Rosemary Street in central Belfast was once home to three Presbyterian congregations. Only First Church remains in its original location - providing a link with the city’s past and contributing to its future. (illustrations showing Rosemary Street’s churches in mid -1800s)

An enchanting and rather wonderful lunchtime recital at First Church with Mary McCabe and Ruth McGinley. Exceptional musical talent...

‘A spirit ripe and ready for the times animated the congregation, and flinging wide its reconstructed doors with songs of gratitude and praise, it opened on Sunday 1st June, 1783, a new era of its vitality and its fame.’ Historic Memorials of the First Presbyterian Church (1887)

‘To worship is to stand in awe under a heaven of stars, before a flower, a leaf in sunlight, or a grain of sand... To worship is to sing with the singing beauty of the earth; it is to listen through a storm to the still small voice within.’ Jacob Trapp

‘Perhaps it is easier to keep alive a vivid religious imagination if one lives close to the annual miracle of nature’s fertility. This is true also if one lives in a community that values the arts, poetry and song...’ Timothy Radcliffe OP

‘Today was a day to pick daisies, to skip and to skate and to sing; today was a day to toss pancakes to spread with the flavour of Spring.’ Celia Warren - Shrove Tuesday (from Allie Esiri’s A Poem for Every Day of the Year).

We were delighted to welcome our Moderator, Rev Chris Hudson, and colleagues from the Ulster History Circle to First Church this morning for the unveiling of a Blue Plaque in memory of the industrialist Sir Samuel Davidson (who had links to Second Congregation/All Souls’).

‘... In my flowerbed Most plants and shrubs aren’t native but have crossed Seas, seasons, different climates, to be here Thriving in shaded Scottish horticulture.’ Douglas Dunn (pic of fireplace in the Minister‘s office in First Church)

’Humbly we accept the gift of unused minutes and hours and days and years, praying that we may use them rightly.’ Harry Lismer Short We‘ll have an abbreviated service tomorrow morning at 10.30am as it’s our AGM. Soup, sandwiches and accountability...

‘Spring… is still a conquering power in our lives… Its revolution each year transforms the face of our world, changes the sky, shakes our very roots. Its fragile intensity is one of the miracles of the land...’ Laurie Lee

‘He wakes the genial spring, Perfumes the balmy air; The vales their tribute bring, The promise of the year...’ John Taylor (from Hymn 62 in Hymns of Faith and Freedom)

‘The hedgerow starts to wake up this month... New life is emerging as the weather is at its most unpredictable’. Lia Leendertz (pic of today’s floral display which provided a splash of vibrant colours for us to enjoy.)

AGM Sunday... the annual cycle of congregational democracy, change and renewal.

‘Tennent‘s ostentatious memorial... survives to this day, offering both a tribute to one of late Georgian Belfast’s most prominent citizens and a point of entry to the complex and multifaceted milieu that he inhabited.’ Jonathan Jeffrey Wright writing about William Tennent

’There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance; pray, love, remember.’ William Shakespeare - Hamlet ’Rosemary - dew of the sea invokes the bracing fragrance of this multiuse herb... Shakespeare cites it most often as a herb of remembrance... a kindle to lost energy’. Gerit Quealy

‘Spring is like a prolonged adolescence, stumbling, sweet and slow, a thing of infinitesimal shades, false starts, expectations, deferred hopes, and final showers of glory…‘ Laurie Lee

10 March, 1833 - ‘Meeting-house re-opened, after re-building of frontage, introduction of hot-water apparatus, &c., at a cost of £681 3s.’ Annals of the Congregation - from Historic Memorials of the First Presbyterian Church of Belfast (1887)

‘We take shelter in the folds and contours of a sacred place, and, although it seems soon to disappear from sight as we take our onward journey, its hidden goodness is still concealed in the folds and contours of our souls...’ Malcolm Guite - from In Every Corner Sing

We’ve got some new signage at First Church in Rosemary Street. We think that it’s vibrant and beautiful and that it provides a lovely splash of colour on grey(ish) days like today...

‘We build on foundations we did not lay... We sit in the shade of trees we did not plant. We drink from wells we did not dig. We profit from persons we did not know. We are ever bound in community.’ from The Book of Deuteronomy, 6 10-12 (adapted by Peter Raible)