Hildegard Burjan

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Hildegard Lea Burjan b. Freund (born January 30, 1883 in Görlitz , Lower Silesia ; † June 11, 1933 in Vienna ) was an Austrian social politician and founder of the Caritas Socialis sister community . In 2012 she was beatified by the Roman Catholic Church .

Hildegard Burjan as a student (1903)

Life

Memorial plaque for Hildegard Burjan in Vienna- Alsergrund (9th district)
Hildegard-Burjan-Hof, an urban residential complex in Vienna- Hietzing (13th district)

They came from a Jewish -liberalen family and studied in Zurich literature and philosophy , doctorate in 1908 with magna cum laude to the Dr. phil. and then studied social science in Berlin . In 1907 she married the Hungarian Alexander Burjan (born November 26, 1882, † November 6, 1973), whom she had met in Zurich. Sick of severe renal colic , she was admitted to the St. Hedwig Hospital in Berlin on October 9, 1908 , where she was supported by the Sisters of Charity of St. Charles Borromeo was cared for. They impressed them with their self-sacrificing devotion to other people out of faith. After months of unsuccessful efforts, the doctors saw no hope for her and gave her opium to relieve the pain. In the Holy Week of 1909 Hildegard Burjan was near death. However, on the morning of April 11, 1909, the solemnity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ , an unexpected improvement set in, which led to her early discharge after seven months of hospitalization.

In Zurich, Hildegard Burjan had already come into contact with Christian ideas through the literary historian and philosopher Robert Saitschick and the philosopher and educator Friedrich Wilhelm Foerster . However, the lively impression that the foster nurses had given her, as well as the disturbing experience of her unexpected recovery, which began at Easter, led her to an existentially anchored conviction of the truth of the Christian religion and of Jesus of Nazareth as Messiah . In the same year she converted to the Catholic faith and received the sacrament of baptism on August 11, 1909 in the chapel of the Berlin St. Josephs Hospital in Niederwallstrasse . She moved to Vienna, where she and her husband accepted Austrian citizenship and gave birth to their only daughter, Elisabeth, although the doctors urgently advised her to have an abortion .

Tom von Dreger : Hildegard Burjan (1930)

She was particularly committed to women. In 1912 she founded the "Association of Christian in Vienna homeworkers " to support these exploited and disenfranchised population, in 1918 the association "Social Services" and on 4 October 1919, the religious community of sisters Caritas Socialis (CS), which to this day charitable tasks dedicates, u. a. Runs nursing homes and a hospice and is committed to training social professions . She urged women to boycott goods from companies that exploit women.

In late autumn 1918 she worked in German Austria for the Christian Social Party in the provisional Vienna City Council , which was in office until the first fully democratic municipal council election, and became an important figure in politics and the church. From March 4, 1919 to November 9, 1920 she was (elected on February 16, 1919 in the first election in which women had unrestricted active and passive voting rights ) a Christian Social Member of the Constituent National Assembly , which on April 3, 1919 Habsburg Law and the Nobility Repeal Law and on October 1, 1920 passed the central provisions of the Austrian Federal Constitution , which are essentially still valid today . She looked for political allies across all party lines.

Burjan was later called the “ conscience of parliament ” and “homeworker mother of Vienna”. She fought for the rights and equality of women. “Equal pay for equal work” was one of their most important political demands. In 1920 she left federal politics, devoted herself to social tasks and committed unorthodox solutions to the material needs of her time. She was involved in the formation of the new Austrian station mission and in family care facilities such as the medium-sized kitchens. She built a home in Pramergasse in Vienna's 9th district for mothers with unmarried children and a difficult social environment, as well as an outlet for free clothing. This made her a pioneer of modern social work.

She was very close to the prelate and Christian Social Chancellor Ignaz Seipel , who headed the government for a total of five and a half years. On the one hand, he accompanied her activities as a clergyman and, on the other hand, as a politician, made many of her projects possible. After his death in 1932 she initiated the construction of the Christ the King's Church in Vienna as a memorial church for Seipel in the 15th district of Vienna .

Hildegard Burjan was, due to the professional position of her husband Alexander Burjan, the general director of the Österreichische Telephonfabrik AG , better acquainted with the Christian Social Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, who was murdered in 1934 as the dictator of the National Socialists . During her last serious illness, he took an active part in her condition and sent her a rosary personally dedicated by the Pope. Dollfuss had switched off parliament in March 1933 ; Hildegard Burjan did not experience the expression of Austrofascism or the corporate state anymore. After his death until 1938, Dollfuss was buried like Seipel in the Christkönigskirche, which was called the Seipel-Dollfuss Memorial Church until the National Socialists came to power.

Almost two and a half decades after her unexpected recovery, which had enabled her to devote herself to her life's work, Hildegard Burjan died in the summer of 1933 at the age of 50 and, despite another operation, finally from the recurring kidney disease from which she had already suffered as a teenager and its consequences accompanied them all their lives.

Most recently she lived with her husband in an upper-class villa at Larochegasse 35 in Vienna's 13th district, Hietzing , in the Unter-St.-Veit district (memorial plaque). Alexander Burjan, industrialist and board member of Radio Verkehrs AG (later ORF ), lived there until 1938 and was able to save his life by fleeing to Brazil. He returned after the war and the house, which had been expropriated in the meantime, was transferred back to him. He sold it but stayed in Vienna, where he died in 1973.

