St. Hedwig (Wuppertal)
St. Hedwig is a Roman Catholic church in the north of the Wuppertal district of Cronenberg and, together with the churches Heilige Ewalde , St. Christophorus in Lichtenplatz and St. Joseph in Ronsdorf, part of the parish association of Wuppertaler Südhöhen .
history
The history of the parish of St. Hedwig goes back to the parish of St. Suitbertus in the south of Elberfeld , which, when it was elevated to an independent parish in 1902, committed itself to setting up a separate chapel for the Catholics in the extreme south of the parish. However, it was not until 1927 that a corresponding piece of land was bought in the south of the Elberfeld, which, however, could no longer be built on due to the global economic crisis and the subsequent war years and lay fallow. It was not until the 1950s that plans to build a church in the north of Cronenberg became more tangible again, and on April 28, 1952, a church building association for Küllenhahn was founded in what is now Café Schwarz . Since January 1954 it has celebrated its own mass celebrations in the auditorium of the community school on Hahnerberg (today's yellow school on Cronenberger Straße). With the help of the parish of St. Joseph in Cronenberg (today Heilige Ewalde), the order to plan a new branch church was finally given in 1956. The Dutch Order of the Cross , which had taken over the mother parish of St. Suitbertus in 1957, was in charge of the building project, and the laying of the foundation stone was celebrated on November 30, 1958. The consecration was made on September 13, 1959 by Josef Cardinal Frings and the church of St. Hedwig von Andechs was consecrated. While construction was still going on, on August 6, 1959, the congregation received the notification to become an independent rectorate church , formed from parts of the congregations of St. Josef in Cronenberg, St. Suitbertus in Elberfeld and St. Remigius in Sonnborn .
Building description
The church is a round building, with the choir facing east, which can largely be assigned to post-war modernism . The main part consists of a thirty-meter-wide six-part half-dodecagon, which on the west side runs towards the circular apse at an obtuse angle. The resulting five surfaces are set in front of five half octagons on the east side , which are surmounted by the main building. The entrance is on the east side, where it merges into the atrium formed by the octagons. The atrium itself houses the baptismal font and a wooden figure of Saint Hedwig created by Heinz Gernot in 1976 , depicted as a princess distributing bread. In the northern part of the porch there has been a Lady Chapel since 1975. The outside of the building is completely plastered in white, the building elements are crowned by a green outer strip at the level of the flat roof.
The bells of the church are located in a two meter high house, which is also called campanile in the community . This replaces a wooden bell tower on the south side of the church that was demolished in 1993 for structural reasons. The bells were a donation from the parents of the first primer from St. Hedwig and were cast in 1964 by Petit & Gebr. Edelbrock from Gescher . As a special feature, since the Charter oecumenica was signed with the Evangelical St. John's Church, they ring on major holidays such as Christmas and Easter together with the bells of St. John's Church 300 meters away at the other end of Von-der-Heydt-Park .
In the interior, the light from the few, triangular church windows made of glass blocks dominates , the arrangement of which is supposed to symbolize the wings of a bird. The interior of the church descends in the direction of the altar, so that the round pews give the impression of a theater . The church offers a total of 340 people in its interior. The flat ceiling is lined with light wood, which is laid in a spiral from the altar towards the walls. Several religions of Saint Hedwig are embedded in the altar itself. The tabernacle of the church was made in 1961 by Egino Weinert , who also created the cross in the choir, and is decorated with blue enamel , divided by twenty-four golden human figures. Also by Egino Weinert comes the way of the cross in bronze , which was erected in 1982 and is located on the large north wall.
organ
The organ of the church is located on the south-east wall of the church and was built in 1973 by Walcker in Ludwigsburg . It replaced a positive with four registers made by Walcker for the church in 1959, the pipe material of which was taken over into the new organ. It has eighteen registers on two manuals. The key actions are mechanical, the stop actions are electrical.
Web links
Coordinates: 51 ° 14 ′ 0 ″ N , 7 ° 8 ′ 59 ″ E