Revival of the Steinach Monastery by the Dominican Nuns of Lienz

Suppl. to the Cath. Papers of Tyrol 1847, No. 44.

Tyrol.

From the Passer, 25 Oct. The former Steinach Monastery will flourish once more. The Dominican nuns of Lienz have purchased the neglected monastery building and intend to establish a daughter house of their order here. In the final days of last month, the Dean of Lienz arrived to inspect the purchase and take a closer look at the restoration of the dilapidated monastery. Renovation work is already underway, and we hope the new community of nuns will arrive as early as next year. Steinach Monastery is said to have been founded by Adelheid, wife of Count Meinhard I of Gorizia, who died in 1275. According to Staffler, the women living together without a formal rule received the Rule of St. Dominic in 1295. (However, when the statistician asserts in II, II, 2, page 665 that Pope Alexander IV prescribed it to Steinach Monastery in the aforementioned year, he is mistaken; for this noble pontiff had already departed this life in Viterbo in 1261.) Professor Beda Weber would place the foundation a century earlier. — After many stormy trials, this monastery too was embroiled in the exemption dispute around the mid-17th century, which only came to an end with the secularization of the monastery. This occurred in 1782. Most of the expelled nuns sought refuge at the time with their sisters in Lienz. Now, new life flows from that sanctuary back into the abandoned Steinach.

Friends of the Kalender für Zeit und Ewigkeit may be interested to hear that its author was also among the numerous visitors who travelled to our area.