Historic services at old church

The Old High Church on the banks of the River Ness

Two leading religious figures are to preach in the same historic Inverness presbyterian church.

Cardinal Keith O'Brien, Scotland's most senior Roman Catholic Church, will begin a series of evening services on 14 May.

It will be only the second time in four centuries a cardinal has preached at the city's ancient Old High Church.

Rev Fergus MacDonald, a former Moderator of the Free Church, will be guest preacher on 18 June.

Pictish king

The Old High Church is the oldest church in the Highland capital.

It is only the second time since the Reformation, over four centuries ago, that a cardinal - the highest rank in the Roman Catholic Church below the Pope - will have preached at the site.

It is where St Columba reputedly converted the warrior Pictish King Brude in 565.

The first was the late Cardinal Thomas Winning, who spoke at the June evening service in 1999.

Rev MacDonald was general secretary of the United Bible Societies from 1998 to 2002 and was twice elected as the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Free Church.

His father, the late Rev John A MacDonald, a prominent Easter Ross Free Church minister, was moderator in 1952.