Reformed Presbyterians

Reformed Presbyterians (Covenanters). Like the Seceders these were Scottish Presbyterian dissenters who established a presence in Ireland in the 18th century. They are called Covenanters because of their adherence to the Scottish National Covenant of 1638 and the Solemn League and Covenant of 1643. The latter pledged Scotland and England to extirpate prelacy and popery and reform the churches in ‘these kingdoms’, ‘according to the Word of God and the example of the best reformed churches’. The Williamite church settlement in Scotland in 1690, while establishing Presbyterianism there, had not implemented the Covenant in full, and this and the growing liberalism of the Scottish church led the Covenanters to secede, constituting themselves a presbytery in 1743. Their first congregation in Ulster was formed at the Vow, near Ballymoney, in 1757. Unlike the Seceders the Covenanters, who never accepted regium donum from an uncovenanted government, have remained outside the Irish Presbyterian church. They sing psalms exclusively without instrumental accompaniment and today have 35 congregations and 3,000 church members, six overseas missionaries, and sister churches in Britain, Australia, Canada, Japan, and the United States.

R. F. G. Holmes