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September 3, 2015

Death Notice No. 16 (To all Unit Administrations):

The Territorial Community of Switzerland, recommends to our fraternal prayers our dear brother, URS SCHENKER, priest of Sion Community, who died in the service of the Blessed Virgin Mary on August 1, 2015 in Sion, Switzerland, at the age of 83 with 65 years of religious profession.

Urs Schenker was born on the Feast of St. John the Apostle, December 27, 1931, the eldest of four siblings: he would have one sister and two brothers. The youngest, Father Paul Schenker, also joined the Society of Mary. After the required number of years in school, young Urs was sent to Suisse Romande (French-speaking Switzerland) to learn the language of Molière in Martigny. One year later, he realized that he was in a school that prepared for the religious life. That was when he decided, not without serious questioning, to follow the path of religious and professional formation to become a Marianist religious. He attended the normal school for teacher-training in Sion. After a novitiate year at Middes (Canton de Fribourg), Urs committed himself to the Society of Mary on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 1949. Six years later, on the same feast, he made his perpetual profession. In his autobiography Father Urs wrote:

I don’t know exactly when Mary entered into my life. But it was certainly very early. When I was little, my mother often prayed at the foot of my bed. One of her favorite prayers was: “Jungfrau Mutter Gottes mein, lass mich ganz dein Eigen sein… Virgin Mother of God, make me all your own…!” That invocation became one of my own daily prayers.

After having earned his Teaching Certificate in 1952, Brother Urs was sent to the primary school in Altdorf (Canton of Uri). He taught there for six years while continuing to pursue his pedagogical formation at the University of Fribourg, earning his License in 1963. His superiors assigned him to the normal school in Sion, where he taught for some twenty-five years. He was a professor of German language, biology, history of art and introduction to media. He was involved in prayer groups. One of his former students, the Abbot Emeritus of Einsiedeln, recounted: “Meeting Father Urs in the normal school in Sion was immensely important for my life and my vocation. He opened up a whole new access to the Sacred Scriptures and to regular prayer. He led us to discover the beauty of creation.” Another former student wrote: “For us French-speaking Swiss in the school, Fr. Schenker was ‘the cinema-man’… [I have] a marvelous memory [of him] characterized by kindness and goodness.”

With Fathers Rudolf Loretan and Otto Jossen, Urs Schenker was introduced to the apostolate of the laity and participated in numerous meetings of Marianist groups, the Affiliates, as they were known at that time. For many years he was a member of the Provincial Council. As Vice-Provincial from 1972 to 1980, he was responsible for the mission collections. His principal concern was the development of our activity in Togo, faced with the diminution of religious vocations in his own country. He was Regional Superior of Switzerland from 2000 to 2009. In 2005, the Togolese brothers, heretofore dependent upon Switzerland, were reorganized into an autonomous region, to his great joy.

From his early childhood, young Urs dreamed about becoming a priest. His commitment to the laity reawakened in him that call to the priesthood. His superiors allowed him to begin to respond to it when he was sent to Abidjan in 1986, where he was responsible for the formation and accompaniment of the young Togolese religious. He began studying theology at the then Catholic Institute of West Africa (ICAO) in Abidjan and continued it in 1988 in Fribourg. Brother Urs Schenker was ordained priest late in life by Bishop Otto Wüest on July 2, 1989, at the age of 58. He exercised his priestly ministry in the Swiss Province’s communities of Martigny and Fribourg.

For several decades, Urs worked with the lay Marianists in Haut-Valais and in Suisse Romande. He organized numerous pilgrimages for French-speaking pilgrims and for German speaking pilgrims. These very spiritual occasions became annual two-day events for the French speakers. Father Urs also organized biblical study days in Sion. He celebrated the Eucharist monthly for the fraternities of Charrat and Monthey. “We remember him as a happy, devoted priest, always ready to serve and especially to serve the lay members of the Marianist Family” – a testimony that well reflects how the laity experienced Father Urs.

In 2013, Father Urs’s health began to cause concern. At the end of September, he underwent a serious operation in Fribourg for cancer. Alzheimer’s Disease began to afflict him. In March 2014, our brother joined the community in Sion. After mid-June, he passed the last months of his earthly life in the Maison Saint-François in Sion (a medical rest home) and prepared to meet the Lord and Mary whom he loved so much.

Father Urs Schenker went to God on Saturday, August 1, 2015. Two and a half years of illness had prepared him for his meeting with the Lord to whom he had devoted his life. “What a beautiful day was that of the Transfiguration (August 6) for accompanying our dear brother Urs to his last resting place!” wrote a Marianist sister.