St. John the Baptist Church is a Serbian Orthodox church in the Butetown area of Halifax, West Yorkshire, England.
The Serbian community in the area has existed since the 1940s, when Serbian prisoners of war and anti-communist refugees from German camps arrived in Halifax in 1947. They needed a place to worship and were given a former Methodist chapel on Simpson Street for worship. Closed in the 1950s, it was taken over by the Serbian Orthodox Church in 1952. The dilapidated building was repaired and renovated, and it was consecrated on 26 September 1954.
In 1963, a split occurred in the Serbian Orthodox community in England and the United States, between those who felt that the central church hierarchy in Belgrade was too influenced by the communist authorities there, and others who believed that they must adhere to the official church hierarchy in Belgrade, regardless of the political complexities of the government there.
This dichotomy was exacerbated in 1964 when Belgrade removed the Serbian Orthodox bishop in the United States, and the groups formally split. After the split, those who recognized Belgrade’s authority remained in Simpson Street, but were greatly reduced.
In the early 1970s, this group moved to join the Serbian Church in Bradford, and the Simpson Street location ceased to be a church.
Most of the Serbian community in Halifax followed an anti-communist line and established their own separate Church with ties to the body in the United States known collectively as the Free Serbian Orthodox Church in Exile.
In 1965, this group purchased the former Ackroydon Wesleyan Methodist Church and Sunday School in Boothtown. The main church building was adapted to their style of worship with a new Community Centre built on the lower floor. The church was built in 1871 as a Methodist church and was abandoned in 1964, when the Methodists moved to the nearby Boothtown United Methodist Chapel.
The interior of the church was, through financial investment and renovation, adapted for Orthodox worship. His Majesty King Peter II Karađorđević attended the ceremonial consecration of the church by Bishop Dionysius Milivojević on September 5, 1965. The property has two halls, a parking lot, and a parish house.
