Politics and religion in North East Scotland

Daily confrontation with the awesome and unpredictable elemental forces of the North Sea has meant that superstition, religion and the fear of God have strongly influenced the lives of fishermen. Those of the North East fishing communities of Cowie, Muchalls and Skateraw in the parish of Fetteresso, Kincardineshire, were no exceptions. They were also almost exclusively Episcopalian in the practice of their religion at the chapels which have stood on Muchalls hill beside Muchalls Castle since 1624 (the latest being the 175-seater St Ternans Church, on the road to Cookney, which was erected in 1831).

Why certain regions of Scotland, such as the Highlands and the North East, should be hierarchically Episcopalian in religion as opposed to the more democratically structured Presbyterianism of central and southern Scotland poses interesting questions about the politics and society of post-Reformation Scotland. It is also paradoxical that these same regions, which the Stuarts had misgoverned and abused for so long, should provide them with such a reliable source of loyal subjects and fighting men. Was it nationalism that spurred the North Eastern and Highland Scots to sympathise with the Jacobite cause or were there other emotions such as anti-English, anti-Hanoverian or anti-Presbyterian feelings in play - or was it simply deference to their "feudal superiors" - the Clan chieftains in the highlands and the lowland Lairds. My own feeling is it was probably the latter.

One of the main lairds of Fetteresso at the time of Culloden was Sir Alexander Bannerman, 3rd baronet of Elsick, who pledged his support for the Jacobite rising soon after the Battle of Prestonpans in September 1745, and was rewarded with the Lord Lieutenancy of the Mearns, his own part of the country, by the Prince. He administered this area until early in 1746 when he joined the Jacobite army at Stirling, bringing with him a contingent of around 160 men. His unit took the eastern route with Lord George Murray's section of the forces on the final march north to Inverness, and at Culloden fought in the second line of battle. Afterwards many those who managed to evade capture by retreating northwards where settled in the Dingwall district and in parts of Sutherland.

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the East Highlands - from Stonehaven to Caithness - were, largely, Episcopal in religion, the Central Highlands - largely the inland districts of the county of Inverness and the Highland parishes of Perth - Presbyterian with the notable exception of Argyll, in the south west, while west of Inverness was Roman Catholic. On the whole, Roman Catholics supported the Stuart cause, but in Scotland they were greatly outnumbered by the Episcopalians. Oddly, the Protestant paranoia of the English was not nearly so strong in Scotland where the king's personal religion mattered little to most Scots - as long as he left their own Church affairs alone.

The Episcopal Church was strongly supported by landowners and, in a predominantly agrarian and tribal/clan economy, where they led their tenants - fisherfolk, smallholders and agricultural labourers were obliged to follow. In the case of the parish of Fetteresso the first principle families recorded were the Frasers, Simon Fraser, who married the eldest daughter of Walter, the first great steward of Scotland, grandson of Banquo, Thane of Lochaber, and the paternal ancestor of the royal house of Stuart. Other Frasers married into the Keith family, which became the Earl Marischal, while another was responsible for settling Robert the Bruce on the throne of Scotland. Other powerful local land-owning families through the 17th and 18th centuries were the Hays, Errol, Burnett of Leys, the Barclays and the Bannermans

Throughout history, state power has been enhanced by its close connection with the institution of organised religion which delivers social as well as spiritual benefits in return for deference. With the Reformation in Scotland the hierarchical administration of the Scottish Church through the system of diocesan episcopacy introduced by David I (1124-1153) collapsed. Whereas previously the activities and views of the clergy (and their congregations) were controlled by Crown appointed bishops

The Reformation

The Scottish Church was born in rebellion against the machinations of the Roman Catholic Mary Queen of Scots. Unlike the Church of England, the Kirk in Scotland could not rely on the state to suppress its opponents. On 17 August 1559, the Scottish Parliament launched the Reformation with a Confession of Faith. The Scottish settlement assigned to the Kirk, which accepted this Confession of Faith, a sovereign authority, while at the same time limiting the authority of the State. The following week three Acts totally destroyed the authority of the Pope in Scotland. All Acts not in conformity with the Confession were annulled, the Sacraments were reduced to two, and the celebration of Mass was made punishable by a series of penalties culminating with death for the third offence. 

