Quickborn working group

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Quickborn working group
QuickbornLOGO0250.gif
purpose s. Self-image
Chair: Felix Zacher
Establishment date: Established in 1967
Number of members: 1000
Seat : Rothenfels Castle (Rothenfels)
Website: www.quickborn-ak.de

The Quickborn Working Group is a member association (see: Catholic Youth Movement ) in the Federation of German Catholic Youth and works closely with the Quickborn Elderly Community. It emerged from the Quickborn of the early 20th century, the Catholic part of the early youth movement in Germany and Austria.

Self-image

Rothenfels Castle on the Main, the Quickborn's central conference venue: View of the inner courtyard

The members of the Quickborn working group do not live according to written principles. They feel connected to one another in an effort to find answers to questions about the present and the future.

Based on the tradition of the youth movement , the Quickborn working group strives for openness to all areas of human life, for simplicity and truthfulness. The members want to live from the knowledge that community belongs to free human existence.

The focus of the working group is on conferences at Rothenfels Castle , where people of all ages meet. Lectures, discussion groups, artistic and creative working groups and self-designed church services take place. While speakers are usually invited to accompany the work week for the thematic part, the musical and creative offers are designed exclusively by the participants themselves.

The Quickborn Working Group is a member association of the Federation of German Catholic Youth (BDKJ) and works closely with the Quickborn Elderly Association.

Important meetings of the Quickborn at Rothenfels Castle are the New Year's Eve meeting after Christmas, the Ascension Day and the work week for the elderly in August. In addition to the conferences at Rothenfels Castle, there are also conferences for the young people of the working group at the Senklerhof in the Black Forest. The Senklerhof was acquired by Quickbornern in 1955 and expanded into a small conference venue.

Meetings

The Quickborn working group traditionally meets regularly for conferences, mainly at Rothenfels Castle .

  • New Year's Eve conference (from December 28th to January 4th with around 250 participants from all generations)
  • Spring meeting of the East-West Circle at Rothenfels Castle
  • Easter free time for young people in St. Benedikt (formerly on the Senkler farm; week after Easter) (see web links)
  • Ascension Conference (formerly a conference for young families and young adults; from Wednesday before Ascension Day until the following Sunday)
  • Autumn meeting of the East-West Circle in Zwochau near Leipzig.

Origin of the Quickborn

Development phase (1909 to 1919)

Preliminary stage of the Quickborn was a group of students in the Catholic - Episcopal Knabenkonvikt in Neisse , who wanted to spend their free time without being forced to consume alcohol and tobacco. The statute named the purpose of cultivating camaraderie among high school students without stimulants, and provided that instructive and entertaining meetings for members and guests were held every month. The students elected the board of their association themselves, a senior teacher at the grammar school took over the protectorate. In 1910 the royal Prussian school administration approved the statute. It became the model for the statutes of similar associations that were founded in many other places in the German Empire and in Austria. In 1912, a circle in Breslau based on the model of the Steglitzer Wandervogel was particularly dedicated to hiking in the countryside. Since 1913 there have also been similar groups for girls. In 1913, Bernhard Strehler founded the Catholic Volkshochschule Heimgarten in Neisse .

From April 1913, Bernhard Strehler published the Quickborn magazine. The title then became the name of the entire federal government. The Low German word Quickborn was seen as the short form of the new will of young people: They wanted to be a living spring, an epithet of the Holy Spirit, to break away from everything that was stale, untrue, and unreal. It is still unclear whether the choice of name is related to the poetry collection of the same name, "Quickborn" by the author Klaus Groth .

Inspired by Bernhard Strehler , Klemens Neumann and Hermann Hoffmann, but based on his own consent, decision and design, Quickborn initiated many innovations that seem natural today, but at that time were introduced against the resistance of the conventional authorities and could not be consistently implemented. Quickborn was the stimulus and pioneer for many endeavors that other branches of the youth movement and life reform also made their own (dispute over priority or authorship would be idle, it was “in the air”). The list is long.

