To the Good Shepherd (Berlin-Friedrichsfelde)
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The Church of the Good Shepherd is a Catholic church in the Berlin district of Lichtenberg , district of Friedrichsfelde , which was built in 1906 as a small church and inaugurated in 1985 as a new building at the same location. It is located on Kurzen Straße, the church area is bordered by Massower Straße, Straße Am Tierpark, Alfred-Kowalke-Straße.
History 1900 to 1945
Towards the end of the 19th century there was a strong increase in the Catholic population in Friedrichsfelde, for which a regular church service was required. The village belonged to the mother church of St. Mauritius Friedrichsberg-Berlin , which is why its curate , Nikolaus Kuborn , took care of the premises for church services in the vicinity: from 1905 the auditorium of the boys' school (Rummelsburger Strasse, later at the Friedrichsfelde underground station) was available to the Friedrichsfelders . In 1902 the parish of St. Mauritius had already acquired two plots of land for later church buildings at a price of 21,000 marks , one of them in Friedrichsfelde, Kurz Strasse. The other property was in the Karlshorst Colony , on which the Karlshorst branch was later built.
When the Kuratie Friedrichsfelde-Karlshorst was established in 1906 , the newly appointed chaplain Bernhard Lichtenberg had donations collected and the proceeds used to convert the house on the purchased property into a parsonage and to build a small, single-nave brick church in place of the existing barn Inaugurated in 1906. An organ (company not known) was installed and in 1907 bronze church bells were hung in the tower, made by the Apolda foundry.
Due to the First World War and its aftermath, there was no further progress in the Friedrichsfeld Church, on the contrary, many parishioners perished and crime spread: in 1920 the monstrance and the chalice were stolen. Thanks to donations from church members, a new chalice and a new monstrance could be ordered from the Schlossarek company in Wroclaw , which are still in use today (in the subsequent building).
Because the population of the Friedrichsfelde district continued to grow rapidly, the church council bought a plot of land in 1929 in order to be able to build a larger church on it. In 1930, a newly founded parish association, which also gave religious instruction and organized social events in the community, began to collect funds primarily for the new church.
From 1933 onwards, the Kuratie Zum Guten Hirten came under pressure from the political situation. There were organizational changes such as the departure of the localities Falkenberg, Blumberg and Biesdorf-Nord and Kaulsdorf-Nord from the Friedrichsfelde parish area (1937, 1938 and 1939), but the National Socialist regime mainly impeded events in church building, religious instruction and the Exercise of the pastor's office.
In 1939, a newly built organ for around 7,700 marks was installed in the church by the Karl Berschdorf company from Neisse . On April 13, 1942, the bells of the small church were pulled in for the manufacture of military equipment. Several air raids on Berlin destroyed both the rectory and the church, and the monstrance and chalice could be rescued from the rubble; Nothing is known about the whereabouts of the organ.
New beginning from May 1945
The Catholic community continued to exist even after the Second World War . The people came again in large numbers to the services, so the church had to be rebuilt, which was achieved with the commitment of many Christians by July 1948.
Although there was already a larger area for a new church, the East Berlin magistrate only approved the construction of a barrack in 1954, in which community meetings and religious instruction could take place. This simple building was given the honorary name Bernhard Lichtenberg House . Despite the decline in acceptance of the church's faith, it was possible to modernize the interior of the church service room in 1964 according to a design by the Dresden architect Egon Körner . A new sandstone altar was consecrated on December 1, 1966.
Due to the construction of large residential buildings in the vicinity of the church, there were numerous new residents from around 1965, including many Catholics. The parish hall was no longer sufficient and in 1970 a larger room for church services was added to the Bernhard-Lichtenberg-Haus, for which a small organ was purchased in 1981.
New building 1983–1985 / rectory
The episcopal ordinariate , in whose church coffers there was some money (especially so-called “ hard currency ”), was able to commission a new church for the community of Zum Guten Hirten in 1978 after lengthy negotiations with government agencies in the GDR . The architects Rainer Rietsch , Walter Krüger and Bernd Stich from the Deutsche Bauakademie designed a modern building that consists of simple geometric shapes such as triangles, trapezoids, etc. that interpenetrate in a variety of ways. The foundation stone was laid on June 21, 1983 in the presence of the Berlin Vicar General Roland Steinke , and on April 28, 1985 the new church was inaugurated . The total construction costs amounted to 1.3 million marks .
