Prior to 1688
St. John's Church formed where the Old High Church now is.
1688
The Act of Desastablishment. Penal laws imposed on the Episcopal Church, forbidding the Episcopalians to meet in groups of more than twelve.
1691
Hector MacKenzie and his congregation extruded from their parish church and forcing them to worship in secret..
1715
After the first Jacobite rising even more stringent laws were passed against the Episcopalian clergy.
1745
The second Jacobite rising and the govement sought to wipe out the Episcopal church. Meeting houses, churches and personages were burned. Clergy were forbidden to meet in groups greater than five people. The punishment for this law was transportation - death if they returned.
1792
Only after the death of Charles Edward Stewart these harsh laws were repealed. As a result (of these laws) most of the history of st. Johns was lost, save only that the congregation met in various houses especiall in a house in Baron Taylor street and a meeting house on the maggot.
1801
St. Johns opened at the north end of Church street.
1839
St. Johns moved a larger building on Church street, growing into the largest Episcopal clergy in the Highlands.
1851
Bishop eden elected, defeating James MacKay, the incumbent at St. John's. Bishop Eden moved his See from Elgin to inverness.
1853
The Bishop's Mission Chapel opened in Academy street near St. John's. This split St. John's congregation, many "landed families" leaving to support the Bishop.
1869
Inverness Cathedral opened.
1874
Cathedral consecrated, St. John's congregation split once more.
1886
Bishop eden died. Bishop James Butler-Kelly, his successor mindful of the state of St. John's funds encouraged them to make their final move.
1897
Bishop Butler Kelly met with the incumbent John Henry Crick and identified a new location for the struggling congregation of St. Johns that of the Mission Church of St. Columba on the Southside road. This church was run by the Cathedtal as an outreatch into the new and growing Crown area with its mixure of new houses. the freehold was purchased from MacIntosh of Raigmore and the existing buildings were raised to the ground. The present St. Johns being erected on this site.
1903
Finally St. John's moved from Church Street to its present location on Southside Rd.
Now
History may have dealt harshly with St. Johns, but it has also fashioned it into a church which survived all that was thrown at it - the people of St. John's have been forged in the flames of adversity and have come through the experience with will and the determination.
The past is place which is nice to visit, but it is to the present we live and it is to the future we look and this is the role for St. Johns to look forward to and plan for the future and not live in the past.
