Wolfgang Grell

This article deals with the theologian Wolfgang Grell. For other people see Wolfgang Crell .

Wolfgang Grell (born September 1, 1924 in Hamburg ; † April 28, 2010 there ) was a German theologian .

education

Wolfgang Grell was a son of Kurt Grell and his wife Ilma, nee Brandes. The father worked as a wealthy businessman in Hamburg, but left the profession in middle age and studied theology. Since he was only able to study at the University of Kiel in northern Germany , the family moved there in 1930. After completing his studies, Kurt Grell refused to take the oath of office on Adolf Hitler at the regional church office .

During his family's stay in Kiel, Wolfgang Grell attended the 7th boys' school from 1931 to 1935. Then he moved to Lübeck with his parents . Here he visited the Katharineum . Since he had to do the Reich Labor Service in 1942 , he finished school without a qualification. In 1944 he was called up for military service, during which he was wounded and spent some time in British captivity . After the end of the Second World War , he passed the Abitur examination in 1946. He then studied Protestant theology at universities in Kiel, Bethel and Heidelberg .

In April 1950 Grell passed the first theological exam in Kiel. He became engaged to the widow Elisabeth Haupt, née Hoffmann, whose first husband had been a pastor and who was expecting a child during Grell's vicariate. Since a marriage during the vicariate was forbidden due to the regulations at the time, the couple married anyway in 1951, Grell came into conflict with the regional church council and Wilhelm Halfmann . In October 1951 he passed the second theological exam and was then ordained directly in Kiel. He then worked as provincial vicar in Melsdorf and took over a pastorate there the following year . In 1959 he went to Oeversee as a pastor .

Work in Oeversee

In Oeversee, Grell first appeared politically on the day of national mourning in 1966, when he forbade the flag delegation of a '66 war club from entering the church. As a result, he got into a dispute with conservative citizens. When Grell took part in public discussions about a war memorial in Flensburg's Marienkirche in 1967 , the conflict intensified. Together with other pastors, the theologian demanded that the memorial for those killed in the First World War be removed. Since many pastors across Germany shared the criticism, this " Flensburg Monument Controversy" attracted national attention. Grell was faced with demands for impeachment from conservative circles . In 1967 the discussions led the regional church office to an “official discipline procedure for improper handling of leading clergy”, which had no consequences.

After the police accused Grell of having been violent at a demonstration against an NPD event, the theologian had a sensational public argument with Interior Minister Hartwig Schlegelberger in 1969 . However, since Grell did not use violence himself, but rather prevented those who were willing to act violently, he then harshly criticized the police.

Grell had been a member of the Schleswig-Holstein state synod since 1966 and of the constituent synod from 1970 to 1977. Here he was particularly committed to democracy within the church and polarized strongly with his theological views. This became evident in the context of the special synod in 1968, which took place after the monument dispute. The theologians discussed the Reformation of the Church and how to deal with current issues. Grell was shaped by the views of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Dorothee Sölle and called for a more contemporary language to be used in the church. He also wanted to reform the traditional understanding of God and the Christian faith. This led to another impeachment process launched by conservative theologians , which was unsuccessful.

Work in Hamburg

From 1972 Grell worked at the Christ Church in Wandsbeck . Politically, he initially campaigned for left-wing pastors and church workers who were banned from practicing their profession . The reason for this was the ban imposed on his friend and school pastor Theo Christiansen. At the request of the relatives, Christiansen had held a memorial service for the shot RAF member Georg von Rauch and was therefore no longer allowed to work at a school in Flensburg .

Grell dealt with the detention circumstances of RAF members and publicly criticized them as inhumane. In March 1974 he was the author of the open letter to the North Rhine-Westphalian Minister of Justice Diether Posser, supported by 77 signatories . It called for the lifting of solitary confinement for the RAF terrorists Ulrike Meinhof and Gudrun Ensslin , and described their detention as “sophisticated torture”. These “arbitrary measures of the state power” would “remind of the worst events in the German past”. And for the attempts of the Minister of Justice to justify these conditions of detention, the following applies: “These are behaviors that are known to us from fascist regimes.” The signatories included Manfred Kock , Wolfgang Huber , Frank Crüsemann , Jürgen Fliege , Dieter Frettlöh , Christofer Frey , Christof Hardmeier , Luise Schottroff , Ekkehard Stegemann , Wolfgang Stegemann , Lothar Steiger u. a. The historian Stephan Linck assessed this letter and its support as a sign that the author and the signatory “lacked a clear demarcation from the radicalization that was taking place”. In 1974, Grell held a memorial service in his community for Holger Meins , who died after a hunger strike , which was followed by another official discipline that had no consequences.

Since he wanted to promote contacts between members and prisoners of the RAF , Grell founded the "Information Office for Political Prisoners in the FRG" in his parsonage. He wanted to reach a large audience and point out that the prison conditions were illegal in his view. He paid prisoners to prisoners well into old age.

Later, Grell campaigned against the expansion of nuclear power and in 1980 took part in an action against the possible election of Franz Josef Strauss as German Chancellor. Most of these activities ended in disciplinary proceedings. In 1979, opponents of nuclear power occupied the Sankt-Petri-Kirche . The regional church office then raised drastic claims for damages against Grell, who had led this protest action, and the other initiators. The dispute ended after an open letter from 20 important theologians such as Helmut Thielicke . In 1983 the theologian had another argument with the church leadership. The trigger was a satire he wrote on the cult of Martin Luther , which had appeared in the church-critical magazine Gegen den Strom and was viewed as blasphemous. In the course of the escalation that followed, the editors of the paper distanced themselves from Grell.

Grell supported conscientious objectors and in 1978 took part in demonstrations by employees of the Alsterdorfer Anstalten who criticized the conditions of life and care. He emphasized the importance of redesigning the psychiatric facilities. From 1985 the theologian became involved in the peace and ecology movement and accompanied the conciliar process of the evangelical church constructively and critically.

Significance in the Evangelical Church

According to Bodo Schümann , Grell was considered a “church rebel” who survived six disciplinary, disciplinary and investigative procedures without consequences, which is likely to be rare in modern church history . The theologian, who came from a middle-class background, showed himself to be increasingly politically radical . The reason for this was his awareness of injustice and the feeling, gained from theological work, that he had to help excluded people and minorities. He himself said that he had never used violence, even if he and his fellow activists never ruled out the use of force to achieve political goals. Grell often led oppositions, but did not initiate any radical change processes himself, but accompanied them as an integrating figure. He did not see critics in church and politics as enemies, but tried to maintain mutual exchange and to respect human dignity . This enabled him to realign the North German Evangelical Church.

literature

• Bodo Schümann: Grell, Wolfgang . In: Franklin Kopitzsch, Dirk Brietzke (Hrsg.): Hamburgische Biographie . tape 6 . Wallstein, Göttingen 2012, ISBN 978-3-8353-1025-4 , p. 110-112 .

Individual evidence

1. ^ "77 pastors and theologians sign the following open letter to Justice Minister Posser". Letter and list of signatories documented in: Idea Spectrum. News from the Evangelical World No. 6 (2001), p. 21.
2. ↑ Stephan Linck: The Radical Left and the Evangelical Student Community, in: Klaus Fitschen u. a. (Ed.): The politicization of Protestantism. Developments in the Federal Republic of Germany during the 1960s and 70s. Göttingen (2001), pp. 77-89, here p. 81.