  • Abstinence from pleasure poisons: stay free from physical dependence, assert yourself against peer pressure.
  • Self-determined way of life: devoting oneself to worthy goals and tasks with joyful seriousness, with serious joy (Seneca: “Res severa verum gaudium”).
  • Youth is not only a preliminary stage of working life, but has its own values, goals and joys of its own as a phase of life (Hoffmann on the first Quickborntag in 1919 at Rothenfels Castle: "Youth has a right to youth, freedom, joy").
  • Education must not only pass on external knowledge (“funnel knowledge”), it has to awaken and strengthen honest willingness and inner certainty. Science school should become more of a school of education.
  • Understanding and trust between teachers and students in both directions.
  • Recognize the skills of young people to shape themselves and allow them to develop
    • in the life of the community (student self-management, independent participation in events, leisure time and celebrations).
    • in all arts (music, visual arts, theater, etc.).
    • Election of group leaders on a temporary basis (“youth is led by youth”).
  • New forms of religious life
  • New liturgy, which incidentally had a major impact on the liturgical reform of the Second Vatican Council
  • Hiking as a source of education: community, nature, home, self-awareness (Juvenal: "... ut sit mens sana in corpore sano").
  • Equal rank for both sexes according to their characteristics, e.g. B. Co-education, participation in events, lectures, conferences, etc.
  • Sexual education as a support and guide on the way to maturity.
  • Practice criticism and judgment in open discussion without pretending.

Such expectations or demands were in contradiction to not a few "taken for granted" of the authorities at the time. For example, the inclusion of both sexes even led to a motion at the German Bishops' Conference to ban the Quickborn Bund. In fact, however, other associations of the youth movement, life reform, state and private school organization adopted quite a few innovations which the Quickborn youth and their leaders had first suggested.

There is no measure of how much self-education in the Quickborn gave its members the strength to withstand the demands and temptations of the totalitarian regime of the thirties and forties, inwardly and outwardly. If you find forms and designations that Quickborn coined and introduced in the vocabulary of the national-socialist Hitler Youth and the international-socialist Free German Youth, you must not avoid the question of who stole from whom, to what extent and with which Target thoughts were distorted.

Romano Guardini proposed new forms for the organization of Catholic worship ; Quickborner tested them for the first time at their conferences ( liturgical movement ). The two personalities of the youth movement who are very close to Guardini, Heinrich Kahlefeld and the spiritual leader of the Normannsteiner Alfons Maria Lins should also be mentioned in this context. Some of these new forms were included in the resolutions of the Vatican Council in the 1960s.

The total number of members in local circles increased from 1,827 (1914) to 7,000 (1918). Basically, a formalized organization was initially rejected. In order to better discuss common questions together, members met regionally from 1914 on, and the local Quickborn groups then joined together to form Quickborn Gauen. Finally, from April 1, 1917, the Quickborn Secretariat in Rothenfels offered information and advice on founding new groups, organizing group life and connecting the groups to one another. In autumn 1917, Bernhard Strehler, Klemens Neumann and Hermann Hoffmann founded the "Verein der Quickbornfreunde eV" in Frankfurt am Main. So the headquarters of the Quickborn movement became a legal person . This association bought the medieval Rothenfels Castle above the town of Rothenfels from Prince von Löwenstein in February 1919 . The castle was symbolically close to the Main, the river of central Germany, but it was dilapidated. Klemens Neumann, then in the age of 46, took a six-month leave of absence from teaching at the Lyceum in Neisse and, with volunteers from Quickborn, repaired the rooms, largely with his own hands and out of his own pocket. Thanks to his drive, the Bund Quickborn was the first German youth organization to have its own building in the form of this castle.

As early as August 1919, 524 girls and boys from all over Germany, as well as teachers in the lay and religious class, gathered at Rothenfels Castle for the first general German Quickborntag. The groups present agreed on common principles, including:

  • Confession to the Catholic faith
  • Rejection of pleasure poisons
  • Experience of home while hiking
  • Right of young people to their own worth and independence

The abstinent circles had become the Catholic wandering bird.

The Quickborn had preceded, other groups followed the example, each with their own content.

The "Bundische Zeit" (1920 to 1933)

blossom

In 1920 the Quickborn Bund had reached the peak of its development with around 8,000 members. It was organized "from bottom to top" on three levels:

  • Local groups each with a maximum of 15 members (boys or girls separately) chose their group leader, some had a spiritual guide. At the weekly group evening, you discussed items that the group leader or a member had selected, there was a lot of discussion, you learned songs and games, during the holidays and sometimes on Sundays you went "on a trip" (at that time, usually only a trip with public transport, hikes on foot from the destination in the surrounding area, sometimes overnight in a youth hostel or with farmers on straw in the barn).
  • The local groups formed districts. The members of the girls 'groups elected their Gauleiter, the members of the boys' groups their Gauleiter, whose job it was to support the work of the local groups. The mostly annual Gau-Tag consisted of lectures, meetings, games, performances and church services.
  • The federal leadership consisted of the Gauleiters and the “First Leader”. This had to direct the activities of the federal government as a whole and to answer to the church authorities. From 1920 to 1927, Bernhard Strehler was the “first leader” of the federal government and also the “castle father” at Rothenfels Castle . At the "Osterthing" in 1927 he passed his offices on to Romano Guardini . In 1934, Strehler was re-elected as federal director, Guardini remained “castle father” until the federal government banned the castle in August 1939 and the castle was expropriated.

