I read a excerpt from the church’s own website that could not describe the church better.

The Story of Burnmoor Church, County Durham 1948

‘This nineteenth century parish church is a worthy and seemly house for the worship of God and finds a warm place in the hearts of not only the inhabitants of the village of Burnmoor but also of church goers in many surrounding districts. It does not possess any ancient . history nor does it aspire to anything but what it is, a homely house of God and as such is beloved by all who worship there. The church is dedicated to St Barnabas and was built at the sole charge of George Frederick D’Arcy Lambton whose wife Beatrix Frances, Countess of Durham, laid the foundation stone on 3rd May 1867.

The surroundings of the church cannot fail to impress, the entrance to the churchyard is from the north, its footpath winding through an avenue of trees to the south porch; the south aspect is of a rolling countryside looking across a typical English country cricket field to the ancient Saxon village of Newbottle. The north looks upon the well wooded old rectory grounds within Lambton Park. As we approach the building we find it built in the Early English style with a turret at the western end with one bell; internally there is a chancel and nave of three bays, north and south aisles; the chancel is elegant and beautifully decorated.

When we enter the church we are at once struck by the contrasting north and south aisles, the former with its high almost flat roof and the latter with its low wall and steeply sloping roof. The north aisle as it is today was heightened and enlarged by John George the third Earl of Durham in 1881 in memory of his father; the roof timbers of English Oak were obtained from the Lambton estate, the cost of enlarging was £1,732 and was executed at the sole charge of his lordship. The church now has a seating capacity of 320 worshippers In the same year the chancel was enriched and beautified by the parishioners in grateful remembrance of the builder of the church. In 1888 a faculty was secured which gave authority to further enrich and improve the chancel, consisting of a richly carved oak screen, reredos, and panelling, mural decorations to the design of Johnson and Hicks of Newcastle upon Tyne.

The most outstanding feature of the interior of the church is a huge monument built of white Italian marble on a blue grey pedestal and fashioned in the form of an angel of victory. The monument was given to the church by the fifth Earl of Durham in memory of his uncle, the third Earl and his father, the fourth Earl. The Angel of Victory is placed in a commanding position in the north aisle and was dedicated on 23rd June 1929 by Dr Herbert Hensley Henson, the then Bishop of Durham. The sculptor is Waldo Storey RA who completed the work in Rome in 1894, the total cost being £3,200.

On the wall of the north aisle is a painting of the “Madonna of the Armchair”; it is a copy of a Raphael and was purchased from the monks of St Mark’s. Florence. The picture was presented to the church as a memorial to Dr Alfred Merle Norman by his great niece Miss Agatha Norman and was unveiled on 20th October 1935. Dr Norman was the first incumbent of Burnmoor Parish; born in 1831, he held the living from 1866 to 1895 and died in 1918. The altar table was provided in 1910 by the parishioners as a memorial to Queen Victoria. The organ was built by Gray & Davison of London.

The church contains a number of memorial windows which will be described in a separate article at a later time.

The churchyard contains an outstanding monument erected to the memory of Beatrix Frances Countess of Durham who died on 21st January 1871 which stands over the family vault of the Lambtons. The monument is in the form of a cross designed by Thomas Drew and was made in Dublin by Walter Doolin in 1873. The cross is made of Irish limestone and is an exact reproduction of the famous Irish cross at Monasterboice, a village in the County of Louth, Eire.’