St. Remigius (Wuppertal)
St. Remigius is the Roman Catholic parish church for the Sonnborn district of Wuppertal and the place of worship for the parish of St. Remigius, which is the continuation of what is probably the oldest Christian community in Wuppertal until the Reformation . Together with the churches of St. Bonifatius , St. Mary's Conception and St. Ludger, it is part of the parish community of Wuppertal West .
history
The first church in Sonnborn dates back to 873, so a document from that year speaks of a " basilica , quae est in Sunnebrunno ". It was built directly on the then economically important trade route from the Rhineland to Paderborn on a pagan place of worship. Today, the Evangelical Sonnborn Church is located on the site . The increasingly dilapidated basilica was replaced by a first new building around 1450. The congregation, which is dependent on the Gerresheim Abbey , remained largely Catholic until the 16th century, when a pastor named Reimers made the first changes in the practice of worship. With the appointment of pastor Hermann Wemmers in 1539, the entire Sonnborn community fully joined the Reformed tradition. The few remaining Catholics in Sonnborner south joined the the monastery Gräfrath imputed community Gräfrath to the Catholics in Sonnborner North and West visited from now on the service in the old church of St. Lawrence in Elberfeld , their community a little later also the Reformation joined .
First church from 1879
At the beginning of the 19th century the pastors in Graefrath saw the need to raise Sonnborn to their own parish. The former imperial court on Sonnborner Strasse was bought and converted into an extensive parish hall with a chapel, “catechist room” and parsonage, where the first Catholic church service in Sonnborn after the Reformation was celebrated in 1855. At the latest since the opening of the Düsseldorf – Elberfeld railway line, including its own Sonnborn train station , Sonnborn has expanded rapidly, and the construction of a complete church was necessary. This was built until 1879 according to plans by August Carl Lange in the neo-Gothic style with an east-facing choir; the construction was largely financed by donations from the Sonnborn merchants. The sale of the parish center on Sonnborner Strasse brought in additional funds, and the Sonnborner pharmacy was located in the building until the motorway was built. Many parishioners initially reacted negatively to the seemingly oversized church building, which clearly stood out from the several hundred year old buildings in the center of Sonnborn, and the increased costs during construction were also criticized. However, this rejection did not last long. Simultaneously with the opening of the church, a plot of land on the Sonnborner Ufer was acquired, where a large community center including an old people's home was to be built, which was also intended to include the rapidly expanding pastoral care area of today's Wuppertal zoo district . However, these plans were not pursued any further after the church opened and instead a chapel was only set up in a private villa in the Zooviertel in 1964 ( Maximilian Kolbe Chapel , closed in 2007). The property on the Sonnborn Ufer was later used to build the new Sonnborn tram loop ; today there is an outpatient care center there. In 1888, Pastor Wammich was appointed the first pastor in the young community, which had been led by deacons up until then. With the opening of the Church of the Conception of Mary in 1901, Vohwinkel was spun off from the parish and became an independent parish . In 1909 several relics of the namesake St. Remigius of Reims were transferred to the church.
The church and the entire Sonnborn town center survived both wars almost completely unscathed; the tower of the church was an important landmark in western Wuppertal for a long time.
Today's church
In 1955, with the opening of the Church of St. Bonifatius, Varresbeck was also spun off from the Sonnborn community and became an independent parish. The beginning of the planning for a new motorway junction in the heart of Sonnborn made it clear that the parish would have to give up its meetinghouses and apartments in order to make room for the new Sonnborn junction . The church itself was taken into account in the first planning and would not have been demolished if the first planning had been carried out. However, the community decided to demolish it and rebuild it elsewhere, as the church would be completely surrounded by bridges and access roads and largely cut off from the Sonnborn itself. In agreement with the Archdiocese of Cologne , it was decided to build a church, including a parish hall and retirement home, on a plot of land on the Garterlaie , 200 meters from the location of the old church.
A competition was announced for the construction of this new church, from which the Cologne architect Fritz Schaller emerged as the winner. The construction management was entrusted to the company Karl Köhler from Düsseldorf , the shell work to the Duisburg construction company Brüggemann. The building should be based on the new theological and functional requirements of the Second Vatican Council . In May 1973 the kindergarten of the new community center was officially inaugurated, at the same time the laying of the foundation stone for the new old people's and nursing home (today's Remigiushaus ) with a total of 112 beds as well as the community and rectory was celebrated. The new church itself was consecrated on Whit Monday 1976 by Auxiliary Bishop Augustinus Frotz .
