St. John Baptist (Milte)
St. John Baptist is a Roman Catholic parish church in Milte . It is a branch church of the parish of St. Bartholomäus and Johannes dT , whose main church is St. Bartholomäus in one. The church and parish belong to the Warendorf deanery in the diocese of Münster .
Building history
A first church or chapel will have stood in Milte as early as the early 13th century. In a list of pastors, a certain "Gerhardus" is already listed, who in 1227 served as pastor of Milte. At the same time, the Romanesque church tower still standing today probably dates from around 1200. The simple, sturdy building in quarry stone, now plastered white, is only accessible through a portal in the west and some light and sound openings (partly coupled windows) into the animated upper floors. The nine-step stepped gables on the east and west sides were probably put on in the late Gothic period. A first documentary mention of a Milter church and parish comes from the year 1256. In it, Bishop Otto II of Munster transferred the patronage of the parish church in Milte to the Vinnenberg monastery. There are no records of the form and appearance of the first church building in Milte. On the other hand, it is known exactly what the previous building of today's church looked like. In a document that was made by the pastor Eickholt in Milter at the start of construction of the new church in 1829 and embedded in the foundation stone of the new building, one can find clear clues. The pastor describes the village church as a low room with several extensions and small windows that do not illuminate the room during the day. Eickholt dated the previous building to the end of the 14th century.
As early as March 1823, a large part of the church roof was covered during a storm, whereupon a makeshift repair was carried out. In May 1826 parts of the vault fell down above the choir, and the damage that was then visible on the wall caused the district administrator to close the church. The service was provisionally held in the school. In several letters between 1824 and 1829, the Milter parish asked the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm IV , who was the church patron, for a new building for the Milter church, which was finally approved. A plan was implemented that had already been drawn up in 1825 by the Münster building inspector Friedrich Wilhelm Müser (1780 - after 1830). The demolition of the old church began at the beginning of April 1829. A year and a half later on October 6, 1830, the new church was inaugurated in the presence of Bishop Caspar Maximilian Freiherr Droste zu Vischering .
Architecture and equipment
The basic concept of the building designed by Friedrich Wilhelm Müser is a gable-roof-roofed hall building with a recessed extension in the west, which houses the rear choir and the sacristy. The Milter parish church is, as can be seen both inside and on the outer facade, a work of the epoch of classicism . In the Milter Church in particular, the forms of the ancient architectural style typical of classicism were adopted without major distortions.
The main features in the design of the facade are four elongated arched windows and a semicircular arched window in between, which are optically connected to a sandstone cornice. Under the small semicircular window in the middle of the side walls there is a portal that is also set in sandstone and carries a strong entablature. The arched windows are enclosed by blind niches drawn down to the base. This structure is also taken up again in the choir room and gives the impression that there are two geometrically exact cubes that are put together to form a building. The interior of the building, in which a flat ceiling was built, is mainly determined by the design of the altar wall and the organ gallery in the west. This is supported by two rows of columns, the shafts of which have flutes . The upper end of the columns follows the simple Doric column. The gallery carries the organ commissioned by master organ builder Pohlmann from Warendorf shortly after completion of the church.
The design of the altar wall is determined by the retracted choir with access and free-standing high altar . The high altar is connected to the side wall sections of the nave by a mighty architrave . This is held on the side walls by fluted pilasters and on the semicircular altar by columns with Corinthian capital . In the middle of the wall above the altar, the room opens with a semicircular dome . As old photos (around 1928) testify, the altar wall was painted in earlier times. In particular, the wall surface above the architrave beams, the semi-dome and the wide hollow that forms the transition from the wall to the ceiling were adorned with scenic and decorative paintings. However, these paintings must have been whitewashed by 1935, since the altar wall is plain in photos from this time.
A larger-than-life representation of the Sacred Heart can be found as a sculptural decoration on the side east walls , on the other side a Joseph. On the south wall at the level of the steps leading to the raised chancel there is a figure of Mary with a blessing baby Jesus on a wall plinth.
