Otto Pfülf

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Father Otto Pfülf SJ

Otto Pfülf SJ (born January 28, 1856 in Speyer , Pfalz , † May 21, 1946 in Pullach ) was a Catholic priest from the diocese of Speyer , Jesuit , spiritual at the Collegium Germanicum in Rome and well-known author of large-scale biographies.

Life

Origin and early work

Otto Pfülf was born as one of twelve children of the Speyer pharmacist Karl August Pfülf in the “sun pharmacy”. His youngest brother was Theodor Pfülf , later President of the Palatinate government. Otto wanted to become a priest and in 1875 joined the Jesuit order, which had just been banished from Germany because of the Kulturkampf . He completed his novitiate in Exaten near Roermond . With him in Holland there were two other Jesuit novices from Speyer, namely Franz Borscht, the brother of the future mayor of Munich, Wilhelm Ritter von Borscht , and Jakob Rebmann , who was drawn to the Indian mission in the USA. Pfülf went to England to continue his studies and was ordained a priest in Ditton Hall near Liverpool on August 31, 1884, together with his friend Rebmann . There he initially stayed as a professor for church history, and then in Luxembourg and Valkenburg , between 1889 and 1913, he worked very actively on the German-language Jesuit magazine "Voices from Maria Laach". There he published a variety of larger and smaller articles over the years. At the same time, Father Pfülf wrote various, large-scale, sometimes multi-volume biographies during this period, e. B. About the Mainz Bishop Wilhelm Emmanuel von Ketteler (3 volumes) or about Cardinal Johannes von Geissel from his home diocese of Speyer (2 volumes).

Spiritual

On October 16, 1913 Otto Pfülf became spiritual at the Mainz seminary . This was only done unofficially, as the Jesuits were prohibited by law from such activities. Officially, Father Pfülf was in Mainz for “scientific work” and “advised” seminarians in his free time. The government tacitly tolerated this state of affairs until Father Pfülf was denounced and he had to stop working on the Rhine. The whole matter had a political aftermath in the Hessian state parliament , where the government just wanted to loosen the "Ordensgesetz", but was now urged by the spokesman of the free-thinking party - because of the "Pfülf case" - to stricter measures. The outbreak of the First World War let the political conflict ebb, but Otto Pfülf had to leave Germany on December 23, 1914.

In 1918 the well-known Father was called to Rome in order to be able to work nationally at the Collegium Germanicum in the same activity that was withheld from him in Mainz . This seminar is run by the Jesuits and is still open to priest candidates from all German-speaking countries and from the old Hungarian half of Austria . Even in Pfülf's time, the alumni wore red gowns as a sign of their affiliation and were therefore popularly known as “the crabs”. Basically, it is an elite of local seminarians who are sent there at the suggestion of their superiors. They were and are particularly loyal to Rome and one speaks of the so-called "Romanitas" of the Germanicists. Not a few of Pfülf's pupils later reached the highest church offices as prelates, theology professors, bishops and cardinals. His influence, which he exercised as a spiritual between 1918 and 1932 on the future high clergy in Germany, is therefore considerable.

In 1932 Otto Pfülf returned to Germany and, despite his 76 years of age, remained active as a spiritual director for the friars at the Berchmannskolleg in Pullach . He died here in 1946, very old, at the age of 91. On May 24, 1946, Father Otto Pfülf SJ was buried in the monastery cemetery there; the rector, Father Freiherr von Gumppenberg , held the requiem and burial ; A delegation from the Germanicum had even come from Rome. The youngest brother of the deceased, the former district president Theodor Pfülf , attended the funeral as the last survivor of the once 12 Speyer pharmacist siblings.

Fonts

Otto Pfülf's biography about Hermann von Mallinckrodt , 638 pages.
  • Father Adolf von Doß SJ, 382, ​​pages, Herder, Freiburg, 1887
  • Hermann von Mallinckrodt , 638 pages, Herder, Freiburg, 1892
  • Cardinal Johannes von Geissel , 2 volumes, 695 and 675 pages, Herder, Freiburg, 1895
  • Petrus Canisius , 125 pages, Benziger Verlag, Einsiedeln, 1897
  • Bishop Wilhelm Emmanuel von Ketteler , 3 volumes, 418, 441 and 403 pages, Kirchheim Verlag, Mainz, 1899
  • The Real Secret Upper Government Councilor Josef Linhoff , the last veteran of the “Catholic Department”, 79 pages, Herder, Freiburg, 1901
  • Sr. Clara Fey , 654 pages, Herder, Freiburg, 1907
  • Joseph Graf zu Stolberg-Westheim 1804-1859. His services to the Catholic Church in Germany., 193 pages, Herder Freiburg, 1913
  • Moritz Meschler, 136 pages, Herder, Freiburg 1917
  • The beginnings of the German province of the newly established Society of Jesus and their work in Switzerland 1805–1847, 522 pages, Herder, Freiburg, 1922
  • From the glories of church history. Otto Pfülf; Collected essays 1889–1914. Reprint from “Voices from Maria Laach”. Edited by Rhaban Haacke OSB. 2 volumes 1002 and 788 pages, Schmitt Verlag, Siegburg, 1984

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ To the Sonnenapotheke Speyer and its owners, including the Pfülf family ( Memento from January 13, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  2. ↑ Exaten Jesuit branch, Holland
  3. ^ Ignatius College Valkenburg, Holland
  4. ^ Berchmannskolleg Pullach
personal data
SURNAME Pfülf, Otto
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Pfülf, Father Otto SJ
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German priest, Jesuit, author, spiritual at the Germanicum Rome
DATE OF BIRTH January 28, 1856
PLACE OF BIRTH Speyer
DATE OF DEATH May 21, 1946
Place of death Pullach