (after all, there are 5 of them and 71 sites stretched across England and Wales). But they’ve been well-tended by the legions of volunteers who show up and give their time and expertise for free.

As Alex added: “The people that love and care for these places take the time to show love and care, to make sure that things are done properly, to do work that they can take pride in. Volunteering with the Friends helped me to understand that despite the quick pace that we all seem to be living at, meaningful impact does not happen overnight, nor does it appreciate shortcuts.”

Thank you, sincerely, to each and every one of our volunteers.

And if you'd like to be part of that - whatever your skills, whatever your circumstances, wherever you are - we'd love to hear from you.