kostel svatého Františka Xaverského v Uherském Hradišti Church

The Church of Saint Francis Xavier is a Baroque church on Masaryk Square in Uherské Hradiště. It belongs to a complex of a former Jesuit college, gymnasium, and seminary for impoverished students. It is the central church of the local Roman Catholic parish.

The Jesuits arrived in Uherské Hradiště by a roundabout route. Their Moravian patroness was Kateřina Alžběta Zoubková ze Zdětína, who bequeathed to the order in 1635 the estates of Zdounky and Habrovany. However, Cardinal František z Ditrichštejna pushed for the college to be founded in Kroměříž. Only when Kroměříž was plundered by Swedish forces in 1643 did the general of the order agree to move the Jesuits to Uherské Hradiště. The foundation stone of the college was laid in 1654, and the foundation stone of the church in 1670.

The church was built by Jan Jeroným Canevalle between 1670 and 1685 according to a design by Jan Dominik Orsi. It was modeled on the Roman church Il Gesù. It is a hall church with barrel vaulting and galleries above six shallow side chapels. It stands near the former ramparts in boggy terrain, on oak pilings and a pine framework. An examination in the nineteen fifties showed that the wood was still in good condition.

The construction was plagued by disasters. In 1681, a fire struck the city and the nearly completed church burned down almost entirely. Nevertheless, it was already consecrated the following year by the Olomouc consecrating bishop Jan Josef Breuner. Another fire in 1695 delayed the completion. The façade and domes of both towers received their final form only in 1755. The niches of the two-tower façade are adorned with stucco statues of Jesuit saints by Ignác Morávek.

After the Jesuit order was dissolved in 1773, services continued, and from 1778 the church has been a parish church. It replaced the deteriorated Church of Saint George, which was later demolished. In July 1997, the church and the entire square were flooded by the swollen Morava River.

The late Baroque furnishings come mainly from the years 1768 to 1773. The main altar is decorated with a painting by Jan Jiří Heinsch from 1689, depicting Saint Francis Xavier baptizing a pagan king. The canvas measures 640 by 420 centimeters and was paid for by Countess Kateřina Magnisová ze Strážnice. An illusory fresco in the presbytery was painted by Juda Tadeáš Supper. The workshop of Ondřej Schweigel supplied the altar sculptures and the pulpit, and numerous paintings by the Jesuit Ignác Raab and his workshop. Stucco medallions of the Evangelists and Apostles on the vault were created as late as 1895.

Beneath the main altar is a crypt where the remains of the patroness Kateřina Zoubková were transferred in 1690. The crypt was abolished during the hygienic reforms of Joseph the Second.