St. Salvator (Munich)

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St. Salvator 2010
St. Salvator, interior view
Salvator Church
Salvatorkirche during the renovation in 2008
The road to the Salvatorkirche

St. Salvator , also called Salvatorkirche , is the former cemetery church of the Frauenkirche and like this a Gothic brick church . Since 1829 St. Salvator has been left to the Greek Orthodox metropolis of Germany . It is called by the Greek Orthodox community in the translation "Transfiguration of the Savior" (Ι.Ν. Μεταμορφώσεως του Σωτήρος).

location

St. Salvator (Salvatorstraße 17) is located in the Kreuzviertel of the historic old town of Munich, near the city wall at the maiden tower, which was demolished in 1804, on Salvatorplatz, named after the church .

history

As a result of the city expansion by Ludwig of Bavaria , the number of inhabitants increased so much that the cemeteries around the two city churches "Alter Peter" and Frauenkirche were no longer sufficient. Because of this, the cemeteries were moved to the outskirts of the city at that time, but still remained within the city walls.

After the cemetery of the parish of St. Peter had been relocated to the Hackenviertel in 1478 and the All Saints' Church on the Cross was consecrated as a cemetery church in 1485 , Duke Albrecht IV the Wise also arranged for the cemetery to be relocated around the Frauenkirche. The master builder is not documented, it is probably Lukas Rottaler, student of Jörg von Halsbach and his successor at the building site of the Frauenkirche . The shell was probably finished in April 1493. On August 15, 1494 - documented - St. Salvator was inaugurated.

In the 17th century, probably in the first quarter, the church received a gallery. On July 24, 1767, the Gothic spire was damaged by lightning ; the damaged part was removed and a baroque essay in the shape of an onion was built as a conclusion . In 1774 the church was renovated and, in keeping with the Baroque zeitgeist of the time, individual colored glass panes were replaced by bright panes. As a result of the abandonment of the cemetery in 1789, the northern side portal, which led directly to the cemetery, was probably walled up.

In the course of secularization , it was decided on April 20, 1803 to vacate the church and about a year later on May 25, 1804 to demolish the church. Since the church, which was now in the possession of the crown, was used as a depot, for which no replacement was available, the demolition was prevented. On December 21, 1806, King Max I gave Joseph St. Salvator to the Evangelical Lutheran parish in Munich. But since St. Salvator was still used as a storage room and carriage shed and later as a granary, the Evangelical Lutheran Congregation could not actively use the church. With the start of construction for St. Matthäus near the Stachus , St. Salvator became the property of the crown again.

Friedrich Thiersch made a significant contribution to the transfer of the church to the Greek community . He had researched the long underestimated contribution of Christianity (and later Orthodoxy) to the culture and science of Eastern Europe and published it in the Greek scholarly newspaper Hermes ho logios , which was published in Vienna . If he had previously had 30 Greek students brought to the cadet school in Munich, he now also saw religion as a necessary part of education. He hoped that, thanks to the Church, a larger Greek congregation would develop in Munich, as was the case at that time in Vienna and Leipzig , where Greeks made a significant contribution to the economy and foreign trade. The opponent of the idea of ​​a church was initially the Russian diplomat of Greek descent, Alexander Stourdzas, who, in the spirit of the Enlightenment, wanted to avoid the link to religion, but was ultimately changed by Wilhelm Traugott Krug . In 1828 King Ludwig I let the building be used by a majesty resolution of September 22nd and 30th, 1828. The church itself remained in the possession of the crown and is still the property of the Free State of Bavaria , which is also the legal successor to the Wittelsbach property. After Leo von Klenze had rebuilt the church for services according to the Orthodox rite, St. Salvator was consecrated according to the Greek Orthodox rite on December 18, 1829.

In the summer of 1869 the tower was restored and reorganized. Since then, the baroque spire has been torn down and the helmet has been adapted to its original Gothic state. At the same time, the twelve figures of the apostles added to the wall templates were replaced by icons. In 1903 the glass windows were repaired and secured. These were outsourced in 1916 and reinstalled in 1928. In 1934 the church was renovated again. The late Gothic stained glass was outsourced in 1941. During National Socialism, the well-known mathematician Constantin Carathéodory was the church council.

The church building survived the bombing of Munich in World War II largely unscathed. However, the glass paintings that were relocated to protect against the air raids were initially almost completely lost due to aerial bombs. After the war, surviving remains were built into the choir windows of the Frauenkirche . In 1970 the iconostasis was set back and the sanctuary was reduced in size. The sacristy and tower were re-covered in 1982, and the exterior was repaired in 1992/93. In the nineties a box with a large amount of broken pieces from the late Gothic glass window was discovered in the church gallery and reassembled by the workshops of the Mayer'schen Hofkunstanstalt . Four restored glass windows were used again in the Salvator Church in 2000. In 2008 the tower was renovated. In 2009 the church received a new portal.

The legal dispute over the rights of use

In the mid-1970s, the Greek Church Community Munich and Bavaria eV claimed that King Ludwig I had left St. Salvator to this association alone. From this, the association derived a special autonomy that freed them from the orthodox church jurisdiction . Above all, this means that the association alone has the right to freely elect bishops and pastors. With that, the Greek parish in Munich effectively left the Greek Orthodox metropolis.

The Free State of Bavaria, which had become the legal successor of the founder, did not share this view and demanded the surrender of the church, which the Greek parish in Munich refused to do. This started a struggle for the Salvator Church , in which Greece, especially the Greek Parliament and the Greek Orthodox Church , also contributed. In the ensuing legal battle, the church was not accessible to either side. On October 13, 1998, the Second Senate of the Federal Constitutional Court rejected the constitutional complaint of the Greek parish in Munich (2 BvR 1275/96). On June 27, 1999 St. Salvator was handed over to the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Germany .

Significant works

Personalities in the Salvator Cemetery

On the Salvatorfriedhof, which was abandoned in 1789, a. buried (see memorial plaque on the east wall):

literature

  • Klaus Gallas : Munich. From the Guelph foundation of Henry the Lion to the present: art, culture, history . DuMont, Cologne 1979, ISBN 3-7701-1094-3 (DuMont documents: DuMont art travel guide).
  • Peter Weismann: Apostolos Malamoussis , MunichPortrait 3, MünchenVerlag, Munich 2010, ISBN 978-3-937090-48-1 , with chapter "The Rescue of the Salvatorkirche"
  • Karin Hösch: Greek Orthodox Churches Munich: Salvatorkirche, All Saints Church, Art Publishing House Peda, Passau 2000, ISBN 3-89643-528-0
  • Konstantin Kotsowilis: The Greek Church of the Redeemer, Formerly the cemetery church of St. Salvator - Munich . Schnell and Steiner, Regensburg 1990, ISBN 978-3-7954-5056-4 (series: Small art guides / churches and monasteries).

Web links

Commons : St. Salvator  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Religious Moments in Euro-American Philhellenism, p. 33 in: The Oriental Question in the Church's Circumstances: The Impact of the Churches Abroad on the Emancipation of the Orthodox Nations of Southeast Europe 1804–1912 by Friedrich Heyer von Harrassowitz
  2. ↑ Wood collective

Coordinates: 48 ° 8 ′ 30 ″  N , 11 ° 34 ′ 29 ″  E