I could happily hunker down here, if the church was bolted, but these wonderful little dry shelters, were not built for the weary traveller or stray cat, the truth is far more interesting.
For the common folk and for many centuries, this was akin to a holding pen, the farthest they could get towards the high alter, the scared space. A husband and wife would be married such a porch as this, the congregation sprawled about the churchyard. One wonders further about this simple hierarchy of placement, which saw the best seats in the house by those who sponsored the gig and the also-rans made to camp outside for the better part of one thousand years. This cruel yet well ordered fabric of human society before the cloth that made the bishop and the nun.
In an age before the invention of the umbrella, or perhaps more correctly its discovery from eastern realms, it would not be suitable to see a man of the cloth become bedraggled, for the drizzle in England cares not for summer or spring. As such, church porches, created to keep the clergy dry and as an after thought, the bride and groom. They also do good work in keeping the sanctity to the space beyond the church door an added mystery, for what use is there in selling paradise if you don’t hold back a little of its wonderment?
We live in an age of gold and diamonds and digital currency, but all would be worthless if the market was flooded, so the allusion of rarity is nurtured, until even those who sell it believe in the completeness of the myth.
For these simple country churches, not their big burly town cousins, the porch remains open through high tide and storm, a place of refuge for folk like me, a free space to take five and think about our next move in the game of life.