Father Henry Middendorf, SCJ

Father Henry Middendorf, SCJ

"Forgetfulness leads to exile, in recollection lies the secret of redemption".

With this quotation from rabbinic literature, Fr. Bernard Bothe, SCJ, begins his book on Fr. Henry Middendorf, SCJ, which was published in 1998, the centenary of his birth (1898-1998).

This straightforward and well documented work presents the value and the generative capacity of memory and recollection, basic elements in the Jewish tradition and faith which are applied to life. For this reason, in 1994, the organism of the State of Israel dedicated to honoring those who during the period of Nazism helped and protected Jews (Yad Vashem), agreed, in response to a petition of the survivors of that epoch, to give Fr. Middendorf recognition for the work which he performed during those years of nazism, when he risked his own life in favor of individuals and families of Jewish origin.

The scene of the events was Stegen, a little village in the southwest of Germany, about 6 miles from the city of Freiburg, at the foot of the Black Forest. The Priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus were engaged in teaching and parochial activities there since the early 1930's.

In the dramatic period from 1942 to 1945, Fr. Middendorf was the rector of the community. Different groups of persons lived there: the SCJ Community made up of twenty religious; three Dominican nuns who looked after the tasks of cooking and washing; a community of eight Vicentinas (Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul) who looked after the 75 children in the orphanage; and a large and variable number of families or single persons who had no place to go. One of the witnesses from that time, Mrs. Lotte Paepcke, described the situation at the end of 1944 as follows: "Catholics, Protestants, those who opposed nazism, nazi sympathizers, French collaborators, Italian antifascists. Some with fear of the present, others afraid of the future. And all of them afraid of everyone." They all found refuge and hope among our people. A total number of 152 people came to us, among whom nine were of Jewish origin.

In 1993, this group of Jewish survivors requested that Fr. Middendorf, SCJ, be given the public and perennial gratitude of the State of Israel for having saved their lives. Today there is a plaque in the Garden of the Just in Jerusalem which names Fr. Middendorf as "A just man among the nations."

Father Bothe, SCJ, includes the documents, acts and discourses prepared for the official celebrations which were carried out both in Israel and in Germany. His birthplace (Aschendorf) also wanted to join in the homage and gave the name of "Heinrich Middendorf" to the village school.

Witnesses testified to Father Middendorf's courage and generosity. He not only helped those who came to Stegan in search of protection, but he also went in search of others to give them protection in his community.

Shortly after the war, Fr. Middendorf was elected a General Counsellor of the Congregation (1949-1954). He then served as Secretary General of the Reparatory Associations until 1956 when he set off as a missionary, at the age of fifty-eight, to what was then called Belgian Congo. During the turbulent revolt of the Simbas in 1964, Father Henry was sent to prison and lived alongside many priests and religious who were subsequently martyred. In 1972, back in Germany for a vacation, he died before he could return to his mission in Africa. He was buried in the cemetery of our school in Handrup.

The life of Fr. Middendorf was marked by his passion for his vocation as a Priest of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the service of the lowest of the low and the needy, in a spirit of simplicity and heart-felt warmth as a true prophet of love and servant of reconciliation. The tradition of the Talmud appears to apply to him when it says: "In each generation there are thirty-six just men or saints who live among the nations. They live peacefully and without being noticed by the people of their time. Only in times of extreme necessity and of the greatest dangers does the action of these men appear, eluding disaster. Afterwards they return to anonymity again. Without them, the world could not survive."