Leased for Three Years, Then Bought: A Tongan Congregation Makes a Former Anglican Church Its “Village”

• A Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga congregation bought the former St Peter’s Anglican Church in Timaru in 2017
• It had leased the building for three years before buying
• The church received $500,000 for earthquake strengthening and upgrades
• Locals held weekend working bees to reduce costs

A Tongan congregation in Timaru, New Zealand, has upgraded a former Anglican church it bought in 2017, with $500,000 in government funding, according to a Kānoa Regional Economic Development project profile published on March 12, 2024.

Tukupā Ma’a Kalaisi, a parish of the Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga, worships in the former St Peter’s Anglican Church, built in the 1910s, with a hall added in the 1950s. The congregation leased the buildings for three years before buying them in 2017, and settled there permanently in 2019.

The $500,000 grant from the Covid-19 Response and Recovery Fund paid for earthquake strengthening and safety upgrades, new fire alarms, wiring, heating, lighting, paint and carpet, and refreshed meeting rooms. The profile said: “A real community effort was required to deliver the work, with locals conducting regular working bees on weekends to reduce costs.” The church serves as a place of worship and as “the ‘village’ for the Pasifika community”, hosting services, events, youth activities and literacy classes.

The purchase gave a migrant congregation a permanent home in an older building another denomination no longer needed.

Jamaican congregations abroad, in the UK, the US and Canada, face the same choice between renting and buying. The Timaru model of leasing first and then buying a surplus church is one some diaspora churches have followed. Leasing first lets a congregation test a building, and public grants for community use can help with the cost of bringing an old building up to standard.

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