Ferdinand Sigg

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Ferdinand Sigg (born March 22, 1902 in Thalwil , Switzerland ; † October 27, 1965 in Zurich ) was a Swiss clergyman and the first European bishop of the newly formed Central Conference of the Episcopal Methodist Church in Central and Southern Europe.

Sigg came from a Methodist family of craftsmen. From 1923 to 1927 he studied in the Frankfurt seminary.

In 1929 he married Alice Mumenthaler. After graduating, he worked briefly in church work in Basel and then became the secretary of Bishop John Louis Nuelsen , an activity that shaped him strongly. In 1936, during an economic crisis, he became director of the Christian Vereinbuchhandlung, the Swiss Methodist publishing house in Zurich. After the war, he worked from Switzerland to help rebuild the German publishing house and the associated printing company in Frankfurt.

As a publisher, he was particularly concerned with the role of the laity in the church, the role of the church in society, socialism and the church and with world mission.

Sigg was committed to ecumenism at an early stage : from 1942 he was a representative of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the Swiss Evangelical Church Federation . For eight years he was president of the Swiss Evangelical Mission Council. From the beginning he worked with the aid organization of the Evangelical Churches in Switzerland (HEKS), which was formed after the Second World War for the reconstruction of the churches in Europe. In 1948 he participated as an interpreter at the inaugural meeting of the World Council of Churches in Amsterdam.

In 1954, a few months after the death of his wife, the constituent meeting of the newly formed Central Conference of Central and Southern Europe took place in Brussels, to which the Episcopal Methodist Church in Switzerland , France , Austria , Belgium , Poland , the then Czechoslovakia , Hungary , the then Yugoslavia , and Bulgaria as well as the Methodist section in North Africa belonged. Some of the countries were traditionally Catholic , others traditionally Orthodox or dominated by Islam . The majority of the states were under communist rule and in some countries Methodists were victims of persecution . Before the election of the bishop, this office was described by Bishop Moore as follows:

“Geographically, we are in a vast space; but our church is small and modest in the same proportion! The future bishop will therefore have an incredibly great task measured by the smallness of the work, which will strain his head and hands excessively if he wants to shape this multicolored central conference into a lively organism. "

Ferdinand Sigg was elected with 37 out of 38 votes in the first ballot.

He also continued to work as a bishop in ecumenism, for example by contributing his experience of ecclesiastical service in Islamic countries and his experience as a publishing director to the World Council of Churches and to its commissions for Faith and Order in Lund in 1952 and Montreal in 1964. He sent greetings to the second session of the Christian Peace Conference (CFK) in Prague in April 1959 , and he participated in the Second All-Christian Peace Assembly in Prague in 1964.

Ferdinand Sigg died unexpectedly in office on October 27, 1965. In 1966, Franz Werner Schäfer was elected to succeed him as bishop.

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personal data
SURNAME Sigg, Ferdinand
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss clergyman and bishop
DATE OF BIRTH March 22, 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Thalwil , Switzerland
DATE OF DEATH October 27, 1965
Place of death Zurich , Switzerland