The Story of Mother Franziska Lechner
Once upon a time, as all good stories begin, this date was
January 1, 1833. The place was Edling, a small town in Bavari
a, Germany near the market town of Wasserburg on the
river Inn. Franzi Lechner was baptized in the church right
across the street from her house and learned from the simple
piety of her family and neighbors to love God with a straight
forward, practical devotion that extended to all those placed in her path of life. From the very
beginning she loved the stories of Sacred Scriptures and was instrumental in reviewing the teachings
of the Church with her playmates.
As a young woman she received the only education available to a peasant girl of her time, a course
in needlework. She felt a strong call to religious life and searched courageously for her place
in the Church. For a time she worked with a priest in Switzerlanhad where she founded a hospital
and several schools for poor peasant girls. Since she still felt called to found a congregation she
went alone and penniless to the Capital of Catholic Austria and applied for permission to organize
a women's congregation and to collect alms for its establishment and works for the poor. In 1868,
in Vienna the plan took shape and soon other women applied to join her and dedicate their lives
to Christ under her direction.
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What began with training of servant girls and securing suitable employment for them, developed
into elementary schools, kindergartens, infirmaries and senior care for the poor. In her lifetime
she traveled the expanding Austro-Hungarian empire establishing institutes where her growing company
of sisters served.
Mother Franziska Lechner died in Austria in 1894 after having built a Church at the Mother
House in Vienna. Today we have the honor of calling her "Servant of God" as she is a
candidate for beatification, a step to being officially declared a Saint
.
This beautiful picture of the Nativity is a treasure kept by the sisters in Breitenfurt, Austria. It was once in the first Mother House. Here we have some thoughts on Christmas written by our Foundress in 1877:
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Prepare a comfortable dwelling in your heart for the poor Christ child so that He may gladly celebrate His rebirth on the Holy Night therein.
O my dear ones, if Jesus finds such a worthy dwelling place prepared in your heart He will gladly remain with you and how powerfully you will perceive His presence!
Scroll down for a Christmas message.
