A CHURCH that was due for demolition has had to close a month early in case it gets bats in its belfry.

St Pius X Roman Catholic Church, in Sussex Road, Moorside, near Consett, was to be knocked down later this year and be replaced by a new church on a nearby site.

Conservationists have warned parish priest Father Jeff Dodds that bats would roost there if they left it too late, so the church will be demolished by the end of the month.

Fr Dodds said: "There has been a rush to have the final Mass in the church because of the bats.

"They start to roost at the end of September or beginning of October, and conservationists told us not to leave it too late or we would not be able to do anything until spring."

St Pius no longer has its own priest and is instead served from St Patrick's, Consett.

Church leaders felt it was better to build a new church with an integrated parish room than to leave the current church with an empty house attached.

The last Mass at St Pius took place on September 9 and was said by Bishop Kevin Dunn. The replacement church is expected to be completed within six months, and will be slightly nearer the main Moorside road than St Pius.

The new church will have an undulating iron roof, which has a shape that echoes the surrounding hillsides.

Fr Dodds said: "There is a lot of new house-building going on around the church and we are hoping we will have a church that provides for all of the needs of the growing parish. It is part of the regeneration that is going on all around.

"The new church has a beautiful design for two reasons: the steel roof reminds us of the steelworks as well as the beauty of the surrounding landscape, and the undulation from low to high gives us a message expressing a rising from death to new life."