Wejsuny village church

Village church in Wejsuny
The village church in Wejsuny in 2010
Construction year:	1908 to 1910
Inauguration:	November 27, 1910
Style elements :	Brick building, neo-Gothic style, stepped gable
Client:	Evangelical Church Community Weissuhnen (Church Province East Prussia)
Location:	53 ° 41 '7 "  N , 21 ° 37' 12"  E Coordinates: 53 ° 41 '7 "  N , 21 ° 37' 12"  E
Location:	Wejsuny Warmia-Masuria , Poland
Purpose:	Evangelical Lutheran branch church
Local community:	Evangelical Lutheran congregation in Wejsuny
Parish:	pl.I. Daszyńskiego 12a, 12-200 Pisz Pastor: Marcin Pysz
Regional Church :	Masurian Diocese of the Evangelical-Augsburg Church in Poland
Website:	www.pisz.luteranie.pl

The village church in Wejsuny (until 1945 Weissuhnen ) is an exposed brick building with a stepped gable in the neo-Gothic style; it was built between 1908 and 1910. It is still a Protestant church in the village of 380 souls in the Polish Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship .

Geographical location

Wejsuny with its Jezioro Wejsunek (Weissuhner See) is 14 kilometers northwest of the district town of Pisz (Johannisburg) on the south bank of the Jezioro Warnolty (Warnoldsee) in the Mazurski Krajobrazowy Park (Masurian Landscape Park). The village can be reached via a side road from Ruciane-Nida (Rudczanny 1938–1945 Niedersee -Nieden) on the Polish state road 58 in a north-easterly direction. Ruciane-Nida is also the nearest train station and is on the Olsztyn – Pisz (Allenstein – Johannisburg) line of the Polish State Railways (PKP).

Wejsuny is a place in the network of the urban and rural community Ruciane-Nida in Powiat Piski , the former Johannisburg district in East Prussia .

The church is on the main street in the middle of town.

Church building

The Wejsuny village church is an unplastered brick building with a tower and stepped gable in front of it, and has style echoes of the religious architecture. The construction of the church began in 1908 and was solemnly consecrated on November 27, 1910. The interior is simple; the pulpit is next to the altar . The original two church bells fell victim to the First World War and were replaced by two new ones in 1920. During the Second World War , which the church survived almost unscathed, one of the two bells had to be delivered.

After 1945 the church remained in the possession of the Protestant church. In view of the 100th anniversary of the church in 2010, various repair and maintenance measures were carried out at a cost of 600,000 złoty (about 142,000 euros) in and on the church, which has now been converted, with the active financial support of the European Union and numerous donors Germany. So the entire roof was redesigned and the walls were cleaned. The tower clock, which had not worked since 1945, received a fundamental repair and a chime to strike the hour. The organ was restored until 2013.

The house of God is considered a special gem and is - next to the Christ the Redeemer Church in Olsztyn (Allenstein) - one of the few old churches in the Diocese of Masuria that are owned by the Evangelical Church.

Parish

The village, founded in 1763 and known as Groß Weissuhnen before 1912 , did not become churchly independent until 1898 in connection with a reorganization of the community in Johannisburg (now in Polish: Pisz). At that time, assistant preachers were initially employed until a parish office was established and in 1908 the construction of a church could begin. In 1925 the Weissuhnen parish had 1,200 parish members.

Until 1945 Weissuhnen was associated with the parish vicarage in the parish of Johannesburg the Evangelical Church of the Old Prussian Union . Due to the flight and expulsion of the local population, evangelical church life seemed to come to a standstill, and the village church in the place then called Wejsuny was threatened with the same fate as almost all other churches in southern East Prussia : They were expropriated in favor of the Catholic Church in Poland . In Wejsuny, however, Protestant parishioners slept in the church in 1950 and again in 1979 in order to save it as a separate church. They were successful: the church is now owned by the Evangelical Augsburg Church in Poland , which looks after it as a subsidiary church (alongside Biała Piska (Bialla , 1938–1946 Gehlenburg) and Ełk (Lyck) ) from the parish in Pisz (Johannisburg) . It belongs to the diocese of Masuria (seat in Olsztyn (Allenstein) ) of the Evangelical Augsburg Church in Poland (seat in Warsaw ).

Weissuhnen parish (until 1945)

Before 1945, the Weissuhnen parish included the parish and 14 towns and villages (* = school locations):

German name	Renaming (1938–1946)	Polish name		German name	Renaming (1938–1946)	Polish name
Gnadenfeld		Zakątki		Luisenthal
* Bear Angle		Niedźwiedzi Róg		* Onufrigowen	Rehfeld since 1929	Onufryevo
Glodowen	Spirdingshöhe	Głodowo		Piasken		Piaski
* Konzewen	Warnold	Końcewo		Popiellnen	(since 1928) Spirding	Popielno
Little Glodowen				Sagon	Spirdingshorn	Zagon
Klein Weissuhnen		Wejsuny Małe		Warnold , Gut Warnold , forestry department		Warnowo Kończewo
Lipnik	Hawk height	Lipnik		* Wiersba	Beldahnsee	Wierzba

Pastor (until 1945)

Eight Protestant clergymen were in office at the village church in Weissuhnen until 1945, and they were appointed assistant preachers until 1898:

• Friedrich Karl Mitzka, 1895–1896
• Heinrich Kull, 1896–1909
• Rudolf Wisniewski, 1910–1922
• Paul Melzer, 1922-1930
• Ernst Seidler, 1932–1934
• Erich Albert August Tiedtke, 1938–1945

Web links

Commons : Wejsuny village church  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Walther Hubatsch : History of the Protestant Church in East Prussia , Volume 2: Images of East Prussian churches. Göttingen 1968, p. 121, fig. 546.
2. ↑ Wejsuny - Weissuhnen at ostpreussen.net (with pictures of the church from before 1945)
3. ↑ D. Lange: Weissuhnen . In: Geographical Register of Places East Prussia , 2005
4. ↑ History of the parish Groß Weissuhnen, with photos and an audio clip with the ringing of the church bell Wejsuny
5. ^ ^{A b} Walther Hubatsch: History of the Protestant Church in East Prussia , Volume 3: Documents. Göttingen 1968, p. 491.
6. ↑ Rainer Stahl: God's word put into practice. How ten communities in the diaspora of northern Poland work. In: Lutheran Service . Journal of the Martin Luther Association, 49th volume, 2013, issue 3, pp. 3–6.
7. ↑ Friedwald Moeller: Old Prussian Protestant Pastor's Book from the Reformation to the Expulsion in 1945. Hamburg 1968, p. 48.