Karl Pagel

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Karl Pagel (born October 30, 1914 in Krolow in Pomerania ; † March 16, 2013 in Lobetal ) was a German theologian and parish priest and from 1954 to 1983 pastor and head of the Evangelical Hope Valley Institutions and Council of Churches in today's state of Brandenburg .

Life

Karl Gustav Kurt Pagel was born the son of a farmer in Pomerania and after graduating from high school he studied Protestant theology in Jastrow . From 1934 to 1939 he was enrolled as a theology student at the universities in Greifswald, Tübingen and Stuttgart. He joined the Confessing Church (BK) and in 1937 was elected spokesman for the BK students of the Pomeranian Evangelical Church . He completed the vicariate in Stralsund .

On September 12, 1939, the vicar received his draft order for military service, first for deployment in France and then on the Eastern Front . In the meantime, Pagel was able to take the second theological exam at the Consistory in Stettin on October 18, 1940. He then got a six-month working holiday approved by the Wehrmacht as a preacher for the rectory in Gingst . After returning from Soviet captivity in 1947 as a former Wehrmacht officer, the theologian first worked as a parish priest in Patzig on Rügen, where he was appointed by the consistory during the war in 1941, and then in Pasewalk , most recently as superintendent . “From July 6, 1949, the official business” of the previous superintendent in Pasewalk was taken over by “Pastor Karl Pagel”.

In Lobetal , it was a tradition in GDR times that the head of the institution was not only a pastor, but also held the mayor's office in personal union. From 1954 to 1983 Pagel held the office of pastor, director of the institution and mayor. He became a CDU member on April 4, 1955 , after being recruited by the CDU district association in Frankfurt (Oder) . In 1974, on the occasion of his 60th birthday, the "Head of the Diakonische Hoffnungstaler Anstalten and Mayor of Lobetal" received a letter of congratulations from the CDU party chairman, in which Götting addressed the member of the CDU main board, Pastor Karl Pagel, especially for his chairmanship in the AG " Christian circles ” thanked the Frankfurt (Oder) district committee of the National Front . In his life testimony, Pagel protested against the fact that "the Eastern CDU is often degraded as the party of> recorders <", although former functionaries of the Eastern CDU "did not want to leave state power to the SED alone ". For their assessment, after the political change and German reunification , Pagel also wanted a yardstick "according to what they could achieve for the concerns of the church and its diakonia."

As a CDU member in the GDR, the pastor, institution director and mayor of Lobetal was an honorary member of the district council in Bernau near Berlin . In this body he primarily devoted himself to questions of social welfare. He also volunteered on the board of the Frankfurt (Oder) district association of the CDU. Pastors invited by GDR organizations and other Christian men and women from the West were sent to visit him in Lobetal, accompanied by GDR officials, to show them the diaconal institution as an example of the social commitment of Christians in the GDR. The politician Nelly Haalck accompanied a delegation of women to Lobetal to introduce them to “the dedicated work” of the full-time employees, and she tried to reduce “the distrust of the West German visitors”. Both CDU members were awarded the GDR's German Peace Medal in 1968 . Pagel also received guests from churches in other countries in the “ Bodelschwinghschen Anstalten ”, e.g. B. from Romania. To a corresponding question from the chief reporter of the newspaper Neue Zeit , how Pagel could cope with the workload, the pastor replied: "Without being firmly founded in God's Word he could not do it."

One of his unforgettable encounters in Pagels' memoirs was a meeting with the Swedish geographer , topographer and explorer Sven Hedin (1865–1952), whom he “ was allowed to lead through the streets of Greifswald ” while studying theology . He was also impressed by the physicist, philosopher and peace researcher Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker (1912–2007) and the natural scientist Manfred von Ardenne (1907–1997), whom he met during the GDR era . Protestant theologians and temporarily as a spiritual inspector of the Berlin City Mission make Paul Le Seur (1877-1963) and the Reverend Walter Lüthi from Switzerland he estimated (1901-1962) "as a gifted evangelist and Bible teacher ." Pagel was “very familiar” with Bishop Albrecht Schönherr (1911–2009).

Pagel was born on December 26, 1916 House sister , Eva, born Folz on January 3, 1941 in the St. Mary's Church to Greifswald married . The marriage had six children: Karl-Georg, Marianne Gerhard, Christoph, Rainer and Gerlinde. In retirement, the pastor lived in the Lobetal "Seniorenwohnpark Am Kirschberg".

Awards

Web links

Book title

  • Karl Pagel: The trail in the dark behind me. Testimony of a life

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Pagel, Karl: The trail in the dark behind me. Witness of a life , Berlin 1997, p. 37; ISBN 978-3-928918-62-6
  2. ↑ Pagel, Karl: The trail in the dark behind me. Witness of a life , Berlin 1997, p. 42; ISBN 978-3-928918-62-6
  3. ↑ Press article (obituary), March 19, 2013 Article for the press
  4. ↑ parish almanac for the ecclesiastical province of Berlin-Brandenburg . Ed .: Evangelisches Konsistorium Berlin-Brandenburg, Berlin 1956, p. 352 under Section C. “Institutions”; DNB 010127313
  5. ↑ Thews, S .: A little history… p. (10-14) 13. In: Parish letter of the parish Pasewalk with Dargitz and Stolzenburg, December 2013 to February 2014, p. (10-14) 13; PDF Congregational Letter from December 2013 to February 2014
  6. ↑ UNION reports (Utm). Published under the license number 1439 of the press office at the chairman of the Council of Ministers of the GDR, published by the Secretariat of the Main Board of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany, NEUE ZEIT publishing house, (East) Berlin, issue 12/1974, p. 28
  7. ↑ Pagel, Karl: The trail in the dark behind me. Witness of a life , Berlin 1997, p. 124; ISBN 978-3-928918-62-6
  8. ^ Neue Zeit , May 9, 1968, p. 2
  9. ^ Neue Zeit , September 26, 1956, p. 1
  10. ↑ Neue Zeit June 12, 1957, p. 3 I.
  11. ↑ Pagel, Karl: The trail in the dark behind me. Witness of a life , Berlin 1997, p. 233; ISBN 978-3-928918-62-6
  12. ^ Besier, Gerhard: The SED State and the Church 1969-1990. The vision of the "third way" , p. 541; ISBN 3-549-05454-8
  13. ↑ Pagel, Karl: The trail in the dark behind me. Witness of a life , Berlin 1997, pp. 39, 48 and 139; ISBN 978-3-928918-62-6
  14. ↑ Article for the Märkische Oderzeitung , written November 2, 2009, on the occasion of Pagel's 95th birthday
  15. ^ Neue Zeit , September 13, 1974, p. 1
  16. ↑ Karl Pagel: The trail in the dark behind me. Testimony of a life. Verbum, Berlin 1997, ISBN 978-3-928918-62-6 .
personal data
SURNAME Pagel, Karl
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German theologian and head of the Evangelical Hope Valley Institutions and Council of Churches
DATE OF BIRTH October 30, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH Krolow
DATE OF DEATH March 16, 2013
Place of death Lobetal