Maria Schutz Monastery (Sankt Andrä)

Portal of the monastery between Bahngasse 39 and 40

The Maria Schutz monastery in Sankt Andrä am Zicksee is the first and so far (2016) only Greek Orthodox monastery in Austria .

history

The monastic community was founded in 2014 after the Roman Catholic Diocese of Eisenstadt provided the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Austria with a plot of land on which the monastery was to be built. Due to various imponderables , however, the reallocation of this agriculturally used area to building land was delayed again and again, so that the monastery community temporarily found its temporary home in a specially purchased building in the market town of Sankt Andrä am Zicksee. The abbot and four monks live in the monastery (as of 2016). The foundation stone for the new building is on 26 September 2020 the presence of Konstantin Opel Ecumenical Patriarch I. Bartholomew held.

At Christmas 2016 the monastic community received a relic of John of Alexandria from Stanislav Zvolenský , the Archbishop of Bratislava .

The sacred core of the building is the chapel dedicated to St. Bartholomew, which was furnished in a typical Byzantine style.