Graveyard church of Heaven’s Gate, Münchberg

It’s what all margrave churches should be and is in the very name of the ‘God’s acre’ church in Münchberg: the entrance to Heaven. According to evangelical doctrine, the only way to get there is through belief in Jesus Christ. This belief comes from preaching the Gospel, and that is why the pulpit is in the centre of the church, flanked by two mighty pairs of pillars, like the portico of a Greek temple. The pulpit roof takes the fom of a crown and promises the believers the crown of life.The reclining figure near to the Risen Christ shows a victory wreath, whilst the other figure holds a quiver of arrows as a symbol of pain. Above all of this, a halo of rays of light shines out as a sign of the glory of God, into which man will enter after death.It was Hof sculptor Wolfgang Adam Knoll who made the pulpit altar for the new graveyard church built in 1747 – and with its stuccoed ceiling and double galleries it is a baroque church worth seeing.
The inscription above the entrance dated 1581 commemorates the first church building in the new graveyard, which was situated outside the city walls owing to lack of space.Some of the old gravestones can be seen on the exterior walls, and some are inside.In time of war, the church was misused time and again by the military as a camp, etc., and yet its position outside the town protected it from being burnt down in the great town fire of 1837. After the fire, the town church nearby was rebuilt in neo-Gothic style, and now just one ‘trumpeting angel’ and the baptismal angel are all that remain of the former margrave church.