A brief history of each of the three parish churches

Our Lady & St Andrew, Galashiels

For more than 150 years the Catholic church of Our Lady & St Andrew has been a beacon of faith and Christian welcome not only for the people of Galashiels but for all visitors to the Scottish Borders.

Built in 1873, the church stands as testament to the faith and commitment of a small Catholic community, aided by the generosity of a remarkable man by the name of James Hope-Scott (1812-73). A barrister and former Member of Parliament, he had married Charlotte Scott, the grand-daughter of the celebrated poet and novelist, Sir Walter Scott. They chose to settle in the Scottish Borders.

A convert to Catholicism, and informed by his own deep faith and friendship with the man who would become Cardinal Saint John Henry Newman, James recognised that Galashiels, as a town of growing population and prosperity, should have its own Catholic church. He acquired a plot of land close to the railway station, and in 1856 construction work on the first dedicated Catholic church in Galashiels began.

On Sunday, August 8th, 1873 the opening of the church of Our Lady & St Andrew, built in the Gothic Revival style, was celebrated with a Solemn High Mass accompanied by an orchestra and 34-strong choir from the Jesuit Church of the Sacred Heart in Edinburgh.

Sadly, James Hope-Scott did not live to see the opening of the church that he had helped to build, having died that April. The new Laird of Abbotsford, his daughter, Miss Mary Monica Hope-Scott, took her place in the congregation, representing the family and her father’s extraordinary faith and generosity.

Since that day the church of Our Lady & St Andrew has been the home of the Catholic community in Galashiels and witness to the Christian message across the Borders.

Today, Our Lady & St Andrew’s is one of the three churches that form part of the parish of Our Lady & St Andrew.

 

St Cuthbert’s, Melrose

St Cuthbert’s in Melrose had been a place of Christian worship for many years before becoming a Catholic church in 1985. Originally built in 1867 as a United Presbyterian Church, in the decades before 1985 it had been called High Cross Church and served one of two Church of Scotland congregations in the town.

When those congregations merged in 1984 to form one Parish Church in Melrose, the Church of Scotland’s General Trustees generously gave the Catholic Church an option to buy.  Up until that point, the Catholic community in Melrose had been attending Mass at the Town Hall once described as ‘a narrow sunless room with four or five rows of hard raked seats and a magistrate’s bench out front.’ The contrast with the new home could not have been greater.

Appropriately, at the start of the week of Prayer for Christian Unity in January 1985, a special ecumenical service, attended by Cardinal Gray, was held to mark the handing over of the church.  The Cardinal expressed his gratitude to the Reverend Alasdair Bennet representing the Church of Scotland, saying that he had always hoped for a Catholic church in Melrose and one ‘worthy of the great Christian past of the town.’

For some years the church retained its name of High Cross until its new patron, St Cuthbert, was chosen.

Today, St Cuthbert’s is one of the three churches that form part of the parish of Our Lady & St Andrew.

 

Our Lady & St Joseph, Selkirk

James Hope-Scott (1812-73) was not only the man responsible for the building of the Catholic church in Galashiels but also the church of Our Lady & St Joseph in the centre of Selkirk.

The first Mass was celebrated on Sunday, April 22^nd, 1866. For the first two years the Jesuits came from Galashiels to celebrate Mass once a fortnight, and then once a week. Indicative of the growing Catholic community, two Masses were being said every Sunday by 1876. After 1903 the Jesuits handed responsibility for the parish over to the diocese.

One of the most distinctive features of Our Lady & St Joseph today is the stained-glass window over the high altar. The artist, Felix McCullagh was commissioned to design and make the window which depicts Our Lady seated with the Child Jesus in her arms. Appropriately, Major-General Maxwell Scott, the grandson of James Hope-Scott, unveiled the window in the 1950s.

On October 18^th 1966 Cardinal Gray visited Selkirk to mark the centenary of Our Lady & St Joseph. He was joined in a concelebrated Mass by former parish priests, Canon Roger Gallagher and Fr Hugh Gordon, and Fr Crampton.

Today, Our Lady and St Joseph’s is one of the three churches that form the parish of Our Lady & St Andrew.