Martin Luther King Church (Berlin)
| Martin Luther King Church | |
|---|---|
 Church and campanile |
|
| Construction year: | 1966-1968 |
| Inauguration: | April 25, 1968 |
| Architect : | Karl Otto |
| Client: | Parish Buckow |
| Floor space: | 23 × 23 m |
| Space: | 400 people |
| Location: | 52 ° 25 '41.77 " N , 13 ° 27' 19.43" E |
| Address: | Martin-Luther-King-Weg 6 Berlin-Gropiusstadt Berlin , Germany |
| Purpose: | Protestant church service |
| Local community: | Ev. Parish in Gropiusstadt |
| Website: | www.kirche-gropiusstadt.de |
The Evangelical Martin Luther King Church (MLK) belongs to the parish in the Berlin district of Gropiusstadt . It is part of a building ensemble that includes the church with its free-standing bell tower ( campanile ), a parish hall with numerous individual rooms and a day-care center . The entire church complex was built according to plans by the architect Karl Otto in the Berlin-Gropiusstadt district and inaugurated in the spring of 1968. The community center building and the increase in the daycare center followed later. The name chosen by the community honors the American Nobel Peace Prize laureate and civil rights activist Martin Luther King, who was killed in 1968 . The MLK forms a church region with the Protestant parish of Gropiusstadt-Süd with a joint parish council. Both belong as individual communities to the Evangelical Regional Church Evangelical Church Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia (EKBO).
Location and transport links
The buildings stand on a community-owned area of around 10,000 m², which is limited to the north by the Gropius Passagen , to the east by some residential buildings (Anna-Siemsen-Weg), to the south and west by a public park and by Martin-Luther-King-Weg . Before the expansion of the shopping center, the MLK had the address Johannisthaler Chaussee 329 and could also be reached from there via its own access road. The construction plan for the Gropiuspassagen in the 1990s, however, provided for a connection to the underground station, which was also achieved through an exchange of land with the municipality. The Martin-Luther-King-Weg can now be reached as an access road via the Kirschnerweg. The community is located in the district of Neukölln , Buckow , in Gropiusstadt, named after the architect Walter Gropius , and can be reached with the U7 underground line , Johannisthaler Chaussee station , the M11 metrobus or the 172 and 736 buses. The access roads and community entrances are designed to be barrier-free .
history
When the Berlin large housing estate Gropiusstadt was built in the early 1960s, more than 40,000 residents came to this area. The plans of the chief architect Walter Gropius and his Chicago office TAC initially did not include a place of worship in the new residential area. The numerous Christians among the new residents soon founded their own Protestant parish in order to create a church home for themselves and the tenants who moved in. In 1964 they built a barrack on the site of the later church as a place for worship ; however, a separate church building was soon to be erected. The congregation received a large building plot from the Alt-Buckow congregation and, in the form of the director of the Berlin art college Karl Otto, won a renowned architect for their wishes and plans. In 1966 the foundation stone for the "Evangelical Church Community of the Berlin Britz-Buckow-Rudow settlement" (BBR) was laid. The murder of the American Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Baptist pastor and civil rights activist Martin Luther King was the reason to apply for this man's honorary name for the new church. The parish council approved the new name in connection with the church consecration on April 25, 1968, although another parish name had long since been shortlisted. The emotion and the strong impression that Martin Luther King had left on his visit to Berlin immediately before were so strong that this choice was made. The inauguration of the complex was carried out by the then bishop of West Berlin , Kurt Scharf , in the presence of church superiors, politicians, the architect and numerous parishioners.
The architect Esther Braun later supplied the building plans for a two-story church pavilion extension and a replacement building for the former garage at the new entrance to the community. The pavilion, made of glass and wood, created a better opening of the area to the entrance area, the newly built town square . The use of this new building as an additional community room was supplemented by the addition of the Bookmarks family and children's library to this complex, which had become homeless due to the closure of the church meeting center Haus der Mitte not far from the community.
Since a parish merger with the former neighboring parish of Gropiusstadt-Süd, the Martin Luther King Church has belonged to the parish in Gropiusstadt and gives one of the two parish locations its name.
The buildings
All of the community buildings planned in the original complex consist of the three basic elements of a steel frame , reinforced concrete wall panels and ribbon windows that the architect had developed based on American experience ("Brockhouse system") and preferred for his buildings.
