A church that was funded and largely built from within the Romanian community to serve more than 1,200 worshippers at any one time was officially opened in Dublin on Sunday morning.

The Betania Church in Tyrellstown Dublin 15 which serves Pentecostal Christians, has bucked the trend of recent times that has seen places of worship significantly scaled back and it now stands as one of the largest in Ireland.

It was funded by the community to the tune of around €8 million and almost entirely built by the Romanian faithful, often at weekends and late evenings.

While it opened its doors several months ago, its official ribbon-cutting ceremony was held on Sunday with local TD and Tánaiste Leo Varadkar, the mayor of Fingal Howard Mahony, Romanian government officials and the Romanian ambassador in Ireland Laurenţiu-Mihai Ştefan in attendance.

“Our mission is to spread God’s love to all nations” said pastors Valerian Jurjea, Calin Onitiu and Avram Hadarau. “This was the motivating force behind the project.”