The cross above the high altar of the Milter Church is a replica of an original created by Theodor Wilhelm Achtermann in Berlin. In 1834 he made a cross for the cemetery of St. Hedwig's parish ( St. Hedwig's Cathedral in today's Berlin-Mitte). In 1835 the wooden frame of the Milter church was made. It reached Milte in 1836. According to an anecdote described in the Milter Heimatbuch, Wilhelm Achtermann is said to have passed through Milte on his trip to Berlin in 1829. There he saw the church under construction and promised to donate a crucifixion group for the new church if he should get anything done in Berlin. As described, he kept this promise in 1835. The two figures, Maria and John, flanking Christ come from the mid-19th century and were created by an unknown artist.
A group of twelve figures of the apostles (including a figure of Christ), which are divided into six works and stand on plinths on the walls of the nave, are not part of the original furnishings . The fully plastic wooden figures date from the 15th century, but have only been detectable in the Milter parish church since around 1928.
pulpit
The sermon pulpit in Milter Church was made a few years after 1830 and its layout is not so faithful to the formal language of antiquity and renaissance. Four acanthus leaves protrude from a fluted column , which in turn support the round pulpit that describes a three-quarter arch. On the upper barrel is carved decoration that gives the appearance of a wrinkled cloth. Leaning against the northern wall of the church - with a view of the altar wall - is the pulpit staircase. Figures of saints stand in four arched niches lined with small Corinthian columns: Pope Gregory the Great , St. Ambrosius , St. Augustine and St. Jerome . The mighty sound cover hangs over the pulpit, inside of which sits a golden dove crowned with rays. The lid is crowned by the classicistic, late medieval sculpture of the church patron John the Baptist , made by the Münster sculptor Evert van Roden . The figure is the only representation of the namesake St. John the Baptist in the Milter Church.
On the north wall in the church tower room, on a plinth, framed by the crosses of the fallen soldiers of the Second World War, there is a group of figures made of wood representing a Pietà . The life-size Vesper picture from the end of the 18th century is made of linden wood. The figures are colored and were restored in early 2005. The origin of this group of figures can be easily assigned. In 1850, the cathedral chapter of Münster gave this former Pietà from St. Paul's Cathedral to the Milter parish when the cathedral church received a new Pietà. This new marble picture of the cathedral was made by Wilhelm Achtermann. It may also be thanks to his personal relationship with Milte that the Holzpietà came to Milte.
Historical parish library
A collection of books by former Milter pastors was rediscovered in Milter Church in the early 1990s. The volumes could be cataloged by the “Historical Holdings in Westphalia” department of the University and State Library in Münster. It is a collection of around 650 publications, most of which were created in the period before 1800. A large part has been restored and was handed over to the parish of Milte in September 1995. The room above the sacristy was set up as a library room for the historical collection and has housed it ever since. The library is accessible through a card catalog on site. At the same time, however, digital data was also recorded. This catalog is available to researchers online via the catalog of the North Rhine-Westphalian University Libraries.
The literature in the collection is characterized by a broad spectrum of content. In addition to theological writings, there are also works on history, philosophy and, occasionally, on classical linguistics, literary studies and folklore. A particularly outstanding piece is a valuable print of the “Missale Monasteriensis”, a liturgical work that was made in 1632 by the famous Antwerp printing company Platin and is one of the most outstanding works of the 17th century in terms of printing technology.
A special find in the collection is the cover of a “Confessionum Flores” by St. Augustine. The cover of the print is an old parchment manuscript from the first half of the 9th century from West Germany, written in Carolingian minuscule script. The fragment of the book cover was part of an epistolarium . Parts of the readings for the feast of St. John the Evangelist (December 28th) and for the feast of the innocent children (December 29th) can be identified.
Web links
Coordinates: 51 ° 59 ′ 52.6 " N , 7 ° 56 ′ 45.8" E