Ludwig-Missionsverein
The Ludwig-Missionsverein was formed with the permission of King Ludwig I of Bavaria on December 12, 1838, and directed by the archbishop of Munich- Freising. It was one of three principal European mission societies for the promotion of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States during the nineteenth century—the other two were the Society for the Propagation of the Faith (Lyons, 1822) and the Leopoldine Foundation (Vienna, 1829).
The American priest Frederic Rese, who had played an essential role in the formation of the Leopoldine Foundation, conceived the idea of a Bavarian mission society. He had been vicar general in Cincinnati when he first pitched the idea to Ludwig I in 1828 and the bishop of Detroit when he finally gained the king’s approval, two attempts and ten years later.Rising to the throne in 1825, the deeply religious Ludwig I differed greatly from his father, Maximilian I. Whereas the father had courted the favor of France (it was Napoleon who granted Maximilian the title of king), the son set his policy in direct opposition to the Hexagon. By the time of Rese’s third petition, the idea had become quite appealing to Ludwig I, given his desire to impede the growth of the French Society for the Propagation of the Faith within his kingdom.
The mission society aimed to promote the Catholic faith in Asia and North America by granting financial support to churches and educational institutions. In its infancy the Bavarian society had to rely on the more established French Society for the Propagation of the Faith for the gathering of information from and the administration of funds to the American churches. Given his German nationalism and Francophobia, Ludwig I only begrudgingly accepted this arrangement. He did not endure the relationship very long. When he learned that German Catholics in the United States were complaining about the allocation of the funds, he severed relations with the Society for the Propagation of the Faith and more vigorously pursued his aim of keeping German Catholics in America “German” and “Catholic.” From 1844 until World War I, the Ludwig- Missionsverein donated almost $900,000 in aid and helped transport Benedictines, Jesuits, and sisters of various orders to the American Catholic churches. In addition, the society supplied German American churches with spiritual articles and religious art.
A large collection of Catholic art, which had been confiscated during the secularizing and military campaigns of the French Revolution, had been transferred to the Bavarian state during the reign of Maximilian I (again due to the congenial relationship between Bavaria and France during the Napoleonic era). Much of this art, as well as that of the Munich-based and Ludwig-sponsored German Nazarenes, made its way through the mission society to the German Catholic churches of the United States.
Kevin Ostoyich
See also Leopoldine Foundation References and Further Reading Mathaser, P. Willibald, O. S. B. Der Ludwig- Missionsverein in der Zeit Kδnig Ludwigs I. von Bayern. Seine Vor-und Grundungsgeschichte 1828—1838 und seine Entwicklung bis zum Jahre 1860. Munchen: Druck der salesianischen Offizin, 1939.
Roemer, Theodore. O. F. M. Cap. The Ludwig-Missionsverein and the Church in the United States (1838—1918). Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America, 1933.
------. The Catholic Church in the United States. St. Louis: B. Herder, 1950.
Springer, Annemarie. Nineteenth Century German-American Church Artists: Old World Traditions and New World Innovations. New York: Peter Lang, 2000.