The medieval Rothenfels Castle needed constant repairs and modernization (water pipes, electricity), and the federal government had to pay off debts. The federal government was not able to demand high monetary contributions from the predominantly youthful or young members. On top of that, the devaluation of money in the early 1920s meant that grants that came in anyway lost their value while they were in the mail. Nevertheless, the rooms were persistently expanded for the work of the federal headquarters and as a youth hostel. Initially, the federal government also had a publishing house, a bookstore, a “Zeugamt” (it supplied equipment for hiking), and even a company for non-fermented fruit processing. The federal government had to give up this economic activity in 1925.

Mainly the castle was the seat of the Quickborn chancellery and home for visits by individual members, for encounters and events of different groups and the gathering of the whole federation at the Quickborn day and “federal thing”. From 1922 onwards, older Quickborners met at the castle for religious, social and cultural “work weeks”. In 1927 Guardini introduced meetings in which Quickborner and guests tried out new liturgical forms for Holy Week and Easter. This was supported by the structural changes made to the castle by Rudolf Schwarz (castle architect from 1924). In a fruitful discussion with Romano Guardini and the castle community, he redesigned both the knight's hall and the chapel into stimulating rooms.

The life of the groups, the districts and the federal government was not exhausted in romantic, emotional pastime, the focus was on all three levels conversations about questions of lifestyle. One discussed and argued “about God and the world” and could not always come to an agreement. The content had three main areas:

  • Organization and internal affairs, applicable regulations and decisions about them, election of the head.
  • Relationship of the Quickborn to other groups of the youth movement.
  • Religious, ethical, educational, psychological and cultural content and political, social and economic problems.

Members who had come of age tried to let the lifestyle chosen in their youth become effective in their professional life in independent responsibility “before God and man”. They no longer saw themselves as a “youth movement” but as a “cultural movement”. Their membership in the federal government took shape in ever changing forms. There were organizational splits and reunions, each with their own programs. The magazine "Quickborn" remained a unifying volume over a variety of spiritual directions.

crisis

In 1924 and 1925, the federal government and the Bundesthing decided on principles that should also make alcohol and tobacco abstinence binding for adults, "rejecting them means breaking with the covenant". It was also forbidden to “use the Quickborn for political, economic, educational, social, life-reforming endeavors [...].” This departure from the Quickborn principle of independent responsibility prompted around a quarter of the members to object and to resign. As a result, the federal government no longer wanted or could no longer officiate, so that at times the federal government practically no longer existed. A new federal government (Guardini) found milder formulations in 1927, but the previous unity of the federal government was wasted. Some Quickborner went to other associations or founded their own groups. One of them was the politically oriented “ October Circle ” with Ida Coudenhove , Walter Dirks and Ludwig Neundörfer , Heinrich Kahlefeld , Lorenz Fischer , Kurt Jaroscheck , Georg Volk and Romano Guardini .

Commandment by the NSDAP and ban (1933 to 1939)

On January 30, 1933, Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of the Reich , and all political and social forces in the German Reich were “brought into line” in accordance with the goals and principles of the only party still allowed, the NSDAP . Step by step, associations of all kinds were joined to the NSDAP, submitted to the leadership of National Socialist party members, dissolved or were banned.

In order to forestall a compulsory reorganization, on Guardini's advice Quickborn dissolved his elderly union and left the “Verein der Quickbornfreunde e. V. ”as the“ Association of Friends of Burg Rothenfels e. V. ”rename. The Quickborn sheet was printed as "confidential handwriting". Most of the districts, districts and groups continued to work as before, only as inconspicuously as possible, e.g. B. by naming their encounters differently. The federal meetings no longer took place at Rothenfels Castle, but in different other locations and were announced as religious retreats. But by their very nature they had always been religious retreats.

Almost until the beginning of the Second World War, the Reich Concordat offered Quickborn as a Catholic youth organization a certain amount of protection, provided that youth work was clearly restricted to purely religious activities. On August 16, 1939, however, the competent Gestapo office also ordered the dissolution of the Catholic youth association Quickborn and the “Association of Friends of Burg Rothenfels eV” “including all subsidiary and subdivisions and affiliated associations” and forbade any activity “that involved the attempt a continuation of this organization or a start-up with the same or similar goals ”. The legal basis of the measure was the " Reichstag Fire Ordinance " of February 28, 1933.

