A BRIEF HISTORY OF VARINA PARISH
Like so many Christian communities before it, Varina Church traces its beginnings to a committed group who was meeting for weekly prayer and bible study. In 1922, they began conducting Sunday School classes in one of the buildings of what is now Varina Elementary School. On July 14, 1923, they held a meeting and voted to buy five acres of land and "...to wait on t
he Bishop and secure his consent for the establishment of a church to be located in Varina District." The Bishop gave his approval to the establishment of the new church and the congregants began meeting shortly thereafter in a cottage near the school. Varina Church had officially been born. In May 1925, the Diocesan Council honored the request of the Varina congregation to become a separate parish. Following the lines of Henrico County’s Varina Magisterial District, this new parish was carved from one of the most historic parishes in American anglicanism -- Henrico Parish, home of St. In 1926 the church building was constructed, and the congregation became self-supporting in 1948. A brick parish house was built in 1955. The 1950s and 1960s were decades of slow, but steady growth for Varina Church. Services were occasionally broadcast on WRVA. By the early 1970s, it was obvious that the church facilities needed to be expanded. Offices and transepts were added to the church building in the mid-1970s, and several classrooms were added to the parish house in the late 1970s. In the 1980s, the church began to focus more on community outreach, as it welcomed weekly meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. More emphasis was also placed on the church’s music ministry, and a pipe organ was installed in the church. In the last decade, Varina has continued to increase its outreach programs. For example, parishioners regularly prepare "hospitality baskets" for the families of young cancer patients at MCV’s Massey Cancer Center, and we began to take part in a multi-congregational "ecumenical garden" to raise food for the needy. In the late 1990s, the church added a family-oriented contemporary Rite II Holy Eucharist at 9:00 on Sunday mornings. Until recent years, Varina Parish was for the most part a rural community with many farms. However, the area is now quickly becoming suburban and increasing in population. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports, "Lured primarily by the countryside’s appeal and secondly, economic opportunities, Varina’s population grew from 9,877 in 1980 to 13,078 in 1996, according to the Greater Richmond Chamber of Commerce. The projection for 2001 is 14,159, a 40 percent increase in just over 20 years." For all its growth and change, however, Varina -- both church and surrounding community -- remain quite aware of the rich history of the area. Earthworks from the War Between the States are preserved on the church property, and the founders of Varina Church pointed with pride to the fact that they were reestablishing an Episcopal presence in the cradle of American Christian history. The Varina community’s association with the Anglican Communion dates to 1611, when a group of settlers from Jamestown came up the James River to a peninsula about twelve miles below Richmond to establish the town of Henricus. A church was built in the town and the first minister was Alexander Whitaker. Whitaker instructed the Indian Princess, Pocahontas, in the Christian Faith, baptized her and gave her the Christian name Rebecca. The subsequent marriage of Pocahontas to Captain John Rolfe cemented a peace between the Indians and the settlers that lasted for several years. During this time, Rolfe successfully cultivated on what is now Varina Farm a Spanish-type to***co similar to that produced in Varinas, Spain. Thus the area received the name Varina. On Good Friday, March 22, 1622, a terrible Indian massacre almost wiped out the entire settlement. Some years after the 1622 massacre a second church was built on Varina Farm. Around 1720, a third church was built along the James River about four miles below Varina Farm. It was called the Curles Church, perhaps because of the adjoining Curles Neck plantation. In 1741, the Curles Church was superceded as the parish church of Henrico by St. John’s Church in Richmond and declined rapidly thereafter. Some 175 years later, an Episcopal presence was finally reestablished in the Varina community.
