A NEWPORT church is organising a day of celebrations to mark its 150th anniversary this month.

St John’s Church in Maindee will mark the milestone on Saturday, April 17th with a series of events ending in a large firework display.

The church doors open at 10.30am followed by a display by the Brownies at 11.30am and a performance by Eveswell Primary School choir at 12.30pm.

A service will be held at the church at 3.30pm where people who were married at the church will be blessed and have the chance to renew their wedding vows.

This service will be presided over by the Bishop of Monmouth, Dominic Walker.

A band will then play between 8.30pm and 9.30pm before the day is finished off with a spectacular firework display at 9.30pm.

St Johns has come a long way since its first meeting was held at the Westgate Hotel in Newport in 1858 before the church was built.

The church was also gutted by fire in 1949 by a suspected arson attack.

Fortunately, the stained glass windows on the east side of the chapel, which were slightly damaged when a bomb fell in Maindee in the 1940s, had been taken out for repair when the fire happened.