Two weeks later the Second World War began. The leadership and members of the Quickborn maintained their personal connection in private as long as and as good as the changing fortunes of war and displacement allowed. In different ways, Quickborner offered passive and active resistance to the Nazi regime.

Nazi regime critic

The following members of the Quickborn were murdered as critics of the regime at the time of National Socialism :

  • Theo Hespers , born December 12, 1903 in Mönchengladbach , who was the city guide of Quickborn there, organized resistance against the National Socialists from 1933 while in exile in the Netherlands. From 1937 he published the resistance magazines "Kameradschaft, Schriften Junge Deutscher" and "Sonderinformationen deutscher Jugend", which were illegally distributed in Germany and its neighboring countries. In July 1937 he founded the youth organization “German Youth Front” in Brussels, which made the struggle of liberal and democratically minded young Germans clear - especially against the Hitler Youth. In December 1938 he published his ideas of a peaceful, democratic Germany after the war in a pacified Europe in the "Kameradschaft". After the occupation of the Netherlands, he was caught and sentenced to death by the People's Court for “high treason and treason” and hanged on September 9, 1943 in Berlin-Plötzensee.
  • Gerhard Hirschfelder , born on February 17, 1907 in Glatz , ordained a priest on January 31, 1932 in the Cathedral of Breslau. Among other things, he was diocesan youth pastor for the County of Glatz. Because of his frank words against the Nazi dictatorship, he was arrested on August 1, 1941 and, after four months in prison in Glatz, taken to the Dachau concentration camp, where he died on August 1, 1942. On September 19, 2010, he was beatified in Münster Cathedral.
  • Rudolf Mandrella , District Court Councilor and Marine Directorate since 1942, born on March 6, 1902 in Auschwitz . In the circle around the Szczecin pastor chaplain Herbert Simoleit, he valued the open exchange about the situation in Nazi Germany. He was betrayed by an informant as the “spokesman” in this group of soldiers. In May 1943 Mandrella was sentenced to death by the Reich Court Martial in Dessau. He died on September 3, 1943 under the guillotine in the Brandenburg-Görden prison.
  • Max Joseph Metzger , born on February 3, 1887 in Schopfheim (Baden). He was ordained a priest on July 5, 1911. After his time as a division pastor in World War I, he became a champion for peace and reconciliation. In 1917 he developed an "international religious peace program" that he gave Pope Benedict XV. sent. 1917 founded the "World Peace Association of the White Cross" and in 1919 participated in the establishment of the Peace Association of German Catholics. In 1919 Metzger founded the “Mission Society of the White Cross” in Graz, which from 1927 was called the “Christkönigsgesellschaft” (“Societas Christi Regis”). His memorandum addressed to the Swedish Lutheran Archbishop Eidem on the reorganization of Germany after the Hitler regime and the incorporation of Germany into a world peace order was betrayed. He was sentenced to death on October 14, 1943 after a people's court trial led by Roland Freisler. On April 17, 1944, he was executed by guillotine in Brandenburg-Görden prison.
  • Bernhard Poether was born on January 1, 1906 in Datteln (Westphalia). As a student at the Paulinum grammar school in Münster, he joined the Quickborn, frequently visited Rothenfels Castle and also took part in the 4th German Quickborn Day there in 1922. He was ordained a priest on December 17, 1932 in Münster. From 1936 to 1939 he was a chaplain in Gladbeck, then in Bottrop. His focus was, among other things, caring for Polish foreign workers in the Ruhr area. Because of his work for the Poles he was imprisoned in Bottrop, then brought to Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1940 and transferred to Dachau concentration camp on April 10, 1941. He died there on August 5, 1942.
  • Alfons Maria Wachsmann was born on January 25, 1896 in Berlin . On the first German Quickborntag in August 1919 on Rothenfels, he sold "building blocks" to finance the purchase of Rothenfels Castle. For many years he was closely connected to Romano Guardini and other Quickborners. He was arrested in June 1943 because of his resistance to the National Socialists. On December 4, 1943, the People's Court sentenced him to death. Roland Freisler justified the conviction a. a. “As a priest, Alfons Wachsmann allowed his chaplains and others to listen to the London inflammatory radio station at least fifty times over the last four years of the war, and students, mostly soldiers, questioned our Wehrmacht reports, repeatedly declaring that we could not win the war and that we were to blame for it . As a propagandist of our enemies of the war, he fell in the back of our fighting people. ”On February 21, 1944, Alfons Maria Wachsmann died under a guillotine in Brandenburg-Görden.

