Fritz Stein (pastor)

Fritz Stein (actually Friedrich Stein ; born March 31, 1879 in Hertershofen ; † March 14, 1956 in Heilbronn ) was a German theologian. He was involved in the so-called church struggle against the synchronization of the Evangelical Church.

Life

Fritz Stein was the youngest of four children of a farmer. From 1886 he attended elementary school in Hausen am Bach; From 1890 he received Latin lessons and lessons in other high school subjects from the local pastor, so that in 1892 he was able to switch to the Reutlinger Gymnasium, where he graduated from high school in 1897. He then studied theology in Tübingen until 1901 and then worked as a vicar in various parishes, before he passed the second theological exam in 1906 and became city parish administrator in Lorch . In the same year he completed a study trip to Italy and got a job as city vicar in Heilbronn. In 1908 he married Mathilde Hornberger from Tübingen, to whom he had been engaged since 1902. No children emerged from the union; The Stein couple adopted Fritz Stein's nephew of the same name, who later also became a theologian.

The first years in Heilbronn

Stein initially worked in Heilbronn as the secretary of the Evangelical Youth Association. In 1911 he received the parish for the southern district, which later became Heilbronn's southern parish. This was initially located in a hall in Südstrasse 156. From 1912 Fritz Stein was the eighth city pastor in Heilbronn. At the same time he continued to work for the YMCA and various diaconal institutions.

During the First World War and the difficult time afterwards, Stein also provided a lot of practical help in his community. For his service in the medical service with the Red Cross he received the Charlottenkreuz , the Cross of Merit for War Aid, the Red Cross Medal III. Class and the Red Cross Medal II. Class. From 1922 he was chairman of the Heilbronn City Deaconess Association. Under Stein's leadership, this association set up a hospital for rachitic children at 13 Villmatstrasse. Fritz Stein provided needy members of the community with food and other necessary things until he was banned from doing so in 1934. His practical skills were praised in official assessments that were made based on his applications for a dean's office. However, a “more finely constructed personality” was preferred for certain positions.

In 1925, a wooden church was bought in Cologne , which was then set up on Heilbronner Südstrasse. This first Heilbronn south church , popularly known as the Schokoladenkirchle, was inaugurated on November 15, 1925. In 1932 the parish council decided to have a new church built for the growing southern parish. The Martin Luther Church was consecrated on June 17, 1934. Fritz Stein, who had also suggested the name for the new church, gave the festive sermon - in the absence of the mayor Heinrich Valid and the district leader Richard Drauz , with whom he had already fallen out because he had made very decisive statements in the area of ​​church politics.

The church struggle

The German Christians had enforced in 1933 that Ludwig Müller became Prussian state bishop and also Reich bishop. With this he should also become the superior of all regional bishops. This met with resistance in Württemberg and Bavaria. In Württemberg, the church leadership had initially negotiated a regional synod with the German Christians, in which they had a narrow majority without the election that had been recommended. Fritz Stein had early concerns about this construct and soon joined the pastors' emergency association around Martin Niemöller . He became a shop steward and head of the Heilbronn group of the State Brotherhood Council .

After a radio report on April 14, 1934, that the Synodal Committee had withdrawn its trust in Regional Bishop Theophil Wurm and that a church emergency had arisen as a result, Stein called a parish council meeting the next day, in which he analyzed this report as incorrect. In reality, he explained, the rulers wanted to support the German Christians after they had lost their majority in the synod. A telegram was then sent to the Reich Bishop in which the parish council declared its solidarity with Bishop Wurm and asked for the emergency ordinances to be lifted , since there was no church emergency in Württemberg. The Heilbronn pastors also wrote a letter of solidarity to Wurm. From now on, weekly meetings were held in the southern church, in which the goals of the German Christians and the principles of the Confessing Church were discussed. In a letter to Drauz in 1934, Stein protested against the accusation of being a "vole" and stated that, on the contrary, he was conducting his fight against the German Christians quite openly, but was at the same time "deeply connected to the state of Adolf Hitler". Nevertheless, Drauz resented the letter and declared at a meeting of the Pastors' Emergency Association on June 4, 1934 that he would have had Stein arrested for this if he were not a pastor, and that he would hit someone else “right and left on the cheek for such statements ". He forbade further letters from the pastor.

Stein and the other Heilbronn pastors, but not Dean Karl Hoß, continued to express their solidarity with their regional bishop, even after an ordinance was published in the Reich Church Law Gazette in September 1934, according to which the Württemberg regional church should also be incorporated into the German-Christian Reich Church . A little later, the German Christians took over power in the Württemberg regional church. On September 30, 1934, Reich Bishop Ludwig Müller paid a visit to Heilbronn and spoke both in the Kilian's Church and at a rally on the market square. He was not received by the pastors - Dean Hoss was the only exception.

Meanwhile, Stein organized a signature campaign for the regional bishop and finally sent over 3,000 signatures to Berlin , whereupon he was repeatedly interrogated by the Gestapo and repeatedly checked. Yet he did not deviate from his demeanor. In 1935, for example, when the Reich Bishop was due to return to Heilbronn, he prompted many colleagues and parishes to send letters of protest to Berlin against this.

The expressions of solidarity with the regional bishop in Württemberg finally attracted attention abroad, so that Hitler thought it wiser to back down. In November 1934 the court found that Theophil Wurm had acted illegally. In Heilbronn the vote of confidence was put to dean Karl Hoß and he had to resign. His successor Julius Rauscher, however, felt the aversions of the party and the city administration after this forced change of office.

Fritz Stein, widowed since 1937, became dean in Knittlingen in 1938 ; In 1939 he moved with the deanery to Maulbronn . Submissions from parishioners of the southern church in Heilbronn to the upper church council to recall Stein back to the city were not taken into account. Stein continued to pursue his line in his new places of activity. Among other things, he resisted handing the evangelical seminar in Maulbronn into the hands of the NSDAP, but was unsuccessful.

Fritz Stein returned to Heilbronn in the post-war period. From 1949 he lived again in his house at Hartmannweg 24. Retired from May 1949, Stein continued to work in hospital pastoral care, among other things, before he had to give up his activities in 1955 for health reasons.

literature

• Martin Uwe Schmidt, You can't serve two masters ... Fritz Stein (1879–1956) , in: Christhard Schrenk (ed.): Heilbronner Köpf VI , Heilbronn City Archives, Heilbronn 2011, ISBN 978-3-940646-08-8 , Pp. 187-208

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Prelate Wurm, quoted in Martin Uwe Schmidt, One cannot serve two gentlemen ... Fritz Stein (1879–1956) , in: Christhard Schrenk (ed.): Heilbronner Köpf VI , Heilbronn City Archives, Heilbronn 2011, ISBN 978- 3-940646-08-8 , pp. 187-208, pp. 195.
2. ↑ Quoted from Martin Uwe Schmidt, You can't serve two masters ... Fritz Stein (1879–1956) , in: Christhard Schrenk (ed.): Heilbronner Köpfe VI , Heilbronn City Archives, Heilbronn 2011, ISBN 978-3-940646- 08-8 , pp. 187-208, p. 200.
3. ↑ Quoted from Martin Uwe Schmidt, You can't serve two masters ... Fritz Stein (1879–1956) , in: Christhard Schrenk (ed.): Heilbronner Köpfe VI , Heilbronn City Archives, Heilbronn 2011, ISBN 978-3-940646- 08-8 , pp. 187-208, pp. 201 f.