Alexian monastery Aachen
.JPG)
The Alexian Monastery in Aachen is the motherhouse of the religious order of the Alexian Brothers at the Alexianergraben in Aachen , whose first documentary mention is dated to 1391. The building complex that stands there today consists of the convent building (Clemensbau) with the St. Alexius Church and the rear wing of the attached Alexianer Hospital (Quirinusbau). The Clemensbau with the church was rebuilt in 1929 according to plans by the Düsseldorf architect Wilhelm Pauen (1865–1949) and placed under monument protection in 1980 .
history
After around 1334 some brothers from the local Begarden , a Catholic religious order for lay brothers in nursing, from which the Cologne Alexians had developed around 140 years later , were sent to Aachen to set up a branch there, too this foundation to the construction of a local monastery building. This was first mentioned in a document in 1391 and was located on a property directly outside the city wall of Aachen at the height of the Scherptor at that time , where the later successor buildings were also built. On March 18, 1469, this new building was elevated to a convent house by Ludwig von Bourbon , the incumbent bishop of Liège , and given the privileges to erect an oratory and a portable altar there. After Pope Sixtus IV had given all monastery brothers and sisters permission to equip their convent buildings with a church or chapel and a “modest” tower with a small bell on June 9, 1472 , this was also the case with the “Begarden” in Aachen initiated. In 1477 the chapel was completed and dedicated to both St. Augustine of Hippo and St. Consecrated to Alexius von Edessa , whereupon the order officially appeared in public as the "Alexian Order" for the first time.
In the following two centuries, the Aachen monastery was expanded again and again and the building complex was modernized in line with the times. This was also due to the fact that after the plague receded and the Thirty Years War ended, the Alexians took on new tasks in caring for mentally ill people, which led to the establishment of the first psychiatric clinics. Only the fire in Aachen in 1656 caused a severe setback for the monastery, when the monastery buildings were also badly affected and the chapel itself was completely destroyed. While the convent building could be completely renovated and used again by 1661, the construction of a new and more spacious monastery church lasted until 1683, the re-inauguration in honor of St. Alexius finally took place on July 29, 1687. Although it was kept very simple on the outside, the interior was characterized by contemporary, sophisticated baroque furnishings.
Further structural extensions were carried out in the 18th century and the refectory was restored. Under French rule from 1795 to 1815, the monastery was spared from state-decreed secularization , despite considerable restrictions , since the Alexians had a necessary charitable status in society due to their charitable and caring tasks. In addition, the Alexians were entrusted with the administration of the Aachen East Cemetery , which was newly established in 1803, and they took care of this for many decades until the commercial funeral home was founded in 1922. There they found their own resting place in a large burial ground before they were given a new burial area in Aachen's Westfriedhof from 1918 .
After the Alexians from Aachen founded further branches in England, Ireland and the USA in the second half of the 19th century, the growing Aachen religious order also developed into a worldwide congregation with four provinces, two of them in Germany and one each in the UK and USA. This also increased the need for more space in the now official Aachen parent company. As a result, in 1872/73 there was a small extension on the west side and in 1880 a larger new building on the street side along the Alexianergraben, the so-called "Clemensbau". Eight years later, the large hospital wing was added on the south side, called the “Quirinus Building”, and in 1896 another hospital wing was added on the west side, mostly according to plans by the Aachen architect Hermann Josef Hürth .
After the First World War , the Alexians were faced with further major challenges due to the numerous injured or post-traumatically disturbed returnees, and the house in Aachen, in addition to its main task as a "sanatorium and nursing home for the mentally ill", was no longer able to perform the tasks of a mother house of the ever-expanding brotherhood perceive. At the beginning of the 1920s, this led to the decision to extensively rebuild and expand the Aachen complex again, to which the Düsseldorf church and monastery builder Wilhelm Pauen could be committed. The wing for the General Curia was inaugurated as early as 1925, followed by the solemn inauguration of the new monastery church by the Aachen auxiliary bishop Hermann Joseph Sträter on February 2, 1929 . During the subsequent demolition of the old chapel to the right of the main wing from 1683, the remains of the dead buried there were found during excavation work, which were then walled up under the choir of the new church and a memorial inscription in the crypt under the sacristy reminds of them. After the rest of the work on the monastery complex had been completed, the renewed motherhouse was consecrated on September 15, 1931.
Shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War , the monastery was dissolved by the ruling National Socialists and occupied with labor columns and forced labor. Later it was to be converted into a theater, but this never happened. At Easter 1944 the buildings and especially the generalate, the church and the front building were badly damaged by air raids with fire bombs and only the tower with the towering cross survived the hail of bombs. The most valuable church treasures could previously be saved by outsourcing. With the invasion of the Allies, the monastery temporarily served as a replacement barracks for American troops. After the end of the war and the later withdrawal of the Americans, who took two still existing oil paintings and a large part of the old books with them, the reconstruction of the monastery complex began immediately under the direction of the architect Friedrich Tappert, with the parent house with the Sick wards and in 1954 the church was completed. 28 years later, in 1982, it received another extensive redesign according to the rules of the Second Vatican Council and finally its current face with a final renovation and restoration in 2006.
Building description Clemensbau with St. Alexius Church
.JPG)
Of the several building wings erected on a polygonal plot and nested with one another in irregular angular functions, the main building, the "Clemensbau" with its red brick construction, which runs along the Alexianergraben and is a listed building, stands out. In the center of the street-side facade is dominated by the seven-story, square monastery tower built around a narrow axis. Its basement is filled by the main entrance, which is entirely furnished with bluestone blocks , with its high rectangular, low-lying entrance door between two narrow, high-rectangular side windows. Above the horizontal lintel stands on a small plinth and above a stone band of inscriptions with the inscription: "Caritas Christi urget" the figure of St. Alexius. The seventh floor of the tower is equipped with open, high and pointed window hatches with half-height protective grilles and thus obviously serves as a viewing platform. The flat roof is crowned by a high cross, which is held down by a life-size angel figure.
To the west of the tower, i.e. to the right of the main entrance, there is a nine-axis, three-storey building wing with a seven-axis mansard roof over the wide, continuous roof cornice . To the east of the entrance there is a seven-axis wing with a simple saddle roof , which is also separated from the upper floor by a wide cornice. In the middle of this east wing is the monastery church, whose apse with its three narrow and tapering twin windows protrudes slightly out of alignment . A stepped gable structure adorned with a small cross rises above the eaves of the apse, in whose niche there is a statue of St. Anthony is set up. The easternmost corner of the roof ridge is crowned by a small octagonal bell tower with open sound hatches and a small decorative ball on its pointed roof.
The majority of the tall and narrow church windows with various apostle figures were renewed during the last restoration in 2006. In addition, there are several old ornamental windows made of lead glass from the beginning of the 20th century in the hallway and stairwell.
Access to the church is only possible via the foyer in the entrance area of the Clemensbau. From there, a small vestibule opens up, which is adorned by a star-shaped stone star embedded in the floor, on which, in addition to a psalm, the years of the consecration and the last restoration are engraved. On the left side of the anteroom is the Pietà and next to it is the Resurrection Chapel with the risen Christ, the Easter candle and the holy water jug. Along the outer walls of the church choir , the individual stations of the Way of the Cross are attached in the form of oil paintings and a few figures of saints are set up to the right and left of the pews. In the center of the chancel is the celebration altar with the ambo and on the back of the altar wall is the high altar built in baroque style . A tabernacle made by Franz Wüsten in 1928 is integrated into this in front of an ornamental shell modeled as an "eagle's wing" with a three-tier crown on top. Several smaller and reworked side altars in the nave and the chancel complete the church furnishings. The musical accompaniment is provided by an old organ from the Georg Stahlhuth company , which was completely refurbished in 2006 by Weimbs Orgelbau from Hellenthal .
literature
- Albert Huyskens : The beginnings of the Aachen Alexians in the context of the order and local history . Verlag Josef Deterre & Sohn, Aachen 1928
- Birgit Cremers-Schiemann: The history of the Aachener Alexianer Brothers , Verlag Alexianer GmbH, Münster 1999, ISBN 978-393-03300-3-4
Web links
- Chronicle of the St. Alexius Church in Aachen
- History mother house Aachen , on the homepage of the order community of the Alexianerbrüder
Individual evidence
- ↑ Alexian monastery in: Albert Huyskens: The old Aachen - its destruction and its reconstruction . Verlag Aachener Geschichtsverein, Aachen 1953. pp. 39–40
- ^ Aachen Alexianerkloster / Alexianerkrankenhaus , portrait of the windows on the pages of the research center for glass painting of the 20th century
Coordinates: 50 ° 46 '19.7 " N , 6 ° 4' 54.9" E