Trinec, North Moravia, Aug 6 (CTK) – About 300 people attended a a mass celebrated in the open air outside the Corpus Christi Church that was deliberately set on fire by three young men on Wednesday in the Trinec-Guty neighbourhood today.
The church-goers expressed their sorrow at the destruction of the rare heritage site and the hope that the church will be renewed soon.
Priest Kazimierz Plachta said the Sunday mass at the site should be held in any weather even in the future and that the renewal of the church should start as soon as possible.
The police have accused three youths of the arson and taken two of them into custody.
Plachta said the event was a sign.
“There is one thing of reading the sign rightly and another thing to continue with the preparation of the documentation in order to start renewing the building as soon as possible if there are the means for it,” Plachta said.
Most of the costs are to be covered by insurance, the rest is to be provided by the Culture Ministry, the town hall, a public collection and the local parish.
According to preliminary estimates, the damage may have reached tens of million crowns.
A wooden church from the 16th century, an outstanding heritage site, was virtually destroyed by a fire in the Guty neighbourhood in Trinec on Wednesday.
The Roman Catholic church was a valuable heritage site with interiors and paintings from the first half of the 16th century.
Between 2012 and 2014, it was reconstructed for 4.3 million crowns.
Judging by the year cut in the portal, the church may have been founded in 1563, but it may be even older.
($1 = 21.961 crowns)
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