Johannes Joseph van der Velden

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Johannes Joseph van der Velden (born August 7, 1891 in Übach ; † May 19, 1954 in Krefeld ) was a Catholic theologian and bishop of Aachen .

Live and act

Van der Velden studied theology in Bonn between 1910 and 1915 and attended the seminary in Cologne . On June 24, 1915, he was ordained a priest in Cologne. He then worked as vicar in Frielingsdorf , then as chaplain in Mönchengladbach- Hardterbroich and finally as parish rector in Rheydt -Geneicken.

Between 1926 and 1929 van der Velden was then general secretary of the papal work for the spread of the faith of the Franziskus-Xaverius-Missionsverein in Aachen . From 1929 to 1935 he was General Director of the People's Association for Catholic Germany . However, against the background of the global economic crisis, he did not manage to save the club from decline. Between 1929 and 1933 he was also the editor of “Katholische Korrespondenz.” The Königswinterer Kreis, which he co-founded in 1930, to which Oswald von Nell-Breuning , Götz Briefs and Gustav Gundlach belonged, worked out essential elements that were later received found in the encyclical Quadragesimo anno of 1931.

After the beginning of the National Socialist rule , he was initially indicted in the so-called People's Association Trial in 1935. It was later dropped again. Between 1933 and 1938 he was Vice President of the Papal Work for the Propagation of the Faith. Then until the closure of the seminary in Aachen in 1942 and there at the same time professor of pastoral and moral theology .

In 1943 he was elected Bishop of Aachen and on September 7, 1943 by Pope Pius XII. appointed bishop of the diocese of Aachen . The episcopal ordination on October 10, 1943 was donated to him by Josef Cardinal Frings .

During the time of National Socialism, van der Velden, as he later stated to the Americans, had contact with the resistance . When Aachen was occupied by the American armed forces in October 1944, he stayed in the city at the request of resistance circles and advised the occupation authorities on setting up an administration. He recommended the appointment of Franz Oppenhoff as Lord Mayor to the American military commander . He also campaigned against planned assignments of territory to Belgium and the Netherlands. In January 1945 the American secret service officer Saul K. Padover conducted a long interview with van der Velden, which he published in 1946.

After the war, he mainly devoted himself to rebuilding the destroyed churches and Catholic institutions.

honors and awards

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Saul K. Padover: Experiment in Germany. The Story of an American Intelligence Officer. New York 1946. German under the title: Liegendetektor. Interrogations in defeated Germany in 1944/45. From the American v. M. Fienborck. Frankfurt / Main 1999, pp. 204-211
  2. ^ Siegfried Koß, Wolfgang Löhr (Hrsg.): Biographisches Lexikon des KV. 7th part (= Revocatio historiae. Volume 9). Akadpress, Essen 2010, ISBN 978-3-939413-12-7 , p. 163.

literature

Web links

predecessor Office successor
Hermann Joseph Sträter
( Apostolic Administrator )		 Bishop of Aachen
1943 - 1954 		Johannes Pohlschneider
personal data
SURNAME Velden, Johannes Joseph van der
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Catholic bishop of Aachen
DATE OF BIRTH August 7, 1891
PLACE OF BIRTH Ubach
DATE OF DEATH May 19, 1954
Place of death Krefeld