Friedenskirche (denomination)

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As a Peace Church is called a church community that is particularly suitable for promoting since about 1900 peace and non-participation in the war committed.

Peace churches

Those Christian marginalized groups that clung to the pacifism of early Christianity and refused military service in the European Middle Ages are considered historical peace churches . Since the 14th century, this included the Cathars , who were annihilated by the Roman Catholic Church as early as 1342, and the Waldensians , some of whom were later absorbed by the Hussites and the Bohemian Brothers .

In the age of the Reformation , the Hutterites and Mennonites , who emerged from the Anabaptist movement , were added.

The Church of the Brethren , Quakers and Shakers , which were built in the 17th and 18th centuries, are also assigned to the peace churches.

In the 19th century, further pacifist church communities emerged as part of the North American revival movement, such as the International Mission Society of Seventh-day Adventists, Reformation Movement .

Practice of the peace churches

Theological basis

Some of the church communities mentioned have major theological differences. What they all have in common is the rejection of violence and the refusal to do military service. In addition, the positions are different and range from the political reluctance of Jehovah's Witnesses to a strong socio-political commitment such as the Quakers, who also engage in high-profile lobbying and campaigning.

Service in uniform

Because of their refusal to do military service , a large number of them have experienced state persecution and repression over the past 500 years. For example, Hutterites and Mennonites had to give up their homeland several times and move to new countries.

First World War

Even at the beginning of the 20th century, the theologically justified rejection of military service was not fully accepted in many Western countries. A well-known example is the fate of two young Hutterites in the USA during the First World War . Because they refused to wear military uniforms, they were forced to spend many hours naked in the open air during the winter, after which they died. Most of the Hutterites then left the USA and moved to Canada . As in the USA, some of the Quakers were exempt from military service. British Quakers sometimes did the medical service in uniform or were incarcerated by the military justice system.

Second World War

In the religious communities it was left to the personal decision of the individual. In the Third Reich, 89% of those who openly avowed conscientious objection on the territory of Austria's Jehovah's Witnesses. (See also Jehovah's Witnesses under National Socialism , Quakers under National Socialism ).

Civil peace work

After the war, members of American peace churches actively worked in reconstruction programs in Europe and supported aid programs such as CARE , Quaker Feeding and Eirene . In 1956, in response to German rearmament , German Mennonites founded the German Mennonite Peace Committee to support the conscientious objection of German soldiers and American soldiers stationed in Germany. In 1986, Mennonites and the Church of the Brethren founded the Christian Peacemaker Teams , which send trained peace workers to conflict regions. Christian pacifists should also be ready to take responsibility in crisis areas. In November 2005, four activists from the Christian Peacemaker Team in Iraq were kidnapped and one of them was murdered by a shot in the head.

On the initiative of the German Mennonites, the General Assembly of the World Council of Churches declared in 1998 the beginning of the 21st century with a decade to overcome violence . In the Department of Protestant Theology at the University of Hamburg , the Peace Church Office has existed since 2006 under the direction of Rev. Dr. Fernando Enns , whose task is the systematic-theological research and further development of a theology of the peace churches. The Institute for Conflict Transformation ( ComPax ) was opened at the Mennonite training center Bienenberg in Switzerland in 2009 , which trains employees in communities and Christian institutions in conflict transformation .

In addition, many peace activities were and are supported (in some cases significantly) by members of the peace churches. Many people are actively involved in the protests against the Scottish nuclear weapons base in Faslane, known as Faslane 365 , or in the Easter marches in Germany.

Military chaplaincy

All traditional peace churches are opposed to the link between church and military associated with military pastoral care , as practiced by the two national churches in Germany ( pastors in uniform ).

War taxes

The collection of taxes that benefited the military budget was repeatedly criticized . In the Quaker state of Pennsylvania , for example, which existed for about 80 years, the usual formation of soldiers for the British crown was rejected. For reasons of conscience, the Quakers were also unwilling to pay the punitive taxes imposed by the British in response. Since they could not prevent the payment of the special war tax, they ultimately withdrew from politics.

In Germany, German Quakers, together with the Peace Tax Network, propagated a peace tax. The taxes should be withheld proportionally to the military budget of the Federal Republic and instead be paid to peace organizations . However, since taxes were withheld by the employer for wage-related work, this could only be done by the self-employed.

Countermovement

The Lutheran Protestant churches have expressly contradicted the positions of the historical peace churches. In the Augsburg Confession , the peace churches are explicitly condemned:

ARTICLE 16: BY THE POLICE (STATE LAW) AND THE WORLD REGIMENT
The police (state order) and the secular regiment teach that all authorities in the world [...] which are created and appointed by God, and that Christians without sin [...] punish evildoers with the sword, legitimately wars lead, fight with them, [...]. This condemns those who teach that what is indicated above is unchristian. [...] But if the command of the authorities cannot be obeyed without sin, then one should obey God more than men.

This avowal was followed by deeds. A number of Mennonites were accused of heretics and killed on the basis of this confession . The Evangelical Church in Germany holds on to this confession to this day and writes about it: "This confession from 1530 is one of the most important theological confessions of the Reformation". The day of remembrance of the Confessio Augustana (Augsburg Confession) is an integral part of the church year and is celebrated on June 25th.

In May 2011, the EKD Council Chairman Nikolaus Schneider accused the peace churches and especially the Mennonites of running away in the discussion about the legitimacy of violence .

See also

Web links

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Spiegel, "Peace activist may warn against the military", August 16, 2009, Spiegel article
  2. ↑ See also the section Corder Catchpool in "Quakers from Politics, Science and Art: A Biographical Lexicon" Edition 2, page 46, ISBN 978-3-88309-469-4 .
  3. ↑ Quakers. In: faslane365.org. Archived from the original on August 3, 2012 ; Retrieved July 3, 2016 .
  4. ^ The Augsburg Confession on the website of the Evangelical Church in Germany.
  5. ↑ Confessions. Evangelical Church in Germany, accessed February 12, 2010 .
  6. ↑ One cannot make peace with such enemies. Welt Online, accessed September 6, 2012 .