Church of the Protection of the Holy Virgin (Rylsk)

Background and Construction

The Church of the Intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary was erected in 1822 ^{[4] [5] [6]} at the expense of the merchants Sevastian and Fedor Andronikovs ^[7] from the Shelekhov clan ^{[8] [9] [10]} , to which the famous navigator Grigory Ivanovich Shelikhov , who founded the first Russian settlements in North America ^{[11] [12]} . The author of the project and the builders of the church have not been established ^[13] . At the same time, according to the records in the clerical records of the Intercession Church about the confessional paintings and metric books that have been preserved since 1774, the church functioned already in the second half of the 18th century, and 1822 may be the year the new building was built ^[14] .

Before the October Revolution

The building of the church was repeatedly repaired: in 1864 the iron roof was closed, in 1884 the church was plastered and painted, in 1895 heating was installed in the church. The next renovation of the building was made in 1905 ^[8] : facades and interiors acquired stucco decoration in the style of pseudo-baroque. Around the same time, a porch was added to the southern facade of the bell tower of the temple ^{[13] [14] [15]} .

As of 1915, the property of the Intercession Church was452 tithes of land, of which only arable were 306 acres , and the rest of the area required reclamation and was not used. Church lands were infertile, brought rental income in the amount of 3360 rubles. The temple also owned a two-story building adjacent to the bell tower, on the lower floor of which there was a gatehouse, a candle shop, a book warehouse of textbooks for church schools and a book store of the brotherhood of Rylsk in the name of St. Seraphim, and on the upper floor there was a two-year parish school . The church parish included a part of the inhabitants of the city of Rylsk (102 houses: 361 men and 375 women), residents of the villages Viskol , Volynka, Pokrovskaya (118 houses: 464 men and 449 women). In total, the parish of the temple by 1917 totaled 220 houses, in them 825 men and 824 women. There were three schools at the church: one two-year exemplary parish school in the city of Rylsk (law teacher and head - priest Vasily Ioakimovich Kallistratov ^{[Comm 2]} (1915)) and one church and parish school in the villages of Volynka and Pokrovskaya (head - priest Vasily Nikolaevich Nikolsky). As of 1915, 167 boys and 32 girls were enrolled in church parish schools. The church library kept 55 books. Before 1917, two priests and a psalm-reader were in the clergy of the Church of the Intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary ^{[8] [14]} .

In the Pokrovsky church there were three ancient icons: the first is the icon of the Intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary , on the back of which there was an inscription that it was “re-written in 1704 by priest Alexei, and when and by whom it was written is unknown”; the second is the icon of St. John the Warrior ; the third is the icon of the Holy Great Martyr Paraskeva Friday , transferred to the Intercession Cathedral from the Pyatnitskaya Church that burned down on May 17 ( 29 ), 1865 ^[8] .

After the October Revolution

After the decree of the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR of January 23 ( February 5 ) 1918 on the separation of the church from the state and the school from the church, the Church of the Intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary continued to function on the basis of the agreement of the parishioners community with the Rylsky City Council of Workers, Peasants and Red Army deputies concluded on May 17, 1919. In accordance with the decree of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of February 23, 1922, 39 items were seized from the temple with a total weight of 1 pound 22 pounds and 38 spools . In the 1930s, the church building was used as a granary . During this period, the church floors were dismantled, platbands were removed, murals on the walls were damaged ^{[8] [14] [15]} .

During the Great Patriotic War, after the liberation of Rylsk from the Nazi invaders, services in the Pokrovsky church were resumed in 1943, and on January 5, 1945, an agreement was signed between the citizens of Rylsk and the Rylsky district executive committee for unlimited use of the church building. At the expense of the community of believers, a gatehouse was built in 1946, in 1954 the temple was repaired, which consisted of whitewashing, painting and restoration of painting, but the work carried out was assessed as unsuccessful. In 1956, the production of a new iconostasis for the right side chapel began ^[14] . In the 1960s, bells were banned. Teachers and Komsomol members were on duty at all Orthodox holidays at the entrance to the church: schoolchildren who visited the temple were not accepted as pioneers or Komsomol members ^[8] .

