Church of the Holy Virgin Intercession in Tomsk

The Polish church of the Intercession of the Holy Virgin of the Holy Rosary was built on the top of a hill near Voskresenskaya hill in 1833. You should visit it after the Tomsk ostrog.

As Tomsk was a place of exile in the 19 century, after the Napoleonic Wars and especially after the Polish riots of 1830 and 1863 there appeared a lot of Catholics in the city. So, there arose the need in a Catholic church. And its construction was initiated by a Polish count Alexander Mashinsky, a citizen of France.

The Tomsk Catholic parish was the largest in Siberia even though it was included in the Novosibirsk Catholic diocese. The church had a rather difficult name, and since the Orthodox Church had no church feast it was also named in honor of the Intercession of the Holy Virgin.

In the 20 century the church was closed. At first, it housed the stable of the NKVD and then the storehouse of a glider club. And in 1979 there was opened a planetarium in the building of the church. The church has never been rebuilt and always maintained in the appropriate condition. In 1990 it was returned to the Church. And since 1991 the religious services have been resumed there.