Reviews of Calvin Presbyterian Church (Translator)

Brian Voss

Calvin Presbyterian Church in Loch Lomond, besides being an active church, is also used as an occasional concert venue, for which it is well suited. We attended a concert on August 7th, 2011, a "Musique Royale" concert, "The Gyspy and the Devil" which was wonderful. Other groups performing here recently include Coro Cantabile, St. Peter's Christian Church Choir. There were once three churches in Loch Lomond. All Presbyterian. The community came from Scotland in the great diaspora from the Islands of Harris and Uist around 1813. Today the only remaining church is a beauty and has the anomaly of having two front entrances. The church was built in 1911 at the cost of $13,000. To finance the cost of building the church, church shares were sold at a value of $70, to be paid by cash, material or labor or any proportion of these means. It has a seating capacity of 500 and was designed by Kenneth Allen MacLead, a Loch Lomond native who studied architecture in Boston. It was a joint venture of the families of the Church of Scotland (the Kirk) and the Free Church, who brought their strong clan traditions and theology to the area. A condition, set by the clan from Uist, is reflected in the church’s entrance. They wanted a steeple and entry of their own so they could walk in as a clan, sit together and then leave as a clan. One entrance and steeple is larger than the other. In recent years the congregation has been made up of only eleven families!