Many people pass the Sint Vitus Church in Stiens every day by bus or on foot, a large imposing building and a beautiful old church. For this article we went to the church and asked the pastor of the church, Mr. G. Wessels, all kinds of questions about everything. Why does the church wall look so crazy from the outside? Why is the tower always tilted? And so on.
Basic information
St. Vitus is a large church located in the old center of the village of Stiens (Leeuwarderadeel). The church is reformed (Protestant) and 900 years old, the oldest parts date from around 1100 AD. We went there on Tuesday December 27th. We were met near the church and given a tour by Reverend G. Wessels through all parts of the church, from the cemetery to the tower.
The name!
This church, like the other ‘Sint-Vitus’ in Leeuwarden and Finkum, is named after Saint Vitus. This was a boy born in the fourth century AD, on the island of Sicily. His father was a pagan senator. Vitus converted to Christianity between the ages of seven and 12. His father was terribly angry about this and tried to dissuade him from the faith in every possible way. He even tortured his son. Vitus left for Rome and managed to cure the son of Emperor Diocletian of insanity along the way. Despite this, he was still arrested by the then persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire. He died as a martyr (someone who dies for his faith) and was later canonized. Vitus’ holy day is June 15. He is the patron saint of dancers, singers and epileptics (people suffering from epilepsy). This is because Vitus was one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers (a group of holy doctors and healers) of the New Testament. Because he specialized in nervous diseases, the St. Vitus Dance, a disease that causes difficulty and jerky movement, is named after him.
When was the church built?
The church was built by a group of monks in 1100 AD. The same monks also built the St. Vitus Church in Finkum and Leeuwarden. The one in Leeuwarden has unfortunately disappeared, where the Oldehove now stands. The monks held church services in the church seven times a day.
What about that sketchy exterior of the church?
The church is built from three types of stone. First, tuff. When it was built in 1100, people no longer knew how to make bricks and therefore brought pieces of tuff from the Eifel, a mountain region in Germany. Tuff is a volcanic material that has a light brown color. When the church was often renovated or renovated in the Middle Ages, monastery stones (handmade stones) were used for this. Nowadays, ordinary brick is used for the rest. The three different types together form a strange sight: a strange soup mess of stones, which look colorful and ‘stuck together’. This is further clarified by the many ‘edits’ on the immensely thick wall: bricked up gates, windows and doors, bricked open windows and demolished extensions.
The interior
The interior of the church, including the roof, is made of wood. The current wood is about 300 years old. The beams that support the roof are themselves supported by cross beams (corbels) on which plant motifs can be seen. The ceiling is a double barrel vault: this means that it had the shape of a half barrel in the middle and on both sides (actually a triple barrel vault, but whatever). The ceiling was also made of wood. Normally, the roofs of churches were made of stone, but because the Frisian soil is not so sturdy, the builders anticipated that the church would sag under the weight of the roof.
What happened in the church?
The church is built like a road. The beams are decorated with plant incisions, they represent trees. The road continues to the front of the church, where there is something very important. There used to be windows here, allowing the first rays of sunlight to enter during the early service. The first rays of the sun symbolized Christ, he ‘lived’ in them. The priest performed a ritual with this and everyone went to the Christ light for a moment. The area at the front of the church where the light ritual was performed was forbidden ground for ordinary people. Possibly there was a wall, wooden structure or curtain to prevent ordinary people from entering the ground. Fun fact: A priest used to say the Latin
words , Hoc est corpus meum , (,this is my body,) during prayer . Because he was talking into a wall and because the audience in the church could not understand Latin, this was colloquially corrupted to ” hokuspokus ” (this is where our current saying ‘hokuspokus’ comes from).
Those who could not or were not allowed to enter the church, for example due to contagious illness, could watch the light ritual through the wall through a window near the altar. This window was called the hagioscope .
”Finking rich”: graves in the church
In the past, rich people could be buried in the church. This is where the expression ‘rich stinkers’ comes from, because of course they didn’t keep smelling nice. The priests were also buried in the church, under special red tombstones in the light area. In St. Vitus there is something very special going on with these graves. The ground of the church is strongly raised by all the graves beneath it! Over time, all the bones have reached the church floor by up to 90 cm. pressed up! That is why it seems as if the ground in the space under the tower (which you reach via a descending staircase) is much lower, but in the past the entire church was at this level.
The most important grave of the many graves in and around the church is that of Philip van Boshuisen and Anna van Eijsinga. Anna, at one point the widow of the wealthy grietman Philip, founded the Erf van het Boshuisengasthuis in Leeuwarden, a series of almshouses intended for poor women. This grave is located at the very front of the church in the light area (formerly behind the altar) and the gravestone is bricked into the wall. Near the light area there is an enormous heavy hatch in the ground, which leads to the catacombs of the church.
The Reformation
The Reformation of the Christian faith around 1500 split Christianity into Catholic and Protestant faiths. St. Vitus became a Protestant church. This brought all kinds of changes. From then on, no priest but a minister preached here. The windows of the light area and the hagioscope may have been bricked up during the Reformation, because Protestants did not want to be reminded of Catholic rituals.
When the light ritual was displaced in the Protestant church, not the altar, but the pulpit became the most important point of the church. After a prayer, the pastor would read stories from the Bible from the pulpit, and the people who had little other entertainment at the time found that very enjoyable.
Sitting in church: used to be a privilege…
When the light ritual was displaced in the Protestant church, not the altar, but the pulpit became the most important point of the church. After a prayer, the pastor would read stories from the Bible from the pulpit, and the people who had little other entertainment at the time found that very enjoyable.
The Saint Vitus soap opera: the tower and the bells
The original tower was made of (heavy) tuff and stood at the entrance. This tower tilted so much that it was demolished in the 15th century and a new one was built from monastery mops. Unfortunately, it is already subsiding again. The bells also have such a dramatic story. The three antique, unique bells date from 1381 and 1570 and were marked during the First World War with a stamp on which the Dutch government asked all soldiers never to melt the bells. Yet this seemed to be happening: the bells were brought to the port of Harlingen by Germans. A sorter who thought the old bells were too beautiful to have them melted down placed them at the back of the row of bells that were transported to the weapons factory. Fortunately, the bells were preserved, because because they were at the back, the war had already ended when it was their turn.
Why in the world do gravestones face east?
There is a reason why all the graves in and around the church are located towards the east. Because Jesus lives in the morning light, there was once a story that when he came back to earth, all the dead would rise and live again. If they were facing east, they could immediately see their Lord. Nowadays this story is no longer believed, but the tradition of placing graves towards the east still exists.
And what is it like now?
Now a service is held once a week. This is on Sunday, at half past nine in the morning.
Concerts are also often held there and there are often guided tours for interested parties in this interesting church.