Mechitarists

The Mechitaristen ( Armenian Մխիթարեան ) are a congregation of Armenian-Catholic clergymen ( Italian Congregazione Armena Mechitarista ; order abbreviation : CAM , in Austria CMV ). They celebrate their services according to the Armenian rite , but with certain adaptations to Western customs.

Library of the Mechitarist Monastery

History of the Mechitarists

founding

After the Armenian Mechitar von Sebasteia (1676–1749) entered the Armenian Monastery of the Holy Cross near Sivas (Anatolia) in 1691 , he met the learned Jesuit Jacques Villotte (1656–1743) after his ordination on a trip to Etchmiadzin in Armenia. know. This missionary told him about European culture, science and the Roman Catholic Church . This encounter made a great impression on Mechitar. From then on he wanted to raise the knowledge and belief of the Armenians to a higher scientific and religious level. With his goal in life, however, he encountered considerable resistance from his church hierarchy.

In 1700 he traveled to Constantinople , where in 1701 he founded a congregation for the spiritual and spiritual regeneration of his countrymen. He named his congregation the Order of Saint Anthony .

In Constantinople, the Armenian patriarch suspected of affection for the Catholic Church, Mechitar and his confreres first moved to Methoni in 1703 in the south-western Peloponnese , which was then Venetian. There he built a church with a monastery in honor of St. Anthony in 1706 . After entering the full community of the Catholic Church, the Congregation received from Pope Clement XI. the confirmation the verification. As a condition for the recognition of the congregation, however, the acceptance of an older rule of the order was necessary. The Mechitarists adopted the Benedictine rules of the order and elected Mechitar as their abbot in 1713, and the Congregatio monastica Antonianorum Benedictinorum Armenorum was created . The mechitarists thus belong to the group of Benedictine orders.

Mechitarists from San Lazarro

Mechitarist Monastery of San Lazzaro in Venice

In 1714 the eighth Venetian Turkish War broke out, which was mainly fought in the Peloponnese. The mechitarists, a total of twelve monks, had to flee to Venice . In 1717 her monastery in Methoni was destroyed by the war. In the same year they received as a gift from the Senate of Venice the island of San Lazzaro , on which a stately monastery with a church was built and where Mechitar spent his old age. He died there in 1749. The rules of the order were later reformed under Abbot Stephan Melkonian .

In 1911 the congregation had around 150 Armenian monks and 15 institutions in Europe and Asia. Today the Venetian branch has five convents, two high schools and four schools as well as an Armenian scientific academy and a publishing house. By 2010 the Venetian Congregation had a total of 50 monks.

Viennese mechitarists

Mechitarist Church in Vienna

A dispute over the reformed rules of the order led to the establishment of a further branch of the order in 1772, which initially settled in Trieste , later had to move on due to the Napoleonic wars in Europe and finally settled in Vienna in 1805 (Ordo Mechitaristarum Vindobonensis) . Despite the change in the rules of the order and the dispute, the monks stuck to the founding program of their congregation founder.

In 1810 Emperor Franz I gave him a Capuchin monastery in Ortisei in today's VII. District (new building) , today's Mechitarist College . As a result, the Armenian-Catholic rite was recognized as one of the three rites of the Catholic Church in Austria , the branch is still the body under public law that officially represents this denomination.

In 1842 the Mechitaristengasse was named after the order and its monastery.

The college has its own print shop, which was founded in 1811 and was fully operational until 1998, where works could be printed in 41 different Middle Eastern languages and scripts, as well as a bookshop. Since 1887 they have been publishing a journal of Armenian philology Handés Amsorya . The library is one of the most important Armenian manuscript and magazine collections in the world. In addition, a museum has been set up in which, for example, a valuable coin collection and numerous exhibits on ancient Armenian art and culture can be seen. The Viennese Mechitaristenkirche in Neustiftgasse is called Church Maria Schutz . It was built in 1874 according to plans by Joseph Kornhausel .

Since 1889, the monastery has also been the seat of a distillery, where the herbal liqueur Mechitharine is made, whose recipe dates back to 1680 and is said to have been brought from Istanbul by Mechitar himself.

