Chapel at Convent of Mercy (RC), Home Avenue, Newry, Co Down, BT34 2DL

Chapel at Convent of Mercy, Home Avenue, Newry

This is a rectangular former nave church in a simple modern style, built between 1920 and 1939. The chapel features a chancel and side chapel, with a barrel vaulted roof and attractive stained glass windows. Although deconsecrated around 2005, the building retains special interest and holds group value with the adjacent convent.

The chapel is located immediately south of the convent, to which it is joined by a link block. It is also connected by a corridor on its east gable to a residential home opposite the convent. The building has a natural slate pitched roof with tiled verges and corbelled eaves. Each gable is topped with a stone Celtic cross. The walls are painted and cement rendered.

The north elevation faces the house and features a semicircular-headed double door at ground floor left, used as a fire exit. Above are five regularly spaced tall semicircular-headed windows. The link block from the house abuts most of the ground floor and the right end of this elevation. At the left end of the wall is a commemorative plaque in Latin to Reverend Edward Mulhern, dated 1937.

The left gable, facing east, is abutted at ground floor centre by a flat-roofed corridor to the residential home. On the exposed wall section left and right are semicircular-headed windows. Above the corridor is a circular cushed stained-glass window with hood-mould. A sanctuary projects from the west-facing gable, with a roof similar to but slightly lower than the main chapel body and a masonry cross finial. The gable contains three tall semicircular-headed leaded windows, with the central one taller than the flankers.

The south elevation has six regularly spaced semicircular-headed windows. The link block connecting to the convent accommodates the sacristy and side chapel. The sacristy section has a flat roof with smooth rendered and painted facade and block parapet. At its centre is a semicircular-headed door with a semicircular-headed leaded window to either side. The gabled section behind abuts the rear of the convent building. The back elevation of this link block faces into the garden and rises two storeys due to ground slope, featuring two semicircular-headed leaded windows to the first floor and a casement window with top hung transom light below.

A building is recorded at this location on the 1835 Ordnance Survey map. However, a photograph in the chapel entrance indicates that the present structure was erected through a bequest of John Jordan, who died in 1935. Whether an existing building was refurbished or demolished to make way for the new one remains a matter for further research. The building was deconsecrated around 2005.