Houses of Worship: Cathedral Church of St. Machar

Located here, directly above Seaton Park is the ancient Cathedral Church of St. Machar. It's one of Aberdeen's most ancient buildings, and it was the ecumenical leaders at the cathedral who founded what would become the University of Aberdeen in 1495.

Though still known colloquially as "St. Machar Cathedral", its official name of "the Cathedral Church of St. Machar" reflects the fact that the building no longer serves as the seat of Aberdeen's bishop. (That's now St. Andrew's Cathedral near the intersection of King and Union Streets.) Little of the original Cathedral Church of St. Machar survives, but even the newer portions are quite old.

St. Machar's Cathedral is difficult to photograph at night (at least, it is when your cameras aren't very fancy), so I won't insult you folks with that. What I can say, though, is that it's really beautiful to walk through Old Aberdeen at night, and look up and see the cathedral with its lights shining on those two conical spires. (You can see someone else's really cool picture of the Machar, at night, in the snow, here.) My favorite memory of the Machar, though, was attending the Christmas Eve service there. It was an amazing experience, after weeks of sheer boredom during the winter holiday from school, to attend that service in a cathedral that pre-dates America by hundreds of years. It's one of those memories of Aberdeen that I'll remember fondly for years to come.