In 2014 the Vienna Congregation had 17 members. She is also active in missionary work. During the Austro-Hungarian Empire , they established parishes in Budapest , Cambridge (Massachusetts) and Los Angeles . They ran a school in Vienna, and today they run secondary schools in Istanbul , Beirut and Los Angeles.

Merger

In 2000 the General Assembly decided to reunite the two independent religious houses of Vienna and Venice. The Vienna Prior General Paulus Kodjanian resigned from his office and Father Elia Kilaghbian was elected Abbot General of the reunited religious community. The Generalate and the Abbot General reside in Venice, the official abbreviation of the order has been CAM since 2001.

On May 20, 2005, Father Elia Kilaghbian was accepted into the Order of Lazarus as Knight Commander in Venice and was awarded the Grand Cross. In 2010 he was a participant in the Special Assembly of the Synod of Bishops for the Middle East .

activities

Activities according to the founding program

The mechitarists publish literature on patristicism, some works are in the Armenian language and others are translations of Greek or Aramaic originals (classical works), which in turn no longer exist today. In 1789 the first printing house was opened on San Lazzaro.
By the end of the 20th century, they printed and distributed Armenian literature among the Armenians. Thereby they exerted an influence on the Armenian culture and education.
They are school bodies in Europe and Asia. In their schools they train Armenian students up to university entrance qualification.
You work as a pastor in Armenia.

Act

The mechitarists are known for their contributions to Armenian philology, literature, education and culture, as well as for the publication of early Armenian-Christian manuscripts. They were the main protagonists who promoted the renaissance of Armenian culture and education (schooling) in modern times. Because of their knowledge of the Orient and the Occident, they have historically been bridge builders and advisors on questions relating to dialogue and interaction with one another.

Other facilities

Academy of Mechitarists Venice

The Armenian Academy in San Lazzaro, which the Venetian Mechitarists (Ordo Mechitaristarum Venetiarum) originally founded in Rome in 1806, quickly gained a reputation as an important Armenian educational institution. The Academy has published a scientific and literary journal called Pazmaveb since 1843 . In 1836 the Academy first published a dictionary in the Armenian language . Today, the Academy still publishes many scientific works in the Armenian language.

The academy also accepts non-Catholics as honorary members. The library in San Lazzaro is one of the most important in Europe in terms of richness of oriental manuscripts.

Publications

Religion in consideration of the use of all who seek God with a sincere heart, especially for those who are involved in bringing up children, according to Abbé Rohrbacher by Abbé Müller, in the mother house of the Christian school brothers . Vienna. 1852.

literature

The Armenian Monastery in Venice in "The Abroad (1828)"

PA Hennemann: The monastery of the Armenian monks on San Lazzaro . Venice 1872

F. Scherer: Die Mechitaristen in Wien , 5th edition Vienna 1892

Mechitharist Congregation (Ed.): Huschardzan. Festschrift on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Mechitharist Congregation in Vienna (1811–1911) and the 25th year of the philological monthly Handes Amsorya (1887–1911) , Mechitharist Congregation, Vienna 1911, archive.org

Vahan Inglisian: The scientific life of the Armenians in the present , in: Oriens Christianus 39 (1955) 102–111.

Inglisian Vahan: One hundred and fifty years of mechitarists in Vienna (1811–1961) . Vienna 1961.

Mari Kristin Arat: The Vienna Mechitharists: Armenian monks in the diaspora. Böhlau, Vienna 1990. ISBN 3-205-05230-7

Marcus Antonius van den Oudenrijn: An Armenian Island in the Occident , Venice 1940

P. Yeprem Boghossian: The activity of the Viennese Mechitarists in Izmir : Chronological overview - An Overwiev of the Educational Activities of The Mekhitarists of Vienna - Viyana Mkhirarist Rahipleri'nin Egitim Faaliyetlerine Gener Bir Bakis. 3 volumes. On the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the Mechitarist Congregation in Vienna (1811–2011) and the 185th year of the Vienna Mechitarist School in Istanbul (1825–2010). (German, French, English; documents also in Turkish in Arabic script). 2008

Barbara Denscher: A bridge between the cultures of the Orient and the Occident: The history of the Viennese Mechitharist printing house (German, Armenian). 2nd edition Yerevan 2012.