Protestant youth
Child and youth work in the Evangelical Church describes itself as Protestant youth .
“Members” are automatically all baptized Protestants of the appropriate age. In Germany, the Evangelical Youth is represented nationwide by the Association of Evangelical Youth (AEJ). In this association, which acts as a contact, regional church and independent associations with a special focus are organized, such as Protestant scouts (e.g. the CPD or the VCP ), the youth association Decided for Christ (EC) or the Christian Association of Young People (YMCA) .
Funded by the respective regional churches, the Evangelical Youth has an independent structure. In addition to the full-time decision-making structure, there is a voluntary , democratic structure within the association. The Protestant Youth occasionally expresses itself independently on political and social issues, special internal church issues or local issues.
The cross on the globe has been the symbol of the Protestant youth since 1935.
Content orientation
The content of the work in the Protestant Youth is varied and motivated differently. In addition to groups of children and young people who deal with faith and its application, there are many sporting or free offers that are comparable to local youth work. This also includes the implementation of vacation free time. The training of young people to become youth leaders enables them to deal with responsibility, the search for ideas and social engagement.
history
The roots of the Protestant youth lie in social care for children and young people in need in the 19th century ( diakonia , missions ) and were influenced by the youth reform movements at the beginning of the 20th century. Common activities such as sports, hiking and standing up for one's faith were the goals of the foundation.
As well as the Wandervogel movement , party youth dressings or trade union youth she was in the era of National Socialism in the Hitler Youth incorporated forcibly forbidden as own association.
After the war, separated by the Iron Curtain , youth groups emerged in the GDR and the Federal Republic of Germany , often called the Young Community .
East Germany
In East Germany, the Young Community was a place that was not owned by the state and thus also made room for free and oppositional thoughts. Signs of the Protestant youth were forbidden. Many East German politicians and dissidents had contact with the Protestant youth.
After 1945, the associations that existed before 1933 tried to reorganize themselves in the GDR area. The Protestant associations - among other things, young men, girls' work, school work - formed again. Organization as a club was not allowed in the Soviet occupation zone by the military administration. That is why they work closely with the church and constitute themselves as the “work of the church”. Only in Thuringia, during the turmoil of the early years, was it possible to register the young men’s factory as an association. But also the community youth work sees itself as an association belonging to the church: The "Young Community", and the sometimes ceremonial awarding of the " Ball Cross " as a badge is in fact acceptance into the association. The “youth chambers” soon to be formed in all regional churches and the regional youth pastors appointed form the structural network with the church leadership.
At the same time, however, the idea of a large youth community, a common youth organization without distinctions between parties and denominations, took hold. Talks were held at the beginning of 1946, and at the end of February the approval of the “Free German Youth” (FDJ) was applied for from the Soviet Military Administration (SMA). The founding deed of February 26, 1946 was also signed by Oswald Hanisch for the Protestant and Robert Lange for the Catholic Church, despite the impairments or even bans on church events that occurred in individual cases. During the 2nd parliament in Meißen in 1947, a large ecumenical service was part of the program, which was also attended by non-Christians. But the policy of the “Ulbricht Group” meant that the “bourgeois” parties officially withdrew as early as 1948, and the churches officially withdrew from the FDJ parliament in Leipzig in 1949. The church youth work should be integrated as a division “Arbeitsgemeinschaft Religion” under an SED-specific youth organization, similar to the CDU in the “National Front”, that was the policy of Erich Honecker (then FDJ chairman), Hermann Axen and Margot Feist (later Honecker). But the churches insisted on their independence. The first hard conflict followed with the GDR government, which from now on only postulated the “unified youth association”. The conflict was to continue throughout the years of the GDR's existence. 1953 the persecution of the young community as a "cover organization for war inciting, sabotage and espionage on behalf of the USA", the persecution of the set-up time (leisure trips) work in the 1960s, the disputes about "open work" and the work for "Peace, Justice and Integrity of Creation".
Thus the church associations were the only associations that were not integrated, the Protestant “young community”, “young men 's work” and other “works”, and Catholic “parish youth” with various associations. The other youth associations were integrated into the pioneer and FDJ organizations as a unified youth association until the early 1950s - again by force if necessary. This youth work was directly intertwined with the school, much of it ran as a “working group” in school rooms, less often it was via the school in groups of the “DTSB” (German Gymnastics and Sports Association of the GDR), the “GST” (Society for Sport and technology) u. a. conveyed.
The Protestant youth was built into the institutions of the church (youth pastoral office, youth work, pastoral care office). The church is both a “protective roof” and a “regulating hand”. An association-like understanding was lost, especially since the churches understood their youth groups as a “gathering of the confessing youth” and did not charge membership fees or the like, even if co-determination, often even self-determination, of the groups remains formative, not least due to the fact that the voluntary nature of the Participation was system-determining.
Here, too, the milieu is initially the breeding ground for work. The youth consecration enforced in the second half of the 1950s as a counter-event to the confirmation, the prohibitions and punishments during set-up times in the 1960s, etc., and the ongoing secularization in general, increasingly softened this milieu.
On the other hand, church youth work increasingly became the place where one could express critical thoughts and live for a while. This brought church youth work from the 1970s up to the critical grassroots groups in the 1980s. This youth work was thus an “oasis”, but also a “niche” - essentially supported by voluntary work, supported, but also often initiated by full-time employees. The democratic voluntary representative structure, not least towards the church, but also for one's own determination of form and content, gained in importance.
Because she often had a difficult time in the official church , the new approaches in the missionary direction as well as in the social diaconal direction were by no means only greeted with joy.
The path of the churches in the GDR between adaptation and resistance, between religious retreat of "Christian bound citizens" (CDU East) and "critical solidarity" (Provost Dr. H. Falcke), between denial, often still characterized by monarchical thinking, and apolitical " Community of the Disciples of Jesus ”, these conflicts of the“ Church in Socialism ”were again and again most evident in youth work. And the church leaders looked for the way between a “protector” of youth work and submission to state requirements. This understanding, the softening ecclesiastical milieu, the state pressure and the general increase in the non-commitment of young people also brought increasing problems in church youth work - the work of the classic association volunteers became less. At the same time, a growing potential of socially committed laypeople and full-time employees grew, which ultimately led to the "peaceful revolution" in 1989, where youth work was almost always involved again and brought its lived experience of democracy, self-determination and communication.
The churches had also built up their own parish pedagogical training courses, the quality of which was very high despite the unfavorable external conditions; Compared to the old countries, these degrees were almost always recognized as a technical college diploma.
West Germany
In West Germany, the offers of church youth, especially in rural areas, were for a long time the only special offers for children and young people, which resulted in particularly high participation rates in the 1970s. This changed at the latest in the 1980s with expanded offers from other associations and the municipalities, but also with children's programs on television etc.
Since the reunification
Today the Protestant youth is represented in most committees for youth work and often provides decision-makers and advisors for the content of youth work.
See also
literature
- Johannes Jürgensen: The bitter lesson: Protestant youth 1933 (aej study volume 7) , Stuttgart 1984.
Web links
- Evangelische-Jugend.de - Homepage of the aej
- Youth in Germany 1918 to 1945: Evangelical Youth (NS Documentation Center of the City of Cologne)
Individual evidence
- ↑ An illuminating regional study on the relationship to the Hitler Youth, with contemporary documents and reports of the times, is available, for example, in: Norbert Czerwinski & Sabine Grabowski u. a. Ed .: Impossible to withdraw? Catholic and Protestant youth in National Socialist Düsseldorf. Düsseldorf 1989, 2nd revised. 1990 edition, without ISBN. The nationwide developments are also documented in detail.