Evangelical Diakoniewerk Gallneukirchen
| Evangelical Diakoniewerk Gallneukirchen | |
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| legal form |
non-profit association ( ZVR : 405344058) |
| founding | 1874 |
| Seat | Gallneukirchen |
| people | Josef Scharinger, Heinz Thaler, Rainer Wettreck |
| Employees | 3,500 |
| Website | www.diakoniewerk.at |
The Evangelical Diakoniewerk Gallneukirchen has developed into a diaconal group of companies in the recent past, based on the “Association for Inner Mission” - an association anchored in Upper Austria as a core federal state. The Diakoniewerk is a member of Diakonie Österreich, one of the five largest charities in Austria.
Field of activity
People in old age find special support in various day care and residential facilities as well as at home. For people with disabilities, the Diakoniewerk is active according to their individual needs in work and day structures, living and therapy facilities, advisory services and mobile services. Children find professional support and training in childcare facilities, as do pupils in schools for health and social care professions. The health sector includes medical and nursing care, obstetrics and preventive health care in clinics as well as various forms of therapy in therapy centers.
The Diakoniewerk responds to the social needs and needs of the people with neighborhood work, family counseling and refugee work. New forms of living for all generations are created based on the concept of neighborhood work. The increasing manifestations of poverty are countered with regional projects and initiatives. The wide range of activities is supplemented by three homes for students, a hotel, a bookstore, a nursery with health food store and a training academy.
history
The origins go back to the time 1806 to 1815, when the Catholic priest Martin Boos worked in Gallneukirchen. Because of his sermons, some of the faithful turned away from the Catholic faith, the so-called Boosians , from which the Protestant parish later emerged (1846 as part of the Protestant community of Thening , independent from 1870). Around 1864 the pastor Ludwig Schwarz heard about the writings of Martin Boos and Boosians. He was transferred from Gorizia to Gallneukirchen and became the first pastor of the newly founded Protestant parish. In 1874 he founded the Association for Inner Mission with the Protestant parish . In order to get suitable specialists for the help and care of people in need, the association resorted to the tradition of deaconesses. Thus, in 1877 the foundation of the deaconess mother house Bethanien with two deaconesses, Elise Lehner from Kirchberg-Thening and Elisabeth Obermeir from Leonding . Ludwig Schwarz kept in close contact with his brother Ernst Schwarz, who only a short time later founded the Protestant Diakoniewerk Waiern in Carinthia .
Soon the sphere of activity of the association and the deaconesses extended beyond the Mühlviertel and Upper Austria. Elise Lehner was elected in 1888 as the first superior of the now 18 deaconess sisterhood. In 1909, 95 sisters moved into the newly built deaconess mother house Bethanien in Gallneukirchen. They understood their work in the sense of the biblical verse from the letter to the Galatians, which can be read above the entrance to the mother house: "In Christ Jesus the faith that is active through love applies" .
The work of the association expanded constantly, also in the war and interwar years. Therefore, the areas of activity of the deaconesses were very diverse - from the nursing of the sick and the elderly, to the care of people with disabilities, of children in homes, boarding schools and kindergartens and of people looking for relaxation, to work as a community nurse, the tasks ranged. Geographically, almost the entire area of the then Danube Monarchy was covered.
The National Socialist rule also left its mark on the people in the Diakoniewerk. In January 1941, 64 people with disabilities were murdered in Hartheim Castle near Alkoven. A memorial in the garden of Haus Bethanien reminds of this today. After the Second World War, the number of deaconesses reached its all-time high as a result of the admission of deaconesses who had fled from Eastern European mother houses. In 1957 the association was renamed "Diakonissenanstalt".
With the year 1963 and the last blessing of deaconesses began the successive downsizing of the deaconess sisterhood and the number of diaconal sisters, which had existed since 1939 as another further form of sisterhood. Today there are still eleven deaconesses and five deaconal sisters living in the evening peace house, the former mother house receives with the Upper Austria. State special exhibition 2015 and the subsequent use by facilities for the disabled and senior work as well as education a new provision.
Despite the decreasing number of sisters, the facilities and fields of work of the social enterprise, which was renamed "Evangelisches Diakoniewerk Gallneukirchen" in 1971, were expanded with more and more secular employees. The commitment of the deaconesses has contributed significantly to the fact that the Diakoniewerk was able to develop into a recognized company in the social, health and educational sectors.
House of Bethany
The Bethanien House is a symbol of the 140-year history of the Diakoniewerk; for more than 100 years it served as the mother house, home and retreat for the deaconesses, the only Protestant sisterhood that saw itself as a community of life, faith and service Has. In the mother house, the deaconesses prepared for their service as trial sisters and sometimes lived here entirely when their place of work was in the immediate vicinity. They have returned here to recover from their challenging service in the community of sisters and to strengthen themselves spiritually. With the end of the deaconess tradition, the deaconess mother house Bethanien has lost its purpose. Thanks to the state special exhibition in 2015, the Diakoniewerk was able to prepare the house in a high-quality way for a modern and contemporary subsequent use, but at the same time to do justice to the legacy of the deaconesses, the original users and pioneers of social work.
Fields of work
As an innovative company, the Diakoniewerk is active in the various fields of work in the social and health sector. It develops contemporary offers for people with disabilities, for people of old age, in the health and education sectors. Based on the principles of social space orientation, the Diakoniewerk campaigns for an inclusive society to which everyone can belong.
Locations
The Diakoniewerk is active in Upper Austria, Salzburg, Styria, Tyrol, Vienna and at other locations.
literature
- Annual report This is us PDF
- 125 years of Diakoniewerk - charity in our time, Gallneukirchen 1999
Web links
Coordinates: 48 ° 21 ′ 10 ″ N , 14 ° 24 ′ 52 ″ E
Individual evidence