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Reformation Scotland -- Cathedral of St. Mungo

View of St. Mungo Cathedral From The Street: St. Mungo's Glasgow Cathedral stands on a site which has been held sacred for 1500 years.  St. Ninian planted the cross and blessed the ground here for Christian burial in 397 while Iona was still an unknown island in the western sea, while St. Andrews was still the haunt of wild boar, and only the smoke from heathen dwellings rose from the Rock of Edinburgh.  St. Kentigern baptized in a nearby stream.  "Mungo", or "dear one", was the name he came to be known by.
 
Much of St Mungo's early life is more legend than fact but he is said to have been the son of a pagan king of Gododdin, a part of Scotland now known as Lothian.  St. Kentigern's mother came from a pagan family and married a Christian, Owen, King of Strathclyde.  He was born in Culross near the Firth of Forth where he grew up under the charge of a saintly person and took his training for the priesthood in a Celtic monastery.  He travelled to "Cathures", which is now called Glasgow, and stopped at a cemetery which had been consecrated by St. Ninian.  Here he founded his church which he dedicated to the Holy Trinity.
 
St. Kentigern was elected by the King and clergy of the region to be the bishop and was consecrated by a bishop brought from Ireland for that purpose.  His determination to raise the spiritual level of the community caused him to clash with the apostate king Morken.  After 14 years he turned his attention to Wales to avoid danger to his life at home.  In 573 he was recalled by Rhydderch, Christian King of Strathclyde.  For a time he had his See in Hoddam in Dumfriesshire.  In 582 he returned to Glasgow.  On one occasion St. Columba visited him.  He died on January 13th, 603 and was buried on the hillside above the stream where he had baptized.
 

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Here we see the main altar above the crypt and tomb where St. Mungo was buried.   There was probably a succession of churches built upon the site.  The next clear history we have of St. Mungo's comes from Bishop John in the 12th century.  The first cathedral of stone was dedicated on July 7, 1136 with King David and his court in attendance.  The church was later destroyed by fire and rebuilt in 1197.  The cathedral of today was begun in the mid-13th century and completed in the early 16th century.
 

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St. Mungo's Famous Quire Screen: Like other churches in Scotland, the Cathedral of Glasgow suffered attacks during the 16th century.  (The only two Glasgow martyrs of the Reformation were burned at the stake in the churchyard.) During the years following the Reformation all images were removed and all chapels stripped of their furnishings.  In pre-Reformation times there were altars at each of the fourteen pillars of the Nave.  There is no trace of them today.
 
The enormous quire screen, which practically divides the church in half, was emplaced at the end of the 15th century.  It is the only one of its kind left in any non-monastic pre-Reformation church in Scotland.  The pulpit was put in about 1600.  A famous preacher there was Donald Cargill, one of the most fervent and courageous of the Covenanters who was eventually put to death in Edinburgh for conscience sake.  There is no medieval glass remaining in the Cathedral.  Most of the windows are from the latter part of the 19th century of glass manufactured in Germany.  Almost alone among the churches of Scotland it has never been roofless.  Worship services have been conducted there continuously for over 700 years.  After the Reformation it became the Parish Church of Glasgow.
 

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