Kostel svatého Václava v Dejvicích Church

The Church of Saint Wenceslas in Prague's Dejvice is a small monastic church, originally a chapel. It belongs to the second Prague vicariate of the Prague Archdiocese. It is a modest Neo-Romanesque building from the early twentieth century, which was built at the end of the First World War. The exact date of consecration is not known, so the anniversary is celebrated every year on an alternative date at the end of October.

The church stands in the area of a provost's court, whose history is much older. Its origins apparently date back to the time of the founding of Dejvice in the eleventh century, and the court was the natural centre of the old village. Before the Thirty Years' War, it is recorded as a royal estate. In its present form, it was established in the seventeenth century as an estate of the provost of the Metropolitan Saint Vitus. After the Battle of White Mountain, no tenant could be found, so the provost managed the estate himself. The court was associated with approximately three hundred hectares of surrounding land, and from the middle of the eighteenth century also with a brewery. In the year seventeen forty-two, during the War of Austrian Succession, the court was burned several times, among others by the French, who had settled in Dejvice. Its present appearance was influenced by extensive reconstructions around the year eighteen hundred. Beneath the church, extensive unused cellars remain to this day.

In the years nineteen hundred and eight and nineteen hundred and nine, a care home was established here for approximately forty deaf-blind children, and the congregation of the Sisters of Divine Love was based in the complex at that time. In nineteen twenty-seven, the church was purchased by the newly founded order of the Sisters of the Apostolate of Saint Francis, together with its founder, the priest Jan Evangelista Urban. At the beginning of the nineteen nineties, the church was restored. Adjacent spaces were transformed into a parish centre and the sisters received a new residential building. Two small bells were added to the tower at that time, dedicated to Saint Wenceslas and Saint Francis of Assisi. Independent spiritual administration was discontinued in two thousand and five, and the church became a rectory church. The entire complex of the provost's court has been a cultural monument since nineteen sixty-four. Its upper part, however, has served since the nineteen fifties as a collection yard and a station for refuse collection vehicles.

In the presbytery there is a fresco with scenes from the life of Saint Wenceslas. The wooden Stations of the Cross are formed by reliefs in Beuron style, and every year a wooden nativity scene is displayed there. There have never been any pipe organs. From the beginning, a harmonium was played, occasionally also by the composer Iša Krejčí. Since nineteen ninety-six, Jan Fila plays there every Sunday, and since two thousand and two, the church has had digital organs.