St. Nicholas Church (Šilopaj)

The Church of St. Nicholas in Šilopaj

The Church of St. Nicholas ( Serbian : Црква Светог оца Николаја (Светог Николе), Crkva Svetog oca Nikolaja (Svetog Nikole)), in the village of Šilopaj in the Opština Gornji Milanovac is a Serbian Orthodox Church in Serbia .

The church building, built in the interwar period from 1936 to 1939, is the parish church of the Šilopaj parish in the Takovo deanery of the Žiča eparchy of the Serbian Orthodox Church. The church is dedicated to one of the greatest and most famous saints , the Holy Father Nicholas of Myra .

location

The church is in the center of the village of Šilopaj. In the fenced churchyard there is the parsonage next to the church and not far from it is the village elementary school.

history

The church, built in the 1930s , is considered to be one of the most beautiful churches in the entire Žiča eparchy. The church's pastors were the Belgrade merchant Ljuba Saračević and his wife Mara. Mr. Saračević came from the village of Šilopaj and donated the church to his place of birth. The church was consecrated to St. Nicholas the Slava of the Saračević family.

The church building was built in three years from 1936 to 1939 according to a design by the well-known architect Dragutin Maslać . The construction of the church cost around 2.5 million then Yugoslav dinars .

On September 21, 1939 the completed church was inaugurated by the three bishops : Nikolaj (Velimirović) of the Žiča Eparchy, Irinej (Đorđević) of the Dalmatian Eparchy and Venijamin (Taušanović) of the Braničevo Eparchy, with the assistance of 13 priests. Thousands of people from all over Šumadija attended the inauguration .

In July 2019 the church celebrated its 80th anniversary, on this occasion the bishop of the eparchy Žiča Justin (Stefanović) held the Holy Liturgy in the church. The rectory was also renovated in 2019. The current parish priest is Archpriest Tomislav Đokić

architecture

The cross-domed church is designed in the shape of a trikoncho and built in the traditional Serbian-Byzantine architectural style, also known as the national style.

The plan of the church is a Greek cross , with a semicircular altar - apse in the east and a central round dome that rises above the tambour in the center of the nave . On the north and south sides there is a side conche in the middle of the nave . On the west side there is the narthex with a small bell tower above the main entrance.

In addition to the main entrance in the west, the church has a side entrance on the south facade. The church was built from yellow sandstone . The sandstone comes from the quarry in the village of Sinoševići , which also belongs to the Opština Gornji Milanovac.

A richly decorated rosette decoration worth seeing has been made from the same material on the west side above the patronage icon above the main entrance .

It has a (wooden) iconostasis with icons , which is typical for Orthodox churches . The interior of the church is painted with frescoes .