Yorkminster Park Baptist Church is the largest Baptist

Baptist

Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...

 church in Canada, built 1926-8 by the architectural firm George, Moorhouse and King, and is named after the 10th century York Minster

York Minster

York Minster is a Gothic cathedral in York, England and is one of the largest of its kind in Northern Europe alongside Cologne Cathedral. The minster is the seat of the Archbishop of York, the second-highest office of the Church of England, and is the cathedral for the Diocese of York; it is run by...

 in York

York

York is a walled city, situated at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city has a rich heritage and has provided the backdrop to major political events throughout much of its two millennia of existence...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. It is located in Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

's Deer Park neighbourhood at 1585 Yonge Street

Yonge Street

Yonge Street is a major arterial route connecting the shores of Lake Ontario in Toronto to Lake Simcoe, a gateway to the Upper Great Lakes. It was formerly listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the longest street in the world at , and the construction of Yonge Street is designated an "Event of...

, the northeast corner of Yonge and Heath Streets.

Yorkminster Park offers traditional Sunday services at 11:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. in a classic cathedral setting. With its longstanding tradition of high quality preaching and music, Yorkminster Park draws members and visitors from across the greater Toronto area and beyond. People of many and varying denominational backgrounds find a wide range of opportunities for friendships, Christian education and service to others.

History

This building is the sixth Church to be occupied by this historic Baptist Congregation. The origins of the congregation date from 1829 under the leadership of “good old Dr. Caldicott”, a young Englishman who preached to a small gathering just south-east of King and Yonge Streets. By 1869 the Church had become Bond Street Baptist Church, just north-east of Yonge and Queen Streets. One of the young laymen of this Church became Senator William McMaster

William McMaster

William McMaster was a wholesaler, Senator and banker in the 19th century. A director of the Bank of Montreal from 1864–1867, he was a driving force behind the creation of the Canadian Bank of Commerce of which he served as the founding president from 1867 to his death in 1887.He served in the...

, the founder of McMaster University

McMaster University

McMaster University is a public research university whose main campus is located in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land in the residential neighbourhood of Westdale, adjacent to Hamilton's Royal Botanical Gardens...

.

In March 1870, a Sunday School mission was opened in what is now Toronto's Yorkville

Yorkville, Toronto

Yorkville is a district in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, well known for its shopping. It is a former village, annexed by the City of Toronto. It is roughly bounded by Bloor Street to the south, Davenport Road to the north, Yonge Street to the east and Avenue Road to the west, and is considered part of...

 neighbourhood by a few workers to serve the northern neighbourhoods of the city, a regular prayer meeting soon followed. During that summer a small chapel was built on Scollard Street, and it was opened on September 1st 1870. The church was officially recognized and dedicated a year later in 1871 as Yorkville Baptist Church.

By 1882 the congregation had grown sufficiently to justify the construction of a new brick church; the Toronto architect E.J. Lennox was commissioned to design a new building at the south-east corner of Bloor

Bloor Street

Bloor Street is a major east–west residential and commercial thoroughfare in Toronto, in the Canadian province of Ontario. Bloor Street runs from the Prince Edward Viaduct westward into Mississauga, where it ends at Central Parkway. East of the viaduct, Danforth Avenue continues along the same...

 and Bay

Bay Street

Bay Street, originally known as Bear Street, is a major thoroughfare in Downtown Toronto. It is the centre of Toronto's Financial District and is often used by metonymy to refer to Canada's financial industry since succeeding Montreal's St. James Street in that role in the 1970s...

 Streets (now the site of the Manufacturer’s Life building). The new church was renamed Bloor Street Baptist and remained on this site until 1926.

Lead by W.A. Cameron (1882-1956), the senior minister of the congregation, the rapidly growing congregation required bigger premises (the Uptown Theatre

Uptown Theatre (Toronto)

The Uptown Theatre was a historic movie theatre in Toronto, Ontario which was demolished in 2003. The entrance to the theatre was located on Yonge Street just south of Bloor. Like many theatres of the time it was constructed so that only the entrance was on a major thoroughfare while the main...

, now demolished, accommodated the overflow for Sunday evening services) and in the 1920s the decision was made to erect a much larger church at Deer Park, a rapidly growing residential community in what was then the city's northern area. The building was designed in 1927 and under construction that year. On 25 March 1928 the Sanctuary was formally opened and dedicated as Yorkminster Baptist Church.

Park Road Baptist Church was founded in 1922 and a new church was constructed on the corner of Park Road and Asquith Avenue in 1927. The architects for that Church were J. Francis Brown and Son of Toronto. The Church was well known in the Bloor and Yonge area especially for its excellent music program. Unfortunately a fire in March 1961 destroyed a large part of the Church House and left the sanctuary with minor structural damage. As the neighbourhood was rapidly changing with the arrival of office buildings, due consideration was given to repairing the damaged structure and selling the property, or uniting with the Yorkminster congregation. The decision to unite with Yorkminster was made and the first business meeting of the combined congregations took place in October 1961. The congregation was renamed Yorkminster Park Baptist Church.

Since W.A. Cameron the church has had six other senior ministers; Emlyn Davies (1951-1961), Murray Ford (1965-1962), John Gladstone (1965-1991), Kerr Speirs (1991-1999), and the current minister, Peter Holmes (2001-present).