The Book of Discipline, which established the structure and creed of the Kirk, proceeded on the assumption that the minister was the centre of the social fabric, and he could be appointed by the congregation only after a process of election, examination and admission.

In England, on the other hand, the Act of Supremacy passed all the privileges taken from the Pope to the Crown. The English Act of Uniformity made obligatory the use of one form of public worship. The Scots Acts merely destroyed the papal authority and condemned the use of one particular rite.

The English Crown arrogated to itself all the power of which the Pope had been deprived. The monarch was head of the Church, and the government of the Church was authoritarian. As head of the Church, the English monarch could persecute religious dissidents on the ground that they were enemies of the state, and in times of crisis under Elizabeth I, and in the days of Laud, the English government wielded this power with a heavy hand.

In 1580 and 1581, Assemblies of the Church of Scotland asserted that the Kirk derived its power directly from God and categorically condemned the whole estate of bishops, arguing that their return would presage a return to Rome. Henceforth bishops, pastors and ministers had equal significance and standing in the Church.

The seventeenth century saw a steady erosion of Presbyterian influence in Scotland. In the early years of his reign James I (VI) was obliged to accept and support the sovereignty of the Kirk, but behind the scenes he was working to restore the Episcopal administration of the Church to follow the English model, a Church which was much more to the liking of the absolutist Stuarts. James I made his first frontal attack on the Kirk in 1597, attacking both the General Assembly and the doctrine of ministerial parity which had been used to claim for every minister the right to speak as he would in the pulpit by virtue of being an instrument of divine truth. In 1606 an Act of Parliament restored 'the Estate of the Bishops' and in 1609 a further Act restored to the prelates the jurisdictions they had lost at the time of the Reformation.

Charles 1 (1625-49)

Charles 1 pursued his father's Episcopal and absolutist strategy in Scotland. Whereas in England Charles had the right to appoint bishops, in Scotland this was denied him; he was faced with a popular democratic Kirk controlled by congregations at parochial level. In Scotland, ordinary folk had a voice in the settlement of ministers. English liturgy, which centred heavily on the sacraments, and read forms - was more appropriate to his absolutist taste. But Scots' worship majored on the preaching of intensely argued sermons. And the General Assembly ruled the Kirk in a spirit of proud independence, seeing itself as answerable to Christ alone, and not in any respect accountable to the Crown in matters spiritual.

Charles's bungling, tactless, and remorseless efforts to impose sacramental worship and Episcopal government on the Scots led to outrage and war with the Bishops who were at the core of absolutism in Scotland.  Their fall in 1638 and the National Covenant - a charter signed by leading Scots worthies, making plain their prime allegiance to the Kirk as historically established - brought Charles to the brink of Civil War. In November 1638 the General Assembly which met in Glasgow Cathedral abolished episcopacy, deposed the bishops and other clergy opposing the Covenant.

Following the defeat of the King in the Civil war, the official religion of England was, for a short time, Presbyterian, and it was from England that Scotland was later to receive the notoriously puritanical "Westminster Standards". In fact, the austerity most denounced in Scottish Presbyterianism owes more to English puritanism than from anything Scottish.


Charles II (1660-85)

On his restoration to power, Charles II (1660-85) relentlessly pursued arbitrary government with the help of the bishops and by buttressing his policy with a profession of toleration which, although appeasing Dissenters, also helped Roman Catholics.

Under Charles II, The Church of Scotland was returned to the Episcopalian structure created by James VI and Charles I by the Act Recissory of 1661. The appointment of James Sharp, minister of Crail as Archbishop of St Andrews and Primate of Scotland, meant that 1662 had restored the old ecclesiastical powers to the bishops.


