St. John the Baptist at Bere Regis

The Church’s Structure

According to Ben Loomis on his website, benloomis.substack.com most gothic churches are built in the shape of a cross, with Bere Regis’s parish being no different. While our building is far different now due to multiple renovations—to put it lightly—over the centuries, the original structure was quite literally in the form of a cross, as shown in this image on the left provided by Bere Regis' own history of the parish. The image on the right is a typical cathedral layout, designed by Ben Loomis.

Likely owing to the rural land of Dorset, neither Bere Regis’s parish nor any of the parishes in Dorset are “proper” cathedrals, as the cathedral to the Diocese of Salisbury (which overlaps a majority of Dorset) is in the neighbouring county of Wiltshire—Where Stonehenge is! Despite this, there are many wonderful churches to see here, including Christchurch Priory, the longest church in England, and St. Edwold’s church, one of the smallest.

Regarding Tess of the d’Urbervilles

If you’re unaware, Tess of the d’Urbervilles is a novel written by Thomas Hardy and published in 1891, featuring a young woman of a poorer family as she navigates life and tragedy in rural southwest England—known in the novel as “Wessex”.

After the family working horse’s death, she is encouraged by her mother to contact a long-lost relative who lives in “Trantridge”, which ultimately leads to said distant relative raping her and conceiving a child. Her child dies, and she goes away to “Talbothays’s Dairy” to become a milkmaid, where she falls in love with a preacher’s boy named Angel Clare.

The two marry, but on the night of their wedding, after discovering her nonvirginity, Angel Clare casts off Tess and goes to Brazil for some soul searching. Meanwhile, Tess is forced to work back at home in “Marlott” with her family, but upon her return, her father dies, and her entire family is forced to find shelter here, at Bere Regis, known in the book as “Kingsbere”.

Once again, she seeks the help of Alec d’Urberville, re-enters into a relationship with him, but ultimately kills him to reconvene with Angel after his return to England. At the end of the novel, she is found by the police at Stonehenge (called by its real name!) and is executed in “Wintoncester”.

Where will I go when I Die?

One of the greatest and most important questions a person can ask. We believe that “In [our] Father's house are many mansions…” (John 14:2 KJV), that all human beings are invited to live in proper communion with the Lord, if they so choose. The unfortunate reality to this, however, is that not everybody chooses this.

“Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God” (Galatians 5:19-21 KJV).

It’s clear that evil abounds in the world, and we as human beings are responsible for it. There are murderers, fornicators, liars, Pagans, and other sorts of people who evidently don’t have the light of God in them. Contrary to the antinomian belief, their actions do matter. But fear not; your story does not have to end the same as theirs. God gives each and every one of us a choice to live purely and do good in the world, and it is up to you to take that chance. Everybody gets a chance.