Maria Merkert

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Maria Merkert

Maria Luise Merkert (born September 21, 1817 in Neisse (Upper Silesia) ; † November 14, 1872 ibid) was a co-founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Elisabeth ( Gray Sisters ) and was beatified on September 30, 2007 .

Youth and Nursing Association

Maria Luise Merkert was born on September 21, 1817 in Neisse as the second daughter of the bricklayer Anton Merkert and his wife Maria Barbara. Like her sister Mathilde, she attended elementary school. The strictly Catholic girls made their first experiences with nursing during the cholera epidemic in the years 1831 to 1833 and with caring for their mother with lung disease. The girls developed the desire to take on nursing as a life's work. Together with her sister Mathilde, she joined the women's association for outpatient nursing on September 27, 1842, which had been initiated by Klara Wolff and Franziska Wernerbelonged to. The task of the association was the home care of the sick and abandoned. Together with senior chaplain Franz Fischer, in 1844 they drafted the association's statutes and house rules for the house inhabited by women. The association was named the sister association for the care of helpless sick people under the protection of the most sacred heart of Jesus .

In 1846, at the insistence of the church authorities, they joined the Borromean Sisters , a religious order active in nursing . Mathilde Merkert became infected with typhus in 1846 while nursing the sick and died, Klara Wolff resigned from the order during the novitiate , Franziska Werner and Maria Merkert left the order in 1850 because they saw their vocation in home nursing , while the Borromean women predominantly in Hospitals worked.

Foundation of the St. Elisabeth Society

Together with Franziska Werner, Maria Merkert began again with her apostolate in Neisse on November 9, 1850, the feast day of St. Elisabeth , who had elected her patroness of the community. The statutes were based on those of the first nursing association run by women; they were called the Gray Sisters of St. Elizabeth .

Church recognition of the Gray Sisters

The Breslau prince-bishop Heinrich Förster recognized the St. Elisabeth Association on September 4, 1859 as a church community. At that time the association had more than sixty members and had thirteen branches. Her fellow sisters unanimously elected Maria Merkert as the first general superior , and the prince-bishop confirmed her in this office on December 27, 1859. She subsequently took over the leadership of the community. In some cases she met with rejection because she was viewed as a resigned Borromean who endangered the good work of this order in the city.

Since the parish did not support her, she worked with the city council. The mayor set up a board of trustees that gave the sister community a legal form, managed donations and made it easier to set up foreign branches. This made the sisters known and gained general prestige. A pastor who knew her well wrote about her: “Besides, I couldn't suggest any of the sisters who would be better suited to be Superior General than Sister Maria Merkert. She is inflamed with great love for the poor and sick, she kills herself to be able to help others; she is clever and agile in the most difficult situations; she enjoys great respect and love from all the sisters and exercises unconditional rule over all. It is your merit, next to the grace of God, that the St. Elisabeth Association has developed in the current way. "

Maria Merkert made her profession on May 5, 1860 .

The sister community received new statutes on June 8, 1860. She no longer needed the help of the board of trustees of the Neiss city administration. Although Maria Merkert was urged to move the motherhouse of the community to the seat of the bishop in Breslau , she left it in Neisse and had a representative motherhouse built there. It was inaugurated on November 21, 1865. On January 8, 1864, Maria Merkert founded the Catholic Charity for St. Elisabeth (KWA) in Neisse as the sponsor for the social work of the St. Elisabeth Association . Soon after, the Danish War broke out and the Elisabeth Sisters were among the first Catholic religious to care for the wounded. Due to its achievements, the Prussian King Wilhelm I recognized the KWA on May 23, 1864 as a legal person.

Memorial plaque for Maria Merkert in Neisse

From around 1866 Maria Merkert suffered from a liver or heart condition, which worsened considerably in 1872. Shortly before her death, on June 7, 1871, the Order received papal approvals from Pope Pius IX. She died on November 14, 1872 at the age of 55, leaving behind a congregation which at that time already had over 440 sisters in 87 branches. Her successor in the office of General Superior was Franziska Werner.

beatification

On July 16, 1964, the remains of Maria Merkert and Franziska Werner were transferred to the crypt of St. Jakobus Church in Neisse and buried in a side chapel of the church. On February 19, 1985, Bishop Alfons Nossol of Opole opened the process of beatification . Pope John Paul II recognized their heroic virtues on December 20, 2004, and Pope Benedict XVI. confirmed a miracle at her intercession on June 1, 2007. On September 30, 2007 Maria Merkert was beatified in Neisse in a church service celebrated by Cardinal José Saraiva Martins .

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personal data
SURNAME Merkert, Maria
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Merkert, Maria Luise; Merkert, Maria Louisa
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Co-founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth
DATE OF BIRTH September 21, 1817
PLACE OF BIRTH Neisse
DATE OF DEATH November 14, 1872
Place of death Neisse