Katedra p.w. Imienia Najświętszej Maryi Panny w Mińsku w opisie wizytacyjnym z 1829 roku
The Cathedral dedicated to the Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Minsk in the visitation report of 1829

Summary/Abstract: The Church dedicated to the Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Minsk was built as a Jesuit monastery church in the years 1700-1710. After the dissolution of the order, it was given to the parish. In 1797 the church was damaged by fire. A year later, it was designated as a cathedral of the newly created diocese, with the capital in Minsk. It was rebuilt thanks to the efforts and funds of Bishop Jakub Ignacy Dederka in the years 1798-1803. In 1869, as a result of the liquidation of the diocese, it was again demoted to the seat of the parish. After reactivating the diocese of Minsk in November 1917, the church regained the cathedral status. However, in 1934, it was taken away from the faithful, closed down by the Bolsheviks, and used as a garage until 1941. It survived the Second World War intact but ceased to serve as a place of worship after liberation. In 1941 the Soviet authorities donated the building to the ‘Spartak’ sports club. In the years 1948-1951, the church was converted into a sports hall. The project of its renovation, prepared in 1982, stated that the building was intended to be used as a room for the organ and choir music. In 1993 the cathedral church was returned to the faithful and was reconsecrated in 1997. Currently, the former Jesuit church serves as a cathedral, the main church of the archdiocese and metropolis of Minsk and Mogilev. The presented report on the inspection of the Minsk cathedral was written in 1829, as a result of the metropolitan visitation conducted in the archdiocese of Mogilev in the years 1828-1831, ordered by Archbishop Kasper Kazimierz Cieciszowski. The document is held in the National Historical Archive of Belarus in Minsk (in Russian Национальный исторический архив Беларуси), in the fonds entitled “Mogilev Roman Catholic Consistory” (in Russian Могилевская р.-к. духовная консистория) – the reference number: fond. 781, op. 27, sp. 427. It was written in Polish. The whole document is comprised of 12 cards written on both sides. The edition of the source was prepared in accordance with the instructions included in the publication manual for historical sources from the 16th to the mid-19th century, written by K. Lepszy, published in Warsaw in 1953.

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