St. Michael (Andernach)
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The St. Michael Chapel in Andernach in the Mayen-Koblenz district in the north of Rhineland-Palatinate was built in 1210/20.
It belongs to the Catholic parish of St. Albert and is surrounded by the playground of the Realschule plus St. Thomas .
history
The St. Michael chapel was the cemetery chapel of the former Augustinian choir women - monastery Our Lady Outside the Walls of St. Thomas (named after St. Thomas Becket ), built before 1482 Our Lady Before the Walls / St. Mary .
After the floor panels were taken up during restoration work from 1853 to 1854, numerous stacked coffins with female corpses were found in the vaults. In connection with the establishment of the St. Thomas Asylum, cells were built into the chapel. This was reversed after a while and the chapel was given its actual purpose as a place of worship.
architecture
While the interior of the chapel has been changed, the late Romanesque tuff stone block exterior shows all the characteristic style elements of its time to perfection. The slender building impresses with its structure with cloverleaf arcades in the basement and with blind arches and columns on the upper floor.
renovation
The chapel was in a desolate condition and acutely dilapidated until the renovation began in 2017. Therefore, it had to be surrounded with a solid construction fence to protect the schoolchildren from falling parts. The first emergency measure in 2015 was the replacement of the rain gutters and downpipes.
The extensive renovation began in the summer of 2017 and lasted until December 2018. The roof was re-covered and parts of the facade were replaced and replaced, as well as the power lines and lighting inside. Underfloor heating was installed under the new floor and the entire interior was painted uniformly white. The altar for the chapel was cut from the old basalt high altar of St. Albert Church and adapted to the cramped space. According to the artist, the new stained glass windows represent the seven-day cycle of creation.
The cost of the renovation was largely borne by the diocese of Trier after the administrative board of the parish of St. Albert had decided, with the consent of the parish council, to give up the also dilapidated parish church of St. Albert and the chapel of St. Michael as a new spiritual center for the increasingly smaller in number to use the future community. The German Foundation for Monument Protection , the Glücksspirale and the Friends' Association, founded in 2015, as well as individual community members who carried out collections for the chapel took on further significant shares of the costs .
Several costly repairs would have been made for the previous parish church of St. Albert, starting with the roof in need of repair, including a completely redesigned lightning protection system, to the church heating that failed in autumn 2017 and could no longer be repaired. The parish church of St. Albert was profaned on November 25, 2018 as part of a pontifical ministry, led by Trier Auxiliary Bishop Jörg Michael Peters, with great sympathy from many believers from all over Andernach and several former priests of the community.
On December 9, 2018, the Bishop of Trier, Stefan Ackermann, inaugurated the St. Michael chapel and consecrated the new altar. For this purpose, the relic of St. Albertus Magnus was transferred from the altar of the former church of St. Albert to the new altar. Various prayer impulses and musical contributions from various groups from the community accompanied the consecration day, which ended with a Vespers.
The next day, groups of pupils from the school center were already using the St. Michael's Chapel.
Support association
In May 2015 the "Friends of St. Michaelskapelle Andernach" was founded and in June 2015 it was entered in the register of associations as a non-profit organization. The first goal of the development association is to raise the parish of St. Albert's own contribution. In addition, the interior design and running costs should be taken care of in the long term.
At the general meeting on January 11, 2016, it was said that membership fees, events and donations from local savings banks, banks and craft businesses had already raised over € 9,000.
Until December 2018, the friends' association supported the restoration of the St. Michael's Chapel with around € 37,000.
literature
- Werner Schäfke: The Rhine from Mainz to Cologne. A journey through the romantic Rhine Valley . Dumont Art Travel Guide, 4th edition, Ostfildern 2006, ISBN 978-3-7701-4799-1 .
- Gerhard Terwelp: History of the monastery of our dear lady for h. Thomas near Andernach . Jung, Andernach 1881 and 1883.
Web links
Coordinates: 50 ° 25 ′ 56.3 " N , 7 ° 24 ′ 24.3" E