This is the London home of an association of secular priests founded in Rome by St Philip Neri (1515–95). The church popularly known as the ‘Brompton Oratory’ is, officially, the church of the London Oratory, the church house being next door on the west. The oratory is unique in the Roman Catholic church in that it emphasizes the aesthetic and artistic in the practice of devotional exercises. Hence in the church of the London Oratory may be seen a beautiful Italian Renaissance building, furnished with statuary and paintings of the highest quality, and featuring an Oratory Choir who sing, at vespers and solemn Mass, the greatest music of the Christian tradition.
The Italian Oratory was discovered by two leaders of the Oxford Movement who had become Roman Catholic converts, John Henry Newman and Frederick William Faber. Faber, who had studied the life of Philip Neri, founded a brotherhood in the Midlands, while Newman and his companions sought instruction in the traditions of the Oratory in Rome. Upon returning to England as Oratorians, they were joined by Faber and his group, the latter remaining in London. It was Faber who was responsible for the church now known as the Brompton Oratory, and his remains rest beneath a stone before the Altar of St Wilfred. A statue of Newman faces Brompton Road on the west of the church.
The Oratory church was designed by Herbert Gribble, a twenty-nine-year-old architect recently converted to Roman Catholicism. It was consecrated in 1884, and the south facade completed in 1893. The interior features a very wide nave with seven chapels on the sides. The great dome surrounded by circular windows sheds rays of light down into the centre before the sanctuary with its ornate high altar. Perhaps the most noteworthy feature of the church is St Wilfrid’s Chapel at the right of the sanctuary. Outstanding among its many splendours is the Altar of St Wilfred, a fine example of Flemish Baroque from the eighteenth century, and the Altar of the English Martyrs. Above the latter is a triptych (three painted wooden panels, which form a backdrop to the altar) by American painter Rex Whistler, showing St Thomas More on the left, St John Fisher on the right, and a scene of the executions at Tyburn in the centre.