Strahlfeld Monastery
The monastery of St. Dominic in Strahlfeld is a monastery of the Dominican Missionary Sisters of St. Heart of Jesus in Strahlfeld in the town of Roding in the Cham district in Bavaria in the diocese of Regensburg .
history
Ignatia Hasslinger and Alacoque Moosmann bought the dilapidated Strahlfeld Palace on vacation, which was extended by the First World War , in order to prepare young girls for missionary work in Africa as religious women. On May 29, 1917, they moved into the old castle estate with three other candidates. With great effort and effort they rebuilt the ruin. Two years later, a newly arrived candidate said about the condition of the monastery: “This should be a monastery !?” By the time the monastery was canonically built, it was a sizable monastery and the number of candidates was already 26. Despite the great poverty, many young people came Women who wanted to enter.
In 1924, the first female missionaries could be sent from Strahlfeld to the British colony of Rhodesia , now Zimbabwe . In 1971 the 493rd and last young sister was sent to the mission.
In Germany, the sisters were involved in agriculture, horticulture and fruit tree cultivation, etc. In 1923 a housekeeping school was opened for girls , which - with the exception of World War II - existed until 1993.
present
Today the monastery is primarily a dormitory for elderly sisters in need of care, for vacation missionaries and for many who spend their retirement years here after many years of service in Africa or in one of the smaller branches in Germany.
For several years now, the sisters have run a meeting place , an educational and recreational center for adults, families and young people.
From 1994 to 2013 there was a small convent at the parish church of St. Martin in Osterode am Harz in Lower Saxony. The sisters have lived and worked in the Caritas nursing home in Roding for decades. In addition, a few sisters work full-time or voluntarily in pastoral care in the diocese of Regensburg and in missionary work in Germany.
Sisters
Of the more than 800 sisters who belonged to this congregation for over a hundred years, around 580 received basic training for religious life in Strahlfeld, and of these more than two thirds were sent out to serve as missions. Magdala Christa Lewandowski was shot dead by gunmen in 1977 during the Rhodesian Civil War.
Web links
Coordinates: 49 ° 14 ′ 30.8 " N , 12 ° 29 ′ 57.2" E