Sacred Heart Church (Żary)
Today's Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (Polish: Kościół Najświętszego Serca Pana Jezusa w Żarach ) - originally St. Marien zu Sorau - is the oldest parish church in Żary , along with the small St. Peter and Paul Church at the castle (Eng. Sorau ).
Building history
The first church in Sorau was built in 1207, and a stone tower was built around 1280. In 1308 the chancel was enlarged, the walls were raised by 6 m and finished with a Gothic ribbed vault, the Marienkapelle and the sacristy were added on the north side. From 1401 to 1430 the three-aisled, Gothic hall church (brick Gothic) was built. By the end of the 15th century, a baptistery was added to the north, the Barbara chapel (1445) to the south and the western vestibule in the entrance area. The church then had 20 altars and the vaults were painted polychrome. In 1496, Martin Hänsel built an organ with 23 registers in the St. Mary's Church in Sorau. This was the first large organ in Lower Lusatia.
After the Reformation (1524) the parish church became Protestant and remained so until 1945. In 1559 the east gable collapsed and the vaults and the choir room were destroyed. A reconstruction took place until 1581. By order of the lord of the Lordship of Sorau and Triebel, Seyfrid I Baron von Promnitz, the Marienkirche received an astronomical clock with astrolabe in 1585 . This watch was designed by Dr. Ludwig Hirschfelder designed and built. Comparable clocks can still be found today in St. Nikolai zu Stralsund, as well as in Esslingen and in St. Paulus Cathedral in Münster. On the occasion of the happy return from five years in exile in Tirschtiegel back to Sorau (during the Thirty Years War), Countess Anna Margaretha, wife of the nobleman Siegmund Seifrid von Promnitz, donated a precious communion jug to Sorau's Marienkirche in 1643. Count Ulrich Hipparchos von Promnitz , Lord of Forst und Pförten and acting administrator of the estate for his underage nephew Balthasar Erdmann, added the baroque Promnitz chapel with a crypt as a so-called "Pförtnisches burial" to the northeast of the choir between 1670 and 1672. In the town fire of 1684, the church was also affected, especially the roof and the interior. The loss of Hirschfeld's unique astronomical clock weighed particularly heavily. In 1775 the important court organ builder Johann Gottfried Hildebrandt received the order to build a large organ for St. Mary's. This organ was his last work with three manuals and 37 stops, because he died shortly after it was completed. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Frankfurt organ company Sauer built a four-manual organ into the baroque organ case using Hildebrandt's pipe material, the structure of which was similar to that of the Silbermann organs in Dresden. The Sorau organ was the largest organ in the province of Brandenburg until 1945. Renovations took place in 1870–1896 and 1911–1913. The main entrance to the church is through the western vestibule (also called Paradise) and the Gothic portal from 1401 with the coats of arms of the Sorauer noblemen von Pack and von Bieberstein (also called Biberstein).
The church was badly damaged by the air raid in April 1945, it was secured from 1958 and rebuilt in 1975–1984. The baroque furnishings were left out and the galleries removed. Due to the modified reconstruction, the Gothic structure is particularly visible. The new parish was founded on June 15, 1980. The new organ from the company of the Broszko brothers was built in 1984 and received the organ case (from 1878) of a percussion organ from the Evangelical Church in Schönau. The Stations of the Cross paintings by Stanisław Antosz are also from the 1980s.
Important musicians and composers such as Wolfgang Caspar Printz and Georg Philipp Telemann performed in St. Mary's Church , who as imperial-Counts-Promnitz Hofkapellmeister were responsible for church music in addition to their service at court. The important cantata poet Erdmann Neumeister worked as superintendent and court preacher at this point.
In addition to this parish church, there are the following within the city of Żary:
- Parish Church of Divine Mercy ( Kościół Miłosierdzia Bożego )
- Parish Church of St. Joseph ( Kościół św. Józefa Oblubieńca )
- Parish Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary ( Kościół Wniebowzięcia Najswiętszej Maryi Panny )
- Parish Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel ( Kościół Matki Bożej Szkaplerznej )
- Garrison Church of the Holy Cross Sorau ( Kościół Krzyża Świętego )
The parishes belong to the diocese of Zielona Góra-Gorzów in the Archdiocese of Stettin-Cammin .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Sorau Castle Archive (accessed on November 25, 2016)
- ^ Brandenburg - Sorau (accessed November 25, 2016)
Coordinates: 51 ° 38 ′ 17.7 ″ N , 15 ° 8 ′ 46.5 ″ E