Working group of Catholic student and university communities

The Working Group of Catholic Student and University Communities ( AGG ) was the subsidiary organ of cooperation between Catholic student and university communities in the Federal Republic of Germany from 1973 to 2000. It was founded in 1973 as a successor to the Catholic German Student Union (KDSE), the amalgamation of the entire Catholic student body. Its successor organization is the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Katholischer Hochschulgemeinden (AKH), which has been representing students in the University and Church Forum (FHoK) since 2000 as the umbrella organization for student communities . The AGG, like the KDSE and the FHoK, had their office in Bonn .

history

The history of the Working Group of Catholic Student and University Communities (AGG) was closely linked to the dissolution of the Catholic German Student Union (KDSE), after the Catholic bishops had withdrawn its pastoral mandate and financial support due to differences in content . Since the students at the KDSE had become increasingly socially critical in the wake of the 1968 movement and, due to the Second Vatican Council, also saw themselves as mature Christians vis-à-vis the church authorities, the majority of the students' critical stance persisted even after the founding phase of the AGG .

These students, who had become so critical and self-confident, were to be deprived of their general political mandate in the supra-regional interest group that was to be founded, as not only students but all university members were included. If the KDSE - after separating in 1969 from the predominantly conservative Catholic student associations - had, in the opinion of the bishops, expanded its mandate too much in the direction of social engagement and social criticism, in future the AGG should primarily focus on the exchange of experiences and the coordination of activities between the serve individual communities. In addition, according to the statutes, it had to represent the concerns of its members vis-à-vis government and church bodies and to ensure that their funding was passed on. However, the AGG should also provide its members with information on university policy, social and church issues and ensure this through the establishment of project areas in their educational work. Differences of opinion about the substantive focus in the implementation of this educational mandate finally led to the dissolution of the AGG in 2000.

Priorities and conflicts

The seminar and educational planning of the AGG was prepared in democratic structures, namely by the full-time employees of the office and the speakers 'group, and negotiated and resolved at the delegates' meetings that take place twice a year. This program comprised events and publications in the following project areas: Theological Education, Congregation Activation - Employee Training, University and Student Social Policy, Third World and Foreign Students, Political Education in the Social and Socio- Political Field, Foreign Workers, Peace Education and Peace Work , Partnership Work (with student communities in the GDR).

According to a report by Klaus Möller, the first chairman of the AGG, up to 300 people took part in the delegates' meetings at the end of the 1970s and up to 100 events were carried out, coordinated and financed by the AGG every year.

The delegates of the municipalities formulated the demands under which the AGG had set its work all the time. B. at a general meeting in 1990 as follows: “We try to orientate ourselves towards people and movements who have achieved liberating church changes. We recognize encouraging approaches today:
in the conciliar process for justice, peace, the integrity of creation;
in the theology of liberation and its pastoral projects;
in feminist theology;
in Christian living and working communities;
in ecumenism;
in cooperation with people who derive their liberating political action from reasons other than Christian ones. "

In the conflict between the AGG and the German Bishops' Conference, which led to the dissolution of the AGG in 2000, in the opinion of Hubert Edin, the last chairman of the AGG, it was only superficially about the money to be saved as mentioned by the bishops, an increase in the efficiency of the work and an increase in the spiritual and spiritual presence of the Church in the college. In reality, it was about the educational work, "which starts from the experiences of the students and involves them in planning and implementation"; and it was about the democratic structures (in municipalities and supraregional), "in which all those involved negotiate rules and content together".

literature

CD-ROM, AGG 1973–2000, Working Group of Catholic Student and University Communities, Bonn 2001, available from: Forum Hochschule und Kirche, 53113 Bonn, Rheinweg 34
AGG (Hg): In what times do we live (do)? Church at the university - balance sheet and perspectives after 40 years of KDSE / AGG (= AGG materials), self-published, Bonn 1987
AGG (ed.): ZeitSpielRäume 1973–1998 - 25 years of the Working Group of Catholic Student and University Communities (AGG), self-published, Bonn 1999
Richard Hartmann: Storms and lulls: Church weather conditions in Germany and their consequences for the work of the KDSE and AGG, 2002
German Bishops' Conference (ed.): The presence of the Church at the university and in university culture, pronouncements of the Apostolic See No. 18, Bonn 1994
Thomas Seiterich-Kreuzkamp: "We are coming, we are pious leftists". In: Publik-Forum No. 5/2001, pp. 32–34

Web links

Individual evidence

↑ CD-ROM, AGG 1973–2000, Working Group of Catholic Student and University Communities, Bonn 2001, available from: Forum Hochschule und Kirche, 53113 Bonn, Rheinweg 34
↑ Cf., ibid.
↑ Cf., ibid.
↑ Cf., ibid.
↑ Quoted from: Hubert Edin: Experiences in supra-regional university pastoral care. In: AGG (ed.): Critical of ideology, equal rights and lively. University congregations as the future workshop of the church. The AGG at the 94th German Catholic Convention May 31 to June 4, 2000 in Hamburg, self-published, Bonn 2000, p. 17
↑ Hubert Edin, ibid., P. 18
↑ TRE (Theologische Realenzyklopädie) Bd. 32, Berlin 2001, p. 266: "The federal work of the Catholic student communities, which are part of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Katholischer Hochschulgemeinden (AGG) and the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Katholischer Hochschulgemeinden at Fachhochschulen (AKHF). Starting in 2001, your interests are to be represented within the framework of a university and church forum that is subject to the supervision of the German Bishops' Conference , in which other institutions and associations active at the university also have a seat and vote. "

[1] CD-ROM, AGG 1973–2000, Working Group of Catholic Student and University Communities, Bonn 2001, available from: Forum Hochschule und Kirche, 53113 Bonn, Rheinweg 34

[2] Cf., ibid.

[3] Cf., ibid.

[4] Cf., ibid.

[5] Quoted from: Hubert Edin: Experiences in supra-regional university pastoral care. In: AGG (ed.): Critical of ideology, equal rights and lively. University congregations as the future workshop of the church. The AGG at the 94th German Catholic Convention May 31 to June 4, 2000 in Hamburg, self-published, Bonn 2000, p. 17

[6] Hubert Edin, ibid., P. 18

[7] TRE (Theologische Realenzyklopädie) Bd. 32, Berlin 2001, p. 266: "The federal work of the Catholic student communities, which are part of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Katholischer Hochschulgemeinden (AGG) and the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Katholischer Hochschulgemeinden at Fachhochschulen (AKHF). Starting in 2001, your interests are to be represented within the framework of a university and church forum that is subject to the supervision of the German Bishops' Conference , in which other institutions and associations active at the university also have a seat and vote. "