The structure consists of concrete with a clinker facade. Large, bright windows in the building showed the implementation of the Vatican recommendations that a church should open to the outside. The shape of the house deviates from previous ideas of church buildings, it symbolizes rather a large tent, the "tent of God over the world". The tower is about 25 m high.
Even before the church was built, a parsonage designed in the same clear style was rebuilt and the old one was demolished in 1983.
Despite the political upheavals in the GDR , three newly cast bells were inaugurated with a service on December 24, 1990. They were re-cast by the former bell foundry in Apolda for 11,000 marks on the basis of the old documents and provided with inscriptions: “I am the good shepherd”; "Watch and pray, Maria helper in prayer" and "Until the last breath - Provost Lichtenberg".
In 1991 the church building received a gilded tower cross , which the Kubich company in Großräschen had produced. Extensive renovation and modernization work was carried out between 1993 and 1997 in the church and rectory.
With the support of the German Federal Environmental Foundation , a photovoltaic system on the roof of the rectory in Friedrichsfelde was made possible as part of the 300 Church Roofs for Solar Energy funding program . The planning took place in 2001, soon after the assembly and on November 26, 2002 the system went into operation.
Interior
The sandstone altar from 1981 from the original church was erected in the new church building (slightly shortened) and consecrated again. The monstrance and the communion chalice from 1920 stand on it during special services. In addition, an organ made in 1968 by the Paul Ott company , Göttingen, was acquired and installed here. The originally simple white church windows were supplemented in 1998 with subtly colored edge elements based on a design by the glass designer Günter Grohs .
In line with the exterior design of the building, the interior of the nave is kept simple, with hardly any right angles to be seen. Panels hung on both sides of the walls serve as room decorations, depicting the stations of the cross in modern painting and a copy of a saint figure with a modern candlestick next to it and green plants.
Church life
From 1906 to 1990
Under the new Kuratie Friedrichsfelde-Karlshorst, active community life developed from 1906, social tasks were taken on, nuns ( maids of Mary ) won over to care for the sick, associations founded, church holidays organized, religious instruction introduced and carried out.
In 1921/1922 the Episcopal Authority in Wroclaw split the Catholic parish Friedrichsfelde-Karlshorst into the parishes Zum Guten Hirten Friedrichsfelde and St. Marien Karlshorst, both of which then developed independently. From then on, Catholics from the towns of Biesdorf , Wuhlgarten, Kaulsdorf , Hellersdorf , Marzahn , Blumberg and Ahrensfelde also belonged to the parish of the Good Shepherd . (Kaulsdorf and Hellersdorf came to the parish office of Berlin-Mahlsdorf as early as 1925. )
When a large prisoner-of-war camp was set up in Friedrichsfelde in 1940, the pastor was allowed to hold services for imprisoned Catholics from Italy, Poland or France.
Since 1991
In 2003, the parishes from Karlshorst St. Marien and Friedrichsfelde were reunited to form a parish called Zum Guten Hirten , which has a total of 3,000 members.
In addition to church services, weddings and funeral ceremonies, student-word church services, religious parades, senior meetings, Bible weeks or rorate masses are organized.
Bernhard Lichtenberg
The above-mentioned chaplain Bernhard Lichtenberg played an important role in the history of the Catholic churches in Lichtenberg and the associated localities Friedrichsfelde, Karlshorst, Biesdorf, Kaulsdorf and Marzahn in their development at the beginning of the 20th century. Later, from 1910, Lichtenberg held other and higher church offices in Berlin. His work and steadfastness during the Nazi era led to his beatification by Pope John Paul II in 1996. Some of the communities mentioned honor his name with memorial plaques on the churches.
See also
Web links
swell
- Jan Feustel : Walks in Lichtenberg. Berlinische Reminiscenzen, 75. Haude and Spener Verlag, Berlin 1996, ISBN 3-7759-0409-3
- 100 years of Catholic parishes in Friedrichsfelde and Karlshorst. 1906-2006. Festschrift. Edited by the Catholic Church Community of the Good Shepherd, Berlin 2006.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: Event overview of the community Zum Guten Hirten in November 2009
Coordinates: 52 ° 30 ′ 23.9 " N , 13 ° 30 ′ 58.6" E