St James Lutheran Church (Viimsi Püha Jaakobi
kogudus in Estonian) is at Nurme tee 3, in Pringi Village, Viimsi, just
a few hundred metres north of Viimsi Baptist Church. This is the newest
church in the region. Designed by Erkki Ristoja and Martin Aunin, construction
started in 2003, making it the only church (to date) within the Estonian
Evangelical Lutheran Church organisation to have been built after the
Second World War. Its congregation was formed on 5 March 1994.
The church seats 230, with a bell tower thirteen metres
high. Construction was aided by private donations and financial support
from the local council, which totalled about seven million Estonian crowns
(£390,000). It was consecrated on 25 July 2007 and was erected to
honour the memory of those who have perished at sea, as well as to
serve local people. The two bells are named Memento Mori and Memento Vivere,
and the smaller one rings on the quarter hour.
The Chapel of St Laurence (Püha Laurentsiuse
kabel) is at Lääneotsa on Prangli Island, which is to the north-east of
Tallinn and Viimsi, about ten kilometres off the coast. The cemetery
nestles alongside the church, on the southern side of the island. The
chapel was built between 1846-1847, by Johan Klamas Rammult Uuetoa and
his brother-in-law, Abram S Liljeberg Pirti, who also shipped over houses
to build on the island from Sipoo in Finland (on the outskirts of Helsinki).
The wooden chapel apparently opened in 1848. A
certain amount of renovation work was carried out in 1860, which is
when the weather vane on the bell cote was installed, with the date
marked upon it. The chapel of ease (to Viimsi parish) serves over
one hundred inhabitants on the island, which also boasts a school
and a parish hall (or 'village house'). The island has been
inhabited since at least the fourteenth century, but the origin of
any earlier inhabitants is unknown.
