Michael Kraus (clergyman)

Michael Kraus (maiden name Mihail Krauss; ) (born March 26, 1908 in Meeburg , Romania ; † November 16, 2003 in Kitchener , Ontario ) was a Romanian Canadian entrepreneur and clergyman of the New Apostolic Church Canada .

biography

Mihail Krauss grew up speaking German on his parents' farm, and his father also owned a tavern. A teacher at school told him about Canada and the money that could be made there. Therefore, at the age of 18, Michael Kraus decided to emigrate to Canada.

He found his first job in a chocolate factory in Kitchener. In 1930 he met his future wife Hilda, whom he married that same year. Friends invited the couple to a divine service in the New Apostolic Church a year after their wedding . They stayed in Kitchener Ward from their first visit and were sealed a few months later .

Kraus found Canada to be his new home, where he wanted to be active for the New Apostolic Church. So he started the door-to-door mission with fellow ministers of the Kitchener congregation to convince more people of the New Apostolic faith. From 1933 he served as a deacon and from 1936 as a priest in Kitchener Ward, one of four congregations in Canada. Kraus meanwhile worked in a furniture factory; In 1941 he started importing upholstery fabrics. Five years later he became a partner in a fabric factory. In the meantime he was ordained as an evangelist in 1944 and as a district elder in 1946 . In 1951 he received the office of bishop and during a divine service in Zurich, Switzerland, he was ordained an apostle by the then Chief Apostle Johann Gottfried Bischoff .

Kraus received the office of District Apostle in 1958 and was commissioned in this office as Church President of the newly created District Church of Canada. At the age of 63 he founded a yarn factory. The Kraus Carpet Mills today employ people in the United States, Canada and Australia .

Overall, he brought New Apostolic teaching to 70 countries for the first time, including Japan , Korea , Taiwan and Malaysia , as well as several countries in West and Central Africa. The states in which the New Apostolic Church was able to manifest itself and where New Apostolic Christians counted include Zambia (1,305,000); India (900,000 - more than a million in the 1980s), Democratic Republic of the Congo (2,600,000) and Pakistan (200,000) (figures according to the New Apostolic Church).

This missionary work began with Walter Schmidt, who particularly supported the work in countries that were Christianized at the time . Chief Apostle Hans Urwyler wanted to "color the white spots on the New Apostolic world map" and with Michael Kraus then brought the New Apostolic faith mainly to countries in Africa . Around 1980 the District Apostle Area in Canada had 1 million sealed (of 2.2 million members worldwide at that time). On December 4, 1994, the District Church had 4 million members (up from about 8 million worldwide at that time).

Overall, he worked as a minister in his church 61 years, including 36 years as District Apostle of the District Church of North America. His hometown was the Canadian city of Kitchener .

Offices in the New Apostolic Church

• Deacon, 1933
• Priest, 1936
• Evangelist, 1944
• District Evangelist, 1944
• District Elder, 1946
• Bishop, 1951
• Apostle, 1955
• District Apostle, 1958

Conservative leadership and controversy

Kraus was not respected by everyone. Some described and insulted him as a “megalomaniac”, “demanding” and “trivial tyrant” who insisted that any of his statements be accepted by the members without any ifs or buts .

Excerpt from a letter in March 1989 for the North American churches: (translation from English)

“ A New Apostolic church member, a so-called Scholar of Royal Highness, who is waiting for him, has only one thing to do, and that is: TO DO WHAT YOU TELL HIM. HE HAS NOTHING TO SAY. If God would allow His children, for whom the highest price has already been paid, to object with their ideas, it would be the first step towards the mass confusion that we see abundantly in the world today. We pray: YOUR WILL BE DONE ON EARTH AS IN HEAVEN. Thus even those in the hereafter / heaven (except God) have nothing to say: ONLY THE SPIRIT OF GOD DECIDES WHAT HAS TO BE DONE. The opposite of democracy , which has caused mass confusion in our time, is autocracy . We looked it up in the dictionary and there the word autocracy was referred to as THE DIVINE WILL. The divine will rules as a divine obligation in our church and is preserved by the chief apostle, the highest-ranking, whom we all support with our lives. The will of man is poison contrary to the will of God and in our church there is no place for poison. To those who do not agree with the above, I say that the Lord Jesus gathered them into a separate group and he gave them a special name: HE CALLED THEM Fools. "

This letter caused criticism from the faithful and even from the Apostle Circle, as it would never have been an interpretation of the New Apostolic Church to compare the leadership position of ministers with theocracy, which Michael Kraus would clearly confuse in this letter. Calling someone a fool who would disagree with him also earned him criticism.

Up until the time in office of Chief Apostle Richard Fehr , New Apostolic believers were not allowed to ask questions or express criticism in order to achieve improvements or compromises in their teaching. For the church leadership it was clear that one accepted the church teaching of one's own free will or not. Richard Fehr noticed at the latest during the great sectarian discussion in Central Europe that one has to repeatedly enter into a dialogue with the faithful regarding questions about doctrine in order to prevent major misunderstandings from being unified.

literature

• Our family. No. 5/2008, p. 16 (to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Michael Kraus' death)
• Kraus Carpet founder also was church leader. In: The Kitchener-Waterloo Record. November 19, 2003, p. B4
• Kraus Carpet founder dies. In: The Guelph Daily Mercury. November 19, 2003, p. A6

Web links

• On the death of District Apostle Michael Kraus: A very extraordinary Servant of God has come home! , Obituary on the website of the New Apostolic Church International, November 19, 2003
• Website of the company Kraus Carpet Mills

Individual evidence

1. ↑ NAC Board (English)
2. ↑ NAC Board (English)  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.