In August 2021, the bell tower of the church, which is now closed, collapsed. The parish supports the restoration, but will not organize it. One of the bells was the first newly installed church bell in independent Slovenia.
The anniversary of the event that strongly marked the church of St. Jakob on Mali Vrh near Globoke in the municipality of Brežice and at least a little the life of the local residents. On August 3, 2021, the bell tower of this church collapsed, so it was immediately closed and, unfortunately for many, it is still closed today.
It was started by an earthquake in Croatia
The collapse of the bell tower is linked to the December 2020 earthquake in Petrinja, Croatia, during which the church cracked and, according to some locals, the bell tower also tilted. It collapsed after a few months, as mentioned. At this moment, nothing is more alien to the locals than the thought that the church of St. Jakob would no longer be on Mali Vrh in the future.
Mali Vrh, an idyllic village in the municipality of Brežice, was also a candidate for a radioactive waste disposal site at the location of the open pit of the former Globoko Mine.
As the locals say, instead of ringing, there is now “dead silence”, and they will do anything to get the bells ringing again at St James’s. How they will do this is agreed on several sides. Among other things, they will have to follow the instructions of the Novi Sad unit of the Institute for the Protection of the Cultural Heritage of Slovenia; the church is not a cultural monument, but it is a registered heritage. According to the conservator Ane Krevelj the institute issued conditions for reconstruction. “One of the conditions is that the church must have the same dimensions after the restoration as before the damage,” he says. According to her, they now have to prepare a project for what they would like to do with the church, and if it meets the conditions of reconstruction, the institute will issue a consent. “The fact that the building has been damaged for a long time is bad for it,” he adds.
The locals agree with this assessment. Determined to put an end to this state of affairs, they established a five-member village building committee, and in addition, it has “things over” the parish economic council at the parish of Brežice. Who of the mentioned (and others) should do the most in the restoration? “If the locals from Mali Vrh are in favor of the church being rebuilt, I am also in favor of it,” says the pastor Ivan Šumljak, also responsible for Mali Vrh in Pišece parish. As the pastor adds, the locals must organize themselves for the restoration, and the parish economic council will help them. Priests, to whom dioceses assign more and more parishes, are no longer able to carry out such renovations, he explained.
Setting up anew
As the locksmith St. Jacob Pepi Radič, the building committee agrees to remove the remains of the damaged church for safety reasons. Then they will decide how to rebuild the church. Since they are now agreeing on the preparation of the appropriate documentation, they do not want to rush forward with predictions about how they envision the new St. Jacob. That’s why they don’t want to talk yet about the type of building material, about where they will place the bells, and about other things that will give Mali Vrh its spirit again, which is now being sucked into the cracks between the stones of the walls in the rest of the church, from which even plants grow near the roof.
“A church built in this way, such as Javorca near Tolmin – this could be one of the possibilities for St. Jacob. It’s stone below, and wooden above.” says Pepi Radič, who emphasizes that they have not yet made a final decision.
Even the former long-time locksmith wants renovations as soon as possible Franc Strgar: “The desire is to go into renovation, so that the church will be as it should be.” With the church of St. Jakob is bound not only by the key, but also by his heart, and the ruin saddens him all the more. The Diocese, the Institute for Cultural Heritage, the municipality and the locals, all must come together, and until that happens, nothing will happen with the restoration, in my opinion.
The bells will not be heard, but they will be talked about
wikipedia
Church of St. Jakob was built at the end of the 17th century.
To the stump of Malovre St. People come to Jakob, among them hikers of the Way of Jakob. This year there was no more Easter at the church “sails”, which the locals miss very much, but on July 28, there will be a mass in honor of St. Jakob, which was confirmed by pastor Ivan Šumljak.
The Mass will of course be without bells, as they have both been stored elsewhere. So if they don’t hear the bells, they will probably talk about them or at least think about them, because they are interesting. As Franc Strgar told us already in August 2021, there was one bell in the church until 1991. On July 25, 1991, a new, larger bell was installed in the belfry, and this was the first newly installed church bell in independent Slovenia. In addition, at that time they put another bell in the bell tower, which was brought from the Dobov church, because they put a new one there. Both, the one for the church in Dobova and the one for the church of St. Jakob on Mali Vrh, donated by a local Franc Polovič. The solemn mass in 1991 on Mali Vrh was led by the then pastor of Pišeš Franc Ornik.
wikipedia
Since 2021, the sad remains of the church have been a reminder of the slow restoration or construction of a new church.
Source: svet24.si
