Holy Ghost Church can be found just "off" the High Street in midsomer Norton. By foot from the High St. go to the end where there is a T- junction (with a short cul de sac opposite) with traffic lights. To left and right is Silver street. Turn right into Silver Street and go past the hardware shop (Casswells). Turn right up the passage way and the Church stands before you just a little to the right.
Alternatively if your travelling by car look for the road just a little further on and before the Anglican Church. Go up here and park in the car park, part owned by Sainsburys. At the entrance to the car park there is a funeral parlor with a passage beside it that runs down to Silver Street. Again the Church is half way down and to the left.
The Church of the Holy Ghost has its own history and guide published by Downside Abbey Press in 2001 with a text written by Dom Benet Innes, parish priest from 1962 to 1985. This guide is available in the Church. The building is a 15th century tithe barn and the oldest complete building in Midsomer Norton. The barn was originally the possession of the Augustinian Cannons of Merton Priory in Surrey. Then in 1539 it was "handed over" to King Henry VIII and passed to Christchurch College Oxford, with whom it remained until 1886. It was then sold off. It then came, by a some what circuitous route, into the possession of Downside Abbey in August 1906 and became a Church in 1913. It has been served by Downside ever since and the current Parish Priest is Dom Michael Clothier OSB.
Who is the Holy Ghost? The Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit is considered in Christian belief to be the "third person" of a trinity of persons (hypostases) in the one God. This is a seeming paradox. Catholic theology asserts there is only one God and God consists of three "persons" Father, Son and Holy Spirit; and each person is completely God. The Holy Spirit is often considered or represents the "feminine" aspect of God.
Christianity along with many faiths contains what appear to be any number of paradoxes such as Jesus being both human and divine or Mary as both mother and virgin or the communion host as both body of Christ and bread. In our empirical, dualistic mindset these paradoxes appear illogical and impossible. But this is to forget that the language of religion is mostly metaphor and helps us to hold concepts in tension until we "see" the truth/mystery contained there in. Perhaps it helps to understand this now that we are more familiar with (but perhaps no better understand) such ideas within quantum physics as light consisting both of particles and waves (and neither) since Einstein's and de Broglie's work in the early 20th century. Ultimately ascent to a doctrine is not important or even necessarily helpful. What is important is the journey to a changed mindset where we can come to love our enemies.
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