Vinnenberg image of grace
The Vinnenberg image of grace , or the Mother of God from the Kingdom of Heaven, is a Madonna enthroned . It is the center of the pilgrimage church of the Vinnenberg monastery in Milte , in the Warendorf district in ( North Rhine-Westphalia ). It represents a pilgrimage tradition that has grown over the centuries, with many historical breaks.
Legend
According to legend, the miraculous image is said to have been carved out of the tree trunk on which the Blessed Mother and St. Johannes had sat after measuring the yard. Bernhard von Vinnenberg had four sculptures made: three portraits of the Mother of God and one of St. Anna. The smallest of the images of Mary created at that time was the Vinnenberg image of grace: the “Mother of God from the Kingdom of Heaven”.
description
The old miraculous image
The old miraculous image came from the Middle Ages. This representation of the Byzantine Madonna originally came from the Byzantine Empire and only became known in the West in the 13th century. The head must have been damaged during the dissolution of the Vinnenberg monastery and was replaced in the 19th century. Crowns were placed on both Mary and the baby Jesus.
“The miraculous image, oak wood, height without base 17 cm. Mary, in a straight upright posture, holds the reclining Jesus child on her lap, who looks up at her. She wears a long undergarment and a pleated coat. The head of the Blessed Mother is new and does not correspond to the character of the picture. The real head is still in the hollow of the picture behind the new back wall. The facial area is still well preserved, only the back of the head is lost. The original shows the solemn posture of the Queen of Heaven, as it corresponds to the character of late Romanticism. The back wall of the throne, the base and the painting are also new to the picture. Second half of the 13th century. "
The lost image of grace (1928): Mother of God from the kingdom of heaven
The lost miraculous image (1930) adorned with a queen of heaven
The new image of grace
The new miraculous image is also made of oak and is 17 cm high. However, the crowns were carved on each of the two figures. The folds of the skirt are not as lush and filigree as in the old miraculous image. The baby Jesus is now rocking deeper into his mother's lap. The crowns were also adorned with gold, pearls and garnets. There is now a band of garnets and diamonds on the lower edge of the base. The figure is not an identical replica, but a contemporary recreation of medieval sculptures. As such, it is shaped by the clear and sober structure of the post-war period. Painting, as with the old miraculous image, was deliberately avoided.
"The simple, down-to-earth and clear fits the Westphalian soul. It is not uncommon for people not to find the image in the church because it appears so modest."
The new image of grace
The new image of grace in half profile
presentation
Over the centuries reports of miracles and miraculous healings have been written about the Vinnenberg image. Accordingly, they were depicted prominently in the chapel. Until the Second World War, the miraculous image was part of an altar. Between 1965 and 1990 it was depicted in a large metal monstrance . Then, because the image of the grace was not easily recognizable, a wooden, Gothic display case in the form of a tabernacle was made . In addition, the miraculous image moved from the rear choir to the left front side.
The miraculous image in the monstrance 1921
The miraculous image in the monstrance, 1970s to 1980s
The current representation of the image of grace
.JPG)
history
The exact date of creation cannot be dated. Based on the painting, it is assumed that it was built in the second half of the 13th century. When two devastating fires burned down the monastery church in the 16th century, the miraculous image is said to have been found in a miraculous way outside the church on the bleaching place of the monastery, which is known as "paradise". In 1654, after the Thirty Years' War , the abbess Anna Maria Plönies founded the Vinnenberg pilgrimage, probably to avert the bankruptcy of the monastery. In the turmoil of secularization , the head of the miraculous image must have been cut off and was replaced in the first half of the 18th century by a representation from the late romantic era. During this period from 1810 to 1831, the image of grace was taken into custody by the parish in Füchtorf. In 1879, the chaplain Bernhard Billmann from Milte, who came from Haltern, was paid the salaries blocked in the Kulturkampf . Since the chaplain was able to stay afloat through donations from the population during this time, he donated the money paid to Vinnenberg. This was the first time that the miraculous image of the faded votive clothing was freed and expertly restored , probably by the sculptor Fritz Ewertz (1860 - 1926). Shortly after the expulsion of the sisters in the Third Reich in 1941, Clemens August Graf von Galen took the image of Our Lady of Heaven to himself, where he placed it on his desk in the Episcopal Palace . During the unexpected air raid on October 10, 1943 at 3 p.m. it was also there and, like the palace, was probably a victim of the flames. Immediately before his sudden death, the bishop commissioned the workshop of Prof. Franz Guntermann in Münster in 1946 to make a new statue to make up for the war loss . The latter, in turn, passed the episcopal commission on to his assistant, the Füchtorf sculptor Josef Picker . Picker used the old templates of the image of grace for the creation, without having to forego an independent reinterpretation. In 1952 the new image of grace was officially recognized by the Vatican after a petition from Bishop Michael Keller on the occasion of the 700th anniversary of the pilgrimage site .
literature
- Wilhelm Rave: Architectural and art monuments of Westphalia, Warendorf district. Edited by Karl Kölker, Münster 1936.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Architectural and art monuments of Westphalia Published by Wilhelm Rave Provinzialkonservator 42. Volume: District Warendorf, edited by Karl Hölker, Aschendorfsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Münster 1936, pp. 380–382
- ↑ Church and Life, from August 22, 2012 for-sister-josefine-is-vinnenberg-a-matter of the heart
- ^ Architectural and art monuments of Westphalia Published by Wilhelm Rave Provinzialkonservator 42. Volume: District Warendorf, edited by Karl Hölker, Aschendorfsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Münster 1936, pp. 380–382
- ^ "Josef Picker still carves", in: Westfälische Nachrichten of February 12, 1981
- ↑ See Art. "Liturgically and artistically successful", in: Westfälische Nachrichten of September 7, 1963