Blessed Peter Friedhofen

Peter Friedhofen (25 February 1819 – 21 December 1860) was a German Roman Catholic professed religious and the founder of the Brothers of Mercy of Mary Help of Christians. Friedhofen worked as a chimney sweep with his older brother until the latter died. This prompted Friedhofen to take care of his brother's widow and children until he founded his own religious order in mid-1850. Pope John Paul II beatified Friedhofen in 1985. Peter Friedhofen was born at the beginning of 1819 on a small farm in Weitersburg as the sixth of seven children to Peter Friedhofen and Anna Maria Klug. His father died in August 1820 and his mother died in 1828. He had five other siblings which included his older brother Jakob. The death of his parents saw the children become wards of the state because no other relatives could take care of them and so a woman took three of the children in - her poverty saw that Friedhofen could not go to school. He made his First Communion at age thirteen. He joined his older brother Jakob as an apprentice chimney sweep when he turned fifteen and he worked in that capacity for a total of three years. When his brother died on 27 October 1845 - he was with the Redemptorists in Holland at the time - it was he who took care of his pregnant widow and her ten other children until suffering a lung condition that forced him to recuperate for a period of time. He met with the Bishop of Trier on 2 July 1847 and the bishop approved the Rule he had made for a new order. Father Antonio Liehs - the bishop's secretary - became his spiritual director. Friedhofen founded his own religious congregation on 21 June 1850 and a month later on 13 July travelled to Aachen while that November moving back to his hometown of Weitersburg. On 25 March 1851 he and two others were vested in their religious habits while Friedhofen took his vows in 1852 a year later. Diocesan approval for the order came on 28 February 1852.