Architecture of the church
Karl Otto designed an outwardly simple concrete-glass building in the shape of a cuboid from the standardized building elements mentioned above. The church building has a square floor plan with sides of 23 meters extended by an entrance foyer that also houses the sacristy . The neighboring free-standing bell tower also has a square base area of 3.5 m × 3.5 m. The church and tower are divided into uniform length and height grids, which are emphasized by the externally visible blue painted steel girders of the building structure. On the church building, small, bright, non-colored glass windows lined up vertically behind the supporting columns and horizontally under the eaves allow daylight into the interior of the church. Materials for the building are light-colored concrete slabs and steel. The building corners are also made with ribbon windows.
Interior of the church
The wall surfaces inside are clad with natural-colored stained wooden panels, which exude a pleasantly warm look on the visitors, and they also serve as wall insulation. The wooden altar is also kept in the same color and fits perfectly into the interior of the church.
The arched altarpiece, woven by Christa Franke (artist signature Popp ), depicts the biblical story of the fishermen on the Sea of Galilee . It was made manually in the church, financed by donations and was completed in 1978. It symbolizes the equality of all people before God, regardless of skin color and origin, and encourages peaceful coexistence. The simple crucifix placed behind the altar table in front of the approximately 2.50 meter high altarpiece looks comparatively modest . It comes from the workshop of the artist Waldemar Otto .
The entire room is column-free and can be adapted to the respective use with variable seating; in total it offers up to 400 seats.
On the western side wall next to the altar is a two-manual organ from the Friedrich Weißenborn company from Braunschweig , which is equally suitable for worship and concert use. It was rebuilt in 1982 by the Warsaw organ builder Gebrüder Kaminski, expanded to 22 registers and made more playable. The last general overhaul was carried out in 2008.
Further wall decorations form a relief Gospel according to Johannes (a private loan) as well as five square tapestries ( antependia ) with the symbols and colors of the church year : (green) vine and vines or community symbol , (white) Holy Spirit as a white dove, (black) cross , (purple) chalice and wafer.
The design of the glass facade of the church interior comes from the artist Anna Pauli, Cologne, in cooperation with Mauritius Pauli, Berlin. The final assembly took place in 2013. With this structural change, the extremely strong back light was insulated while maintaining the transparency typical of the church. The design combines the strict line structure of the wooden reliefs of the wall cladding in the interior with the organic characteristics of the park landscape outside.
tower
The bell tower is around 15 meters high, and a four-meter high stainless steel cross rises on the flat roof. Inside there are three bronze bells that are named "Ruf", "Sammlung" and "Sendung".
The facade of the top tower segment is formed by vertically arranged wood, which gives the bell a good response. For the ringing of bells beyond the times of day (9, 12 and 18 o'clock) the community has developed a ringing order.
Parish hall
The single-storey house, also built by Karl Otto in a no-frills style, has various rooms of different sizes, which can be recognized by the floor plan. The rooms form the basis for the diverse activities of the community shown below. In the 1980s, some renovation work was carried out in this building, among other things new parquet was laid and permanently sealed with a special covering. In 2009 the parish hall received new windows and an energy-refurbished facade. The basic external dimensions of the house are 75 meters in length and 21 meters in width. In the entrance area there is a painted textile mural (gift from the partner church in Soweto / South Africa), several banners with pictures and quotes from Martin Luther King and the sketch of a mural of the biblical scene of the Good Samaritan, which the congregation did not implement.
Social housing and daycare centers
In the north-western part of the building there was a spacious caretaker's apartment with garages, two parishioners' apartments and the building erected as a nurses station, which was previously set off with red facade elements, but is now only equipped with a vestibule. The nurses - first one, from 1970 a second and from 1983 a third - cared for the sick and needy at home or in the treatment rooms in the building. From 1985 state welfare stations were set up, to which the sisters now organizationally belonged. Soon all the church welfare stations in Gropiusstadt merged to form a diakonia station , which was managed by a pastor. In the meantime, this diaconal work is carried out by the established Diakoniewerk Simeon with more than 1,300 employees. After a renovation, the Britz-Buckow-Rudow Diakoniestation moved into the rooms of the church pavilion, caretaker's apartment and nurses' station. This complex is a structural link between the service building and the day care center (Kita) Martin Luther King (Martin-Luther-King-Weg 7) built on the south side . The “Coretta King” daycare center (Bohm-Schuch-Weg 9), which is within walking distance, is also part of the community. The daycare centers are open to children of all residents of Gropiusstadt, regardless of their origin or religion. The interconnected buildings have the following (rough) side lengths: social building 19.5 m × 28 m, day care center 29.5 m × 33 m.
