Church Profile

Galston Parish Church is a busy small town charge with a congregation of 800 + where the minister is still very much regarded as the Parish minister and contact is virtually with the whole parish.

The congregation is active, led by an enthusiastic and hard working Minister and Kirk Session in which the majority of elders are involved and committed. Worship is reasonably well-attended, the praise led by an excellent choir.

Mission is ongoing, with regular parish visitations as well as other ongoing events which involve parishioners. A pastoral care team of church visitors has been operating for a number of years. The minister is at present Chaplain to the local Primary School and shares Chaplaincy with a Secondary School. Galston Parish Church is the only Church of Scotland in the town. There are excellent relationships and regular joint services with St. Sophia’s R.C. Church who, for five years, worshipped in one of our halls while remedial work was undertaken at their church building. There is also a Brethren Church. The Kirk Session numbers 60 +, most of whom are active and operate a committee structure which cover Worship, Nurture (formerly Baptism, Fellowship and Membership), Pastoral (formerly Care and Community), Education (formerly Children and Young People), Outreach (formerly Wider Mission) and Roll Review. Two elders are attached to each church organisation. The elders also serve in the Congregational Board with 21 other elected members of the congregation.

There is a good musical tradition with a three-manual pipe organ, an organist and choirmaster and a choir of 20 + who participate each Sunday.

There is a healthy Boys’ Brigade Company and equally healthy Girls’ Brigade Company. There is a Creche, Sunday Club and a Seekers Group catering for children of all ages. The Guild is attended by more than 60 at their fortnightly meetings and the Young Women’s Group has a dozen members. There are also variable study, bible study, young adult, contact and bereavement groups – and a walking club.

There are approximately 50-80 funerals, 12-15 marriages and 12-15 baptisms in a year. As well as background to membership meetings for those considering communicant membership, there are background to marriage, background to baptism, background to eldership and background to congregational board meetings.

A staffed church office ensures all records are kept up to date and office-bearers fully informed. Sunday worship is fairly traditional and evening services flexible and varied.

Galston Parish Church has a strong financial base thanks to the response of members over recent years. A first ever Planned Givings Campaign in 1997 received a magnificent response from the congregation with annual givings nearly doubled; these campaigns are repeated every four years. A major restoration and refurbishment of the church followed the first campaign and since then there has been an extension to the Hogg Hall, enabling organisations on a Sunday to meet under one roof.

Other organisations benefit from our congregation’s generosity, £2000 given annually, and £10,000 has been raised for work in Malawi with 40 members of the congregation paying for the education of a child in a five-year commitment.

There is contact with Ahrensfelde near Berlin in the former East Germany which began in 1987. Regular group visits between the two towns are now well established.

Times of Services

Sunday mornings, 11 a.m., in the Church

Sunday evenings, 6.30 p.m. in Hogg Hall, Winter months.

Facilities for people with particular needs

Public address system, Loop system, Disabled access, Disabled toilet, Pew removed for wheelchairs.

Past Pastors

ALEXANDER BLAIR was imprisoned for supporting the Covenanting cause;
ROBERT FINDLAY became a Professor of Divinity at Glasgow University;
GEORGE SMITH was mentioned by Robert Burns in The Holy Fair and was the great-grandfather of Robert Louis Stevenson;
ROBERT STIRLING is remembered as the inventor of the Stirling Engine and ministered to the sick during the cholera epidemic in the 1850s;
LOUDOUN BLAIR, appointed as minister of the union, whose 25-year faithful and dedicated service as a parish minister culminated with a nomination to be Moderator of the General Assembly.