"All Saints Church, Peshawar: The Church That Looks Like a Mosque"

All Saints Church Peshawar is an Anglican church inside the old walled city at Kohati Gate, opened on 27 December 1883 and built to look like a mosque, with a central dome, minarets and pointed arches. It is still a working parish church of the Church of Pakistan. Since the suicide bombing of September 2013 it has been a guarded site, so a visitor should ask in advance and accept a short, escorted look rather than expect to wander in.

Why does All Saints Church look like a mosque?

The idea came from the Reverend Thomas Patrick Hughes, a Church Missionary Society missionary in Peshawar from 1865 to 1884, best known as the author of A Dictionary of Islam. He argued that a church in the heart of a Muslim city should have a "fitting external embodiment" in the local style, rather than look like a transplanted English parish church.

Before 1883 the small Christian congregation of the walled city met in the Edwardes Mission School and in a reading hall known as the Anjuman, or Mission Chapel, in Peepal Mandi. Money for a proper building came partly from a bazaar held in Simla in July 1882, organised by Lady Aitchison. Work began in August 1882 under the Reverend Worthington Jukes, and the church opened on St John's Day, 27 December 1883.

A missionary account of 1885 describes the building as about 100 feet long, of brick covered with chunam (lime plaster), built by a local architect under the missionaries' supervision.

What to look for at All Saints

From the street, the church reads as a small mosque: a domed central space, minarets, arched openings and Persian calligraphy across the entrance. The cross on the dome gives it away.

Inside, look for:

• The orientation. The chancel is at the west end, so the church faces towards Jerusalem rather than following the European habit of facing east.
• The pinjra screen. The altar is screened with fine carved wooden latticework, the pinjra craft Peshawar was known for.
• The inscriptions. Texts on the walls are in English, Hebrew, Pashto, Urdu, Arabic and Persian.
• The scalloped arch dividing the nave from the chancel, the most mosque-like feature of the interior.
• The memorials. Plaques in the ambulatory include one to Isidor Loewenthal, the Polish-born missionary who translated the New Testament into Pashto, and one to Dilawar Khan, a former outlaw who served with the Corps of Guides.
• The painted door at the end of the chancel, given by Lady Edwardes, wife of the 1850s Commissioner of Peshawar, Sir Herbert Edwardes.

The church also keeps an 1806 Bible in Hebrew and English with a brass latch engraved "Peshawar City, Afghanistan", from the decades when Peshawar was the winter capital of the Durrani kings of Afghanistan.

What happened at All Saints Church in 2013?

On Sunday 22 September 2013 two suicide bombers attacked the congregation as some 600 people gathered on the church lawn after the morning service. Official figures in the first days put the dead at more than 80. The Church of Pakistan's later count was 127 dead and about 170 injured, many of them children, and church leaders said the true toll was higher because families took bodies home before they were counted. A faction linked to the Pakistani Taliban claimed the attack. It remains one of the deadliest attacks on Christians in Pakistan's history.

In January 2022 gunmen on a motorcycle shot dead Pastor William Siraj and wounded a second priest as they drove home from church.

The parish carried on, and the church is still in use for worship.

How do you visit All Saints Church?

All Saints is a church first and a monument second, and a church that has been bombed. Go with that in mind.

1. Ask first. There are no published visiting hours. Contact the Diocese of Peshawar or the church before you go, or ask at the gate on a weekday and accept the answer.
2. Expect security. Guards will check you and may ask your purpose and your CNIC. Do not photograph the guards or the security arrangements.
3. Avoid service times unless you are going to worship. Sunday is busy and is when security is tightest.
4. Dress modestly, keep voices low and ask before photographing the interior or any people.

To get there, take a rickshaw or ride-hailing car to Kohati Gate; most drivers know the church. It fits well into a morning on foot in the walled city: our old Peshawar walking tour covers Qissa Khwani, Mahabat Khan Mosque, Sethi House and Gor Khuttree.

Is it safe to visit All Saints Church?

The UK government advises against all travel to Peshawar (advice updated 22 September 2026), and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has seen repeated attacks this year, including the bombing at Kohat Police Lines on 18 September that killed 23. Pakistani visitors still come to Peshawar every day, and most attacks target police and security forces, but churches have been targeted before. Check local news on the day, keep your visit short, and go on a weekday. Overseas visitors should read their own government's advice, which may say not to go and can affect travel insurance. Our guide to whether Peshawar is safe sets out the wider picture.

Is it worth seeing?

If you are interested in architecture, religious history or Peshawar's mixed past, yes. There is nothing else quite like it in Pakistan: a Victorian church that deliberately borrowed the language of the mosques around it. It is a short visit, 20 minutes or so inside if you are let in.

It is not for someone who wants a relaxed, open sight to drop into. If access is refused, you lose little by seeing the facade from the street and moving on. For Peshawar's other historic church, see our guide to St John's Cathedral in the cantonment, and our Christian heritage guide covers churches across the country. More ideas for a Peshawar day are on our experiences page.

Frequently asked questions