Use of the church complex and community life
Cultural
- Church music plays an important role in the community and manifests itself in a variety of projects and concerts. At the Martin Luther King parish, it is a declared focus of work alongside senior work and cooperation with the Diakonie. In the spectrum of church music, recorder groups for children and adults, the trombone choir that has existed since 1985 , the CantemusChor Berlin, the Concertino Neukölln orchestra and the regional church choir should be mentioned. The musical direction is in the hands of the cantor René Schütz (as of 2012).
- The GropiusSoirée concert series takes place regularly in the Martin Luther King Church ; it is part of the central event program Music in Churches .
- The parish regularly invites the Trinitatis theater group, founded in 1971, to performances with various programs in October.
- Until the fall of 2009 there was the library in the community center bookmarks , which is then moved to the neighboring community Gropius-Süd. In the meantime (as of 2016) the library's offer is limited to group offers for surrounding day-care centers. The aim is to arouse interest in reading in children.
- In 2010 a junk shop started its work in two community rooms, through which the poor can receive numerous donations in kind.
- With an ecumenical Pentecost festival, summer festivals, an international evening, a bazaar or Advent and Christmas celebrations, a lively and varied community life is created, which owes its positive effect above all to the commitment of numerous volunteer community members. Art exhibitions also take place in the parish hall, such as the Magic of Nature in 2005 by the painter and sculptor Wolf U. Friedrich or in 2006 Biblical and religious motifs by Iris Hillmeister-Becker .
- A special highlight in the intercultural work of the community is the Kitchens of the World festival . People of all nations who live together in Gropiusstadt have the opportunity to present their respective local dishes and thus to get closer to each other in a particularly binding way. Initiated by the church social workers of the communities in Gropiusstadt, this festival, which was prepared and carried out together with the district mothers, is a contribution to understanding in a district that is home to people from over 50 nations.
Church life
The guiding principle "Church for others - Church with others" is alive. It expresses an attempt not to exclude anyone who wants to participate. The basic idea of the congregations is: "Building and shaping the church together". This takes place in the Christian coexistence of community life in numerous discussion groups, in work with children, adolescents and senior citizens, in offers for women as well as in joint excursions to places in the vicinity or far away. Contacts with foreign church institutions played a role early on.
From the late 1970s, there was intensive collaboration with Polish parishes. For example, young people from Berlin took part in the Action Reconciliation for Peace Services in the construction and maintenance of the Stutthof Concentration Camp memorial near Gdansk . The democratic efforts initiated by the Solidarność movement in Poland were supported with aid deliveries. In cooperation with the Evangelical Educational Organization, the Evangelical Academy and the Society for German-Soviet Friendship , contacts were established both with institutions in the former Soviet Union and with representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church in Berlin. The explosion of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor and its devastating effects on the people of the region were, in turn, the cause for the establishment of relations with Ukraine .
Together with the other parishes in the local area ( St. Dominicus and Trinity ), the MLKG took part in the "Year of European Churches on Migration 2010" , which was proclaimed by the Conference of European Churches (KEK) and the Commission of Churches for Migrants in Europe (CCME) .
As part of a partnership with African parishes, the MLKK also regularly holds foreign church services, for example of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church .
literature
- Ernst Badstübner, Sibylle Badstübner-Gröger, Martin Dettloff (illustrations): Churches in Berlin. From St. Nikolai to the community center "Am Fennpfuhl" . Berlin Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1987, ISBN 3-374-00171-8 .
- 30 years. 1968-1998. Evangelical Martin Luther King Church, Berlin-Gropiusstadt. Published by the Parish Council of the Martin Luther King Parish, 1998.
Web links
- Homepage of the parish in Gropiusstadt
- Online church database with brief information on the Martin Luther King parish
Individual evidence
- ↑ BVG route map to Metrobus number 11, accessed on March 14, 2010.
- ↑ a b c 30 years. 1968-1998. Evangelical Martin Luther King Church ...
- ↑ Website with dates for music in churches ; here in the MLKK , accessed on January 6, 2012.
- ^ Homepage of the TT theater group with a chronicle, overview of the plays and a list of names of around 20 active members ; Retrieved January 6, 2012.
- ^ Website about the artist WU Friedrich with a short biography and exhibitions ; Retrieved March 5, 2010.
- ^ Website of the architect and freelance artist I. Hillmeister-Becker with a short biography and exhibitions, ( Memento of the original from March 31, 2012 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. Retrieved March 5, 2010.
- ^ Document with information about church services in churches in the Neukölln district; PDF document. Here: p. 15 ; Retrieved March 5, 2010.
- ↑ Addresses of the EKBO with foreign congregations in Berlin (English) ( Memento of the original from November 20, 2007 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. ; Retrieved March 14, 2010.