William III (1689-1702) 

The fall of the Royal house of Stuart and the 'Revolution Settlement' of 1690 led to the disestablishment of Episcopacy in Scotland and the restoration of the Presbyterian nature of the Church of Scotland: Presbyterian, Protestant, free of patronage - the system whereby monarchs, feudal superiors, or landlords, appoint ministers - and committed to the Westminster Confession of Faith. Local Kincardineshire Episcopalians, however, held on to Dunottar Parish Church until 1709. Thereafter they worshipped in the Tolbooth until a meeting place was erected in Stonehaven High Street in 1737.

William III's prime foreign policy objective of was to resist the French at all costs which, in Scotland, meant holding the Jacobites at bay. Throughout Scotland many Episcopal incumbents and professors were thrown out of their manses and replaced by the Presbyterian ministers ousted in 1662. Tensions increased between restored Presbyterian ministers and the displaced Episcopal clergy: considerable injustice was done, with much ill feeling aroused, and this offended body of Episcopalians soon became one of the strongest blocs of support for the exiled Stuarts. Matters were not helped by the fact that the end of the 17th century was marked by a succession of bad harvests and a long, merciless recession. In Scotland as a whole at least 5 per cent of the population simply starved to death. In places such as rural Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, the figure was nearer 20 per cent. At times such as these, to challenge the laird meant certain death

By 1692, the General Assembly was refusing to readmit even those Episcopalian ministers who would recognise Presbyterian government and accept the Westminster Standards. King William himself was more tolerant than the Kirk and in 1693 and 1695, successive acts granted a form of 'indulgence' to those Episcopalians who would acknowledge him, but only a hundred or so Episcopalian ministers took advantage of this opportunity. The remainder of the non-Jacobite Episcopalians had to wait until the Toleration Act of 1712 while true non-jurors remained excluded until 1792. The Toleration Act of 1712 had the proviso that all clergymen must take an oath of allegiance and abjuration. The general effect was to promote the belief that Episcopacy was to be reintroduced. The Episcopalians prospered under Anne (1702 1714), but their vigorous adherence to the 'Fifteen' Rebellion cost them dear; some of their clergy, especially in the Aberdeen area, were deprived, and an Act of 1719 closed all meeting houses where prayers were not offered for King George.

The Church of Scotland did, however, have great difficulty in re-establishing itself in the Highlands. The Episcopal incumbents, who had occupied the main charges after the Restoration, proved adept in stirring up popular feeling against Presbyterian intruders. Furthermore, the issue was politicised by Jacobitism. The Jacobite chiefs were overwhelmingly Episcopalian. Their loyalty was to the exiled Stuart claimants, and to them Presbyterianism was but the House of Hanover at prayer.

George I (1714-1727) 
The 1715 rebellion, the strongest and most popular of the Stuart uprisings, was never really a Highland adventure; its heartland was solidly in the Episcopal North East where the majority of people were overwhelmingly in favour of the Stuarts 

George II (1727-1760) 

During the 1745 Rebellion, as Charles Edward Stuart and his men advanced through Scotland, Presbyterian ministers fled before them, and Episcopal curates briefly re-occupied many manses. The failure of the 'Forty Five' brought considerable repression down on the Episcopalians and with these restrictions the number of the clergy and the size of the congregations declined; though Aberdeenshire remained a stronghold

The present day

Today, the Episcopal Church, while autonomous, is in full communion with the Church of England. The governing authority is the General Synod, an elected body of 160 members, which meets once a year. The diocesan bishop who convenes and presides at meetings of the General Synod is called the Primus and is elected by his fellow bishops.

In 1993 there were 56,742 members of the Episcopal Church in Scotland of whom 34,909 were communicants. There are seven bishops, 207 clergy and 314 churches and places of worship.