In the 1970s, significant repair and construction work was carried out in the church: domed roof ceilings were replaced, the facade was finished, a small refectory , office, a baptismal house and a candle shop were built in the churchyard. Inside the temple, walls and domes were painted, and a new iconostasis was built, which, however, is much smaller than the original carved wooden gilded iconostasis ^[8] .

On October 25, 1990, in accordance with the Law of the RSFSR “On Freedom of Religion,” the religious association of the Orthodox Parish of the Intercession Church of the Kursk Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) was registered ^{[Comm 3]} . In September 1991, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexy II visited the Intercession Church, who, at the head of the delegation of Russian clergymen, stayed in the Kursk diocese and made an excursion to the Maryino sanatorium (the former estate of the Baryatinsky princes) located in the Rylsky district . Having made a prayer in the Intercession Church, Alexy II spoke to hundreds of Rylins ^{[8] [17]} . In accordance with the Federal Law “On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations” dated September 26, 1997, the religious organization Pokrovsky Parish in Rylsk was registered ^{[Comm 4] [14]} .

Onions and crosses were updated in the 1990s and 2000s, roofs were repaired, the floors in the church were paved with ceramic tiles, asphalt was laid on the territory adjacent to the church, and an openwork metal fence was installed. An old two-story building located near the bell tower of the church, which before the revolution housed a two-year parish school, and recently until 1992, a dormitory of a teacher training college, was also thoroughly repaired. Now, in the renovated building, Sunday school classes and students of the Cadet Cossack Corps are held ^[8] .

Currently, the temple is active ^{[3] [7] [11]} .

Temple

The temple is brick, single-headed, cross-domed , built in the style of classicism ^[6] , has the shape of an octagon with four sides slightly convex between the porticoes , which gives the impression of a round shape of the main volume. Four-columned porticoes, decorated with carved cornices ^[15] , the colonnade on the altar (eastern) side is leaned against the wall ^{[6] [8]} . Windows on the facades of the temple are located in two lights; lower light windows are higher, have a rectangular shape and are equipped with forged grilles. To our time, deaf forged metal doors have survived. The facades are plastered and painted white and light green ^[13] .

A powerful dome , resting on a high drum and four pillars from the inside, crowns the central volume of the building ^[18] and supports a cylindrical shape lantern , which is the basis of the final chapter ^[13] .

The temple has three thrones : the middle one is the Intercession of the Most Holy Theotokos , the left one is the holy martyr Paraskeva , the right one is the archangel Michael and St. John Chrysostom ^[14] .

Belfry

The bell tower adjoins the temple from the western side, has a height of 50 meters and is almost an exact copy of the bell tower of the Assumption Cathedral of Rylsk ^[11] . The bell tower stands on four massive pylons , forming three entrances to the temple along two corridors intersecting at right angles in the form of a cross ^{[6] [19]} . Its harmony is due to the clear proportional rhythm of the tiers decreasing upward. The corners of the bell tower are framed by beams of five half-columns ^[8] with inconspicuous bases and capitals ^[18] . A porch is attached to the bell tower from the south side ^[19] .

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• Pokrovsky Cathedral of the city of Rylsk (Neopr.) . The official website of the Kursk diocese . Kursk diocese (2012). Date of treatment October 5, 2015.
• Pokrovsky Cathedral (neopr.) (Inaccessible link) . Pride of the region (2010). Date of treatment October 5, 2015. Archived March 5, 2016.
• Pokrovsky Cathedral (neopr.) . Shrines of the land of Kursk . Kursk Regional Scientific Library named after N.N. Aseeva (2011). Date of treatment October 5, 2015.
• Church of the Intercession of the Mother of God (Neopr.) (Unavailable link) . The county town of Rylsk (2012). Date of treatment October 5, 2015. Archived March 6, 2016.
• Church of the Intercession (neopr.) (Inaccessible link) . Monuments of history and culture of the peoples of the Russian Federation . FSUE GIVC Ministry of Culture of Russia (2011). Date of treatment October 4, 2013. Archived February 2, 2014.
• Church of the Intercession, 1822 (neopr.) . The official website of the Administration of the Kursk region . Committee for Informatization, State and Municipal Services of the Kursk Region (06/19/2014). Date of treatment October 5, 2015.
• Church of the Protection of the Holy Virgin in Rylsk on the site "Temples of Russia".