A humorous ceremony with a serious background

Created: 09/17/2022, 07:00

Village leader Wolfgang Hodbod (on the microphone) spoke at the 50-year celebration.

In the first row: (from left) his deputy Annette Ehnes, Olaf von Löwis, Caritas Association chairwoman Gabriele Stark-Angermeier and Ilse Aigner.

© Cs

Giving support, drying tears, being a role model: the employees of the children's village in Irschenberg have been caring for their protégés for half a century.

At the ceremony to mark the anniversary, facility managers and dignitaries recalled the beginnings 50 years ago.

Irschenberg – Actually, a photo show should illustrate the lectures by village director Wolfgang Hodbod, his deputy Annette Ehnes and headmaster Thomas Wimmer on Friday afternoon.

But a cyber attack on the largest social organization in Upper Bavaria a few days ago (we reported in the national part) had flattened all the data.

Hodbod and his team mastered it – like everything else in their working life, which undoubtedly brings many serious problems: After all, they set themselves no less a task than giving around 90 children from broken families support, security and a good sense of self-esteem.

24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

They chatted away so humorously and informatively that the journey through time into the past and future was clear even without a presentation.

And at least: The film about the children's village, produced by an external media company, could be shown.

And touched the guests, including Sister Rosa and Sister Evodia from the Order of the Holy Family, who had done pioneering work in Irschenberg from 1972.

Also Irschenberg's mayor Klaus Meixner (CSU),

Hodbod described the social context in which a classic children's village first developed in Irschenberg - and finally the differentiated youth welfare association of today, including a special educational support center up to the 9th grade, advice for parents and relatives, external living groups and outpatient help.

“Up until the 1960s, the home landscape was characterized by large institutions.

There, minors lived in large groups, strictly segregated by sex and age,” Hodbod explained.

The pedagogy was rigid and aimed at teaching obedience.

But from the beginning there were also reform movements.

These included the “orphan family” of mixed gender and age that the Sisters of the Holy Family founded in Donauwörth in 1916 – the forerunners of today’s children’s village families.

The model project was discontinued in 1920, but after the Second World War the sisters founded a similar facility in Stakheim near Mühldorf.

In family groups with a sister as the group mother, they cared for war orphans and refugee children.

At the end of the 1960s, the house – an old military hospital – was no longer up to date.

A new place had to be found.

So it was fitting that the Caritas director at the time, Franz Sales Müller, planned to build a children's village.

He had in mind an alternative to the home care of the time.

Also under the impression of the student protests, which denounced the conditions in the homes from the end of the 1960s.

With the help of the association that still exists today, he founded the children's village.

In 1972 the sisters and children from Stakheim moved in.

Mayor Klaus Meixner can still remember the first residents today: "From day one, Angi, Kaspar and Horst drove with me to Miesbach on the school bus," he said in his welcoming speech.

He regrets not knowing what became of the three classmates.

But he is proud to have the Caritas Children's Village in Irschenberg, which contributes to Irschenberg's reputation.

In the 1980s, a visit to the facility was even part of the women's program during state visits by high-ranking politicians.

Ilse Aigner said: "Anyone who, like me, was lucky enough to grow up in an intact family cannot imagine what it means to not have one." It is all the more important that this facility exists.

After the ceremony, Aigner officially opened the children's village's new wet playground, which the association had financed.

District Administrator Olaf von Löwis thanked the children's village team: "Without their passion and commitment, there would be a significant gap in our society."

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