New beginning after 1945

First beginnings

At the new beginning of the Quickborn after 1945, there is an appeal by federal leader Heinrich Bachmann (died 1946). In 1946 the Quickborner of the British occupation zone met in Hohenlimburg . The Quickborn was also rebuilt here. The declaration of some members of the Jungborn (previously parallel organization for the working people) that they want to work in the Quickborn (e.g. Hein Wullenweber) had a supportive effect. The first leaders were Friedrich Schlüter, Wilhelm Mogge, Thea Trimborn, and Maria Mette and Karl Caspers from Jungborn.

In Freising , the first meeting from the western zones, the "Basic Law of Quickborn" was passed in 1946, which was revised in 1947 at Ludwigstein Castle. Here Wilhelm Mogge was elected federal director.

The first joint federal meeting took place from August 4th to 10th 1947 at Ludwigstein Castle, because the castle in Rothenfels was still inhabited by refugees. Important topics of the first conference were: reorganization of Germany and Europe , social need and help of the Quickborn for displaced persons, unity of Christians , human wholeness, abstinence . Furthermore, the Bund Quickborn wanted to remain an independent and responsible life movement. “Quickborn is a life movement of Catholic German people who stand in the people and church in a resolute, truthful and sober attitude.” That is what the “Basic Law of Quickborn” passed there. The merger of Jungborn and Quickborn was also confirmed and the previous Quickborn sun cross was chosen as the common logo: the cross over the rising sun. Fritz Schlueter became federal leader, Wilhelm Mogge became “Federal Chancellor” and Father Bernward Dietsche OP became the spiritual adviser. The western Quickborners also provided some sort of integration aid for their members who had come from the east as refugees .

Foundation of the Federation of German Catholic Youth (BDKJ) and the consequences for the Quickborn

In the Quickborn there was a great deal of resistance to efforts by the German bishops to break down youth organizations according to diocesan and parish boundaries. Romano Guardini particularly stood out against this project , who wrote a letter to the youth bishop Albert Stohr (Mainz) as early as August 1945 in order to defend himself against a decreed unified youth . He formulated reasons against the unified dictate. Quickborns such as the 35-year-old Wroclaw Cathedral Vicar Johannes Theissing helped found the BDKJ in 1947 and Quickborn was a member of the BDKJ from the beginning - until today -. "In discussions and votes in the BDKJ on the intended rearmament of Germany, only the Quickborn, the crowd and the youth association of the Catholic German Women's Association vigorously opposed the vast majority of diocesan associations and member communities that supported rearmament with Christian-pacifist arguments."

With that, a certain isolation in the strong network was established, especially since the Quickborn was the smallest community in the BDKJ. What distinguished the Quickborn from the other member communities of the BDKJ:

  • The clergy in the Quickborn were advisory boards - they had no management functions
  • Boys and girls lived together in Quickborn - at that time a revolutionary regulation in the Catholic area
  • The work in the Quickborn is voluntary - also at the federal level
  • The Quickborn has no parish and diocesan borders; it has its own structure that is independent of the official church.

The structure of the Quickborn Federation consisted of districts and groups.

The era of Rothenfels Castle

Rothenfels Castle Chapel

It was not a matter of course that Rothenfels Castle would be returned to the Quickborn after the expropriation by the National Socialists. The German bishops would have liked to have made something different out of the area, which is so picturesquely above the Main (near Lohr). It was u. a. Thanks to Romano Guardini that the Quickborn became owner again. He made the bishops aware that the association "Quickbornfreunde" e. V. - u. a. also youth bishop Stohr - bought the castle in 1919 and restored it with great effort and commitment.

On April 16, 1948, the "Association of Friends of Burg Rothenfels" e. V. reopened. The first chairman was the manufacturer from Düsseldorf, Josef Heinrich Sommer; Deputy was the Quickborn federal manager Friedrich Schlüter (for a long time the editor of the "Burgbrief").

For the first time after the war, a meeting took place from August 1st to 7th, 1948 at the Quickborn-Burg Rothenfels (Main). Even if the journey was very difficult, the Quickborn people came to “their” castle from distant regions. The tradition of annual factory weeks was re-established here.

In 1949, the 40th anniversary of Quickborn was celebrated here. Other meeting places were the " Wieskirche " near Steingaden and the Senklerhof in the community of St. Märgen , Black Forest, bought in 1955 at the suggestion of the Quickborn University Group Freiburg .

