Veselinje Monastery

The Veselinje Monastery is a Serbian Orthodox monastery dedicated to John the Baptist and located at the village of Vrba 5 km (3.1 mi) south-east of the town of Glamoč, in western Bosnia and Herzegovina. The monastery's church, consecrated on 10 August 1975, was built without intention to found a monastery around it. The ktitor of the church was Veselin Nearlović, a businessman from Buenos Aires, Argentina, who was born in Vrba. After the ktitor agreed with the idea to establish a monastery at the church, monastic buildings were constructed, and the Veselinje Monastery was consecrated on 8 April 1985. The church was built at the site of an earlier, wooden church, which was erected in 1865. It was burned down during World War II, in 1941, by the Ustaše, Croatian fascists. The Ustaše also brutally tortured and murdered the parish priest of Vrba, Simo Banjac, whom the Serbian Orthodox Church canonised as a martyr in 2003. In 1995, at the end of the Bosnian War, the Croatian Army took control of the Municipality of Glamoč.