Category:Otakou Maori Memorial Methodist Church

English: The Otakou Maori Memorial Methodist Church was erected during New Zealand's Centennial Year to commemorate the establishment of the first Christian mission in the South Island by Rev James Watkin on 16 May 1840 and the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi at Otakou on 13 June of the same year. The church replaced a weatherboard building erected on the same site in 1865 by the chief Taiaroa who had previously given ten acres of his land on which to build a church following his baptism and acceptance of the Christian faith in 1857.

The memorial church was first proposed in 1931 and the Rev T A Pybus subsequently played a major part in bringing this centennial project to fruition. In 1938 the Methodist Conference resolved to erect a brick church at Otakou and the foundation stones were laid two years later on 24 February 1940. The cost of the building was met by a government grant, the Methodist Church and local fundraising efforts and the church was officially opened on 22 March 1941.

NZHPT Category I; registration number 5177.