Religion

Religion

Religion

Keighley is home to all the Christian denominations with St Andrew’s Parish Church, now shared between Anglicans and Methodists, built in 1847 on the site of the original Christian settlement. A significant Catholic population was re-established in the town from the 1830s onwards with the arrival of many Irish migrants who came to find work, first on the canal and the railways, later in the many textile and engineering factories.

Keighley has three Catholic churches with St Anne’s designed by Augustus Welby Pugin and consecrated in 1840, now being the oldest Christian building in the town centre still in its original use. St Joseph’s was built in 1934 to a unique Romanesque design and Our Lady of Victories at Guard House in 1939.

The United Reformed, Mormons, Quakers, Salvation Army and Jehovah’s Witnesses are all also represented together with the first spiritualist church in Britain, founded at Keighley in 1853 by David Richmond.

Though not originally from the town, Richmond stayed here for many years, and helped to establish the movement throughout the country. Spiritualism died out after the Second World War, but the Keighley church remains open.

Muslims make up the second largest religious group in the town with several mosques including the impressive purpose-built Emily Street Mosque. Keighley also has a newly established Buddhist centre.