THREE projects to maintain, develop, and protect historic synagogues, churchyards, and churches across the UK are to benefit from the National Lottery Heritage Fund’s latest round of funding, announced on Tuesday.
The Foundation for Jewish Heritage has been awarded more than £140,000 to support its work, which includes pilot schemes to manage and maintain historic synagogues, and for education and outreach. If successful, a further £1.2 million of delivery funding could be unlocked.
The Nature in Sacred Places project — a partnership led by Natural England with the Church of England, the Churches Conservation Trust, the Bat Conservation Trust, and Caring for God’s Acre — has been awarded almost £550,000 for an 18-month pilot project to preserve nature in churchyards and outdoor spaces.
Working with about 150 religious buildings across England, the project aims to build awareness, resources, and skills for volunteers, communities, and custodians of religious buildings. A further delivery grant of £4.2 million could be made available for a four-year delivery phase.
The charity Caring for God’s Acre was established in 2000 to support the conservation of burial sites and the people who look after them. Separately, it has been awarded £325,000 of development funding — with a potential delivery grant of almost £3.8 million — to support its plans to transform burial grounds across Wales.
The Hafanau Heddwch (Havens of Peace) project will support volunteers to care for and develop these areas into accessible green spaces for communities and visitors, as well as wildlife havens. It has also received funding from the Church in Wales.
This latest round of National Lottery funding is part of a pot of about £15 million announced by the Heritage Fund in September 2024 specifically to address funding gaps for places of worship. Since then, this pledge has risen to £17 million for eight projects, including the three announced on Tuesday.
The chief executive of the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Eilish McGuinness, said: “Places of worship are among our oldest and most cherished heritage. . . However, they are facing many challenges, and their futures are not always certain.
“We have so far supported eight ambitious projects which have the potential to make a real and lasting positive impact for the future of places of worship and support our vision for heritage to be valued, cared for, and sustained for everyone, now and in the future.”
Through its separate grants programme, the Heritage Fund has also invested £145 million into more than 225 places-of-worship projects since April 2024.
The latest of these, also announced on Tuesday, is £4.725 million for the Wren Project at St James’s, Piccadilly, in London, aimed at “reimagining” the church, designed by Sir Christopher Wren in 1684, for the modern day. As well as redevelopment and environmental sustainability, this includes a Changemaker Programme to foster young leaders in music, the environment, civil society, business, and the arts.
The Rector, the Revd Lucy Winkett, said: “We believe our church building, courtyard, and garden are public sacred space for everyone, from all faiths and none. We are very grateful to the Heritage Fund for helping us embed these values for generations to come.”
Other grants include nearly £116,000 to restore the Category A listed medieval St Monans Auld Kirk, in Fife; £220,000 to enable essential repairs and community engagement at St John’s, Doddington, in Shropshire; and nearly £98,000 to alter the west end of the 14th-century St Mary’s, Finedon, in Northamptonshire.