As of , there are more than 140 current and former places of worship in the district of the City of Winchester in the English county of Hampshire. Christian denominations and groups of various descriptions use 108 churches, chapels and meeting halls for worship, and there is also a mosque for adherents of Islam; another 34 former churches and chapels no longer serve a religious function but survive in alternative uses. The City of Winchester is one of 13 local government districts in the county of Hampshire—a large county in central southern England, with a densely populated coastal fringe facing the English Channel and a more rural hinterland. The district covers a large, mostly rural area in the centre of the county, focused on the ancient and historic cathedral city of Winchester—where a settlement existed by the Middle Iron Age, the first church was built in the mid-7th century, and the present inner-city street layout was established by Alfred the Great in the 880s. In the surrounding area are small market towns such as Alresford and Bishop's Waltham, each with a variety of places of worship, and dozens of villages with medieval Church of England parish churches and, often, a Nonconformist chapel: various forms of Methodism were strong locally in the 19th and 20th centuries, and several Methodist chapels remain open.
The 2021 United Kingdom census found that, although not forming a majority, the largest percentage of the district's population was Christian. A large proportion of places of worship are churches belonging to the Church of England—the country's Established Church—but the Roman Catholic Church has an unbroken history locally even during the post-Reformation "penal era", and several Catholic churches are in use. Of the major Nonconformist denominations, Methodism was always the strongest locally—as late as 1940 there were 27 chapels in use—and, apart from one United Reformed congregation in Bishop's Waltham, worshipping communities of Baptists, the United Reformed Church, Quakers and The Salvation Army are confined to Winchester itself. Groups of Evangelicals, Open Brethren and Pentecostals linked to the Assemblies of God denomination also have their own places of worship; and several of Britain's smaller and less mainstream groups meet in the area as well, such as Christian Scientists, Latter-day Saints and members of the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, who have several meeting rooms.
Historic England or its predecessor English Heritage have awarded listed status to 70 current and nine former places of worship in the district. A building is defined as "listed" when it is placed on a statutory register of buildings of "special architectural or historic interest" in accordance with the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport, a Government department, is responsible for this; Historic England, a non-departmental public body, acts as an agency of the department to administer the process and advise the department on relevant issues. There are three grades of listing status. Grade I, the highest, is defined as being of "exceptional interest"; Grade II* is used for "particularly important buildings of more than special interest"; and Grade II, the lowest, is used for buildings of "special interest".
Overview of the district and its places of worship
The City of Winchester district covers about of land in the central part of Hampshire and had a population of about 118,000 in 2017, rising to nearly 127,500 in 2021. Clockwise from the south, it shares borders with the city of Portsmouth, the boroughs of Fareham and Eastleigh, the district of Test Valley, the borough of Basingstoke and Deane, the district of East Hampshire and the borough of Havant, all in Hampshire. The largest centre of population is the ancient cathedral city of Winchester, where about one-third of the district's residents live; other large settlements are Denmead (2017 population 7,175), Bishop's Waltham (6,750) and Alresford (also known as New Alresford; 6,300).
Winchester, situated at a narrow crossing point of the River Itchen, was important to a succession of settlers: evidence from the Early and Middle Iron Ages survives, and the remains of the settlement were taken over by the Romans, expanded and named Venta Belgarum. After the Romans left, "a wave of Germanic settlement occurred", followed by the arrival of Anglo-Saxons. They quickly established a church (the Old Minster) here, and by 660 it was a cathedral. The present Winchester Cathedral replaced it in the late 11th century, and the city was thereafter an important centre of Christianity. Abbeys, priories, almshouses (such as the Hospital of St Cross) and religious houses opened across the city, and by 1300 there were 54 churches within its boundaries. The only survivors from that era in the city are St Leonard and St Swithun-upon-Kingsgate, although the tower of St Maurice still stands and the redundant St Peter Chesil is now a theatre.
The Anglo-Saxons founded many other churches in the surrounding villages and countryside, and some survive in whole or in part. Boarhunt is "a very valuable specimen of a pre-[Norman] Conquest building" and has been dated to the 1060s. Corhampton, which was altered in the 19th century, may date from as early as 1020. Hambledon was extended several times in the medieval era but retains much Saxon-era fabric inside, as does Headbourne Worthy, where some of the work has been dated to 1030. Tichborne, prominently sited on a hill, has kept its Saxon layout and its contemporary chancel, although the nave was built in the Norman era (the 12th century). That period was significant for the area's parish churches: many were founded or rebuilt. Chilcomb, Easton and Farley Chamberlayne are wholly Norman or have been only slightly altered. Others of that era, with varying amounts of surviving Norman features, include Bighton, Bishops Sutton, Bishop's Waltham, Bramdean, Cheriton, Compton, Crawley, Droxford (a "typical ... Hampshire village church" of the Norman era), Martyr Worthy, Morestead, Soberton, Southwick, Sparsholt, Stoke Charity, Warnford and Wickham. The 13th century, when Norman architecture transitioned into Gothic, also left its mark locally: new churches, many of which were altered, extended or rebuilt at various times between the 16th and 19th centuries, were provided in the villages of Durley, Exton, Hunton, Kilmeston, Meonstoke, Micheldever and Upham, and Owslebury's church dates from the late 13th and early 14th centuries.
