We are an open community of the faithful Christians who try to take seriously the message of the Gospel and deepen our life of faith. We support ecumenism and interfaith dialogue; we also try to be close to those who long for spiritual and personal values in their lives.

The Academic Parish of Prague has been around St Salvator (Holy Saviour) Church since 1990, all the time with the Msgr. Prof. Tomas Halik as our spiritual leader. Primarily, it provides a pastoral care to students, teachers and employees of various Prague universities. It is, however, open to all who seek their spiritual home here.

Our team

Parish Priest Msgr. Tomas Halik Priests Fr. Marek Orko Vacha Fr. Samuel Privara SJ Pastoral Administrator, Manager Martin Stanek Pastoral Assistants Denisa Cervenkova, CSTF Adela Muchova, Petr Mucha Parish Assistant Marta Mills

Chief Organist Robert Hugo Architect, Art Curator Norbert Schmidt

 

Services during the academic year

Sunday 2:00 pm and 8:00 pm Holy Mass
Tuesday 6:00 pm Holy Mass
Thursday 8:00 pm Eucharistic Adoration

Services during the summer holidays
Sunday 8:00 pm Holy Mass

Activities available for foreign students
Meditation (silent) – Tue 7:00 pm (crypt)
Holy Mass (in Czech) – Sun 2:00 pm and 8:00 pm, Tue 6:00 pm (church)
Eucharistic adoration (silent) – Thu 8:00 pm (church)
Gregorian chant (latin) – Wed 7:00 am (sacristy)
Spiritual Exercises, Concerts, Exhibitions etc.

Worships

We meet regularly to celebrate worship services. We love a beautiful liturgy too.

Basics of faith

We offer intensive education courses for adults, this preparation for baptism and confi rmation usually takes two years. About one thousand young people have already participated during the past twenty years. The lectures are open to everyone who is interested in faith education.

Spirituality

There are various spiritual meetings, such as silent meditation in the Church crypt, spiritual talks and Eucharistic adoration weekly. Together with the Jesuit priests and the Carmelite nuns we organize spiritual retreats (one-day, weekends, and weeks), such as St Ignatius exercises, contemplative seminars, creative retreats, Sadhana courses and many more.

Dialogue

We provide space for meetings of various religions´ representatives. In past, for example, H.H. Dalai Lama, Rabbi David Rosen, or Imam Ammar al-Hakim attended. There is of course strong ecumenical openness towards the other Christian Churches.

Art

In collaboration with the Centre for Theology and Arts we organize exhibitions, artistic interventions to liturgical space and debates about the relationship between faith and art. We take care of music of good quality, especially liturgical music. Our parish has its own Church choir; it also works with an ensemble of Baroque music on several projects. There are two special highlights during the year: the Ash Wednesday being the fi rst cultural-musical-spiritual event and the Night of Open Churches the second one.

Education

The sacristy of our Church serves as a meeting place for guests from around the world; various lectures, debates and artistic performances belong to our regular semester schedule..

Other activities

We support student activities (meetings, pilgrimages, community happenings, sport activities). We work with universities, nongovernmental organizations and various church movements. We also focus on supporting people in needs through several charitable projects.

History and seesights in st.Salvator church

 The history of the church is closely associated with the arrival of Jesuits to Prague and the construction of the Klementinum complex. The construction of st.Salvator church in the renaissance style was started in 1578 by Marco Fontana di Brusata. The church was renovated in the 17^th century in the baroque style by the architect Carlo Lurago.

Statues on its front and portico, designed by Jan Jiří Bendl, represent the Saviour Christ flanked by the four evangelists. The niche in the gable holds a statue of The Immaculate. At the opposite ends of the facade there are statues of St.Ignace of Loyola, the founder of Jesuit order and St,Francis Xaverius, the missionary in Asia. Statues of the Church Fathers are placed on the balustrade.

The interior is rich with stucco decoration. The altarpiece was painted by Jiří Hering in 1632 after “Transfiguration of Christ” by Raffael, kept in the Vatican. The ceiling fresco symbolizes the four continents known at the time.

There are statues of  St.Wenceslas (Czech main patron saint) and St.Adalbert in the aisles. In the middle of the left aisle is a rococo altarpiece of St.Aloysius, with a St.Ignace altarpiece at the end, the latter flanked by statues pf St.Paul and St.Peter.

In the middle of the right aisle is a rococo altarpiece of St.Stanislaus Kostka, and a baroque altarpiece of St.Franciscus Xaverius, flanked by statues representing India and Asia, at the end.

An altar with an iron-and-glass artwork designed by Karel Stádník in 1986 in the chancel represents the Universe. The raised platform covers a large crypt with remains of Jesuits.
An 18^th –century rococo pulpit is adorned with a statue of Moses at the summit and statues of Church Masters below, and with statues of four of the apostles at the top of the canopy.

The twelve confessionals, carved between 1660 and 1670 by Jan Jiří Bendl and bearing statues of 12 apostles, rank among the best examples of early baroque sculpture in Bohemia.A beautiful 17^th-century grille separates the nave from the antechamber, where you can notice two marble fonts dating back to 1600´s.

This church has had a rich preaching and teaching tradition - among all the famous preachers, the philosopher and mathematician Bernard Bolzano can be mentioned, who worked here as a University preacher between 1805 and 1819 and significantly influenced the intelligentsia in the time of the National Revival. This tradition was broken in the time of communism, when priests, who worked here, were imprisoned or forced to leave into exile.

 Virtual 360°Guide

photo © Martin Staněk 2014