⏰️ SAINT SIMONS CATHOLIC CHURCH , GLASGOW - BURNED TO THE GROUND 28 JULY 2021

SAINT SIMONS CATHOLIC CHURCH POLISH SHRINE ? - Insurance Job ?
SAINT SIMONS CATHOLIC CHURCH

In front of church there is a Memorial Stone in Polish which translates:

During the second World War Polish soldiers on leave from the battlefields came to this church to attend Mass together to hear the word of God in their native tongue, to sing their Polish hymns, and to thank Our Lady, Queen of Poland, for this touch of home the Polish community of Glasgow has. Through the years they felt deeply grateful to Father Patrick Tierney for the privilege he has accorded them of celebrating the Polish Mass in this Church and for the many kindnesses received from him and the parishioners
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History

David Livingstone, the greatest African explorer, always told the story that he only escaped from the dye works at Blantyre because a Catholic priest taught him Latin. This enabled him to qualify for medicine at Glasgow University. The priest was Daniel Gallagher, an Irishman who, after studies in Rome, held the first Roman Catholic services in the West End of Glasgow in 1855. He opened this little church in Partick Bridge St in 1858 calling it St Peter’s. It is the third oldest Catholic church in Glasgow (after the Cathedral and St Mary’s in the East End).

By the turn of the century the church proved too small for the dockers and their families and in 1903 a new St Peter’s was opened in Hyndland St. The Partick Bridge St building served as an extension (known as the Bridge St Chapel)  until the Second World War when soldiers of the Polish Armed Forces who had escaped the Nazis and who were based in Yorkhill Barracks needed a church. Since then the building has also been known as the Polish Church. It was the focus of the Polish community in exile and still today the Saturday Vigil (6 pm) and Sunday (noon) Mass are said in Polish by a Polish priest from the chaplaincy in the Polish Club in Kelvingrove.  There is also Mass in Polish in St Peter’s on Sundays at 3 pm.

https://www.stsimonspartick.org.uk/history/