St. Joseph (Hamburg-St. Pauli)
The Catholic St. Joseph Church was built in the years 1718–1723 as a baroque sacral building on the Große Freiheit in Altona ; Today this place belongs to the Hamburg district of St. Pauli due to the border shift .
History of the Church: The Great Freedom in Altona
Altona, today also the name of Hamburg's westernmost district, was an independent town in the Prussian province of Schleswig-Holstein until well into the 20th century. Until the middle of the 19th century, the Duchy of Holstein was part of the entire Danish state ; Although the duchy, together with Altona , was part of the Holy Roman Empire until 1806 , political sovereignty fell to the Danish kings from 1460, who were also dukes of Schleswig and Holstein. King Friedrich III. von Denmark , in his capacity as Duke of Holstein, granted the Catholic community of Altona the privilege of freedom of belief in 1658 and assigned it a building site on the Altonaer Große Freiheit to build a church. The name of the street, which was first built from 1610 onwards, refers to the freedom of belief program: the Danish kings recognized the advantages that were offered to them when they allowed freedom of trade and religion in their city - in contrast to neighboring Hamburg. The fact that they gave craftsmen and other tradespeople here, even without membership in a guild and evicted religious refugees, a home and the opportunity to work, turned out to be a fortunate circumstance for the development of Altona.
The Catholic community was founded in 1594 in what was then the County of Pinneberg-Holstein and began building a chapel on the Große Freiheit in 1660 . This first church was destroyed in the Altona city fire in 1713 during the Great Northern War . Now it was time for the construction of a large new church building , the parishioners and numerous donations from home and abroad created the financial basis. First, the preserved mission house was makeshift as a preaching site. The municipality then bought building land in the neighborhood and hired an architect to draw up construction plans and to manage the site. On June 21, 1718, the imperial envoy of the Holy Roman Empire in Hamburg , Count Christoph Ernst Fuchs von Bimbach (1664–1719), laid the foundation stone . The second Catholic church building was erected by 1723, but the church was consecrated in 1721 and the baroque building was consecrated to St. Joseph . This church was the first Catholic church in northern Central Europe to be built after the Reformation . Your community is the oldest Catholic community in what is now Northern Germany. The Austrian architect Melchior Tatz is believed to be the builder .
Exactly after 100 years the church council had considered re-erecting the building at a different location, since the church building is “in the most badly reputed quarter of the city of Altona, on the Große Freiheit [...] not far from Sittenstraßen. In the approximately 25 entertainment venues on the street, which is only 350 meters long (dance halls, cafes, hippodrome, open dining hall, inns), a pleasure-seeking audience - especially at night - comes together, so that a nocturnal street wave goes up and down in front of the church. Policemen with a loaded pistol ensure order; On Sunday morning, sleepy figures meet our churchgoers. T. annoying. […] That this is an unworthy location for a place of worship, which seriously damages the interests of the congregation, is not only felt by the Catholics. Neighboring parishes have sold their churches in the same street or in a parallel street and built new ones in better urban areas. ”Pastor Heinrich Hartong sent several begging letters with the information cited here in order to collect the necessary 400,000 marks . However, as the development shows, there was no such relocation of the church building.
architecture
The tower-free church building with forecourt stands on the street of an entertainment district and forms a closed architectural ensemble with the pastorate and other auxiliary buildings. The Hamburger Schmuckstrasse - until the 1930s the core of the so-called "Chinese Quarter" - leads at a straight angle to the church portal, so that a wide line of sight is created from the Talstrasse behind it. The exposed brickwork of the church building was made of dark red bricks ; the portal of the hall building has an ornate facade in baroque garb with sandstone decoration, which follows models typical of the epoch. A mighty sculpture - the holy figure of St. Joseph - sits enthroned between two high windows above the portal . Together with the volute- decorated gable, the facade is one of the most important remaining testimonies of baroque architecture in the Hamburg city area. The church inside contained significant furnishings, most of which, however, were destroyed during the Second World War . The adjacent rectory was built by the town architect Claus Stallknecht (1681–1734) by 1717.