Little happened for the next four centuries to the area's parish churches except for some extensions or refitting: the only new church was Avington, a Georgian "gem" described as "the best in the county" of its era (it was completed in 1771). The church at Old Alresford was also rebuilt in Georgian style around this time. Churchbuilding and rebuilding took off in the following century, though: many churches in the area underwent restoration in the Victorian era or shortly afterwards, in common with many other places. Some of these programmes of works were carried out by architects of national significance: Arthur Blomfield at Alresford, Thomas Graham Jackson at Bishop's Waltham, Corhampton, Winchester Cathedral and Wonston, Henry Woodyer at Easton, George Edmund Street at Headbourne Worthy and Upham, William Butterfield at Sparsholt, the Hospital of St Cross (St Faith's Church) and St Michael's, Winchester, and Alfred Waterhouse at Twyford (a near-complete rebuild retaining some older fragments). Also prolific locally were father and son John and John Barnes Colson of Winchester, who were in partnership as architects and who worshipped at All Saints Church in Compton; between them at various times they restored that church and Durley, Kings Worthy, Martyr Worthy, Micheldever, Morestead, Old Alresford, Tichborne, Warnford, and St Bartholomew and St Swithun-upon-Kingsgate at Winchester. John senior also designed new churches at Newtown (1847–50; the first church he designed anywhere), Woodmancott (1854–56), Ovington (1865–67, replacing an older building on the site), St Paul, Winchester (1872–89) and Shedfield (1875–80), and in 1860 added to the church at Swanmore which had been designed by Benjamin Ferrey 14 years earlier. Other entirely new churches of the Victorian era, some of which (like Swanmore) were by nationally recognised architects, include Otterbourne (1837–38, by Owen Browne Carter); Beauworth (1838); Colden Common (1842–44); West Meon (1843–46, by George Gilbert Scott); Denmead (1880, by James Fowler); and Curdridge, East Stratton and Northington, all designed by Thomas Graham Jackson in the late 1880s. As well as the Colson-designed St Paul, the growth of Winchester prompted the construction of Holy Trinity in 1853–54, Christ Church in 1859–61 and All Saints in 1885 to the designs of Henry Woodyer, Ewan Christian and John Loughborough Pearson respectively. Much more modest were the tin tabernacles erected on Bramdean Common in 1883 and at South Wonston, replaced in the 1990s by a new church. Other 20th-century Anglican churches were built to cater for Winchester's continued suburban growth: at Oliver's Battery a prefabricated Reema Construction hall was bought and erected in 1956, a church opened in 1962 on the Stanmore estate, and a large brick church was completed in Weeke five years later.
The Roman Catholic faith was largely suppressed throughout England after the Reformation in the 16th century but survived in Winchester, albeit largely hidden. A house was used for the secret celebration of Mass, and in 1583 "much evidence [was] discovered to show it was a major Mass centre". A resident priest was appointed by a later owner of the house, Roger Corham, around 1674, and a shed in the priest's garden was used as a chapel from 1740. Later extended and dedicated, it became the first consecrated post-Reformation Catholic church in England. It was used until the present St Peter's Church opened in 1926. As the city grew, additional Catholic chapels were built at Weeke (1957; no longer extant) and Oliver's Battery (1969; still in use as St Stephen's Church). Another place nearby where Catholicism "appears to have enjoyed a little-persecuted existence since the Reformation" was Tichborne near Alresford. A chapel at Tichborne House was used for Masses for many years, certainly by 1633, and in the new (1803) house one survives in occasional use; it was superseded by a large Modernist church, St Gregory the Great, in Alresford in 1968. Further south, in Bishop's Waltham, Mass was celebrated from 1906 at an inn, then the chapel of the nearby seminary was used until the present Church of Our Lady Queen of Apostles was built. Nearby, at Wickham, the Park Place Catholic retreat and pastoral centre has a chapel which is open for public Masses.