Sint-Jan Baptistkerk

Sint-Jan Baptistkerk stands in Berendrecht, part of Antwerp, as a brick church shaped by centuries of rebuilding. Its entrance portal sits beneath a gabled roof. Inside, the central nave rises beneath a wooden pointed barrel vault, while the late Gothic choir ends in three sides. The late Gothic choir survived the twentieth-century reconstruction.

After flooding destroyed the original village, the community moved to higher ground in 1329 and established the first church. A new choir followed during rebuilding in 1685. Side aisles arrived in 1846, then the nave, side choirs, and front tower changed the building in 1869. The Belgian army destroyed that tower in 1940. Reconstruction from 1941 to 1943 preserved the late Gothic choir. Religious services ended here in 2018, when the chapel of Our Lady of Hagelberg became the parish church.

The interior holds a seventeenth-century polychrome wooden statue of John the Baptist and a crucifix from the same period. Michiel Coxie painted the Calvary scene in 1573. Other works include The Holy Family with the Young John and an eighteenth-century painting by J.M. Froiy. The wooden pulpit inside the church dates from 1730. Outside, gravestones remain, including one dating from 1400.