Katharina Staritz

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Katharina Helene Charlotte Staritz (born July 25, 1903 in Breslau ; † April 3, 1953 in Frankfurt am Main ) was a German Protestant theologian . She was one of the first women to allow the Evangelical Church to work as a pastor. She was consecrated in Wroclaw in 1938 and, during the Nazi era, worked as Wroclaw City Vicaress to integrate Jewish Christians into the communities and not to exclude them. She therefore had to endure protective custody , labor camps and incarceration in the Ravensbrück women's concentration camp from 1941 to 1943 .

Life

Katharina Helene Charlotte Staritz was born as the eldest daughter of high school professor Carl Staritz and his wife Margarete, née Ismer, in Breslau at Matthiasplatz 3. She had a sister, Charlotte, who was seven years her junior.

Theology student and vicar

In 1922 she passed her Abitur at the Viktoriaschule in Breslau and from 1922 studied philology with the subjects German, history and religion at the University of Breslau and from 1926 Protestant theology at the Philipps University in Marburg. In 1928 she passed the faculty examination and completed her doctorate a few days later with a thesis on Augustin's belief in creation according to his interpretation of Genesis - as the first woman at the theological faculty in Marburg.

From 1930 to 1932 she completed several teaching vicariates, worked in hospital chaplaincy with children and gave supplementary lessons for confirmands from secular schools as well as transition lessons for young people and women. Through this she came into contact with Jews who wanted to be baptized Protestants. Because of this activity, she finally took over the management of the church aid center for Protestant non-Aryans .

In 1932 she became vicar in Breslau, where she was consecrated on November 6, 1938.

resistance

In the “Church Aid Agency for Protestant Non-Aryans”, Katharina Staritz was officially active in church care for Jews and their relatives. Together with Pastor Heinrich Grüber, she ensured that many of them could emigrate. Pastor Grüber was arrested for the first time in 1937; from 1940 to 1943 he was a prisoner in the Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps. From then on, Katharina Staritz, her sister Charlotte and others worked underground and continued to do everything in their power to save Jewish citizens. Until 1939 it was basically still possible to organize trips - albeit under difficult circumstances.

In her resistance activities against the National Socialist regime of the German Reich , Katharina Staritz became known in particular through a memorable circular that she addressed to her “Breslauer Amtsbrüder”. She wrote it after the Police Ordinance of September 5, 1941, which made it mandatory for all Jews in Germany to wear the Star of David. Among other things, she wrote:

“It is the Christian duty of the congregations not to exclude them [note: Jewish Christians] from worship because of the labeling. They have the same right of home in the church as the other parishioners and especially need the consolation from God's word. There is a danger for the congregations that they will be misled by non-Christian elements, that they will endanger the Christian honor of the church through unchristian behavior. There must be pastoral care for them here, for example by referring to Luk. 10, 25–37, Matth. 25, 40 and Sach. 7, 9-10 are helped. "

Thereupon the Wroclaw church leadership released her from service without notice and put her on leave. Two months later an article appeared in the Black Corps , an SS body, entitled “Frau Knöterich as City Vicar”, which was supposed to incite the population against Katharina Staritz. The church administration urged her to leave Breslau. She went to Marburg, where she was taken into "protective custody" at the beginning of 1942 and transferred to the police prison in Kassel in March 1942.

Katharina Staritz was from April 7, 1942 to June 5, 1942 in the Breitenau labor education camp . She then came to the Ravensbrück concentration camp , where she was one of the political prisoners. However, a lawsuit never followed.

She owed her “trial” release from the concentration camp on May 18, 1943, to her sister Charlotte, who had submitted numerous petitions to the church authorities and the National Socialists. She even managed to get an appointment with Eichmann . Finally, Count Paul Yorck von Wartenburg also campaigned for her release . He influenced Gauleiter Hanke , on whose orders Staritz had been arrested.

The poems and letters she wrote during her imprisonment were published posthumously under the title Des great light reflection .

