„MICHAEL THE BRAVE” MEMORIAL CHURCH

„MICHAEL THE BRAVE” MEMORIAL CHURCH

Having the Holy Trinity and Saint „Silvan the Athonite” as the patron of the church, „Michael the Brave” Memorial Church was built on the site of the old metropolitan cathedral, which was founded by Michael the Brave in 1597. According to some sources, the body of Michael the Brave was buried in his metropolitan church Alba Iulia, after being exhumed from Campia Turzii sometime after August 1601.

For the Orthodox Romanians in Transylvania, the existence of the Metropolitan was a great step forward. Alba Iulia became the capital of Orthodoxy through the existence of this metropolitan of Transylvania, a status that it maintained throughout the seventeenth century.

In the 17th century the metropolitan complex included: the cathedral built on the initiative of Michael the Brave, an older church, as well as the printing house building. Among other things, it is generally considered that here, the New Testament from Balgrad was printed in 1648, for the first time in Romanian. Another well-known volume that would have been printed here was „Psaltirea” back in 1651. In those years, the metropolitan archdiocese was St. Simion Stephen. But, the newer historians are skeptical about the functioning of this printing house in the mid-seventeenth century.

There are serious arguments that the New Testament of 1648, the „Psaltirea” of 1651 and other works of these years were printed at the princely printing house in Alba Iulia and not in the typography of the Orthodox Metropolitan, where the first volume printed was „Ceaslovețul” in 1687, but only after the princely printing ceased to function.

After the Habsburgs took Transylvania and encouraged the union with the Church of Rome (Greek Catholicism), the Orthodox Metropolitan of Alba Iulia turned into a Greek Catholic Church. In addition, after 1715 with the beginning for the great bastion fortress works, the demolition of the complex was demanded. Some saved materials were reused for the erection of the Maieri 2nd Church, built exactly at the same time, in order to replace the old metropolitan complex.

The construction of the current church was started in 1988, placed as close as possible to the place of Michael the Brave Metropolis. The church is made of wood in the style of Maramures Region and is active since 1992. Blessing of the church by priests was made in 2006. In 2013 the painting of the church was completed by the Romanian painter Nicolae Bălan.

Scientific consultant: Tudor Roșu, PhD historian

Translation made by: Ciprian Dobra, PR expert