The Quickborn was now divided into the Elderly League, the Middle Class (middle class: 20 to 30 years) with a Quickborn University Ring and the boys and girls community. Middle class, girls and boys decided on pioneering federal regulations and published the “werkblatt des quickborn” and for the girls “Auf dem Weg”, for the boys “Das große Venture”, federal magazines that served to keep communities together. The majority of the boys and girls felt bound by abstinence: No alcohol or nicotine consumption . Important topics at Werkwochen were (according to Meinulf Barbers): peace , social and political questions, liturgy , unity of Christians , upbringing and self- education . Topics of the Protestant theologian Rudolf Bultmann (demythologizing the Bible) and the outlawed Jesuit Teilhard de Chardin also fascinated the young Catholics in Quickborn. The theologian Bruno Leuschner was a frequent speaker. With Father Manfred Hörhammer, many Quickborners got involved in peace issues and took part in the international peace pilgrimages from Pax Christi to Chartres. Many - especially young - Quickborners were suspicious of the rearmament of Germany after 1945.

Dissolution of the previous Quickborn community

Reinhard Krämer (Rottenburg), who founded the “Blaue Rotte”, a group of boys led by him, forced the first arguments. He also founded the new magazine “Das kleine Wagnis” (as opposed to the “big daring” of the Quickborn Boys' Association).

At the BDKJ Federal Festival in 1965 there was a protest event by the Quickborn Youth League with Carl Amery on the topic: "How far to the next surrender". The previous press conference was chaired by Martin Stankowski (today WDR ) ( editor of the "great venture"). In it, Stankowski u. a. attentive to the pressure from the BDKJ to cancel this event with Carl Amery.

1966 gave up members of the youth league and the middle class on the name "Quickborn". Some organized themselves in the “Bund Christian Youth Groups” (bcj / BCJ). The BCJ worked in the BDKJ, but was considered oppositional in the BDKJ: So the BCJ - contrary to the decisions of the BDKJ Federal Association and the German Federal Youth Association - contacted the FDJ of the GDR . From the mid-1980s, the BCJ slowly disintegrated. In the 1990s his membership in the BDKJ was suspended, which then determined around 2000 that the BCJ no longer existed. For a few years now, however, some veterans of the former BCJ have been meeting at Rothenfels Castle on the fringes of the Rothenfels Whitsun Conference (see above).

Reconstruction as a Quickborn working group (from 1967)

The former leaders of the Bundesjungengemeinschaft Meinulf Barbers (from 1957 to 1962; from Düsseldorf) and Walter Schlicht (1962–1964, Burgwart at Rothenfels Castle) called in February 1967 about 20 Quickborners for a new beginning. In June 1967 the "Quickborn Working Group" was founded. The participants were able to agree on the following principles:

  • Joint responsibility for the work of Rothenfels Castle
  • Continuation of the work of the Quickborn in a contemporary form
  • Openness for all members of the younger generation who feel committed to the work of the castle

On December 31, 1967, the former "Quickborn Jüngerengemeinschaft, Bundeskasse eV" was dissolved with the Quickborn working group.

From September 8th to 18th, 1967, the seminar “European cultures meet”, organized by the Quickborn working group and a French youth organization, took place at Rothenfels Castle. They then met every two years in Germany or France - and later also in South Tyrol. At the Leipzig Autumn Fair, friends from Central Germany met with the Quickborn working group. These half-yearly meetings have been held since 1991 (in spring) at Rothenfels Castle and (in autumn) in Zwochau near Leipzig .

In the fall of 1967 Meinulf Barbers was elected national spokesman for the working group. On September 28, 1967, during a conversation with the BDKJ, it was clarified that the Quickborn working group would (again) be a member of the Catholic youth organization. From the mid-1970s until today, the traditional New Year's Eve meetings of the Quickborn working group of the Quickborn working group at Rothenfels Castle are well attended (250-300 participants). The old tradition of the “Work Week for Young People” began again during this time - it used to be the backbone of the younger generation in Quickborn. In the 1990s, conferences were also organized again at the Senklerhof in the Black Forest (see web links). The unmistakable sign of the successful new beginning was the steadily increasing number of participants in almost all central conferences and events at the federal level. The educational program of Rothenfels Castle was consistently expanded during these years. There were also guest events that were not initiated by Quickborn groups. Rothenfels Castle has now also become a member of the Bavarian Youth Hostel Association . As part of the educational work, the castle became a member of the Bavarian Adult Education Association .

In 1992 the "Quickborn-Arbeitskreis eV" was founded as a legal entity. Meinulf Barbers was the chairman from 1992 to 2000. Sabine Löbbert-Sudmann was chairwoman from 2000 to 2016, and Felix Zacher since 2017 . According to Meinulf Barbers (see Barbers 1988), the focus of the conferences is: a life of faith , ecumenism , peace , environmental issues, upbringing and self- education .

