Church of the Ascension of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Darava!!!! Incredibly sunny :))) It is built of blocks carved from concrete German dugouts from the First World War.
We attended an organ music concert last year, we were delighted!
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Level 18 Local Expert
September 14, 2022
Lithuania and the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the village of Darevo.
The history of the entire Belarusian land is reflected in the fate of the small village of Darevo near Lyakhovichi, as if in a mirror. More than once, Darevo was devastated by devastating wars, but each time it was literally reborn from the ashes. And today, as almost 600 years ago, the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary stands in its center on a hill. Time after time, the parishioners rebuilt it: several times — from wood, and in 1938 — from brick.
Darevsky Church…
The first mention of the Church of the Ascension of the Blessed Virgin Mary dates back to 1440. The initiator of the construction was Peter Mondrigovich, a statesman of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
During the war of 1812, the church burned down. A new wooden church on the ashes of the old one was erected in 1841.
In early June 1915, the ancient bells were removed from the towers of the church — they were hidden by drowning in the Shchara River. In 1915, the small Belarusian village of Darevo appeared on the front pages of European newspapers — it was in the epicenter of merciless fighting, the front line passed here. Not even a handful of ashes remained from the church that stood on the hill. The place where the bells were sunk was also lost.
In 1931, a young priest, a graduate of the Pinsk Theological Seminary, Priest Stanislav Shaplevich, arrived in Darevo. He took up the construction of the building with youthful energy. Since there were not enough funds, Father Stanislav suggested cutting down blocks from German dugouts that had survived after the last war. The walls of the church were built from them.
The new church opened its doors to the faithful in 1938. And in 1939, the unification of Western and Eastern Belarus took place. The church was closed, and Priest Stanislav Shaplevich had to hide from the persecution of the new government.
After Stalin's death, a "thaw" set in. Despite the "thaw", the church was not returned to the faithful — there, as often happened in those years, there was a granary, and later it was adapted as a warehouse. But the residents of Darevo raised funds and built a house for the priest