Pfarrkirche Ernsthofen

The parish church of St Mary’s Flight into Egypt stands in the centre of Ernsthofen, a village in the Amstetten district of Lower Austria. It sits just south of the cemetery, facing north with a tall south tower. The church is listed as a protected monument and belongs to the deanery of Haag in the diocese of St Pölten. The building began in the 14th century as a chapel dependent on St Valentin’s parish, under the Erla monastery. After repeated floods forced the village to move east, the present church was rebuilt in 1666 on new foundations while keeping the old layout. The architect Georg Bruckmayr supervised the work, completed in 1677 and consecrated a decade later. In the late 19th century the interior was refitted in historicist style by Max Oberhuber, and the organ by Josef Breinbauer dates from the same period. Inside, the nave and the polygonal chancel form a single early-baroque space. The tower on the south side rises above the main entrance. The furnishings combine neo-Romanesque and neo-Gothic elements, and the walls show traces of earlier frescoes uncovered during restorations in 1893–94 and again in 1977 and 1998. The churchyard to the north contains simple gravestones and a line of mature linden trees.