Urban Thelen

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Seal of the Gnesen cathedral chapter with the inner inscription S (an) c (tu) s ADALBERTUS

Urban Thelen (born April 22, 1915 in Winden , Kreuzau municipality ; † May 2008 in Drove ; buried June 22, 2008 in Winden) was a sexton , organist and choirmaster in his hometown.

Thelen is very well known not only in Winden, but also in Poland . There he is considered a national hero because he saved the relics of Saint Adalbert von Gnesen , the national shrine there , from destruction by the National Socialists during the Second World War .

Live and act

After attending commercial school, Thelen was called to labor service and then joined the Wehrmacht, where he worked in military service offices. After the outbreak of World War II, he was appointed head of the Inowrocław Office of Reconnaissance and Military Assistance . He made friends with Paul Mattausch, who provided pastoral care to the Polish population.

Sergeant Thelen received his most dangerous job as a soldier in World War II: Cardinal Adolf Bertram from Wroclaw had received news of the planned destruction of the Gnesen cathedral . The destruction of the relics of St. Adalbert and the desecration of the Blessed Sacrament threatened. The Gnesen Vicar General Eduard van Bleriq made contact with Father Mattausch in Inowrocław , where Thelen was stationed. He put "his soldier" on the march. In July 1941 Urban Thelen took the train to Gniezno in his Wehrmacht uniform and returned home with the small reliquary shrine wrapped in wrapping paper. In the compartment, he said, nobody would have dared to sit next to him. "It was probably the aura of the saint". In Inowrocław the relic was handed over to Mattausch and survived the chaos of war walled up in the vestry floor of the St. Nicholas Church. In 1992 he brought a piece of the Gnesen relic to the new altar in St. Mary's Conception in Kleve .

Only after the war was Thelen able to implement his wish to attend music school. He then became organist in the Marienkirche in Düren and directed the church choir.

Thelen did not tell the story of the relic's rescue for decades and did not tell his friends until 1980. The media were informed in 1997. Thelen was then invited to Gniezno by Archbishop Henryk Muszyński and received the title of "Honored from the Archdiocese of Gniezno". He died in Drove at the age of 93.

reception

Today's Hoesch Design GmbH bathtub factory, one of the largest bathtub manufacturers in Europe, belongs to a Polish group of companies based in Gnesen . Wieslaw Podraza, who rescued the Kreuzau company from bankruptcy in 2005 and donated the memorial plaque, paid tribute to Urban Thelen as a person with a special attitude and who should not be forgotten.

On March 17th, 2016 the world premiere of the documentary “Der Kurier des Kardinals” by Andrzej Machnowski, which tells the story of Urban Thelen, took place in Poland .

Honors

  • Federal Cross of Merit , awarded by the then Federal President Roman Herzog
  • Memorial stone in Winden, unveiled on September 6, 2019, on Lehrer-Mainz-Strasse, in the shadow of Urban Thelen's birthplace, so to speak
  • Awarded the title of Honorable of the Archdiocese of Gniezno

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Barbara Cöllen: O Niemcu, który uratował relikwie najstarszego patrona Polski (Polish) on dw.com, accessed on September 16, 2019.
  2. ↑ A Polish national hero from Winden. In: Aachener Zeitung from December 11, 2018, accessed on September 16, 2019.
  3. ↑ Dorothée Schenk: Like a sergeant brought St. Adalbert to safety on poloniaviva.eu, accessed on September 16, 2019.
  4. ↑ a b Barbara Cöllen: Urban Thelen uratował dla Polaków relikwie św.Wojciecha (Polish) on dw.com, accessed on September 16, 2019.
  5. ^ Hoesch story , accessed on September 16, 2019.
personal data
SURNAME Thelen, Urban
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sexton, organist and choir director
DATE OF BIRTH April 22, 1915
PLACE OF BIRTH Winden , Kreuzau community
DATE OF DEATH May 2008
Place of death Drove