Buchhagen, Germany, February 7, 2024
Photo: GoFundMe
After three years of building a new monastery church, the brotherhood of the Holy Trinity Bulgarian Orthodox Church in Buchhagen, Germany, is appealing for urgent support.
The monastery, which is under the Bulgarian Diocese of Western and Central Europe, needs to raise $32,270 (30,000 euros) towards materials for the roof of its church, the Bulgarian Orthodox Church reports.
Donations can be made via GoFundMe.
Photo: kirchenbau.org
The monastery’s construction page describes the church’s architectural style:
The architecture of the Buchhagen Monastery church combines the requirements of the venerable liturgical tradition of the Holy Mount Athos with the stylistic language of the early Romanesque period, characteristic of the region (Weser Romanesque, Old Saxon, Ottonian art). Due to the relationship between this oldest German church architecture and Byzantine, Georgian, and Old Slavic church architecture, this connection is extremely harmonious. It comes very close to the Divine archetype of the “Heavenly Sanctuary.” As a result, a unique and coherent model of German-Orthodox church art, deeply rooted in Holy Tradition, emerges.
The monastery was founded in 1990 by Elder Johannes, a convert to holy Orthodoxy who then spent years in monasticism on the Holy Mountain under the elders of the Great Lavra and Elder Joseph of Vatopedi (a spiritual child of St. Joseph the Hesychast). The holy habitation follows the Athonite typikon.
Holy Trinity Monastery is also known for its own German-language musical style that combines elements of Byzantine and Gregorian chanting:
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