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Biserica Bălăneanu — Iancu Nou

By Tronaru Iulia

  • LOCATION

Bălăneanu Church — Iancu Nou stands at Șoseaua Mihai Bravu no. 117-119, Sector 2, near where it meets Șoseaua Iancului and Vatra Luminoasă street. The name comes from Stanciu Ioan Bălăneanu, a local merchant who donated the land the church was built on.

The story started with 218 parishioners of the old Iancu Church, people living "outside the Iancu barrier" who needed a place of worship closer to home. On February 19, 1872, archpriest Alecu Hartofilax reported the merit of the request to Metropolitan Nifon, and 24 parishioners and landowners from the suburb pledged 5,000 lei each toward it. Building began on June 14, 1873, and finished on December 2 that same year, when the church was consecrated. Its patron saints are St. Nicholas, St. Haralambie, and Saints Constantine and Helena.

Architecturally, the church follows a triconch plan, measuring 32 by 13 by 16 meters, with two matching octagonal towers. The walls are hand-made Oltenian brick, bound with hydraulic lime mortar, and a frieze of geometric and floral motifs runs around the building. The porch has three painted blind arcades on the façade, and inside it a spiral metal staircase climbs to the choir loft. The carved wooden iconostasis, wall paneling, and bishop's throne are the work of sculptor Grigore Dumitrescu.

The building has gone through several rounds of repairs — 1907-1908, 1928, when the bell tower went up, 1940, after the narthex tower collapsed in the earthquake, then 1957 and 1977-1978. The original painting, in oil, dates from 1912-1913; it was redone in fresco between 1957 and 1959 by Gheorghe Vânătoru, restored in 1984 by Virginia Videa, then again in 1995-1996 by Marian Rondelli. The most recent major work, conservation and infill painting, ran from 2014 to 2017.

Between 2009 and 2014, an entire parish complex went up: a new mortuary chapel shaped like a nave outside and a triconch inside, a 17-meter bell tower with three automated bells, a holy-water fountain, and a candle house, alongside structural consolidation on the old church. On June 30, 2019, 146 years after the foundation stone was laid, the church was reconsecrated in a rite led by Bishop-vicar Varlaam Ploieșteanul, with the relics of St. Ephrem the New brought in for veneration.

The parish is currently led by priest Laurențiu Lazăr, parish priest since September 2020, alongside priests Eugen Bruno Marin and Constantin Daniel Cojocaru and deacon Cosmin Băjănică.