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The story of
Davidson’s Mains Parish Church
Beginnings
Like
quite a number of congregations throughout Scotland, this congregation
had its beginnings back in 1843.
In that
year there was a bit of a verbal ‘bun-fight’ within the Church of
Scotland (mainly over what was seen by some as unwarranted interference
by the state in the affairs of the church): the spat ended in a major
‘split’, with some 400 ministers leaving the Church of Scotland to form
what became known as the ‘Free Church’ (‘free’ from state interference,
as they saw it).
Historians call it ‘The Disruption’ – and that’s probably quite a good
description of what happened: having something like a quarter of your
ministers leave in one fell swoop is a bit disrupting to say the least!
The
minister at Cramond Kirk at the time, Rev Dr George Muirhead, was one of
those who left the Church of Scotland in 1843: indeed, he had the
distinction, as a sprightly octogenarian, of being the oldest minister
so to do (back in those days ‘retiring’ simply meant ‘shy’ when it came
to ministers: like their sermons they just went on and on!).
Although there was nothing as formal as a three-line whip or anything,
all the elders (leaders) at Cramond Kirk followed his lead and, along
with members of the congregation, formed the Free Church of Cramond.
More
for practical (presumably geographical) reasons than because they’d
settled into a ‘divide-and-conquer’ mode, this new congregation
initially met for worship in two different places: the eastern part
gathered in the old schoolhouse (now the Royal Bank) at the west end of
Main Street here in Davidson’s Mains – maybe they had an eye on a secure
financial future! The western part of the congregation, in rather more
pioneering fashion, opted for a barn as their place of worship, first at
Braehead and then at Fair-a-Far Farm.
Bureaucracy probably hadn’t been invented back then, because within two
months of leaving the Church of Scotland they’d managed to agree on
where they would build a place of worship and were up and running with
construction: and then, a mere seven months later, they were holding
their first act of public worship in the building which we still use
today.
They
knew how to get things done! (Today, with more hoops in the system than
there are on a Celtic football strip, we’d probably still have been
waiting for the draft report of a sub-committee of some obscure
department in the ecclesiastical hierarchy).
What’s
more, the whole thing cost them a mere £455, which sounds like a pretty
good deal, even given inflation – that wouldn’t even buy the front row
of seats now!
By 1846
the congregation numbered 167, were already onto their second minister
and had committed themselves to the building of a school (the present
small North Hall) and a schoolhouse (now the Beadle’s Cottage). It took
a few years more before they got round to building a manse for the
minister – but, well, first things first and all that!
Identity crises
Over
the next fifty years, the ‘disruption’ at its start became a thing of
the past and the congregation settled, at least for a while, into a
quieter, less dramatic sort of life.
But
with the turn of the century things got a bit complicated again! (If
you’re prone to migraines you should probably skip this next bit!)
It was
a period when churches were beginning to realise that the
‘split-on-sight’ policy of separating whenever there was disagreement
was neither that clever nor that healthy: and so there was a good deal
of ‘shaking hands’ and ‘making up’ and letting bygones be bygones going
on.
In 1900
most of the congregations in the Free Church and the Free Presbyterian
Church, for instance, decided to get over their differences and together
they formed the United Free Church.
(If
you’re really into your church history then you should know that not all
their congregations were prepared to do so: hence you still have the
Free Church Continuing and the Free Presbyterian Church Continuing [to
give them their proper titles –the unofficial title, of course, remains
the ‘wee Frees’!])
The
congregation here, though, went with the general flow of the Free Church
as a whole and metamorphosed that year into the United Free Church of
Cramond.
Then
someone somewhere got the bright idea that since the congregation was
actually in the village of Davidson’s Mains it might be a shade
confusing to have the Cramond reference – they plainly didn’t want to be
mixed up with Cramond Kirk! Hence another change of name – this time to
Davidson’s Mains United Free Church.
However, hardly was the ink on the new headed notepaper dry before they
were having to replace the notepaper all over again!
The
“that’s when good neighbours become good friends” spirit had
obviously caught on in the early part of the 20th century.
The United Free Church (having found that uniting with others was
plainly not the end of the world) and the Church of Scotland figured
that when you got down to brass tacks the two denominations were really
pretty similar in most important respects (in fact, so similar your
average Evening News reader wouldn’t have been able to spot the
difference at all)
So when
in 1929 the two finally got their act together and joined forces to
become the (now pretty much united) Church of Scotland, the congregation
here found itself back where it had started – a Church of Scotland
congregation, now called Davidson’s Mains Parish Church.
Growth
Thankfully the ink this time has been able to dry and we’ve not had any
more identity crises to get over for almost a hundred years!
Not
that life’s been dull, of course! There was a fair amount of change in
the whole landscape of the village as Edinburgh’s boundaries grew over
the decades and as major building programmes were carried out in
Silverknowes and Barnton and beyond.
With a
significantly increasing parish population, bit by bit more
accommodation was required. In the mid-1930s the North Hall was built:
in the 1960s the South Hall and car park were added: and within the
following decade the church building itself was extended to provide more
seating for a congregation now comprising over 900 members.
We must
have got the building bug or something for, taking our cue from God in
his work of creation, having done some major new work in these three
distinct areas, we’ve come back in more recent years to do further work
in each of these three important areas.
Having
sold the old manse – an offer we couldn’t refuse! (but don’t worry we
didn’t leave the minister homeless!) – the congregation were able
completely to refurbish the North Hall in 1995: since then it’s been in
full use on a daily basis and manages to combine being a hive of
activity and a haven of peace at one and the same time.
To mark
the new millennium, a sort of belated celebration of the birth of Jesus
2,000 years previously, the ‘chancel’ area of the church building was
altered and upgraded to improve the quality of our worship: that
included the acquisition of a digital organ and furniture which ensured
the whole large area is now entirely flexible. All sorts of
possibilities opened up as a result!
Two
millennia on from Christ’s birth in a stable, of course, standards of
hygiene have rather markedly changed: which necessitated a few changes
on our part, too! To comply with new legislation governing health,
safety, hygiene and accessibility for all, the South Hall was given a
thorough ‘make-over’ in 2002: the kitchen and meeting rooms were
upgraded, toilet facilities were greatly improved (including the
provision of a shower) and we even created our own ‘Upper Room’.
All of
which (along with the spacious, well-kept gardens and the sizeable car
park) has made our complex an attractive venue for ‘day-away’ seminars
by businesses, an ideal setting for conferences hosted by organisations
from across the country, a low-cost accommodation suite for as many as
100+ students gathered in Edinburgh over Hogmanay to fund-raise for a UK
charity, and … well, virtually anything else you can think of!
Tomorrow’s world
Despite
all the changes around us here in Edinburgh, we’re still very much the
‘village’ church, a people set in the midst of a friendly and vibrant
local community whose needs we try to serve in Jesus’ name.
The
current minister, Rev Jeremy Middleton, is the most recent in a line of
eight ministers who have cared for and served the parish (he’s nothing
like as old as the first minister was!) and there is always a warm
welcome both at the services of worship on a Sunday and through the week
in all that’s going on. We hope, one way or another, that all who share
in our life as present-day followers of Jesus Christ will catch a sense
both of the wonder of his love and the sheer adventure in his call.
Our
story is really his story and we look forward to the future with
excitement. We recognise that growth involves change and as we
experience the transforming power of God in our lives we hope that we,
in turn, may always be a force for good and an agent of change both in
the local community and in the wider world.
If
you’d like to share the adventure and be part of the story, do contact
us and we’ll do our best to help. |
