St. Sava Church (Berlin)

Friedenskirche

The Church of St. Sava ( Serbian : Црква светог Саве Српског / Crkva svetog Save Srpskog) is a Serbian Orthodox church , which was built in 1888-1891 according to a design by August Orth as a Protestant Church of Peace . It is located in the Berlin district of Gesundbrunnen in the Mitte district , Ruppiner Straße 28. The hall church , consecrated on January 19, 1891 , has a rectangular floor plan in the neo-Gothic style and is a listed building .

It is the parish church of the parishes Berlin I and II in the deanery of North and East Germany of the Eparchy of Düsseldorf and all of Germany of the Serbian Orthodox Church.

history

The idea of building the Friedenskirche to provide better church supplies for the residents in the densely populated area around Vinetaplatz was born through the commitment of the Christian labor movement . The Berlin City Mission , led by Adolf Stoecker , and a chapel association founded in 1885 collected the money for the church. After the inauguration of the church, the Peace Community was founded by St. Bartholomew . The church was slightly damaged in the Second World War and was restored by 1953. In the 1980s, the Friedensgemeinde increasingly gathered in the rooms of the Ascension Church , so the Friedenskirche was empty. A demolition was out of the question because of the monument protection. According to the recommendations of the Evangelical Church in Germany , a church building should only be given up as an exception.

When Yugoslavia opened its borders, many Serbs also came to Berlin, who founded the Serbian Orthodox Church of St. Sava in 1970 . The congregation did not have its own church, but it was able to celebrate its services in the churches of the Evangelical Church in Berlin-Brandenburg (EKiBB) (predecessor of EKBO until 2003 ). At the end of 1990 the Friedenskirche was sold to the Berlin parish of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Germany . The altar and pulpit have been removed as they are not in use for the Orthodox rite . After the renovation and refurbishment of the church with an iconostasis with icons , it was consecrated again on November 11, 2001, this time in an Orthodox manner.

Building description

View of the iconostasis of the church

The red brick masonry was originally integrated into the closed development , but it is now more free due to the changed urban space as a result of urban redevelopment and urban renewal in the early 1970s. The width of the property is only 15 meters. A small square was recovered by allowing the facade of the church by seven meters from the original alignment back sat. The narrow 50-meter-high facade , raised well above the eaves , is emphasized vertically. It contains three pointed arched portals crowned with stepped eyelashes , three slender pointed arched windows on the level above and, in the upper area, a little set back behind a balcony , a steep stepped gable with a large pointed arched sound opening to the bell house . Two polygonal turrets with battlements and a pointed helmet flank the gable. In order to create as many seats as possible, wide galleries run around the chancel , which are located on a self- supporting steel structure that is hidden under brick.

The interior originally received daylight only through the three windows in the polygonal choir and three circular skylights in the yokes of the ribbed vault , which are located under the flat roof of the nave . As a result of the urban redevelopment in the early 1970s, the neighboring tenements were demolished and replaced by new blocks without side wings. This enabled three round windows to be inserted on the south side .

The altar carved from oak wood , the figures of the crucified with Mary and John in front of a golden background on the reredos and the pulpit , also made of oak wood, were created by wood sculptor Gustav Kuntzsch in Wernigerode .

Bells

In the bell room with a square floor plan of four by four meters hang three cast steel bells , which were cast by the Bochumer Verein in 1890 . Their production including accessories (clapper, axles, bearings and bell lever) cost 2,658 marks .

On the shoulder of every bell there is the embossing: GEG. IN THE FACTORY OF THE BOCHUMER ASSOCIATION FOR MINING AND CAST STEEL FACTORY IN BOCHUM, WESTPHALIA, 1890 .

Bell plan
Chime	Weight (kg)	Diameter ( mm)	Height (mm)	inscription
f '	990	1335	1185	Flank: HONOR TO GOD ON THE HEIGHT.
as'	582	1125	1005	Flank: WAKE UP!
c "	302	0890	0850	Flank: PRAY!

literature

Franz Gottwald (Hrsg.): Heimatbuch vom Wedding . Kribe-Verlag, Berlin 1924, p. 197 f .
Wilhelm Lütkemann: German Churches, Volume 1: The Protestant Churches in Berlin (Old City) . Verlag für Volksliteratur, Berlin 1926, p. 93 ff .
Günther Kühne, Elisabeth Stephani: Evangelical churches in Berlin. Christlicher Zeitschriftenverlag (CZV), Berlin 1978, ISBN 3-7674-0158-4 , p. 286 f.
Klaus-Dieter Wille: The bells of Berlin (West). History and inventory. Gebr. Mann Verlag, Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-7861-1443-9 .
Architects and Engineers Association of Berlin (ed.): Sacral buildings. (= Berlin and its buildings , part VI.) Ernst & Sohn, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-433-01016-1 , pp. 85 f., 370 (Fig. 184-186).
Christine Goetz , Matthias Hoffmann-Tauschwitz: Churches Berlin Potsdam. Wichern-Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-88981-140-X .
Angela Beeskow: The furnishings in the churches of the Berlin Church Building Association (1890–1904). With a contribution to the iconography of Protestantism . Gebr. Mann Verlag, Berlin 2005, ISBN 978-3-7861-1765-0 , p. 351 f., P. 425.
Dehio-Handbuch der Deutschen Kunstdenkmäler, Berlin. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich / Berlin 2006, ISBN 3-422-03111-1 .

Web links

Commons : Friedenskirche Zum Heiligen Sava (Berlin-Gesundbrunnen) - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b compilation of the bells delivered to Berlin and the surrounding area ; Bochum Association, around 1900. In the archive of the Köpenick Church of St. Josef, viewed on August 6, 2019.

52.541283 13.397038Coordinates: 52 ° 32 ′ 28.6 " N , 13 ° 23 ′ 49.3" E

[Plan-1] compilation of the bells delivered to Berlin and the surrounding area ; Bochum Association, around 1900. In the archive of the Köpenick Church of St. Josef, viewed on August 6, 2019.