St John's Evangelical & Reformed Church
Saint John's Evangelical and Reformed Church is a Protestant congregation founded in 1903 by German Americans. A 1903 map shows it named Evangelishe-Friendskirche and located at 2100 6th Avenue South. For most of the century it was located at 2700 Clairmont Avenue also on the Southside.
Its name changed several times throughout its history as a result of denominational mergers and the congregation's departure from a denomination. Prior to 1934, it was known as St John's German Evangelical Church or St John's Evangelical Church. In 1934 two German-American denominations (the Evangelical Church and the Reformed Church in the United States) merged and it became known as St. John's Evangelical and Reformed Church. In 1957 the Evangelical and Reformed Church merged with the Congregational and Christian Churches to form the United Church of Christ and the congregation became known as St. John's United Church of Christ.
Later the congregation, like many from the Evangelical and Reformed tradition, left the United Church of Christ. The congregation also moved to the Brook Highland neighborhood at 7160 Cahaba Valley Road where it took the name Brook Highland Community Church.
In 2018, the congregation left the Brook Highland neighborhood to move Downtown to the Blackwell Building at First Avenue North and 25th Street North. In 2019 its Brook Highland building was sold to Trinity Presbyterian Church, which relocated to it from Cahaba Heights.
In Birmingham, the congregation renamed itself St. John's Community Church and in November 2019 began meeting in the Metro Monitor building at 612 37th Street South.
Pastors
- Herman S. Ritter, 1956
External Site
- St. John's Community Church on Facebook.com
References
- Kelly, George B. (1903) Map of Birmingham, Alabama and adjacent suburbs Birmingham via Library of Congress digital collections
- Anderson, John (August 30, 2018) "Brook Highland church moving back to downtown Birmingham" Hoover Sun