Post-war activity

Since she had only been released from the concentration camp "on a trial basis", she had to report to the State Police in Wroclaw twice a week and could not officially take part in church work. In January 1945, however, she fled to Marburg, where she was used as a substitute for the Kurhessische Kirche in Trusen in the Schmalkalden district, in Sebbeterode , in the Ziegenhain district, and in Albertshausen . The Evangelical Church of Kurhessen-Waldeck did not recognize the consecration as an ordination. Staritz stayed in Albertshausen until October 1949.

She received the order from Bishop Adolf Wüstemann to draft a vicaress order for the Protestant church in Kurhessen. In addition, she was appointed to teach religion and German at the Froebel seminar in Bad Wildungen . Furthermore, she worked for the prison chaplaincy in the women's prison in Ziegenhain.

On September 10, 1950, she was introduced to the Alte Nikolaikirche in Frankfurt am Main as vicar for women's work. She received a preaching and pastoral care assignment at the St. Catherine Congregation. She was the first woman in Hesse to get a pastor's position, although she still had to bear the title of vicar. Since the Katharinenkirche had not yet been rebuilt at that time, she preached - alternating with the two other parish priests - in the parish hall in Fichardstrasse in the north end . In 1950 she was accepted into the civil service.

Katharina Staritz died of cancer at the age of 49. Her grave is in the Bockenheimer Friedhof in Frankfurt. Their work and their merits "were only very hesitantly recognized by the official church, the German Christians and the Confessing Church".

Commemoration, designation

In the Maria Magdalenen Church in Wroclaw, a memorial plaque in German and Polish has been commemorating her work since 2003.

In Frankfurt am Main , Diepholz and Bretten streets are named after her.

In Bad Salzhausen there was a Katharina Staritz seminar and conference center; the Evangelical Regional Association Frankfurt am Main closed it at the end of 2013 after 23 years.

Works

  • The reflection of the great light. In memoriam Katharina Staritz. Evangelical Women's Aid in Münster , Berlin 1952.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ According to a 1927 by the Evangelical Church of the Old Prussian Union , which includes the Silesian church belonged, adopted theologians Act was indeed allowed women to remove theological examinations, but were not allowed to act as pastors. They were hired as "vicars". Instead of the ordination customary for men , a "consecration" took place. Their remuneration was only 75% of the pastor's salary, they were not allowed to preach, were limited in their work to work with children and women, excluded from administering the sacraments and committed to celibacy .
  2. ↑ Eberhard Röhm , Jörg Thierfelder : Evangelical Church between cross and swastika. Pictures and texts from an exhibition . Stuttgart 1981, p. 135.
  3. ↑ Jutta Brendow: “The reflection of the great light.” In Memoriam Katharina Staritz, pastor of Albertshausen. In: Lukasbote. Community letter for the Protestant parishes Albertshausen, Hüddingen and Reinharshausen . Christmas 1984, p. 8.
  4. ↑ Hannelore Erhart : Theologians in Church and Community in World War II - the example of Katharina Staritz . In: Günther van Norden , Volkmar Wittmütz (ed.): Evangelical Church in the Second World War . Cologne 1991, p. 185.
  5. ↑ Juliana Ziegler: “Impertinence for decent Germans”. The SS declared Katharina Staritz's commitment to baptized Jews. She was arrested, sent to a concentration camp - and became a pastor. In: chrismon, issue 4/2016, p. 49.
  6. ↑ Herta Däubler-Gmelin on the occasion of the presentation of the Staritz biography from 1999, [1]
  7. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from April 7, 2016 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. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.frankfurt-evangelisch.de
  8. ^ Sister of Katharina
  9. ↑ EKD press release ( Memento of the original of July 9, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ekd.de
personal data
SURNAME Staritz, Katharina
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Staritz, Katharina Helene Charlotte
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Protestant theologian
DATE OF BIRTH July 25, 1903
PLACE OF BIRTH Wroclaw
DATE OF DEATH April 3, 1953
Place of death Frankfurt am Main