Christ the Savior Church (Pristina)

The unfinished cathedral church (2013)

inside view

The Cathedral Church of Christ the Savior ( Albanian Katedralja e Krishtit Shpëtimtar , Serbian Саборни храм Христа Спаса Saborni hram Hrista Spasa ) is an unfinished Serbian Orthodox church in the Kosovar capital Pristina . The shell is on Agim Ramadani Street on Hasan Prishtina Square, right next to the National and University Library of Kosovo .

The architect Spasoje Krunić commissioned by the Serbian Orthodox Church began planning the cathedral in 1991. The project included the erection of a single dome structure with an integrated bell tower in the Serbo-Byzantine style . The cross on the roof of the cathedral was erected on January 27, 1999, the feast day of St. Sava of Serbia . On orders from Belgrade, construction began on the university site without informing its staff.

The building should combine modern architecture with traditional elements. The construction work started in 1995 came to a standstill due to the Kosovo war . Originally, the building erected on the campus of the University of Pristina was supposed to be completed by 1999. Today's University of Prishtina as well as the Raszien-Prizren eparchy of the Serbian Orthodox Church lay claim to the building and the area. While the Pristina city council considers the property to be owned by the university, the Serbian Orthodox Church refers to documents from the 1990s.

The cathedral church is still empty today, its future is uncertain. According to photographer Martin Godwin, it is seen as a symbol of the reign of Slobodan Milošević . According to the architect Sali Shoshi of the NGO Cultural Heritage without Borders, the church is a testimony to history in the 1990s when the Serbian state used urban planning for political purposes to express the rule of the Serbian people over the local population.

The University of Pristina and the Kosovar government have no concrete plans for the future of the construction underway, but according to a spokesman for the university this may change in the course of major infrastructure improvements.