St. Andrä im Lavanttal had been the seat of the Prince-Bishops of Lavant from 1225 to 1859, when the see was transferred to Marburg, now Maribor in Slovenia, by the Bishop of Levant, Blessed Anton Martin Slomšek (seen above). In connection with the transfer, he also reorganized the diocese of Lavant. This was both an historical, pastoral and national accomplishment. By these moves Slomšek managed to include in his diocese about 200,000 Slovenes who before belonged to the diocese of Graz and who would have been lost to German influence. He left St. Andrä in August and later that year the Jesuits moved into the former bishop's residence there and opened a novitiate and later a tertianship. This was where Fr. Karl Rahner, SJ, famous Jesuit theologian, made his tertianship. The Jesuits also took over the twin-towered Baroque church of Maria-Loreto dating from 1697 and the parish church, which goes back to the ninth century. Only in 1969 did the novitiate move to Germany, and the Jesuits moved out of the former bishop's residence to open a retreat house (Schloss Kolleg) outside of town. The building serves today as a residence for the elderly under the name Elizabeth House. The parish church of St. Andrä was under the caare of the Jesuits from 1945 to 2007.
