The transition from Catholicism to Protestantism was sometimes bloody. It was similar in Bern, where the Antonite monks from the Antoniterkirche had resided for centuries. Expelled, their former churches and chapels were desecrated, but did they really leave the city?
In the winding veins of Bern's Old Town, where the cobblestones whisper and centuries sleep behind closed shutters, stands a building ignored by most passersby. They shouldn't. Behind Postgasse 62 lies the Antoniterkirche, now a shell of holy ground that once echoed with prayers and plagues and now echoes just as often with the ghostly footsteps and whispers of dead monks.
The Berne Controversy was a debate on the theology of the Swiss Reformation that took place in Bern from January 6 to 26, 1528, and ended with Bern becoming the second Swiss canton to officially become Protestant. The monks were then driven out of the city, but according to some ghost stories, some never left the city.
Antonites and their history in Bern
The Antonites, a medieval order of monks known for their care of the unwell and the infamous Tau cross symbol, settled here in Bern before 1283 as servants of Saint. Anthony the Great. They were healers, yes, but also collectors of bone relics and donations, who were said to care for the unwell with both herbs and obscure rituals. As their presence grew, so did the anxiety surrounding them. They said there was something about the way they looked at you. Something about the scent that clung to their robes.
Their magnificent church, rebuilt in 1444 and again in the 1890s, remained proud for only a few brief decades. By the 15th century, they had rebuilt their chapel into a magnificent Gothic church, welcomed the Shoemakers' Guild and the Rebleuten Society to worship at its altars, and employed six friars and several lay nurses in their hospital.
Then came the Reformation – a righteous fire that burned in Bern and cast the Antonites into the shadow. In 1528, the last monk was expelled. Crowds plundered the sanctuary. The altars were destroyed. The candles went out. Statues were dragged and burned in the streets.
Hatred towards the Antonite brothers, like towards all monks, also grew in the years preceding the Reformation. People complained about shameless begging, a decline in morality and an unexemplary lifestyle. Now this hatred has exploded. Lynchings of monks were not uncommon. But did the monks ever really leave?
Visitation of the Antoniterkirche
After secularization, the church served many functions: a granary, a saddlery, and a fire station. Pews were torn out, partitions fell and prayers stopped. But not presence. In each incarnation, employees have reported strange noises. Bleat. Shuffling. Cold hands where they shouldn't be. People said it was rats. But rats don't whisper Latin. Rats don't sigh from behind walls.
There is also the woodcutter's story, recorded in the collection of ghost stories from Bern. He was working alone in a separate room when a frigid wind blew through the boarded walls. Something moved behind him. He turned around, expecting vermin. Instead, there stood a towering figure in black monk's robes, with a pulled hood and gigantic, gloomy eyes. The monk slowly raised his hands. No sound, no breathing, just that terrifying look. The woodcutter dropped his saw. “It was the prior,” he said later, trembling. “The last one. The one who never left.”
Haunted former church
Today, the building is shared by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bern, and the Orthodox chapel hides quietly in the basement. The altar is long gone, the pews have been removed, but those who enter the chapel still say they felt they were being watched. About frigid drafts that move against the wind. They didn't talk about whispered invocations.
The faithful come and go. However, something still remains under the floorboards. In the coldest months, neighbors talk about tranquil singing under the stone. Muffled crying. Ghostly figures moving along the elderly monastery paths.
The Antoniterkirche was intended to be a place of healing. But after centuries of misuse, desecration and silence, it seems the wounds run too deep. And in the obscure heart of Bern, the dead cannot always sleep peacefully.
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Visitation of the Antoniterkirche: Where the monks never left
The transition from Catholicism to Protestantism was sometimes bloody. It was similar in Bern, where the Antonite monks from the Antoniterkirche had resided for centuries. Expelled, their former churches and chapels were desecrated, but did they really leave the city?
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History of the Antonierkirche | Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bern
https://www.maerchenstiftung.ch/maerchendatenbank/11839/im-antonierkloster
Antoniterkirche (Bern) – Wikipedia
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