Lenten Pilgrimage - 20

Today we are half way through our Lenten Pilgrimage, and find ourselves at St Columba's Church , High Street, Grantown-on-Spey. The building is shared with St Anne's Roman Catholic Church.



St Columba’s began as a mission from St Andrew’s Cathedral, Inverness, in 1870 at the instigation of Bishop Robert Eden. It was served from Aberlour, until it gained its independence. From 1930-66 it was run jointly with Rothiemurchus.

The figure of St Cecilia, the Patron Saint of Music, represented in the stained glass window above the organ, is in memory of Mrs Barclay, a former organist of St Columba’s.

Sadly, the two congregations do not join together for the celebration of the Eucharist.

O thou, who at thy Eucharist didst pray
that all thy Church might be for ever one,
grant us at every Eucharist to say
with longing heart and soul, "thy will be done."
O may we all one Bread, one Body be,
through this blest Sacrament of unity.

For all thy Church, O Lord, we intercede;
make thou our sad divisions soon to cease;
draw us the nearer each to each, we plead,
by drawing all to thee, O Prince of Peace;
thus may we all one Bread, one Body be,
through this blest Sacrament of unity.

We pray thee too for wanderers from thy fold;
O bring them back, good Shepherd of the sheep,
back to the faith which saints believed of old,
back to the Church which still that faith doth keep;
soon may we all one Bread, one Body be,
through this blest Sacrament of unity.

So, Lord, at length when sacraments shall cease,
may we be one with all thy Church above,
one with thy saints in one unbroken peace,
one with thy saints in one unbounded love;
more blessèd still, in peace and love to be
one with the Trinity in Unity.