The rothenfels castle letter konturen also makes important contributions for the members of the Association of Friends of Rothenfels Castle

Interest in the preservation of Rothenfels Castle grew again since the 1970s. Several members of the Quickborn working group held the function of "castle keeper". From 2008 the “Burgzeitung” will be published; The Quickborn-Älterenbund is also involved.

The Quickborn working group participated again in the Kirchentag of the 1980s: It invited to church services and ecumenical conferences - partly in cooperation with the Catholic Student Youth (KSJ) and the Community of Catholic Men and Women (KMF).

At Easter 1984 there were three anniversaries to be celebrated during a work week at Rothenfels Castle:

  • 75 years of Quickborn
  • 70 years of Spielmann
  • 65 years of Rothenfels Castle

The Spielmann is a songbook edited by Klemens Neumann. It largely contains folk and church songs, which have seen many editions up to the present day. The predecessor of the Spielmann was the songbook Quickborn-Lieder published by Klemens Neumann in 1914 . That is why the 70th anniversary was celebrated in the Easter week of 1984.

On January 3, 2004, the Quickborn's self-image was formulated: We come from the tradition of the youth movement. Quickborn means "living spring" (...).

To mark the 100th anniversary of Quickborn, the book On the Traces of the Living Source - Mosaic Stones from 100 Years of Quickborn appears . The castle is continuously being renovated - in 2009 with the new wood chip heating system; the kitchen is also being renewed.

For the Ecumenical Church Congress 2010 , Burg Rothenfels, together with the liturgical institutes and the Evangelical Church, designed daytime liturgies in the Trinity Church in Munich. Since then, Rothenfels Castle has also been involved in the Catholic Days - as will also be the case in 2014 - in ecumenical daily liturgies organized together with many sponsors.

In the educational area of ​​the youth hostel , the castle offers an open program for people and groups who do not work in the Quickborn. There are also offers for music groups, choirs and orchestras.

On June 4, 2017 (Whit Sunday), the 50th anniversary of the Quickborn working group was celebrated at Rothenfels Castle. Around the turn of the year 2017/18, around 300 members of the working group discussed the future of the organization at Rothenfels Castle.

