Johannes Höver

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Johannes Höver

Johannes Höver CFP (full name: Johann Philipp Martin Höver , from 1857 brother Johannes ; born November 10, 1816 in Wahlscheid-Oberstehöhe , † July 13, 1864 in Aachen ) was a teacher and founder of the religious association of the Brothers of the Poor of St. Francis ( Latin Congregatio Fratrum Pauperum Francisci seraphici ) in Aachen.

Life

Johannes Höver was born in Oberstehöhe as the son of a farmer and went to school in Neuhonrath. From 1833 to 1835 he was a private tutor at Gut Zissendorf ( Hennef (Sieg) ). In May 1835 he passed the entrance exam for the teachers' college. At first he was given the vicariate school in Uckendorf . After attending the teachers' college in Brühl for two years , he became a teacher at the one-class elementary school in Breidt bei Birk in November 1837 and at the end of 1843 a teacher at the free school at the parish of St. Peter in Aachen .

In 1846 his wife Anna Maria Katherina (née Zimmermann), mother of their two children, died. Through his niece, Höver came into contact with the founder of the Aachen poor sisters of St. Francis , Franziska Schervier . This gave rise to the idea of ​​looking after neglected young people. On February 22, 1855 he became a member of the Third Order of St. Francis . At Christmas 1857, four brothers of the Third Order founded a cooperative that pursued Höver's idea. After that he was called Brother Johannes . Initially, the first brothers devoted themselves to night-time nursing of poor people, while they worked for the sisters during the day, for which the sisters gave them their maintenance.

In May 1858 the brothers moved into a new home next to the monastery church at the mother house on the corner of Kleinmarschierstrasse and Elisabethstrasse, which was given to the poor sisters of St. Francis belonged. Höver himself also moved to the brothers. In order to be able to devote himself entirely to monastic life, he separated from his two sons (then 12 and 15 years old) and took leave of absence as a teacher. The two sons attended the Stella Matutina Jesuit boarding school in Feldkirch , the son Friedrich Höver became a Jesuit , his brother a politician.

At the beginning of 1860 the number of brothers had grown to 12. The Aachen district president Friedrich von Kühlwetter supported Höver's plans to establish the order. At the beginning of 1860, the cooperative received its first parent company from donations in Alexanderstraße, in which an inn and a beer brewery were operated.

Höver resumed teaching at the St. Peter's free school in April 1860; the number of students was given in August 1861 as 140. Here the cooperative was able to focus on the main task it was supposed to have, caring for neglected male adolescents. The first child was admitted on May 31, 1860, by the fall of 1861 the number rose to over 50, so that the house was soon overcrowded. On January 5, 1861, the Archbishop of Cologne, Cardinal Johannes von Geissel, approved the cooperative's statutes for five years. Thus, the Hövers cooperative was recognized as a "church body" with the status of a diocesan congregation. The final episcopal recognition took place on July 1, 1872. On February 8, 1863, the cooperative took over as a branch of an institution for poor and abandoned boys in Cologne.

In the spring of 1861, Höver began to show the first signs of a serious illness. The condition deteriorated considerably in the spring of 1862. In the autumn of 1863 he traveled to Kaiserswerth without finding the expected relief from his severe headache. On this trip he suffered a stroke. New strokes made the condition much worse. Therefore he resigned from the office of superior in October 1863 and handed it over to Brother Bonaventura Schaeben. Höver died in July 1864.

A memorial plaque for Johannes Höver is on the cemetery side of the parish church in Neuhonrath . In addition, the long-standing motherhouse in Aachen, Johannes-Höver-Haus , built after his death, was named in his honor , as was a senior citizens' home in the Düsseldorf branch in the mid-1980s and, as early as 1924, a home for weak and sickly orphaned boys in the Franciscan parish of the parish St. Francis in Berlin-Friedrichshagen .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Max Heimbucher : The orders and congregations of the Catholic Church. 2nd, largely revised edition, vol. 2 . Schöningh, Paderborn 1907. p. 500.
  2. ↑ → www.jesuitica.be , accessed on August 5, 2012
  3. ↑ Max Heimbucher : The orders and congregations of the Catholic Church. 2nd, largely revised edition, vol. 2 . Schöningh, Paderborn 1907. p. 501.
  4. ↑ Biographical-Bibliographical Church Lexicon ( Memento from June 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
personal data
SURNAME Höver, Johannes
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Höver, Johann Philipp Martin (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German founder of the Order of the Poor Brothers of St. Francis
DATE OF BIRTH November 10, 1816
PLACE OF BIRTH Voting
DATE OF DEATH July 13, 1864
Place of death Aachen