The daughter Elisabeth (1910–2005) attended the Dominican schools and lived in London from 1934, later in Washington. She worked in the diplomatic service and after finishing her professional career, she worked for the Vatican as an interpreter for almost 30 years. She died in Rome and was buried in the Central Cemetery in Vienna.

Beatification process

The beatification process for Hildegard Burjan was initiated in 1963 by the Archbishop of Vienna, Cardinal Franz König . After the exhumation , her body was buried on May 4, 2005 in a “place of worship”, in the Hildegard Burjan Chapel in the CS headquarters in the 9th district of Vienna, Alsergrund .

Pope John Paul II visited the Caritas-Socialis-Hospiz Rennweg on June 21, 1998, where he expressed his appreciation for Hildegard Burjan.

The Vienna Archbishop Cardinal Schönborn supported the beatification process: Hildegard Burjan is an impressive figure for the Archdiocese of Vienna , but also for all of Austria - a person to show off , and in a speech he paid tribute to Hildegard Burjan's work with the words: With an open heart for the needs of the times, she campaigned for the rights of the underprivileged and against any social exclusion of marginalized groups by society . On June 7, 2011, the College of Cardinals in Rome recognized the miracle necessary for a beatification. The recognized miracle concerns the healing of a woman who turned to Hildegard Burjan with her request: As a result of several operations, she was unable to give birth to a child. According to the doctors assessing the case, the fact that she later gave birth to three healthy children cannot be explained medically.

Pope Benedict XVI confirmed the decree of the Congregation for Beatification on June 27, 2011, which recognized a miraculous healing through the mediation of Hildegard Burjan (1883–1933) from Görlitz. The beatification took place on January 29, 2012 in St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna by Cardinal Angelo Amato . This was the first beatification in St. Stephen's Cathedral.

Hildegard Burjan's day of remembrance is June 12th.

Appreciation

  • In 1964 the Province of Lower Austria dedicated a window in the Vienna Votive Church .
  • On the occasion of her 100th birthday in 1983, the Austrian Post issued a special postage stamp.
  • In 1984, Burjanplatz in Vienna Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus (15th district) was named after her, and is located directly in front of the Christ the King's Church , which she initiated .
  • Hildegard-Burjan-Hof was the name of an urban residential complex in its last residential district in Vienna, the 13th district , built in 1994/1995 according to plans by Walter Buck at Speisinger Strasse 46-48 with 31 apartments .
  • In her hometown of Görlitz, a place name and a memorial plaque unveiled in 2012 on the house where she was born , Elisabethstraße 36, commemorate her, as well as a bell that was cast in 2013 for the Görlitz Cathedral Church of St. Jakob.
  • A memorial plaque was unveiled in 2017 in the arcades of the Vienna City Hall .
  • In 2017, in the 15th district of Vienna, the parish Hildegard Burjan was founded with her as patron in the course of the amalgamation of parishes .

literature

Movies

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Sister community Caritas Socialis (ed.): Hildegard Burjan. Living with tension. Biography , Vienna 2011, p. 9f.
  2. ^ Sister community Caritas Socialis (ed.): Hildegard Burjan. Living with tension. Biography , Vienna 2011, pp. 8, 10.
  3. ↑ Traces of the Blessed Hildegard Burjan in Berlin. Archdiocese of Berlin , October 13, 2017, accessed on October 21, 2017 .
  4. ↑ Erika Weinzierl : Emancipation? Austrian women in the 20th century. Jugend & Volk, Vienna 1975, p. 159.
  5. ↑ Archive link ( Memento from January 6, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  6. ^ Church in the interwar period by Ingeborg Schödl, accessed on January 29, 2012
  7. ↑ Erika Weinzierl : Emancipation? Austrian women in the 20th century. Jugend & Volk, Vienna 1975, 2007 ISBN 3-7141-7418-4 , p. 168
  8. ↑ Burjan Hildegard and Alexander ( Memento from September 18, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Online presence of VHS Hietzing Project Jews in Hietzing of the VHS Hietzing
  9. ^ Text of the speech
  10. ^ Austria: Burjan, the next blessed? on Vatican Radio
  11. ^ Message kath.net from June 8, 2011
  12. ↑ Burjan beatification on January 29, 2012 in Vienna
  13. ↑ First beatification in St. Stephen's Cathedral on ORF on January 23, 2012, accessed on January 24, 2012
  14. ^ A social pioneer becomes the new blessed , accessed on January 29, 2012.
  15. ↑ Entry on Hildegard Burjan in the Austria-Forum  (as a stamp illustration)
  16. ↑ Vienna honors the social politician and founder of the order Hildegard Burjan on Kathpress from May 15, 2017, accessed on May 15, 2017
  17. ^ [1] on Archdiocese of Vienna, accessed on February 5, 2020
  18. ^ Production West TV Film: co-production ORF and production West: Hildegard Burjan: Anita Lackenberger and Gerhard Mader on the trail of the founder of Caritas Socialis, 2008.

Web links

Commons : Hildegard Burjan  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Burjan, Hildegard
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Friend, Hildegard (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian social politician (CS), member of the state parliament, member of the National Council and founder of the order
DATE OF BIRTH January 30, 1883
PLACE OF BIRTH Goerlitz
DATE OF DEATH June 11, 1933
Place of death Vienna