Sophie Blocher

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Sophie Blocher (born June 18, 1935 in Laufen am Rheinfall , † June 13, 2002 in Basel ) was a Swiss pastor and social worker .

Life

childhood and education

Sophie Blocher was the fourth of eleven children of the parish family Wolfram and Ida Blocher-Baur and a sister of Christoph Blocher and Judith Giovannelli-Blocher . After a household apprenticeship and an internship in a children's home in England, she trained as a nurse in Zurich and then as a midwife in England .

Missionary activity

In 1958 she was accepted into the Basel Mission . On their behalf, she worked in Ghana from 1961, initially in a hospital in Bechem , and from 1962 she headed the nursing school in Bawku . After eleven years of mission in Ghana, she returned to Switzerland in 1972, but continued to support the Bawku hospital.

Working in Switzerland

An internship at a psychiatric clinic was followed by the Church Theological School in Basel and a vicariate in Zurich. In 1981 she took over a pastor's office in Muttenz for 14 years .

After seven years in office, she clarified whether it was possible to create a home for people on the street where they could feel at home spiritually and emotionally. With the support of the “Working Group of Christian Churches Baselland”, they moved into the “Haus zur Eiche” in Birsfelden , which they presided over.

From 1990 to 2000 she headed the Assembly of Representatives, and from 1996 to 2000 she was also President of the Basel Mission, which switched to mission21 . In 2000 she gave up all praesidia to take care of the financing of new homeless shelters.

In summer 2001 she developed severe rheumatism, possibly as a result of an inoperable kidney tumor that was discovered soon after . She did not live to see the opening of the "Sophie Blocher Houses" named after her in Frenkendorf on November 3, 2003.

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