The Jesuit Monastery in Yurovichi village

The former Jesuit Monastery in Yurovichi (Kalinkovichi district) is a place that you should visit if you believe in miracle, mysteries and beauty. Every brick here is saturated with these three essentials.

The fate of the miraculous icon

The today monastic complex comprises only several buildings behind the brick wall: the monastic corpus and the Temple of the Nativity of the Mother of God. Today they belong to the orthodox monastery of the Turovsky diocese.

The history of the creation of the monastery of Yurovichi dates back to Jesuits, in particular to the missionary activity of the monk Martin Torovsky (Turovsky) that over 10 years preached in Volyn and Polesye with a miracle icon of the Mother of God.

In the XVII century, he built a chapel for the sanctity on the Yurovichsky hill. According to the legend, the Mother of God herself chose that place through a sign. So the Yurovichi Monastery was founded in 1673. Since that the icon has brought about many miracles and become known as the Yurovichi icon of the Mother of God.

Today the original of the icon is in Krakow where it had been brought before the monastery was closed in 1831 by the Russian authorities. But before that the local artist Yadviga Kenevich made an exact copy of the icon. That copy was kept in the temple for a long time (at first in Catholic, later – in Orthodox) but then disappeared. It was acquired again only in 2006. It was miraculously found in the neighboring village, and a cross procession carried it to the Temple of the Nativity of the Mother of God where it is still kept.

The miracles of the Yurovichi Mother of God

Many miracles and salvations by “panna Mary from the Yurovichsky hill” are described in a brochure of 1742 published in Poznan (Poland). Here there are several of them:

• the raising from the dead of a son of one parishioner from Yurovichi called Prigorodsky that happened during the funeral procession;

• the raising from the dead of a son of the scribe Lenkevich from Mozyr that died in the fire;

• the rescue of the drowned resident of Yurovichi Rutkovsky.

The history of the monastery

The Jesuit Monastery existed since 1673 to 1820 when the Jesuit Order was eliminated in the territory of the Russian Empire. During this period, Fathers-Jesuits built an impressive church (1741) and a brick corpus, established the Jesuit Collegium in the territory of the mission (1778). But in 1820 the temple complex was given to the Bernadine Order.

•1830-1831 – after the revolt the monastery was eliminated.

•1840 – the church was given to the fold of the Catholic Church as parochial.

• 1864 – the church was closed by order of Governor-General Muravyov.

• 1865 - the temple is consecrated as the Orthodox Temple of the Nativity of the Mother of God.

• 1876 – 12 domes of Neo-Gothic architecture were added to the Baroque temple. There was established a convent in the territory.

• 1920 – the Soviet authorities

• 1950 – the former monastic complex was given to the nursery school.

The revival of the sanctuary

According to reports of local people, the complex withstood the Second World War but the Soviet authorities began to demolish it for the purposes of the collective farm. In 1993, it was given to the Turovsky Orthodox diocese that established the Monastery of the Holy Nativity of the Mother of God there in 2005.

The reconstruction of the architectural monument of the XVIII century was started in 2006 and had to be finished in 2012 but it was delayed due to a lack of resources. Nevertheless, the temple complex even now attracts tourists and pilgrims from Belarus and other countries (it is included into “The Golden Ring of Gomel region”). Here you can admire the fine design of the exterior of the temple made by Jesuits, see the copy of the famous icon and hear the legend how one girl came into the monastery underground in Yurovichi and went out in Kiev…