In the course of the reconstruction in the period up to 1955, the roof was given a steel girder construction with triangular trusses to which the flat Rabitz barrel vault was attached. The statics of the gallery was improved by a new reinforced concrete construction. Small round openings above the segmented arched windows let more light into the nave.
Destruction and rebuilding
In 1938 the St. Joseph Church in Altona became a church in the Hamburg district of St. Pauli due to a border shift due to the Greater Hamburg Act . In 1944 the building was almost completely destroyed in repeated bomb attacks; the interior burned out and the roof collapsed, only the facade remained - albeit badly damaged.
The reconstruction took place in the years 1953–1955 under the direction of the architect Georg Wellhausen (1898–1987) and cost 437,000 DM . Further expenses resulted from the restoration of the church stalls, the Stations of the Cross and the murals as well as the purchase of an organ from the Evangelical Kreuzkirche community in nearby Ottensen and its subsequent restoration. At this point in time, only the front side of the Große Freiheit was restored or repaired, the church building was rebuilt in a contemporary style in the classic modern style. The re-inauguration took place on December 11, 1955 with a mass by the Hamburg auxiliary bishop Johannes von Rudloff (1897–1978). The organ consecration took place on December 19, 1956. The connected tower carillon was heard for the first time on December 19, 1961.
Between 1969 and 1971 the St. Joseph Congregation had a new parish hall built in a simple architectural style. The used organ installed in the 1950s did not last long, so a new instrument was commissioned from Becker . This organ was on April 20, 1969 inaugurated be.
In the years 1977 to 1979, under the direction of the Hamburg architect Jörn Rau, the interior of the church was re-baroque, with the aim of re-emphasizing the originally festive state. After completion of the renovation work, a solemn pontifical mass took place. Since the last changes in the interior of the church in 1993/1994, the interior of the church has again been dominated by the large main altar, which, with both side altars and the subtle colors of the wall, comes closer to the former spatial effect.
present
Description of the location and use
The St. Joseph Church is located in the middle of the Hamburg neighborhood , the world-famous St. Pauli on the Große Freiheit. It is surrounded by night clubs, brothels, street prostitution and fast food restaurants, and there is little reminiscent of the old pre-war buildings and the cosmopolitan, contemplative Altona of that time. The Great Freedom, where the local Mennonites also owned a church in the past and which is not far from the old Jewish cemeteries , is now a center of Hamburg's red light district.
Three bells are parked directly on the east side of the church building .
The St. Joseph Church and the St. Theresien Church in Altonaer Dohrnweg form a Roman Catholic parish. It is also home to the Polish Mission in Hamburg , whose compatriots frequent the services in Polish.
Organs
The large organ by Klaus Becker from 1969 is located on the upper of the two superimposed galleries . A total of 33 sounding registers are available on three manuals and pedal on the baroque instrument . In a chamber on the second floor there is the gaming table for the carillon with now 25 bells, manufactured by a Dutch company.
Another small organ is installed on the lower gallery, which comes from the workshop of the organ builder Beckers and was installed in the St. Joseph Church in 1963. It is a positive organ with 5 registers without a pedal.
- Disposition of the great organ
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- Link : I / II, III / II, I / P, II / P (both as stops and as kicks)
- Playing aids : 4 free combinations (as kicks)
Special equipment
- The only preserved ossuary in Hamburg is in the St. Joseph Church . Viewing is possible.
- Since January 9, 2017, a picture cycle by the German musician and drawing artist Udo Lindenberg (* 1946) depicting the 10 commandments has been on view in the church . The works were created in 2002 using a special Likörell technique in which Lindenberg actually used egg liqueur. According to the parish priest, Karl Schurz, “a lifelong dream is coming true. In view of the 'life-destroying tendencies of our time', Lindenberg tries to interpret the Ten Commandments in a humorous way in such a way that they are not perceived as a 'moral straitjacket' but as 'boundary stones of great freedom'. "
crypt
There is a former burial place under the church. The crypt was the burial place of Altona Catholics who did not have their own cemetery until the 17th century. The crypt room was devastated several times, most recently during the Second World War. Today there is an "ossuary" which can be visited during church tours as part of the Hamburg museum landscape. Between 1719 and 1868 there were almost 300 settlements in the crypt of the church. In addition to those named under pastors , the laying of the foundation stone and other high-ranking personalities such as:
- Theodora Countess von Jacobsberg (July 30, 1692 - September 9, 1719), wife of the Swedish Field Marshal Carl Gustav von Dücker , who had recently been raised to the rank of count .
