On November 6, 1887,One of the world’s most famous sporting institutions was born in a parish hall in Glasgow.

The small group of clergy, lay Church members and sportsmen who gathered at
St Mary’s Church Hall, East Rose Street, could never have guessed it at
the time, but the result of their afternoon’s work was destined to grow
into a club that would hold millions in its thrall. These were the pioneers
who founded Celtic.

Chris Cameron, who takes care of memorabilia at Celtic Park, said: “It
is a little known anniversary. People tend to focus on later dates, when the
club built a ground and started playing matches and winning their first trophies.
But the whole story of the club can be traced back to that meeting.”

There was a sense that the Celtic club was an idea that had found its time
when it was born in November 1887, and there were several factors at play that
ensured a safe delivery.

First, there was a growing enthusiasm for a football club in the city that
would represent the Irish population, and provide a focal point and a source
of pride for the thousands of poor immigrants who had poured into Glasgow’s
fetid slums. They were covetous of the success enjoyed by Edinburgh’s
Irish club, Hibernian.

Hibs had won the SFA Cup in Glasgow in February in 1887, to much rejoicing
in the green enclaves of the city. The winners held their postmatch celebration
at St Mary’s Parish Hall, and the event made a huge impact on Glasgow’s
Irish football followers. It was no coincidence that Celtic’s founding
fathers chose the same venue to launch their own club a few months later.

The chief figures in the club’s founding were the chairman of that inaugural
meting, John Glass, and Brother Walfrid, the Catholic cleric who shrewdly assessed
football’s potency as a money-spinner. His aim was to create a club that
would generate cash to feed the needy, especially children, in the east end
of Glasgow.

Cameron said: “The impetus for the start of the club was charity, and
that was first on the minds of the people who met at St Mary’s Church
Hall. The aim was to build the club as a means of raising money to feed the
poor, and the success of Hibs was the catalyst which gave them the confidence
to go ahead.”

In hindsight, it seems odd that an Irish football club needed such a long gestation.
But before Celtic were formed, the Irish community had already tried and failed
to establish clubs big enough to compete with Scotland’s established sides
– mainly because they didn’t have the funds to sustain such an enterprise.
At least three dozen had come and gone, including an earlier Celtic that never
made it out of infancy.

But the new Celtic quickly caught the imagination of the Irish populace, and
attracted the kind of organisers who were equipped to make the dream a reality.

Within a few months enough subscriptions had been collected – half- pennies
from people who could ill afford them, as well as more substantial donations,
including one from Archbishop Charles Eyre – to get the club started.
A ground was built by volunteer labour, and in May 1888 Celtic played their
first fixture, against a friendly club which gave them much support in their
early days – Rangers. Celtic won 5-2 in front of a crowd of 2,000, who
had each paid 6d to get in, and one of the greatest sporting stories ever told
had begun to unfold.

“The history which we can touch and hold, in the form of medals, begins
later,” Cameron said. “We have medals at Parkhead which were won
by the first successful Celtic side.” Celtic won their first championship
in 1893, and their first SFA Cup in 1892.

“But the written records, and the club’s oral history, stretch
back to that day on November 6, 1887, when it all began.”

Source:The Times

Brother Walfrid (May 18, 1840 - April 17, 1915) founded The Celtic Football Club in 1887 as a means of raising funds for the poor and deprived in the east end of Glasgow.

In 1893 Walfrid was sent by his religious order to London's East End. Here he continued his work, organizing football matches for the barefoot children in the districts of Bethnal Green and Bow.
The charity established by Walfrid was named
The Poor Children's Dinner Table.

If she said "it's me or Celtic "....Would you help pack her bags?