The beauty of Catholicism

Feb 03, 2010
By Rokas M. Tracevskis

ECCLESIASTICAL FASCINATION: In October, Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite attended the opening ceremony of the Church Heritage Museum.

VILNIUS - The Church Heritage Museum is the newest museum in Vilnius. On Oct. 18, Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite and Parliament Speaker Irena Degutiene attended the opening ceremony of the museum, located at Sv. Mykolo Street 9. The museum opened in the St. Michael the Archangel church which is situated in front of St. Anne’s church (Napoleon wanted to bring the latter to Paris, according to popular legend).

The museum’s exhibition of golden monstrances, paintings and sculptures was created in cooperation of the Lithuanian National Museum and the Roman Catholic Church with help from the Catholics in Cologne.
The most impressive part of the exposition is the monstrances and reliquaries from the so-called Vilnius Cathedral treasury. In the 1980s Lithuanian culture experts found a treasury of golden masterpieces in the Vilnius Cathedral, which was an art gallery at that time. They are valued at hundreds of dollars. According to the Soviet rules, such treasures were supposed to be sent to Moscow then, but local apparatchiks of culture decided that it was not worth informing Moscow.

They kept the treasure secret, in storage in a Lithuanian museum. Now the treasure has been returned to the Church. The medieval gothic-style golden monstrances are too expansive stuff to use during Mass. So, the museum was the right place for them.

Liturgical clothes, sculptures and paintings are also presented at the exposition. A pre-recorded guide with headphones is available.

It took four years to reconstruct St. Michael church for the purpose of this museum. It was the Museum of Architecture in Soviet times. The Roman Catholic Church has plenty of functioning churches in Vilnius, especially in its old town. Somebody counted that their concentration per square kilometer is bigger in Vilnius than in Rome. This is why the Church decided to turn St. Michael’s into a museum.

At the end of the 16th century, the church was commissioned by Leo Sapieha, chancellor of the Lithuanian Grand Duchy, as a mausoleum to his family. The tombstones of the Sapieha family can be found at that church. The style of the church’s architecture is renaissance-baroque. The courtyard of the church, with somewhat Dali-style surrealistic columns, is one of the most beautiful yards in Vilnius.

“Vilnius can become the pilgrimage center of Europe because we have what to show: the Ausros Gate and the Church Heritage Museum which is one of the most interesting museums in Europe,” said Vilnius Mayor Vilius Navickas after meeting with Vilnius Archbishop Cardinal Audrys Juozas Backis, on Jan. 25.

Opening hours Tuesday-Saturday: 11:00 - 18:00. Closed on Sunday, Monday and national holidays. Admission is free for everyone on the last Friday of every month.

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