- César Claude Rainville (1767–1845), former adjutant to General Dumouriez,
- Clemens August Graf von Kurtzrock (1745–1822), Princely Thurn and Taxic Chief Postal Director
- Ludovica Augustina de Crozat de Thiers († 1813), wife of the French Field Marshal Viktor Franz von Broglio .
After an aerial mine destroyed the church down to its facade on July 28, 1944 during World War II (see above), all the remaining dead were reburied from the St. Joseph churchyard to the Ohlsdorf cemetery . The crypt with the bones scattered by vandalism was later walled up. An overhaul has been carried out here since the 2010s, ie there is now an ossuary that is open to the public.
Church cemetery
Until 1871 all deceased parishioners were buried in the adjacent St. Joseph churchyard, some gravestones have been preserved. The St. Joseph Community has been using parts of the Protestant cemetery Diebsteich in Altona-Nord for their burials since 1874.
Pastor
- From 1796 until his death in 1808, the exiled Bishop of Metz , Cardinal Louis-Joseph de Montmorency-Laval (1724-1808), who also died in Altona and worked in the crypt of the Church was buried. He regularly celebrated Holy Mass there during his lifetime, with an Aloys Kleyser being named as his altar boy, who owned a dormitory and pub on the Große Freiheit. Contemporary witnesses also report that the cardinal was very charitable, walking through the streets in a red skirt and occasionally throwing money to the children. In 1900 his remains were transferred to Metz Cathedral .
- Bishop Montmorency-Laval was accompanied by his relatives Magdaleine Susanne de Paulmy d'Argenson, née Duchess of Montmorency-Luxembourg (1751-1813), former lady-in-waiting of the executed Queen Marie Antoinette of France. She ran the cardinal's household, died on February 22nd, 1813 and was also buried in the tomb of St. Joseph.
- Joseph Versen (1768–1831)
- Johannes M. Bernhard Bertelt (1804-1835)
A more comprehensive but not complete overview of the priests who worked in St. Joseph up to 1991 can be found in the commemorative publication for the 400th anniversary of the congregation.
In the media
In 1970 the church was the main location for the film The Pastor of St. Pauli with the actor Curd Jürgens (1915–1982) in the lead role. The television series Großstadtrevier is also often filmed against this backdrop.
literature
- F. Grundmann, T. Helms: When stones preach - Hamburg's churches from the Middle Ages to the present. Medien Verlag Schubert, 1993, ISBN 3-929229-14-5 .
- R. Hootz (Hrsg.): Picture manual of the art monuments Hamburg & Schleswig-Holstein. Deutscher Kunstverlag, 1981, ISBN 3-422-00373-8 .
- Festschrift for the 400th anniversary of St. Joseph's Church, 1994
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e From the Festschrift for the 400-year celebration, p. 20ff.
- ↑ a b c Festschrift for the 400th anniversary, p. 40ff.
- ↑ Parish of St. Theresien
- ↑ a b Festschrift for the 400th anniversary, p. 55.
- ^ Dpa: Forgotten crypt on St. Pauli: Where 350 skulls and bones can be viewed. In: shz.de. Schleswig-Holsteinischer Zeitungsverlag, November 2, 2015, accessed on November 3, 2015 .
- ↑ Udo Lindenbergs, 10 Commandments in Hamburg Church '. In: Berliner Zeitung . January 4, 2017, p. 19.
- ↑ Website on Cardinal Louis-Joseph de Montmorency-Laval, with details on his stay in Altona ( Memento of June 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ Source on Cardinal Montmorency-Laval and his relatives or on their grave inscriptions
- ↑ Festschrift for the 400th anniversary, p. 80.
Coordinates: 53 ° 33 ′ 4.7 " N , 9 ° 57 ′ 26.4" E