Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion and seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The Cathedral was founded by St Augustine in 597AD, though the present building dates mostly from the late medieval period. Archbishop Thomas Becket was murdered here in 1170 and it thereafter became a place of pilgrimage. The Cathedral is a holy place and part of a World Heritage Site.

The Cathedral stands on the site of an ancient Saxon Church, founded in the 8th century by St Frideswide, the Patron Saint of Oxford. Though nothing now remains of this church, a Saxon cemetery lies under the cathedral cloister.

The present building was constructed in the last quarter of the 12th century as the monastery church for a community of Augustinian Canons.  The monastery was called St Frideswide’s Priory, and inside the church stood an ornate shrine on which were kept the relics of the saint. Pilgrims visited the shrine throughout the Middle Ages, including Catherine of Aragon, who, in 1518, came to pray for the birth of a healthy son.

In 1524, just before the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Cardinal Wolsey gained permission from the Pope to close down St Frideswide’s Priory so that he could use the land to build a vast new college for the university. He planned to include a new chapel for his ‘Cardinal’s College’ but died before the building was complete, which meant that the old monastery church was retained.  King Henry VIII founded the college as Christ Church instead and in 1546 moved the first Bishop of Oxford into the church, thereby creating a unique institution: a college chapel that is also the Cathedral for the Diocese of Oxford.

Christ Church Cathedral is one of the oldest buildings in Oxford and one of the smallest cathedrals in England. Unusually for a cathedral, its centre stalls face inwards, in collegiate style. Its interior is breathtaking; the stonework almost glows and the stained glass is stunning.  The Becket Window in the Lucy Chapel dates from 1320 and is one of very few images of Becket to survive.  There is still a shrine to St Frideswide.  But perhaps best of all is the remarkable stone vaulted ceiling in the chancel, which is 500 years old.

Visitors should note that services begin five minutes later than ‘normal’ time, because the Cathedral keeps the old ‘Oxford Time’ (ie five minutes west of Greenwich). This means 6pm Oxford Time is 6.05pm GMT or BST.

The spectacular ruins of Elgin Cathedral still impress.  The cathedral was established in 1224 on land granted by King Alexander II and was dedicated to the Holy Trinity.  Though suffering fire and, most famously, sacking by the Wolf of Badenoch, Alexander Stewart, the Earl of Buchan, the cathedral continued to grow and thrive, and was known as ‘the lantern of the north’, until the Scottish Reformation of in 1560, when the cathedral was abandoned.  Gradually, it fell into an ever-worsening state, until it began to receive some care and attention in the 19th C.  Highlights of a visit now include the magnificent 13th C west front, octagonal chapter house, carved stonework and Scotland’s tallest gravestone (5m high and dedicated to the Anderson family).

Calling itself 'the Cathedral of the Sea', the Cathedral Church of St Thomas of Canterbury began life as an Augustinian chapel, dedicated to St Thomas, in 1188, and later became a parish church. The chancel and transepts of the current building date from this time, but it is largely a more modern creation. Following damage by Parliamentary forces during the English Civil War, the church was rebuilt and developed in the 17th and 18th centuries. It became the Anglican cathedral of Portsmouth in 1927 and the building was extended, in neo-Byzantine style; this work was halted during the Second World War and only completed in 1991. The building exterior does have a faintly Oriental look; the interior is wonderfully light, in a kind of Baroque-Greek style.

St Albans Cathedral is known as the oldest site of continuous Christian worship in Britain and stands over the place where Alban, Britain's first saint, was buried after the Roman gave his life for his faith more than 1700 years ago. A church was built over the grave and it became a place of pilgrimage.  King Offa of Mercia is said to have founded a monastery here in 793 AD.

William the Conqueror appointed Paul of Caen as the first Norman abbot of St Albans and Paul set about building a new church, using material from the Roman city of Verulamium. Today, St Albans is the only cathedral in Britain with a Norman crossing tower that is still standing – and built of Roman bricks.  It also has the longest nave in England, with medieval paintings on its pillars and wonderful stained glass in its windows. St Albans Abbey was dissolved in December 1539, most of its buildings were destroyed and its valuables disappeared – along with St Alban’s relics.  In 1553, the people of St Albans bought the church for their own use. However, the upkeep was expensive and by 1832, the Abbey was in a poor condition.  Wealthy Victorian benefactors paid for the building to be repaired, which included remodelling the West End, removing medieval features and replacing the statues in the High Altar Screen. In 1877 what had previously been a local parish church became a cathedral and the seat of the Bishop of St Albans.