Saturday, May 17, 2008

FSSP Seminary Excursion to Reichenau, Rheinau and Landsberg [Updated]

The FSSP website has uploaded some beautiful pictures of the May 1st excursion of their European seminary at Wigratzbad, Bavaria, to the isle of Reichenau and to Rheinau.

On the isle of Reichenau in Lake Constance (Bodensee), there is the ancient Benedictine abbey (founded in 724, but dissolved, like so many others, in the secularisation of 1803) of the same name. The entire island is part of UNESCO World Heritage since 2000.

Mass was celebrated in the monastery church of Rheinau, also an ancient Benedictine abbey, founded in 778 and dissolved in 1862. The church as it is today was built in 1710 by Franz Beer.

This is the monastery as seen from the other side of the Rhine:


And two aerial views:



The interior:


The high altar:


Solemn Mass:




Benediction:



At the same link, there are some pictures of an earlier (7 March) excursion to Landsberg on Lech, which I think we may have seen here on the NLM before, but since the church is so beautiful, I suppose there is no harm in posting again some select pictures. The church is the former Jesuit church of the Holy Cross.

Exterior of the church:



Interior:


Solemn Mass:





Detail of the high altar:


One of the wonderful ceiling frescoes by Felix Anton Scheffler, depicting the famous scene at the Milvian Bridge:



The third excursion at the link, to Irsee, has been mentioned on the NLM here and here.

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