Herz-Jesu-Kirche (Berlin-Charlottenburg)
The Herz-Jesu-Kirche stands on the anger of the former village of Lietzow in the Berlin district of Charlottenburg behind the imposing town hall of the district . It was created at the height of the Kulturkampf from 1875 to 1877 as the first new building project for a Catholic church in the Prussian Charlottenburg.
prehistory
Behind today's church building there was already a chapel and the monastery of the Good Shepherd , where “ fallen girls ” were cared for. A Catholic school was also run here.
After the founding of the empire , more and more Catholics came to the imperial capital. The chapel in Alt-Lietzow became too small.
Church building
The architect Hubert Stier provided the design for the basilica without a tower and without a transept, in which neo-Gothic and neoclassical elements were combined. The cramped building site and the time of the Kulturkampf led to the unusual shape. The church didn't really stand out in the cityscape.
It is a structured masonry structure with predominantly brick facing . The central nave protrudes slightly in the three-axis street facade, and a stepped portal forms the main entrance. Originally a roof turret crowned the facade, which was not rebuilt after the destruction of World War II . Gothic buttresses are built on the sides .
The cross-rib vaulted basilica is designed according to the bound system. The end of the choir is triangular. This unusual detail was only created in 1883 when the choir was added, initially with only the nave . Then previous buildings were partially removed in order to gain space for the choir. The aisles are largely windowless. This was due to the neighboring buildings at the time of construction.
The interior of the church has been redesigned several times. During the last renovation from 1992 to 1995, an attempt was made to bring the interior back to the original painting in terms of color.
The small and colorful choir windows and the mosaics of the twelve apostles underneath, which were created by Lammers in 1937, survived the Second World War . The life-size neo-Gothic cross that hangs high in the center of the choir comes from the time it was built. The baptismal font was salvaged from a beer garden when the church was being built , where it was used as a flower pot. This piece dates from 1537 and is therefore the oldest piece of furniture in the church.
Directly to the left of the church there is a rectory built later in the style of the church. The community center was added after the Second World War.
Parish
From 1913 to 1930, the later provost Bernhard Lichtenberg worked as pastor at the Charlottenburg Herz-Jesu-Kirche . This priest - who was beatified in 1996 - stood up against the National Socialists in the Sacred Heart Congregation during the Weimar period . Even as provost he continued to work against the system, in particular against the conditions in the concentration camps , the disenfranchisement of Jews and against euthanasia . He paid for this resistance with his life in 1943.
In 2006 the congregation had over 7,300 members. In addition to the Sacred Heart Church, St. Thomas Aquinas and the chapel in the Cardinal Bengsch Center also belong to the community. St. Thomas Aquinas is the central church for the Francophone Catholic community in Berlin.
organ
The organ of the church was built in 1972 by the company EF Walcker & Cie with 18 stops on two manuals and a pedal . The purely mechanical instrument has slide chests . The disposition is as follows:
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- Coupling : II / II / P, II / P
Back and side front
Madonna in the entrance area
Baptismal font and Easter candle
Side altar with tabernacle
Organ loft
literature
- Christine Götz, Matthias Hoffmann-Tauschwitz (ed.): Churches Berlin Potsdam. Guide to the churches in Berlin and Potsdam . Morus-Verlag and Wichern-Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-87554-368-8 and ISBN 3-88981-140-X .
Web links
- Entry in the Berlin State Monument List
- Website of the congregation Herz-Jesu in Berlin-Charlottenburg
Coordinates: 52 ° 31 ′ 5.7 ″ N , 13 ° 18 ′ 36.1 ″ E