St. Michael (Heidelberg)

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St. Michael from the northwest
Church building from the west with the baptistery and sacrament chapel
South-east wall with glass windows

St. Michael is a Catholic parish church in the southern part of Heidelberg , which was built in 1962/63. It is dedicated to the Archangel Michael .

history

Südstadt is a young part of Heidelberg that was only created after the Second World War. The church of St. Michael was built in the new building area in 1962/63 according to plans by Manfred Schmitt-Fiebig in collaboration with H. Eisenhauer and H. Haffner. The foundation stone was laid on June 11, 1962. The parish of St. Michael became a curate in 1963 and an independent parish in 1970. From 2005 she formed the pastoral care unit Philipp Neri together with the parishes of St. Albert ( Bergheim ) and St. Bonifatius ( Weststadt ) . St. Michael has been part of the Philipp Neri parish since 2015.

description

The church is a reinforced concrete structure on a pentagonal floor plan. The outside is clad with rubble stones. The tower stands as a campanile on the street corner next to the church building. On the west side is the lower baptistery and sacrament chapel, which is separated by a  lattice created by Harry MacLean . The ceiling of the church rises to the east towards the altar, and the stalls are also oriented from three sides towards the pentagonal altar island. Behind the altar is a concrete wall designed by Peter Dreher with 12 rosettes, which symbolize the apostles. The crucifix, the Madonna and the statue of the Archangel Michael are by Gisela Bär . The two walls leading to the altar are provided with colored glass windows separated by lamellas, designed by Albert Burkart and executed by Bernd Gossel.

In terms of floor plan and design, St. Michael differs significantly from the new St. Bartholomew Church in Wieblingen, designed by Schmitt-Fiebig less than a decade earlier . The free-standing altar and the barely existing separation between the altar and the parish area anticipate the liturgical reform of the Second Vatican Council . The church was a model for later church buildings and is under monument protection as "type-building".

future

St. Michael was planned in the 1960s in optimistic anticipation of an increasing number of believers. Today the church, with its 600 seats, is much too big for the parish with 1200 Catholics and an average of 60 Sunday worshipers and the costs for the congregation are too high. Therefore, there are considerations for the future use of the church, which, in addition to dismantling and conversion, do not exclude the demolition of the listed church.

literature

  • Hans Gercke: Churches in Heidelberg . 1st edition. Schnell und Steiner publishing house, Regensburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-7954-2413-8 .
  • Melanie Mertens: Church in a square. St. Michael in Heidelberg-Südstadt . In: Denkmalpflege in Baden-Württemberg , Volume 42, 2013, Issue 1, pp. 46–47 doi : 10.11588 / nbdpfbw.2013.1

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Heidelberg History Association: Timeline of Heidelberg history from 1945
  2. ↑ a b St. Michael receives a reprieve. Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung of October 2, 2012, view of the districts, p. 6
  3. ↑ What will happen to St. Michael? Possibilities for a future use of the Südstadtkirche are being explored. In: Church on the Way, No. 1/2012, p. 8 ( PDF )

Web links

Commons : St. Michael  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 49 ° 23 '17.3 "  N , 8 ° 41' 17.6"  E