Abandoned Middletown Church

Located in Middletown, RI is a church by the name of the Maria Mater Spei Church. It's been abandoned for quite some time, though I could not find out much about its history. I do know its future though: it's already been gutted and some work has been done to it and around it, and it will soon enough be torn down to build more residential areas nearby. It's a surprise it's survived this long, with the recent addition in the past year or two of the residential area on the hill above it, which you can see in the first picture. It's a beautiful church, especially during golden hours.

From the street in the distance.

See the black stains along the sides of the building in the foreground and the structure in the background? I thought perhaps these could be evidence of a fire on the first floor, which stretched up to the top while blowing in the ocean breeze (hence their slant). This may have been one of the reasons for its abandonment.

Near where the front entrance used to be, but completely overgrown.

Piles of rubble and dirt are all around the sides.

The back of the church.

I was surprised to find these doors wide open. This place has countless easy points of entry.

Before we go inside, let's skip to what it looked like from atop the roof:

This was the path I used to get here, beyond the houses on the hill.

Looking down in the front, from the roof.

Inside a rooftop elevator.

Now inside, where it was dark and flooded on the lower floors and mostly empty on the upper floors:

Staircase graffiti.

I shot this to make it look like the light was turned on, but there is no power here.

These steps lead down to the basement, which had at least 10 inches of water in the shallow places. I didn't have the foresight to bring my rain boots, so you can expect another post when I return to explore the basement, which seemed more interesting and less disturbed.

It's a shame I couldn't get down here.

This painting on the wall was enough to catch my eye. This place is supposedly haunted, but that didn't bother me.

This used to operate the elevator.

Moving upstairs:

The elevator, just an empty shaft now.

Next we moved to the chapel area, which was a large room with a ceiling far above. The reverb in the center of this place was insane.

I don't know what kind of stone this is, but it looks rather valuable.

Broken stained glass. It's terrible what the vandals will do, but at least they don't tear the whole place down like the state or the owners.

A retired balcony looking down at the chapel.

I had heard about a nearby set of tracks that led to some abandoned train cars, so I figured I would scout around the property where I thought they were. It turns out I was looking in the wrong place, but here are some photos of what I found:

On a path right next to the church.

Up the road, more land is being cleared for construction.

Followed a completely different trail and came to an opening with this stone wall on my right.

I found some old tombstones along the trail in the woods. That's when I decided to leave.