St James’s Church, St Andrews

St James’s Church, St Andrews

Following the Reformation the authorities in St Andrews (like many other Scottish towns) prosecuted Roman Catholics. This meant that for several centuries there was no official Catholic congregation in St Andrews. As religious toleration increased in the nineteenth century Catholicism returned to the area. In 1885 a Roman Catholic church dedicated to St James was founded on the Scores, looking out over the sea. The original church was made of corrugated iron and was sometimes known as the ‘Tin Tabernacle’. In 1909 the iron church was removed and replaced by a stone church designed by Reginald Fairlie, who would later become a leading Scottish architect (designing among other sites the National Library of Scotland). The interior of the church underwent some alteration in the 1970s to reflect new approaches to worship following the Second Vatican Council (which ended in 1965). Today St James’s remains a Roman Catholic church, serving the residents and students of St Andrews.

sacredlandscapesoffife

Bess Rhodes

Site

76

21/05/2021

(1) Raymond Lamont-Brown, St Andrews: City by the Northern Sea (Edinburgh, 2006), pp. 169-170. (2) Places of Worship in Scotland, St James Roman Catholic Church, St Andrews: http://www.scottishchurches.org.uk/sites/site/id/4722/name/St+James+Roman+Catholic+Church,+St+Andrews+St+Andrews+and+St+Leonards+Fife [Accessed 12 May 2021].

cm x cm x cm

current,56.34296255006758,-2.7975077930386765;

St James’s Church, St Andrews

TEXT

Building

156

1

Catholic