Ludwig Maria Hugo

Ludwig Maria Hugo, ca.1930

Ludwig Maria Hugo, official death card, 1935

Grave slab, Mainz Cathedral

Ludwig Maria Hugo (born January 19, 1871 in Arzheim , Diocese of Speyer , † March 30, 1935 in Mainz ) was Bishop of Mainz from 1921 to 1935.

Life

Born in Arzheim, southern Palatinate, the son of elementary school teacher Nikolaus Hugo (* July 20, 1838 in Arzheim ; † November 3, 1878 in Arzheim ) who later switched to the Bavarian State Railways as station master and the landlord's daughter Lina Margaretha nee Breitling (* 9 January 1843 in Arzheim ; † May 7, 1898 in Arzheim ). He spent his school days in the Latin school in Grünstadt and in the grammar school and Konvikt von Speyer . Hugo studied in Innsbruck and at the Collegium Germanicum in Rome . There he received on 28 October 1894 from the hands of Cardinal Vicar Lucido Parocchi the priesthood and in 1895 the doctor of theology doctorate . He then worked in the diocese of Speyer in several functions as a priest; first as chaplain from September 2, 1895 in Landstuhl , from September 6, 1897 in Deidesheim and from September 6, 1900 in Kaiserslautern ( St. Martin ), then from September 1, 1903 as prefect of studies in Speyer, and finally from April 23, 1904 as Pastor in Remigiusberg (see Haschbach am Remigiusberg ). Here he published the widely acclaimed book "Catholic Exegesis under a false flag" , in which he denounced modernism "as a simple country pastor" (as he called himself in it) and supported the line of Pope Pius X in the so-called modernism dispute. This is how Bishop Konrad von Busch became aware of him. He called him on October 29, 1905 as cathedral vicar and bishop secretary to Speyer, where he first got a closer look at the administration of a diocese. From November 4, 1911 he was pastor of Bliesdalheim , Saarpfalz . As early as October 1, 1915, during the First World War, Ludwig Maria Hugo took over the leadership of the Speyer diocesan seminary as Regens .

Since the Mainz bishop Georg Heinrich Maria Kirstein could only exercise his office to a limited extent due to illness, Hugo was on March 7, 1921 by Pope Pius XI. appointed coadjutor of the diocese of Mainz and titular bishop of Bubastis . He received the episcopal ordination on April 10, 1921 in Speyer, five days before the death of his predecessor Kirstein, by the Speyer Bishop Ludwig Sebastian . Co-consecrators were the auxiliary bishops Adam Senger from Bamberg and Antonius Mönch from Trier . He took over the leadership of the diocese of Mainz on April 15, 1921 and was enthroned on April 27, 1921. As papal assistant to the throne he was on November 28, 1928 by Pius XI. appointed.

During his term of office, the Mainz Caritas Association flourished and the foundation securing measures at Mainz Cathedral took place . A high point of his pontificate was the consecration of the restored cathedral in 1928 in the presence of the Apostolic Nuncio in Germany, Eugenio Pacelli .

Hugo resolutely opposed the burgeoning National Socialism : As the first German episcopal authority, Hugo's ordinariate in 1930, under the leadership of Vicar General Philipp Jakob Mayer , banned Catholics from membership in the NSDAP . National Socialists were denied reception of the sacraments and church burials in the diocese of Mainz. After the seizure of power by the National Socialists Hugo demonstrated to the third International Congress of Christ the King in 1933 and Ketteler -Feier of the working people in 1934 the Catholic resistance to National Socialism.

literature

• Bishop Dr. Ludwig Maria Hugo - Memoirs , recorded by a priest of the Diocese of Mainz (no name given), 61 pages, Mainz Verlag und Druckerei Lehrlingshaus, 1935
• Dr. Karl Speckner: Guardians of the Church - A book from the German episcopate , Kösel & Pustet Verlag Munich, 1934, pages 218-226
• Ludwig Lenhart : Dr. Ludwig Maria Hugo (1871-1935). A theological-religiously distinctive, the National Socialism early see through the Palatinate on the Mainz bishop's chair (1921-1935) , in: AmrhKG 18 (1966), p. 119.
• Hugo- A bishop, a pastor and his picture , Hösbach, 2018

Web links

• Entry on Ludwig Maria Hugo on catholic-hierarchy.org
• Ludwig Maria Hugo on "Saarland Biographies"
• Biographical page in the portal "regionalgeschichte.net"

predecessor	Office	successor
Georg Heinrich Maria Kirstein	Bishop of Mainz 1921–1935	Albert Stohr