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A Visit with Father Timofei

20/8/2018

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Today I cycled over to the little chapel and overgrown garden tucked away in a corner of the Olympia Park. It was hard to find, although  I've been there several times. Today there was a festival next to the gates to this little garden, I could hardly imagine that there would still be access. But there it was, the little buildings and unruly garden of Father Timofei. Here is the legend of Father Timofei and his church as I have pieced together from the Internet:

Father Timofei was born in 1894 in Bagayevskaya on the Don. In the Second World War, he transported coal in the German-occupied Russian city of Schachty. During the retreat of the German Wehrmacht, fleeing from the advancing Red Army, he was forced to help the enemy escape and transport them with his horse-drawn cart. Only at Rostov, in southern Russia, 46 kilometers from the mouth of the Don in the Black Sea, was he freed. Father Timofei later reported that he had his first vision of the Virgin Mary here, telling him to build a church dedicated to peace between East and West.

After many years as a vagabond, he reached Vienna and met his future wife Natascha. The construction of a church in Vienna failed because of the local authorities. The two moved on to Munich, where they arrived in 1952. They settled down on Oberwiesenfeld, on the edge of the former airfield which later became the Olympic Park. Here the Mother of God again appeared and advised him to build a Russian church on these grounds, then a field of rubble from bombed Munich. Timofei did as he was told and built church and house. Although his buidlings were unauthorized, there was ample rubble as building material on the Oberwiesenfeld. Rubble as far as the eye could reach, and he built. He built the towers of his church from old oil barrels. Inside, he lined the ceiling with the silver foil collected from the wrappings of chocolate bars. And he created a garden of Eden, about a hundred by a hundred meters, planted with bushes, vegetables and flowers. 


No one took offense at the buildings and their inhabitants. But at the end of the 1960s, there were plans to build for for the upcoming Olympic Games on these grounds where Timofei's church and house stood. Protests hailed from Munich's residents. Lord Mayor Hans-Jochen Vogel and Willi Daume, President of the National Olympic Committee for Germany, then found that Father Timofei could not be driven away and the plans were changed. The Olympic games made room for Father Timofei.

At the almost Biblical age of 107 years, Father Timofei had to move to a nursing home where he died at the age of 110.


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  • Home
  • Bicycle Tours
    • 2021 >
      • Autumn in the Allgäu
      • Austria Again
      • A Dip into Tyrol
      • Wertheim and Beyond
      • We got as far as Wertheim
      • Bavarian Getaways
    • 2020 >
      • Out and About in Bavaria >
        • Day 1: Gauting - Bad Tölz
        • Day 2: Bad Tölz - Bad Kohlgrub
        • Day 3: Bad Kohlgrub - Landsberg
        • Day 4: Landsberg - Gauting
    • 2019 >
      • The Season Has Begun
      • Pedaling and Shooting in Bavaria >
        • Day 1
        • Day 2
      • More Pedaling in Bavaria >
        • Day 1
        • Day 2
      • Cycling the Inn in Austria >
        • Day 1 Gautig to Tölz
        • Day 2 Tölz to Jenbach
        • Day 3 Jenbach to Innsbruck
        • Day 4 Innsbruck to Rietz
        • Day 5 Rietz to Landeck
        • Day 6 Landeck and Home
    • 2018 >
      • A Two Day Outing
      • A nine-day tour in Lower Bavaria >
        • Day 1
        • Day 2
        • Day 3
        • Day 4
        • Day 5
        • Day 6
        • Day 7
        • Day 8
        • Day 9
      • The Romantic Road >
        • Day 1 - Füssen to Peiting
        • Day 2 - Peiting to Klosterlechfeld
        • Day 3 - Kosterlechfeld to Gersthofen
        • Day 4 - Gersthofen to Donauwörth
        • Day 5 - Train Ride Home
      • Continuing on the Romantic Road >
        • Day 1 - Donauwörth to Raustetten
        • Day 2 - Raustetten to Dorfgütingen
        • Day 3 - Dorfgütingen to Creglingen
        • Day 4 - Creglingen to Hochhausen
        • Day 5: Hochhausen to Uettingen
        • Day 6 - Uettingen to Würzburg
      • Alpe-Adria Tour 2018 >
        • 1. Alsace or the Alps?
        • 2. We're Off: Munich to Bruckmühl
        • 3. Mountains Aready? Bruckmühl to Übersee
        • 4. Almost Salzburg: Übersee to Freilassing
        • 5. On the Ciclovia Alpe-Adria: Freilassing to Golling
        • 6. A Short Ride: Golling to Werfen
        • 7. A Patch of Blue Sky: Werfen to Sankt Veit
        • 8. Holed up in Sankt Veit
        • 9. The Big Climb: Sankt Veit to Unterkolbnitz
        • 10. Inching Our Way: Kolbnitz to Spittal
        • 11. Flat and Dry: Spittal to Arnoldstein
        • 12. Buongiorno Bella Italia: Arnoldstein to Chiusaforte
        • 13. Best Bike Path Ever: Chiusaforte to Tavagnacco
        • 14. Closer to the Sea: Tavagnacco to Palmanova
        • 15. Last Day on the Road: Palmanova to Grado
        • 16. Grado and How We Got Home
    • 2016 >
      • To Berlin and Beyond
    • 2013 >
      • Eight Wheels in Transit
    • 2011 >
      • From Passau to Vienna
    • 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006
  • Day Rides
    • Rides 2023
    • 2022 Rides
    • 2021 Walks and Rides
    • 2020 Bicycle Days
    • 2019 Rides >
      • Bicycle Days 2019
    • 2018 Rides >
      • Bicycle Days 2018
      • 2018 Monthly Challenges
      • Cycling in Circles
    • 2017 Rides and Challenges >
      • Late to the Party
      • The Munich Kaffeeklatsch
  • Bicycle Memories
    • 1981: Bicycling with Daniel
    • 1981 - Passau to Vienna
    • 1982 - Provence with Daniel
    • 1985: Believe It or Not
    • 1986 - Southwest France
  • About
  • Contact
  • My Blog
  • Miscellaneous
    • Hochbunkers in Munich