Pilgrimage church Christkindl

Steyr-Christkindl parish and pilgrimage church is a baroque pilgrimage church in the Christkindl neighborhood of Steyr.The blueprints were created by Carlo Antonio Carlone, who was inspired by the Roman Pantheon.The church takes its name from a wax figure of Jesus as a baby (Christkindl) that rests above the high altar.To the divine Christ child is the formal term, although the Christ child under heaven is commonly used locally.

Carlo Antonio Carlone finished the blueprints for the current church in 1702.Carlone modeled the baroque building on the Pantheon, the Roman basilica of Santa Maria Rotonda.Further construction was prohibited due to a lack of approval from the bishop ordinariate in Passau.On April 16, 1708, permission was eventually obtained five years later.Carlone’s work was passed over to master builder Jakob Prandtauer, who consecrated the nearly finished church on September 28, 1709.In 1880, Otto Schimmer, the main constructor of Linz Cathedral, raised Prandtauer’s façade towers.

A parish was formed in 1785, following the Josephine reforms, when Garsten Abbey was secularized.The parish was founded in 1891.

The Kirchweiler also includes the current rectory and structures erected by Prandtauer himself between 1710 and 1715.The former hermitage (now Hotel-Restaurant Christkindlwirt) has been used as an inn for the last 200 years.Close to the cathedral is the Loreto chapel, which was erected in 1876.To the west lies the cemetery, which was erected in 1784.The farmyard at the cemetery functioned as an inn named the Christkindlhof until January 2021.A baroque garden formerly stood between the vicarage and the cemetery, but it has since been removed.

Since 1950, the Christkindl Christmas post office has been in operation.In addition to selling religious items (Christkindl shop), the parish office has a philatelic archive with practically all special postmarks dating back to the inception of the post office.

The church is a Roman-style basilica.It has four apses and two façade towers in a circular shape.

The church was designed to be built around a place of worship.The spruce stem has been featured in Leonhard Sattler’s baroque high altar (which was possibly created by Prandtauer himself) since before 1720. The trunk is walled up to a height of 120 cm and iron braced to the masonry above.A gilded copper globe from around 1760 is used as a tabernacle.

The Assumption of Mary is shown in Johann Karl von Reslfeld’s cupola fresco.Reslfeld was also responsible for the Christmas figure on the left side altar, as well as the altarpieces in the parish church and the Margaret Chapel.The crucifixion painting on the right side altar comes from the monastery of Tegernsee.The artist is Karl Loth.The altar frames were designed by Marian Rittinger, a Garstner lay brother.