Schladming Evangelical Church

Schladming Evangelical Church is a Lutheran Evangelical church located in Schladming, Styria.It is part of the Evangelische Pfarrgemeinde AB Schladming, which is part of the Evangelische Kirche AB’s Styrian Superintendency in Austria.

Following the publication of the Josephine Edict of Tolerance in 1782, a separate evangelical parish with 1000 members was established in Schladming.The trades house was originally used as a place of worship, and it was not until 1814, after the town fire, that it built its own prayer house, and in 1834, it developed a Protestant cemetery with its own storage hall.The tower, reinforced by a surrounding gallery, was erected in 1852 to display the community’s rising self-confidence to the outside world, according to a design by Hieronymus Beck, after Protestants were allowed to establish churches beginning in 1849.The church was built only after the tower was completed, from 1857 to 1862, according to the plans of road master Karl Ganzenberg and based on the model of the Protestant parish church in Wels, which had been built just a few years before, from 1849 to 1852.The Gustav-Adolph-Verein made important contributions to the church’s construction.It is designed as a Gothic hall church, comparable to Schladming’s adjoining medieval town parish church, with galleries in the side aisles and the organ on the second floor.It has a polygonal chancel that, like a medieval church, is enlarged by two sacristy extensions to form a cross.

Four panels are the shattered remains of a Protestant winged altar from around 1570. St. Peter and St. Paul are depicted on the thin panels.The largest panels depict the Crucifixion and the Brazen Serpent.The backs of the panels are embellished with odd paintings, scrollwork embellishments, and inscriptions.

The Schladming Church, with 1000 seats, is the largest evangelical church in Styria.