Description of the attraction
Unfortunately, no chronicle sources about the construction of the famous monastery church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker have survived. There is information that the Nikolayevsky Lyubyatovsky Monastery took place already in the 16th century. At the time when its foundation took place, the monastery was located outside the settlement and the city, namely in itself Lyubyatovo.
The authoritative researcher of the architecture of the city of Pskov V. V. Sedov notes that the temple was most likely erected between 1540 and 1560. Initially, it was five-headed. Of greatest interest is the fact that the throne of the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker was founded on a sacred spring preserved in the sub-church until 1872, because it was in this year that it was filled up due to the spread of dampness from it.
In the winter of 1570, at the time of the week of Great Lent, the great Tsar Ivan the Terrible came to Pskov from the destroyed Novgorod in order to punish the rebellious city. Grozny, in memory of his stay in the city of Pskov, decided to leave here an icon with the face of the Savior Jesus Christ.
In 1581, the famous Stefan Batory was preparing troops for the siege of Pskov and decided to go around the city to the village of Lyubyatovo. If you believe the legend, the monks took from the church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker an icon with the face of the Vladimir Mother of God to the north of the monastery, closer to the Pskov River. In the village of Lyubyatovo, in 1609, there were long ranks of Novgorodians who came to pacify the rebellious and rebellious Pskovites. According to the chronicler, the holy monastery suffered greatly at that time.
After the Time of Troubles passed, St. Nicholas Church fell into a long desolation and, after some time, in 1645 was abolished. Some time after the closure of the monastery, it was restored again. The revival of the church is directly related to the name of the great Emperor Alexei Mikhailovich.
According to the spiritual states of 1764, the church was converted into a parish, and the monastery was closed. In 1828, the church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker again fell into disrepair: a strong leak opened, the arches in the vestibule collapsed - it became simply impossible to serve in such a room. Repair work in the temple was carried out by Antip Iakovl, a courtyard landowner Molchanov from the village of Berezki Dedeneva. The famous at that time painter Bezrodny P. I. renovated the temple iconostasis. The stone throne, badly dilapidated, in 1832 was declared completely unfit for the process of sacred rites. With the approval of Archbishop Methodius, it was subject to destruction, and the new throne was consecrated in June 1833; the old antique antimension was left on it.
Before the revolution, in the church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, there was a particularly revered shrine - this is a miraculous icon with the face of the Vladimir Mother of God. A reliquary was carved on the reverse side of the icon, but the relics have not survived. Only in 1928 was the holy icon taken out of the monastery, and from 1930 to the present day it has been housed in the collection of the State Tretyakov Gallery.
Nikolskaya Church in the village of Lyubyatovo is considered one of the few churches in the city of Pskov, which was not closed during the revolution, but even this did not prevent its repeated robbery at all. A considerable number of icons were taken outside the church during 1928. The especially revered miraculous icon "Tenderness" was also taken away.
During the difficult period of the Great Patriotic War, the fascist invaders plundered the temple, and the ancient icons of the St. Nicholas Church were sent to Germany. After the end of the war in 1945, all the icons returned to Pskov, and some of them were transferred to the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker.
Since 1988, the church has a Sunday school for children. The school is only open on Sundays and is taught by experienced teachers. Since 2003, the Orthodox Pilgrimage Service has been actively working at the church with the blessing of Archbishop Eusebius of Velikie Luki and Pskov.
