Berlin: the End of the “Pink Sisters”

I recently read that the Berlin monastery of the order known as the “Holy Spirit Adoration Sisters” in the English-speaking world is to be closed and sold. The reason given is lack of vocations. It seems that only 11 sisters are left (aged between 40 and 84). These sisters – colloquially called the “Pink Sisters” because of the unusual color of their habit – have preserved their strictly cloistered community. The focus of their spirituality is Eucharistic adoration. Strangely, however, the nuns of the monastery of St. Gabriel and the Annunciation of Our Lady have not followed a prescribed order of prayer for decades. (“Ewiges Gebet hinter Gittern: die “Rosa Schwestern” in Berlin,” Katholisch.de, 10/12/2021)

I do not know if the closing of this monastery is connected in some way with reported Vatican initiatives to centralize control over contemplative religious life – and allegedly also to reduce the number of such communities. The list of orders and monasteries throughout the Catholic world declining or disappearing is also, of course, almost endless. But the monastery of St. Gabriel and the Annunciation of Our Lady is remarkable for several unusual features.

First, the church and cloister were built in 1933-37 under the National Socialist regime. It is not a very well known fact, but a fair number of Catholic churches were erected in Germany immediately prior to World War II. Construction continued, even as elsewhere in Germany individual laymen, priests and bishops were attacked or in some cases even killed, as Catholic publications and organizations were suppressed. It was only with the coming of the Second World War in 1939 that the regime launched a broader crackdown on Catholic religious life (especially schools and congregations).

Second, the “Pink Sisters” had been called to Berlin by Fr. Bernhard Lichtenberg, the provost of the Berlin cathedral (a Catholic diocese of Berlin had been established only in 1929). Fr. Lichtenberg had undertaken the audacious task of evangelizing this non-Catholic and even non-Christian city – at that time one of the greatest in the world. But he recognized that to succeed in such a work the support of contemplative religious prayer and of Eucharistic adoration would be needed. Therefore, he established a strictly cloistered monastery in the midst of secular Berlin. A vocal opponent of the regime, Fr. Lichtenberg went on to have numerous altercations with the Nazis, and in 1943 died of ill-treatment as he was being transported to Dachau concentration camp. (Kloster St. Gabriel und Kirche Mariae Verkündigung, de.wikipedia.org, read 11/27/2021)

I have often thought that neglect of the contemplative life was a not insignificant flaw in the otherwise admirable record of evangelization of the New York Archdiocese. For in New York, as in Berlin, a missionary Catholicism had to build up the faith in an alien environment. In New York, however, the focus was almost exclusively on apostolic action. In Manhattan the one remarkable exception was the establishment in 1909 of the order of Marie Reparatrice in the former parish of St. Leo – initially, against resistance of the Archbishop. These semi-contemplative sisters, dedicated to Eucharistic adoration, soon enjoyed great suceess in the city. For a long time their church remained a welcome island of contemplation even for non-Catholics. These sisters of “Mary Reparatrix” were destined to disappear in the wake of the Council – their church is now the site of a high-rise apartment building. ( The Churches of New York LXXXI: Losses 11)

Third, the architecture of the Berlin church and cloister may be surprising in its modernity. For, regardless of the dogmas proclaimed by that era’s National Socialist propaganda and by our present day intellectuals and academics, the architecture of the Third Reich (like its music and films) in fact resembled very much that of the previous Weimar republic and also that found elsewhere in the West. The style of church of St. Gabriel – especially its interior – is severe but elegant. Is this not “noble simplicity”? The complex of buildings is protected by the local German law governing historic monuments.

So the “Pink Sisters” came to Berlin in most difficult times. But they perhaps were prepared for that – hadn’t their umbrella organization, the “Steyler Missionaries” (aka the “Society of the Divine Word”), founded in 1875 by a German priest, had to start its existence in the Netherlands because of the persecution under Bismarck’s Kulturkampf? And the convent of St. Gabriel, once established, did persist – through the allied bombings, the horrifying fall of the city in 1945 and the subsequent decades-long division of the city into East and West Berlin. It is only in the age of Pope Francis and of the rich and progressive German church that the story of this contemplative community comes to an end. A precious refuge of peace, quiet and spirituality will be lost.