Architecture

Built in the Gothic Revival style, the church is made of Owen Sound rubble stone walls, with Indiana limestone

Indiana Limestone

Indiana Limestone, also known as Bedford Limestone is a common regional term for Salem limestone, a geological formation primarily quarried in south central Indiana between Bloomington and Bedford....

 used for the piers

Pier (architecture)

In architecture, a pier is an upright support for a superstructure, such as an arch or bridge. Sections of wall between openings function as piers. The simplest cross section of the pier is square, or rectangular, although other shapes are also common, such as the richly articulated piers of Donato...

, arch

Arch

An arch is a structure that spans a space and supports a load. Arches appeared as early as the 2nd millennium BC in Mesopotamian brick architecture and their systematic use started with the Ancient Romans who were the first to apply the technique to a wide range of structures.-Technical aspects:The...

es and traceried windows

Tracery

In architecture, Tracery is the stonework elements that support the glass in a Gothic window. The term probably derives from the 'tracing floors' on which the complex patterns of late Gothic windows were laid out.-Plate tracery:...

 in the aisles, nave

Nave

In Romanesque and Gothic Christian abbey, cathedral basilica and church architecture, the nave is the central approach to the high altar, the main body of the church. "Nave" was probably suggested by the keel shape of its vaulting...

, and transept

Transept

For the periodical go to The Transept.A transept is a transverse section, of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In Christian churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform building in Romanesque and Gothic Christian church architecture...

s.

Its immense size gives Yorkminster Park seating for 1,200 people in the main sanctuary and room for 500 more in the transept and galleries. This is made possible, in part, by having a 55-foot nave unobstructed by pillars, a feat accomplished by a technique not available to the medieval architects of the original York Minster: a steel trussed

Truss

In architecture and structural engineering, a truss is a structure comprising one or more triangular units constructed with straight members whose ends are connected at joints referred to as nodes. External forces and reactions to those forces are considered to act only at the nodes and result in...

 roof.

From the west wall to the chancel

Chancel

In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar in the sanctuary at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building...

 steps is 158 feet, and the crossing

Crossing (architecture)

A crossing, in ecclesiastical architecture, is the junction of the four arms of a cruciform church.In a typically oriented church , the crossing gives access to the nave on the west, the transept arms on the north and south, and the choir on the east.The crossing is sometimes surmounted by a tower...

 measures 107 feet.

Features

The entrance wall to the church's tower includes a piece of carved stone from York Minster cathedral. A brass plaque below the carved stone reads:

This stone for more than five hundred years formed a part of one of the mullions

Mullion

A mullion is a vertical structural element which divides adjacent window units. The primary purpose of the mullion is as a structural support to an arch or lintel above the window opening. Its secondary purpose may be as a rigid support to the glazing of the window...

 of the clerestory

Clerestory

Clerestory is an architectural term that historically denoted an upper level of a Roman basilica or of the nave of a Romanesque or Gothic church, the walls of which rise above the rooflines of the lower aisles and are pierced with windows. In modern usage, clerestory refers to any high windows...

 windows of York Minster, the great cathedral founded at York, England, in 927 A.D., and was presented to this church by the Dean of the ancient Minster.

The church's great four-manual pipe organ

Organ (music)

The organ , is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet. The organ is a relatively old musical instrument in the Western musical tradition, dating from the time of Ctesibius of Alexandria who is credited with...

 was built by Casavant Frères

Casavant Frères

Casavant Frères is a prominent Canadian company in Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec, which has been building fine pipe organs since 1879. As of 2008, they have produced over 3800 organs.- Company history :...

 of St. Hyacinthe, Quebec

Quebec

Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....

, and was installed in 1928. Tonal revision and the addition of some new stops was carried out in 1965; two stops were added in 1971; a new console was installed in 1975.
The Yorkminster Park organ is now one of the finest instruments in Canada, containing 77 stops

Organ stop

An organ stop is a component of a pipe organ that admits pressurized air to a set of organ pipes. Its name comes from the fact that stops can be used selectively by the organist; some can be "on" , while others can be "off" .The term can also refer...

 and 5,328 pipes

Organ pipe

An organ pipe is a sound-producing element of the pipe organ that resonates at a specific pitch when pressurized air is driven through it. Each pipe is tuned to a specific note of the musical scale...

. In 1985 and 1988 renovation programs were begun which included necessary repairs, improvement in tonal quality, the addition of a floating trumpet stop and the capture-action electronic memory for the console. Yorkminster Park is one of the leading organ recital halls in Canada.

In 1933 the first “Carols by Candlelight” concert of Christmas music was presented in Toronto at Yorkminster; and the choral service has become a longstanding tradition in the city. The choir enjoys an outstanding reputation for the quality of its singing.

Noonday Organ Recitals, free to the public, take place each Wednesday from 12:30 to 1:00 p.m., except during the summer months.

The church has in the last fifty years been creating a collection of stained glass windows in the sanctuary that cover a wide range of biblical and secular themes, both historical and allegorical. By the diversity of their themes the windows illustrate that valuable lessons may be learned from all of history and literature. These windows have been donated in memoria and add significant beauty to the church.