“The stone that the builder rejected, has become the cornerstone.” (Psalm 118: 22-23, Mark 12:10)

This shrine of St. Hildegard is owned and operated by The Community of St. Hildegard, an independent Christian community deeply rooted in the rich soil of Catholic spirituality and liturgical practice. Our independent status allows us to be open, creative, and inclusive in a way we could not be if we were connected to a larger institution.

The physical church building within which the shrine exists was built in 1926 by a small group of Byzantine Catholic immigrants in honor of St. Michael the Archangel. The large cornerstone commemorates its origin.  The Byzantine Catholic community served the community of Fairport Harbor, Ohio until it closed its doors in 2012. The church building was listed for sale in 2015.

In 2016, while in the process of completing a PhD in Ethical and Creative Leadership focused on the works of St. Hildegard of Bingen, Rev. Dr. Shanon Sterringer and her family purchased the property (which included both the church and rectory) to be transformed into the Hildegarden Retreat Center, which opened its doors on Hildegard’s Feast Day, September 17th 2016.

At the time, Sterringer was not yet ordained, but was working within the diocesan context as a lay ecclesial minister. She was looking for a creative and tangible way to bring her doctoral work, and Hildegard’s charism to the wider world. In 2016, a plaque was placed near the original cornerstone by the Hildegarden Board of Directors to mark the change in use. The magnitude of what would develop was still unknown, but the seeds had been planted. After only two and half years of operation, the Hildegarden shut its doors in December 2018. Dr. Sterringer and the space itself took a sabbatical allowing a necessary time of gestation for the Hildegard Haus to be born.

The Hildegard Haus opened its doors in September 2019 following Rev. Shanon’s ordination as the Community of St. Hildegard church. While it started with a small group of local members, the pandemic pushed the services online and a vibrant zoom community emerged. Today, our community gathers every weekend both online and in-person. The most recent plaque placed above the original cornerstone was purchased by one of our local members, Dan Parker.

Related to our discussion of the cornerstones, Hildegard built two monasteries in her lifetime (actually, it is more likely that she built one and restored the other). During her years leading these monasteries, Hildegard wrote over 72 hymns/antiphons. The hymns were written in Latin and continue today to be chanted in Latin.  In this collection of hymns is an antiphon for the dedication of a church.  Included in our tour is a video of this antiphon performed in the Hildegard Haus by Rebecca Fasanello in 2021 for St. Hildegard’s Feast Day.

Hildegard scholar, Dr. Barbara Newman, offers both a literal and poetic translation of this antiphon in her work, Symphonia.  The poetic translation is as follows:

“Ecclesia! maiden tall beyond measure, clad in God’s armor, your gems the color of heaven: you are the fragrance of the wounds of nations, the city of knowledge. O lady, O jewel ever sparkling: such music sounds at your crowning.”