Fr. Richard Henkes, S.A.C., A Picture of His Life A Picture of His Life | Page 12

Strandorf.
This is a small spot with 780 inhabitants in the
Hultschiner Ländchen region, which belonged to the Archdiocese of
Olomouc. In the German-Czech border area, the nationality often
changed. In 1938, the Wehrmacht occupied the Sudetenland. The
Archbishop of Olomouc therefore extended the general vicariate of
Branitz, the German-speaking area, to the Sudetenland. The vicar
general was Josef Martin Nathan. He appreciated Fr. Henkes, who
regularly held retreats for young people in St. Joseph in Branitz since
1935. After 1938, the cooperation deepened. With the closure of St.
Joseph, Fr. Henkes joined a circle of about thirty priests who held
three-day courses, or spiritual weeks, in the parishes themselves so
that the Gestapo did not discover and end their efforts before they be-
gan. In the spring of 1941, Fr. Henkes was threatened with imminent
conscription and then assigned to parish work by Monsignor Nathan
as pastors were not allowed to be conscripted, according to the Con-
cordat. As a result, Richard Henkes became the fill-in parish priest in
Strandorf, settling in the presbytery headed by Paula Miketta, who
was already a bursar and housekeeper for Pastor Dr. Josef Vrchovecky.
The Germans had forced the Czechs to move to a separate part of the
diocese. The fate of the Czechs affected Fr. Henkes greatly. He did not
like it when children with language difficulties in German were being
teased in school, going as far as forbidding mockery. This is the root
of the zeal that developed as a Czech student in Dachau, inspiring
him to build a bridge between the Germans and Czechs after the bad
experience of the war.
The parish flourished in the service of their new priest. The wor-
ship, in the sense of the liturgical movement, was attractive, and the
children felt addressed. For two wonderful years the church and its
pastor grew stronger together. Fr. Henkes continued to work as a pas-
tor and became a leader of the Pallottines in the eastern Sudeten re-
gion. He negotiated with Monsignor Nathan so that the community
could “accommodate” several Westerners to escape the Nazi regime.
One shared joy and suffering in Strandorf - and suffering was
always increasing. As Fr. Henkes knew from his own youth in Schön-
statt during the First World War, he kept written contact with the
soldiers of his village who were at the front. He mourned with fami-
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