When the Going Gets Tough It Gets Slippery Too

Greyfriars Kirk has an important place in the history of the Scottish Covenanters. In 1638 the National Covenant was presented and signed in front of the pulpit. In 1679, some 1200 Covenanters were imprisoned in the Kirkyard pending trial. The Covenators were a major pain to the English Kings because they refused to accept the King as the head of the church. Just as Henry VIII decided he was in charge of the English church instead of the Catholic Pope, the Covenanters decided that local prebysterys should determine the governance of the church. Once this idea caught it wasn't long before the colonists in America decided that regular government should also be regionally determined. What I find most interesting is that these English kings who were being attacked by the Covenanters of Scotland were themselves from the Scottish Stuart family. In the mid 19th century, the Rev Robert Lee, then minister of Old Greyfriars, led a movement to reform worship, introducing the first post-Reformation stained glass windows in a Presbyterian church in Scotland, and also one of the first organs. He received considerable criticism at the time, but most of his proposals were subsequently widely accepted in the Church of Scotland.