Sacred Heart Church Highgate

Sacred Heart church was blessed and opened in 1906. But its history really begins in the spring of 1891, when Bishop Matthew Gibney rode out from central Perth north along the partly unmade road we now know as Beaufort Street. He chose the area at the top of Highgate Hill as the future site of a school and church, surrounded by residential lots.

The land was subdivided into 79 lots, with a site in the middle named Alacoque Square in honour of Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, founder of devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Mount Heart Estate was auctioned on 23 January 1892.

By early 1897 Catholic residents of the area were asking for a school and church in the rapidly growing suburb of Highgate Hill.

Their Bishop agreed that a church could be erected on the site. A small timber and iron building was erected by residents and Mass was first said there on 4 April 1897.

The foundation stone for the new church was laid on 20 August 1905. It still stands to the right of the main entrance.