Well-known persons of the Quickborn and the Quickborn working group

See also

literature

  • Evelyne A. Adenauer: “In the eleventh hour”. Hermann Hoffmann and his commitment to German-Polish understanding and ecumenism in the interwar period. (= Work on Silesian church history. 18). Aschendorff, Münster 2008, ISBN 978-3-402-10176-6 .
  • Meinulf Barbers : Quickborn Working Group, in Handbook of Church Youth Work, Vol. 4, ed. by Günter Biemer and Werner Tzscheetzsch, Freiburg 1988
  • Meinulf Barbers: Quickborn working group. In: Günter Biemer (Hrsg.): Handbook of church youth work. Volume 4: Günter Biemer, Werner Tzscheetzsch (ed.): Youth of the Church. Self-presentation of associations and initiatives. Herder, Freiburg (Breisgau) a. a. 1988, ISBN 3-451-21085-1 , pp. 172-186.
  • Meinulf Barbers: The Quickborn Bund 1945-1965. In: Historical youth research. Yearbook of the Archives of the German Youth Movement. NF 1, 2004, ISSN  1863-1185 , pp. 211-240.
  • Meinulf Barbers: Restoration or Reconsideration? The fate of the Bündische Jugendbewegung in Germany after 1945. Using the example of Quickborn from 1945 to 2011. In: Archive for Silesian Church History. Vol. 70, 2012, ISSN  0066-6491 , pp. 257-284.
  • Johannes Binkowski : Youth as a trailblazer. The Quickborn from 1909 to 1945. Theiss, Stuttgart u. a. 1981, ISBN 3-8062-0250-8 .
  • Theodor Dietrich: Die Quickbornburg, In: Rothenfels 1148 - 1948, ed. v. Ludwig Weiß, Aschaffenburg 1949, pp. 110 - 126
  • Hermann Fuhrich: The home garden. Studies and sources on Catholic popular education work (= Working Group for Silesian Song and Silesian Music. Publication. 4, ZDB -ID 2244501-8 ). Laumann, Dülmen 1973.
  • Gohlke, Johannes: The history of the Catholic youth movement Quickborn after 1945. Unpublished manuscript of the thesis at the Pedagogical University Hamm / Westphalia. Hamm 1969
  • Franz Henrich : The unions of the Catholic youth movement. Their importance for liturgical and eucharistic renewal. Kösel, Munich 1968, (at the same time: Munich, university, dissertation, 1966).
  • Winfried Mogge: "This ancient house on a rocky ground ...". Rothenfels am Main: history and shape of a Lower Franconian castle. Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-8260-4989-7 .
  • Quickborn working group (ed.): On the trail of the living source. Mosaic stones from 100 years of Quickborn and 40 years of the Quickborn working group. Quickborn working group, Göttingen 2009.
  • Godehard Ruppert : Quickborn Catholic and youthful. A contribution to the history of the impact of the Catholic youth movement (= Z dziejów kultury chrześcijańskiej na Śląsku. 17). Wydział teologiczny uniwersytetu Opolskiego, Opole 1999, ISBN 83-88071-95-5 .
  • Godehard Ruppert: Rothenfels Castle. A contribution to the history of the youth movement and its influence on the Catholic Church (= Rothenfelser Schriften. 5, ZDB -ID 2556933-8 ). Rothenfelser Buchhandlung, Burg Rothenfels 1979, (At the same time: Bochum, University, diploma thesis, 1979).
  • Association of the Friends of Rothenfels Castle; Where we are guests and hosts, Burg Rothenfels - our castle for 100 years, Verlag Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2019.
  • Marcin Worbs: Quickborn and Heimgarten as a cultural-religious event in Upper Silesia (1909–1939) (= Z dziejów kultury chrześcijańskiej na Śląsku. 16). Wydział teologiczny uniwersytetu Opolskiego, Opole 1999, ISBN 83-88071-75-0 .
  • Walter Zahner: Rudolf Schwarz, master builder of the new community. A contribution to the conversation between liturgical theology and architecture in the liturgical movement (= Münster theological treatises. 15). Oros, Altenberge 1992, ISBN 3-89375-046-0 (also: Münster, Universität, Dissertation, 1991).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Self- image of the Quickborn working group.
  2. ^ Franz Henrich: The leagues of Catholic youth movement. Their importance for liturgical and eucharistic renewal. Kösel, Munich 1968, (at the same time: Munich, University, Dissertation, 1966), p. 164
  3. ^ Speech by Meinulf Barbers: Peace efforts in Quickborn (until 1946).
  4. ↑ Witnesses for Christ. The German Martyrology of the 20th Century, published on behalf of the German Bishops' Conference by Helmut MOLL, Vol. 1–2, Paderborn a. a. 42006, Hespers: Vol. 2, 1273-1277; Hirschfelder: Vol. 2, 701–703
  5. ↑ a b c according to Meinulf Barbers: Restoration or reconsideration? In: Archives for Silesian Church History. Vol. 70, 2012, pp. 257-284.
  6. ↑ For the person see Franz Josef Schäfer: Der Kapuziner Manfred Hörhammer. In: Yearbook for West German State History. Vol. 41, 2015, ISSN  0170-2025 , pp. 509-590.
  7. ↑ The Quickborn working group is established.
  8. ↑ from December 28th to January 4th
  9. ↑ Meinulf Barbers: Restoration or Reconsideration? In: Archives for Silesian Church History. Vol. 70, 2012, pp. 257–284, here p. 280.
  10. ↑ Main-Post , Würzburg, June 3, 2017; Main-Echo , Aschaffenburg, June 6, 2017
  11. ↑ The brochure published for this occasion on the festive event on June 4, 2017, Rothenfels Castle, differentiates the anniversary event and the occasion: "50 Years of Quickborn Working Group", the festive event on June 4, 2017 at Rothenfels Castle
  12. ↑ Lohrer Echo , January 8, 2018, p. 14.
  13. ^ Association of Friends of Rothenfels Castle; Where we are guests and hosts, Rothenfels Castle - our castle for 100 years, Verlag Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2019; P. 55
  14. ^ Association of Friends of Rothenfels Castle; Where we are guests and hosts, Rothenfels Castle - our castle for 100 years, Verlag Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2019; P. 55
  15. ^ Association of Friends of Rothenfels Castle; Where we are guests and hosts, Rothenfels Castle - our castle for 100 years, Verlag Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2019; P. 55
  16. ↑ not to be confused with the politician or musician of the same name
  17. ↑ Karl Rahner: Complete Works. Volume 1: Early Spiritual Texts and Studies. Basics in the Order. Herder, Freiburg (Breisgau) a. a. 2014, ISBN 978-3-451-23719-5 , p. CXXX.
  18. ↑ one of the best sources for the period after 1945