| St Mary's Church | |
| Country: | England |
| Denomination: | Church of England |
| Churchmanship: | Central |
| Status: | Active |
| Functional Status: | Parish church |
| Heritage Designation: | Grade I listed |
| Architect: | Samuel Pepys Cockerell Charles Robert Cockerell |
| Parish: | Banbury St. Mary |
| Archdeaconry: | Archdeaconry of Dorchester |
| Diocese: | Diocese of Oxford |
| Vicar: | The Revd Serena Tajima[1] |
| Nonstipendiaryminister: | The Revd Canon Jeff West |
| Organistdom: | Dylan McCaig |
St Mary's Church is a Church of England parish church in Banbury, Oxfordshire in the Diocese of Oxford. The church is a Grade I listed building.
St Mary's Church was built in the 1790s to replace the Medieval one damaged during the English Civil War. The church was designed by Samuel Pepys Cockerell, with a tower and portico added by Charles Robert Cockerell in 1818 to 1822.
The inside of the church was re-ordered in the 1860s and 1870s by the then vicar Henry Back, an Anglo-Catholic, to make it more suitable for Eucharistic worship. He commissioned Arthur Blomfield to oversee the re-ordering and to decorate the church in a Byzantine style. It was during this time that stained-glass windows designed by Robert Turnill Bayne (1837 - 1915) were added, including one depicting The Parable of the Talents.
St Mary's Church stands in the Central tradition of the Church of England.[2] It is a member of Inclusive Church.
From 1993, the church was shared by the Church of England and the United Reformed Church; it was not, however, a Local Ecumenical Partnership.[3] [4] This agreement ended by the time of the 2019 vacancy.[5]
The church's Resurrection Chapel is home to one of the 84 Lamps of Brotherhood that were made after World War II as a sign of reconciliation between nations.[6]