Günter Hitzemann

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Günter Hitzemann (born January 24, 1929 in Bad Oeynhausen ; † January 20, 2015 in Hamburg ) was a German Baptist clergyman. In the course of his service within the Federation of Evangelical Free Churches in Germany , he took on leadership tasks within his free church for many years .

Life

After graduating from high school , Günter Hitzemann studied from 1950 to 1952 at the Bethel-Bielefeld Theological University . He then attended the Protestant Free Church theological seminar in Hamburg-Horn , which he completed in 1954 with the theological exam. The topic of his thesis was: The term “love” in Hellenistic and Biblical usage .

From 1954 to 1957 he was vicar in the Evangelical Free Church congregation Hamburg-Altona (Christ Church), which then appointed him to their parish pastor. In 1968 he was appointed to Berlin. Here he took over the management of the Baptic Diakoniewerk Bethel , which he headed until his retirement in 1992. During the time of his directorate, significant expansions of the Bethel plant took place. For example, the Bethel senior citizens' home in Berlin's Booth-Strasse was built under his leadership, the former Welzheim district hospital was taken over into the sponsorship of the free church Diakoniewerk and the Bethel facilities in Bad Oeynhausen were opened. During his term of office, branches of the Berlin Bethel Diakonie were also set up in Trossingen and Vienna .

In addition to his professional activity in the free church diakonia, Günter Hitzemann was also involved in the governing bodies of his free church. For more than 20 years he was a member of the federal leadership of the Evangelical Free Churches. His special focus was on theological training , external missions as well as diakonia and financial budget. From 1973 to 1975 and from 1981 to 1989 Hitzemann was President of the Federation of Evangelical Free Churches and thus held the highest office of his Free Church. In this function he made a major contribution to the fact that the German Baptist Union confessed its failure in the Nazi dictatorship on the occasion of the Hamburg Congress of the European Baptist Federation and formulated a confession of guilt. From 1982 to 1984 Günter Hitzemann was also President of the Association of Evangelical Free Churches . He is also considered to be one of the co-founders of the Association of Free Church Diakonie Works , of which he was also the first chairman. From 1977 to 1991 he was a member of the Diaconal Conference of the Evangelical Church in Germany and was the deputy chairman of this association for over ten years.

Günter Hitzemann lived in Hamburg. In 1954 he married his wife Ingeborg and had three daughters, all theologians, including Andrea Strübind , Baptist theologian and professor of church history at the University of Oldenburg .

Appreciations

In 1989, the Diakonisches Werk awarded Günter Hitzemann the crown cross in gold for his life's work . A year later, the Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany presented him with the Federal Cross of Merit on ribbon .

Works (selection)

  • Hans Luckey to the memory , in: Festschrift 100 Years Theological Seminar 1880 - 1980, pp. 78–84
  • Highlights from the life of a free church. Religious piety takes precedence over global responsibility , Wetzlar 1983
  • We see ourselves entangled in the debt of our people and our federal community. On the genesis and function of the confession of guilt from 1984 , in: Zeitschrift für Theologie und Gemeinde (Ed. Society for Free Church Theology and Journalism ), Volume 8/2003, pp. 307ff

literature

  • Society for Free Church Theology and Journalism (Hrsg.): Festgabe for Günter Hitzemann's 80th birthday , in: Journal for Theology and Congregation (ZThG) , Volume 14/2009, pp. 270–309, ISBN 978-3-932027-14 -7 , ISSN  1430-7820
  • Günter Balders : Eduard Scheve. Henchmen and precursors. Günter Hitzemann on his 60th birthday , Wuppertal and Kassel 1989

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hartmut Riemenschneider / Christoph Stiba: Obituary for Günter Hitzemann (PDF; 128 kB) ( Memento of the original from September 23, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , baptisten.de, accessed on January 22, 2015. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.baptisten.de
  2. ↑ Predigerseminar Hamburg-Horn: Festschrift for the celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Preachers' Seminar of the Evangelical Free Churches (Baptists) in Germany , Hamburg-Horn 1955, p. 100
  3. ↑ Günter Hitzemann is 80 ( memento from January 23, 2015 in the Internet Archive ), portal-oncken.de, message from January 13, 2009.
personal data
SURNAME Hitzemann, Günter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Baptist clergyman
DATE OF BIRTH January 24, 1929
PLACE OF BIRTH Bad Oeynhausen
DATE OF DEATH 20th January 2015
Place of death Hamburg