The Parish of St. John the Evangelist was established in 1861 and the present church was erected in 1878. Its founder, Father Edmund Wood (1830-1909), introduced the principles of the Oxford Movement to St. John’s and the Diocese of Montreal. The Parish was the first Anglican church in Canada to celebrate daily Mass and provide private Confession, and the first in Quebec to reserve the Blessed Sacrament.
In keeping with the principle that the church is open to all, St. John’s was the first parish in the diocese (and one of the first in the country) not to rent pews. To this day, the congregation sits on chairs rather than in pews.
St. John’s was the first non-Roman Catholic church in Montreal to foster separate institutions: St. John’s School became Lower Canada College, St. Margaret’s Home for Incurables continues as part of the Father Dowd Nursing Home, and St. Michael’s Mission to the Poor, which serves over one hundred breakfasts and lunches per day to Montreal’s homeless, continued to operate from the church until 2022.
Notes from "Churches of Montreal"
The most underrated church in Montreal. Impressive for its slum gothic architecture and Anglo-Catholic liturgy.