On May 12, 1989, a serious fire broke out in the church when several cable insulations caught fire after repair work on the copper sheets on the roof. A wedding was being celebrated in the church an hour before the fire, and at 12:38 p.m. residents set off the fire alarm. The flames hit several meters high and the smoke column could be seen at times as far as Wichlinghausen on that day due to the clear weather and the calm . The fire could only be extinguished with the support of the fire engines from Barmen and Elberfeld and the Sonnborn and Vohwinkel volunteer fire departments . A spread of the flames on the Remigiushaus could be prevented at the last minute. Despite massive damage, the roof was not in danger of collapsing after the fire was extinguished and the damage in the interior was limited. The damage amounted to around one million Deutschmarks , and the renovation work was completed by Christmas 1989. During this time, at the personal invitation of the presbytery of the evangelical parish of Sonnborn, the main church in Sonnborn was avoided.
On June 5, 2016, the community finally celebrated its 40th parish festival, to which Rainer Maria Woelki , incumbent Archbishop of Cologne , also appeared.
Building description
The church is an oval , very geometric, circular building that is exactly south-facing, thirty meters long and a maximum of twenty-four meters wide. The entrance is on the northeast side and is in front of the church on the side. It houses a small foyer. The twenty meter high church tower on the southwest side of the building is set on a line opposite the entrance . The entire building is clad from the outside with exposed concrete and today almost completely overgrown with climbing plants, only the tower is clad with copper plates and gives the church together with the climbing plants a completely different impression than before the plants. The three bells were cast by Petit & Gebr. Edelbrock from Gescher . The chapel of the retirement home was located below the church on the same floor plan until 2010. Today the hall houses a youth library. The roof rises above the altar area at the same height as the church tower. All around are round skylights, which give the church, which is also clad in exposed concrete in the interior, a particularly light and airy impression. The pews, like the hall, are rounded so that you can see all the other places from every seat.
Altar and ambo
The altar designed by the Cologne artist Jochem Pechau is located exactly below the elevation of the roof. Like the church itself, it is extremely simple. The design feature to be emphasized is the Christ monogram with the laurel wreath, which refers to the early church . Symbolically, it represents the merging of the first letters of the Greek name Christ with the surrounding community. The monogram is entwined with the laurel wreath as a symbol of resurrection and victory over death.
The ambo, also designed by Jochem Pechau, is to the left of the altar. It is made entirely of bronze and today shows a clear patina , which is supposed to establish a connection to the also copper church tower, which is the only copper-covered element of the exterior building there which appears comparatively "foreign body-like" and is intended to clarify the connection between the outside and inside of the church. The bronze reliefs show three scenes from the life of the prophet Jonah , how he cannot escape the will of God by fleeing. At the front you can see the representation of the king of Nineveh , who wears a penitential robe instead of a cloak . In the background you can see the Mesopotamian city of Nineveh with the rainbow spanning over it after the flood .
Christ mosaic
A particularly noteworthy work of art is the artistically remarkable Christ mosaic from 1889 in the choir of the church behind the altar. It shows the Son of God in the representation of Majestas Domini , looking directly at the viewer. The head is surrounded by a cross nimbus and he is holding a book in his left hand. A special feature of the mosaic is the depiction of a coin in the right hand, which is extremely unusual for the depiction of Majestas Domini. He holds it with three fingers, which is supposed to indicate the Trinity . The depiction of the coin should refer to Matthew 22, 21 “ Give the emperor what belongs to the emperor and God what belongs to God ”.
tabernacle
The tabernacle is located away from the actual church space in a side chapel to the southwest under the tower, which represents a structural unit with the Remigiushaus. It was made by the goldsmith Cassau in Paderborn. The image on the door shows the sacrificed Lamb of God . In addition to the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit and the seven sacraments, seven rock crystals are also intended to indicate the fullness of God. The inaccessible side chapel also houses a miraculous image of Our Lady of Perpetual Help , which was made for the old church in 1882 and had to be extensively restored after the war due to fire damage.
organ
For many years St. Remigius did not have an organ, and due to the lack of a suitable instrument, the parish singing had to take place for a long time without musical accompaniment. It was not until the spring of 1983 that the organ designed by Cologne cathedral organist Josef Zimmermann was consecrated in the north-eastern area of the gallery. It was built in 1981 by Johannes Klais Orgelbau in Bonn and has twenty-three registers on two manuals with a pedal. To the right of the organ, in the absence of a suitable gallery for concerts, a small three-tier choir stand was set up at the same time, which meant that around thirty seats in the church interior were lost. The organ was only slightly damaged in the major fire on May 12, 1989, as it happened to be covered by a waterproof tarpaulin on that day due to clean-up work after the wedding in the morning hours.
literature
- Catholic parish association Wuppertaler Westen, R. Mues, M. Vogt: Church leaders Wuppertaler Westen - St. Remigius , Wuppertal 2015
- Parish of St. Remigius: Commemorative publication for the 40-year consecration of the new parish church St. Remigius in Wuppertal-Sonnborn on Sunday, June 5th , 2016, Wuppertal 2016
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ On the history of the Church of St. Remigius , accessed on April 20, 2017
Coordinates: 51 ° 14 ′ 21 ″ N , 7 ° 5 ′ 50 ″ E