The first damage was already visible ten years ago.
"Even my predecessor mentioned that," said Diessen pastor Josef Kirchensteiner yesterday.
Together with church caretaker Barbara Mann and architect Verena Selmigkeit, he explained the renovation work that began in August on the church tower next to Marienmünster.
Dießen -
“You had to be afraid that the plaster would peel off,” said Verena Selmigkeit, who oversees the work on behalf of the State Building Department.
The west side of the tower shows severe weather damage that urgently needs to be repaired.
This damage mainly affects the west side and only the outer wall, "the substance is in good condition".
No wonder, the tower is only 35 years old.
Kirchensteiner is still amazed after five years.
Since then he has been looking after the parish of the Assumption of Mary.
“Fascinating that the reinforced concrete looks so filigree on the outside”, he finds and raves about the decorations “in a wonderful baroque manner”.
Unlike him, church carer Barbara Mann witnessed the construction first hand 35 years ago.
Her father Erich was one of those who pushed this new building forward with the combined strength of all Dießen people.
And when you see the old photographs, you understand why.
For a long time next to the Marienmünster there was an unadorned concrete block that had nothing in common with the baroque church.
This block had replaced a tower that was largely destroyed by fire in 1827 and was then provisionally supplemented with a pointed hood.
When it finally became dilapidated, they were probably happy to have a tower at all - there is no other way of explaining the “block” that was built as a result.
The tower, like so many other things on this historic site, has a special meaning.
An old engraving clearly shows that it was once the connection between the old Gothic church and the baroque Marienmünster.
The tower stood right in between, originally belonging to the old church.
This was torn down and the tower was later “baroque” by the master builder of the cathedral, Johann Michael Fischer, according to Barbara Mann.
So it fit better with the existing church.
When this tower became dilapidated, the building sin followed.
The people of Dießen could not be happy about the new tower.
Finally, a board of trustees "Dießener Kirchturmbau" was founded and fought for a new building.
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The church tower at Marienmünster has been scaffolded since mid-August.
© Dagmar Rutt
Together with the architect Richard Zehetmeier, the board of trustees worked on a design based on the towers in Bergmüller's main fresco in the Marienmünster.
Amazingly, among all the old plans in the minster, there are actually none of the original tower.
Its history has not yet been archived or explicitly documented.
So today's tower was built - made of robust reinforced concrete, one meter thick at the bottom.
The walls taper towards the top to 65 centimeters, according to Verena Selmigkeit.
“And on the eve of my ordination, the onion was placed on the tower,” says Kirchensteiner.
He could remember the date so well.
That was 35 years ago.
Kirchensteiner was not there personally.
Today the people of Dießen are proud of this tower, which they sometimes also call the Fischer Tower, although the master builder of the Marienmünster has nothing to do with this modern building.
But everything now fits together, and if you don't know, you can't tell the tower is young.
So that it stays that way, the restoration of the structure, including the cross, is now about 80 meters high.
The Free State lets go of 700,000 euros for this.
The parish church foundation has to pay five percent of these costs, 60 percent of which are borne by the diocese.
It is 14,000 euros, calculates Barbara Mann and, as a conscientious church nurse, does not fail to point out that donations for this sum are welcome.