Megain Memorial Church of the Nazarene, Newtownards Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim, BT4 1AF

Megain Memorial Church of the Nazarene is a well-preserved Gothic-revival red-brick church, originally built as a Presbyterian place of worship, dated 1889 and designed by Vincent Craig (1869–1925). It stands on the south side of Newtownards Road, east of Belfast city centre, between Montrose Street and Chamberlain Street, and faces north. Craig was born in Craigavon and was the younger brother of Sir James Craig, who later became the first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland.

The church was originally constructed as a memorial to the Reverend Henry Cooke of May Street Presbyterian Church, though it takes its name from Alexander Megain, who financed its construction and had been a member of May Street during Cooke's ministry. The estimated cost of construction was £2,000. The foundation stone was laid on 13 April 1889, and the building was completed that same year. The first minister was the Reverend James McConnell, who preached at Megain Memorial for 31 years and was responsible for clearing the debt on both the church and its adjoining lecture hall. By 1962 the congregation numbered approximately 1,500 families and around 5,000 individuals. The church is now occupied by the Church of the Nazarene, an evangelical Wesleyan denomination first established in the United Kingdom in 1915.

The building takes the form of a gabled double-height hall with paired transepts, a three-stage entrance tower with broach spire to the northeast, and a canted stair-bay to the northwest. The broach spire, complete with lucarnes and a weather-vane, is a particularly fine example of the brick type. Walling throughout is English garden wall-bonded red brick on a chamfered plinth, with buttresses having masonry offsets and cusped pinnacles to the main elevation, and red sandstone dressings. A moulded string course runs beneath a carved sandstone panel at the main elevation. The roof is pitched natural slate with terracotta ridge tiles, raised stone verges, and a finial to the gable. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods with hoppers are carried on a projecting sandstone eaves-band.

Windows are leaded and stained glass lancets set in red sandstone surrounds with chamfered sills. The north elevation and transepts have geometric tracery windows; the transept tracery is of the flat variety and features tripartite cusped lancets.

The north-facing principal elevation consists of a gabled vestibule with an entrance bay to the right (lower) and the tower to the left. The gabled vestibule has a geometric tracery window with hood mould, decorative stops, and a carved inset reading "Megain Memorial Church"; it is flanked to either side by a lancet, each with a carved inset reading "1889". The ground floor has five lancets grouped to the centre. The entrance bay projects slightly at ground floor level beneath a lean-to roof and contains a replacement double-leaf timber door surmounted by an ornately carved Gothic panel, set in a chamfered recess with a sandstone ashlar surround, moulded archivolt, and hood mould; there is a trefoil opening in a sandstone surround at first floor level. The three-stage entrance tower is topped by the broach spire with lucarnes and weather-vane; the third stage has paired Gothic openings with louvered vents on all four sides and a dentillated frieze; a double string course separates terracotta foliated panels, with paired lancets to the first and second stages on the east elevation. The tower's north elevation entrance has replacement double-leaf doors surmounted by a Gothic panel in a chamfered recess with sandstone ashlar surround and archivolt, the whole surmounted by a decorative red-brick pediment with finial.

The east elevation has the bell tower to the right and paired gabled transepts to the left; the central connecting section is three windows wide, and to the far left is an additional lower gabled entrance bay. The transepts have three windows at ground floor level and a traceried window at the upper level. The lower gabled entrance bay has paired lancets over a pointed-headed timber-sheeted door in a chamfered recess.

The south, rear elevation has three slender openings to the gable. It is abutted by a modern extension of no architectural interest, which in turn abuts the church hall to the south.

The west elevation mirrors the east in composition, with the gabled stair-bay to the left and paired gabled transepts to the right; the central section is again three windows wide, and there is an additional lower gabled entrance bay to the far right. The transepts have three windows at ground floor level and a traceried window at the upper level. The stair-bay has a canted window with a four-paned mullioned window and a paired lancet above, surmounted by an oculus. The lower gabled entrance bay has paired lancets over a pointed-headed timber-sheeted door in a chamfered recess.

Internally, the building retains a well-preserved late-Victorian Gothic interior, and the architectural fabric is largely intact overall.

To the rear, a two-storey red-brick church hall was added in 1902 to designs by William David Redmond Taggart (1872–1940), a Belfast-based architect for whom the Megain Memorial Hall was the first recorded work. The hall was built by Hewitt Bros. of Ballyhackamore, whose tender was submitted in June 1902; the hall was opened in November of that year. It measured 85 by 34 feet and contained classrooms on the ground floor with a lecture hall on the first floor. The hall was also formerly used as a school. Although it is not considered to be of special architectural interest, it is relatively sympathetic in design and is of significant social interest given its relationship with the church.

The church is situated between Montrose Street and Chamberlain Street, which comprises mainly 20th-century red-brick terraced housing built on the site of earlier terraces. The site is bounded to the street by cast-iron railings on a red-brick and sandstone plinth, with latch gates to the entrances. To the east is a cleared building site.