We meet on the 1st to 4th Sundays at 09.30am and alternate with CHS if there is a 5th Sunday in the month (preceded by breakfast) and we hold Special Evening services on the 1st Sunday of the month at 6.30pm (see news sheet for more information or contact the office).

The services St Mary has more of a traditional Anglican service usually with a keyboard accompanying the hymns. 
* On the 1st & 3rd Sunday mornings we have a service of Holy Communion. (There is sometimes a baptism during the service on the 1st Sunday.)
*  On the 2nd and 4th Sunday mornings we have a service of Morning Prayer.
*  On the 1st Sunday we have a 6.30pm service - venue alternates between St. Mary & CHS.

If you would like to have a look around St. Marys, it will be open every Friday afternoon between 1 and 4pm throughout the summer, please do feel free to drop in.  Members of the congregation will be there so if you have any questions about the building and grave yard, they will be happy to either answer your questions, or if they don't know the answers, they will find out for you and let you know. 

The Parish Church of St. Mary, Widford stands proudly as a gateway to Chelmsford.  For many centuries there has been a church standing on this site but the current church was built by Arthur Pryor (the owner of Hylands House) in 1862.  If you  have ever been to Galleywood and seen St. Michaels church, you will notice that it is the same but bigger than St. Marys.  This is because Arthur Pryor fell out with the people of Widford and so decided to move out of St. Marys and build a new and bigger church  a little way up the road.

Sadly St. Marys - a Grade II listed building - is showing its age and we need to spend somewhere in the region of £200,000.00 to bring the building into a good state of repair.  That is quite aside from the £100,000.00 a year running costs we have every year which is entirely funded by our members - you won't ever see begging letters from us, nor will you see a "thermometer" of funds raised ... but if you do have a spare £200,000.00 you don't know what to do with, please do get in touch! 

Work began last year with some essential stonework repairs to the outside of the building and the repair/replacement of the rainwater goods, however, there is still much more to be done as well as decorating the inside of the building.

2012 will be a very special year for us when we will be celebrating both its 150th birthday, and the 50th birthday of Church of the Holy Spirit - keep a look out for the celebrations throughout the Parish of Widford.  We are also looking into ways to improve the inside and make it more "user friendly".  We'll keep you updated via this website but if you do want more information or have any ideas to share, please do contact us.  The plan is to have everything ready in time for our 2012 birthday celebrations.