The Daughters of Saint Paul first arrived in Düsseldorf in 1964. They began the apostolate of communication and the Word through our bookshop in Nuremberg in. Here are some memories about these past sixty years.
Sr Elena Barchetti, who arrived in Germany on September 15, 1964, together with Sr Cecilia Baron Toaldo, today lives in Nuremberg. She is the living memory of the Paulines in Germany. Sr. Elena is from the South Tyrol Italian province, and is a lively, strong-willed person who looks much younger than her 88 years.
“Our beginning in Düsseldorf, sixty years ago, was adventurous,” said Sr Elena, “because we left Rome on September 14th and arrived in Cologne at six in the morning the next day. For a few weeks we were guests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Sisters (the Sisters of Herz Jesu.) No one, neither the superiors nor us, imagined that we would go to Düsseldorf; we had never heard of it. We were afraid that Düsseldorf was a remote village. Those who accompanied us, seeing the apprehension on our faces, told us: ‘Don’t worry, Düsseldorf is the capital of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia.’ We put our hearts at rest and immediately called the Superior General in Rome who encouraged us: ‘If the Chancery officials told you to go there, go!’ After our arrival, in September 1964,” continued Sr. Elena, “we began our apostolate by visiting families with two bags of books and in this way the people began to know us. Then we thought about going to school and nursery school libraries. We carried out this apostolate for years. It was very tiring, but we were young, and it didn’t bother us.”
In the late 1970’s and 1980’s the presence of the Daughters of St. Paul in Germany expanded to four cities with four bookshops, but today they are only present in Nuremberg that was opened in 1978. They are an international community, made up of six Daughters of St. Paul from different parts of the world. The Sisters are still mourning the recent death of one of their younger sisters, who was originally from Madagascar.
Yet, despite being an international congregation, in Nuremberg they are known as “the Italian nuns”. “We have an Italian style in our congregation because of our roots; when we organize our meetings in Europe,” explained the American superior Sr. Christine Hirsch, who arrived in the in 2001, “the official language is Italian. However, we speak German among ourselves in community.”
Times change and after sixty years in Germany, the Daughters of St. Paul, through the apostolate of communication of the Word, continue to carry out their mission through their bookshop in Nuremberg.
Interno
Sr. Christine e sr. Helene ©PCB
Libreria Paoline a Norimberga da fuori ©PCB