Saint Sava Church in Southern Kosovska Mitrovica Celebrates Patron Saint’s Day The Church of Saint Sava in southern Kosovska Mitrovica has turned a scarred battlefield of the 2004 pogrom into a defiant altar of continuity, as local Serbs gathered to celebrate their patron saint’s day under the gaze of unfinished walls and damaged icons.

On Tuesday, the church marked its slava, the Feast of the Transfer of the Relics of Saint Sava, with a festive liturgy attended by believers who remain in the overwhelmingly Albanian southern part of the divided city. The celebration was described as “solemnly” observed, with full church ritual despite the small size of the remaining Serbian community.

Chronologically, the story stretches back more than two decades. The Church of Saint Sava was “burned and destroyed in the March pogrom against Serbs in 2004,” with reconstruction beginning only in 2014, a slow, symbolic rebuilding project in a neighborhood where Serbs have largely fled.

At this year’s liturgy, Archimandrite Mihailo, abbot of the Monastery of the Holy Archangels near Prizren, placed the day’s ritual squarely in that history of violence and attrition. He noted that “although there are few Serbs in South Mitrovica, they nevertheless exist and gather,” framing the very act of assembly as resistance.

His message was both pastoral and political in tone. The abbot called the path of Christ “the path of the cross and the path of suffering,” insisting that Saint Sava showed this “like none of us,” and casting the damaged church and desecrated graves as proof that neighbors “do not respect anything” and “in every way endanger the space and take everything they can from us.” Yet he pivoted to defiance, telling the faithful that “no force, no temptations can do anything to us as long as we hold on to Saint Sava” and urging them to trust in God to “overcome all storms and shipwrecks.”

After the liturgy, the community cut the slava bread and shared a festive lunch hosted by the Rakić and Baščarević families, turning a ravaged sanctuary into a brief, fragile enclave of normalcy and resolve.