Pfarrkirche Neukirchen am Walde

The parish church of Neukirchen am Walde stands in the village centre of Neukirchen am Walde in Upper Austria’s Grieskirchen district. Built for Saint John the Baptist, the church belongs to the Peuerbach deanery in the Diocese of Linz and is protected as a listed monument. Its late-Gothic nave was extended in 1668 by a Baroque side chapel dedicated to Saint Bernard. The four-bay hall has unusual three-star ribbed vaults because the windows sit between the piers. A pointed spire crowns the tower at the south-east corner, while the sacristy retains its original net-ribbed ceiling. Inside, Franz Stadler’s 1765–66 high altar carries Bartolomeo Altomonte’s painting of the Baptism of Christ. The side altars date from the 19th century, the Rococo pulpit from about 1770. The Bernhard chapel holds a 17th-century altar with a scene of Saint Barbara’s beheading, and a 1780s crucifix and Mater Dolorosa hang in the nave.