St John's Catholic Church

St John's Catholic Church, completed in 1837, is the oldest Catholic church in Australia. The building is a simple Georgian colonial structure in locally quarried sandstone — modest by European standards but of considerable historical significance given its age and continuity of use. The church is still an active parish and holds regular services.

The church stands on a slight rise overlooking the village, giving it a quiet presence above the main street. The interior is plain but well-maintained, with original wooden pews and a small pipe organ. The graveyard around the church contains headstones from the convict era and beyond. A short visit is worthwhile for the building itself and the context it provides about the Irish convict experience in early Tasmania.

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A story
St John's was consecrated in 1837 and is the oldest Catholic church in Australia. It was built to serve the large Irish Catholic convict population of the region, at a time when celebrating Catholic mass was still a relatively recent legal right in British colonies — Catholic worship had been banned in colonial Australia until 1820. The church's early Irish convict parishioners had often been transported for political crimes or agrarian resistance back in Ireland rather than for ordinary theft.