Is Greyfriars Church too small for Remembrance Service?

COULD Lanark’s toll of casualties from the World Wars have been added to by casualties from the 2013 Remembrance Service to honour them?
By The Newsroom
Published 27th Nov 2013, 07:00 BST
Remembrance row...Rev Bryan Kerr outside Greyfriars ChurchRemembrance row...Rev Bryan Kerr outside Greyfriars Church
Remembrance row...Rev Bryan Kerr outside Greyfriars Church

That was the chilling question asked by one of the congregation at the November 10 Remembrance Sunday gathering in Greyfriars Church which, he claimed, was too small to safely hold a congregation of that size.

The kirk was especially busy as it was its turn to host the annual service, held on a ‘round-robin’ basis by Lanark churches since it was decided not to resume the use of the Memorial Hall .

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The hall had been the place where annual Remembrance Sunday services were held until it closed for refurbishment in 2008, the churches then taking turns to host the event.

Lanark Community Council, decided not to move the ceremony back into the re-opened hall as the church arrangement was so popular.

TOO popular, says Douglas Ritchie, an ex-serviceman of Lanark’s Cleghorn Avenue, who claimed Greyfriars was potentially hazardously overcrowded on November 10.

“The church was not big enough for the number of people attending; if there had been an emergency, there was no way the place could be evacuated safely,” he said.

For more on this story pick up a copy of this week’s Lanark Gazette