A CHURCH started by a Belgian priest in a cottage in Burnley has celebrated its centenary.

Father Notterdam was sent from St John's Church in Padiham to organise a mission or daughter church in Lowerhouse.

The first meeting was in a cottage on Lowerhouse Lane in October 1896 and the following year, Mass was said in a rented house on Kiddrow Lane. In 1898 a new building was constructed to house the church upstairs while downstairs, 36 pupils attended the school. A week later the chapel was dedicated to St Augustine.

When the congregation grew in the 1960s, a new church was built and blessed in June 1963. The former church space became part of the school. Brian Moorhouse has written a book detailing the church's history.

A centenary mass was celebrated in the church by Father Robert Livesey, the present parish priest who has been at St Augustine's for 10 years.

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