Protestant church
Between Politics and Bible Exegesis: Church Congress ends
After five days full of political statements and Bible studies, the Kirchentag in Nuremberg is coming to an end. photo
© Pia Bayer/dpa
Debates about climate and growth, about war and peace. A highly political Kirchentag ends in Nuremberg – and one in which some things were different than usual.
A Federal President who thinks about how water becomes wine. A CDU leader who wonders how things will continue after death – and a Bavarian Prime Minister who sees “”Good times, bad times” in the Bible” in the Bible story about Joseph and his brothers.
Top politicians also used the Evangelical Church Congress in Nuremberg, which drew around 70,000 visitors, to formulate their religious thoughts. One more, the other much less well-founded. However, the Kirchentag will not be remembered because the politicians showed their religious side – but the Protestant Church presented itself explicitly politically and very differently from what is known of it.
The Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the AfD’s high in polls, climate change: the Kirchentag makes all of this an issue and gives top politicians plenty of room to do the same.
Approval for Scholz, Baerbock and Merz
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) defend the asylum compromise and their foreign policy in the Russian war of aggression, CDU leader Friedrich Merz is clearly opposed to any form of appeasement policy towards Russia. All three received a lot of applause on Saturday – just like the day before the Inspector General of the Bundeswehr, Carsten Breuer, with his expected clear yes to arms deliveries to the war zone.
“I waited with a trembling heart to see how he would be greeted,” said Church Congress President Thomas de Maizière on Sunday at the end of the five-day event. The Kirchentag audience is traditionally considered to be pacifist. The fact that Breuer was also greeted with applause speaks for the open and respectful climate of discussion.
Some politicians might have been booed earlier, says the General Secretary of the Kirchentag, Kristin Jahn. “Maybe it’s good that something is changing.” Because the social challenges are great and need cooperation and not competition.
Former Federal President Joachim Gauck takes up this in a discussion with Baerbock and emphasizes that pacifism is a wonderful idea. “Unfortunately, I had to learn that we were sometimes in a romantic bubble,” he says, and “that there is a difference between our beautiful visions and wishes and what is politically feasible.” He emphasizes: “Of course you have to help the victim. What else?” He sees it like Baerbock, who says: “For me, standing on the attacker’s side is not an option.”
Climate crisis as a “turning point”
The great challenge of climate change also gets a lot of space at the Kirchentag: The activist Luisa Neubauer is a guest and is almost celebrated in the old walls of the St. Sebald Church. And Carla Hinrichs from the Last Generation group is sitting on the podium together with Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens).
The climate crisis is a “turning point” for Prime Minister Winfried Kretschmann (Greens) from Baden-Württemberg. He, too, masters the balancing act between Bible exegesis and political message and leaves his audience quite hopeful despite the challenges posed by climate change: “The time will come – the time has already come.”
Of course, the chancellor feels visibly more comfortable when the subject of church and faith is dealt with and he doesn’t have to say much about it: He was baptized as a Protestant and left, he doesn’t like to explain his motives. Only this much: He has read the Bible in its entirety and thinks that people’s cultural thinking is shaped by it.
The number of events on the subject of abuse in the Protestant Church is comparatively small – and so is the interest in the main event on the subject, at least at first glance. Most of the seats in the hall remain empty for the panel discussion entitled “Calling abuse by its name”.
In the end, Church Congress President de Maizière and Heinrich Bedford Strohm, Bishop of the host Bavarian state church, were extremely satisfied: “The mood was relaxed, hearts were open, minds were clear,” says de Maizière. “If we succeed in dealing with the difficult and contentious issues in this way, then this Church Congress has served our country.”
The next Evangelical Church Congress is planned in Hanover in two years’ time.