To the good news (Berlin)
The evangelical parish church "Zur Happy Message" in the Berlin district of Karlshorst in the Lichtenberg district was inaugurated in 1910 and is one of three church buildings of the Evangelical Paul Gerhardt Parish of Lichtenberg ( Evangelical Church Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia ) formed on September 1, 2001 . It stands on a separate square between Sinziger Strasse, Königswinterstrasse, Lahnsteiner Strasse and Weseler Strasse.
Building history
The Karlshorst colony, founded in 1895, had many church adherents of both denominations, who initially belonged to the Friedrichsfeld parish. Since the way to the local church was quite long, the parishioners were allowed to use the "Kaiserpavillon" for their services, which stood at the confluence of Kaiser-Wilhelm- and Prinz-Heinrich-Straße (today: Lehndorff- and Wandlitzstraße) and served as a reception hall for the imperial majesties at horse races on the obstacle course .
When the Protestant parish of Karlshorst was founded on July 1, 1906, the members therefore decided to build their own church as an urgent task, for which, according to the law of the time, a separate cemetery had to be available. After this was resolved through a compromise with the Friedrichsfeld community, a competition was held in 1907 among the architects of the time. Among other things, also participated Alfred Messel with designs. The contract was finally awarded to the architects Peter Jürgensen and Jürgen Bachmann , who later also supplied the designs for the Schöneberg town hall .
They designed a brick building in free form with a little borrowing from the medieval Gothic style ; The foundation stone was laid on May 9, 1909. The church, which had not been given a separate name, was opened on May 8, 1910 in the presence of His Royal Highness August Wilhelm Prince of Prussia , son of Wilhelm II , of the then summus episcopus of the Evangelical Church of the Elderly Provinces of Prussia , including the parish and sexton's house built to the north and south-east in the same style. In the autumn of 1910 , three bronze bells could be installed in the tower , the bell storey of which is surrounded by a decoratively patterned parapet and slightly set back from the base of the tower. Two of the bells were melted down in May 1917 for the production of military equipment, the smallest bell was sold to Triptis in Thuringia (this was then also melted down during World War II ). The 56 meter high tower is crowned by an octagonal, copper-clad pointed helmet. From the height of the bell floor there is a broad view over Karlshorst to the Müggelberge .
After the end of the First World War , the community collected donations for the casting of new bells. The Ulrich and Weule company in Bockenem am Harz manufactured three new bells from hard cast iron for 102,000 marks . The inauguration of the new bells took place during a festive service on March 19, 1922. The bells bear the inscriptions “HONOR TO GOD IN THE HEIGHT”, “PEACE ON EARTH” and “WELCOMING PEOPLE”. They call the believers to the services on Sundays and feast days, to casualia (baptisms, weddings and funerals) and announce the passage of time. The bell is coordinated with that of the nearby Catholic Church of St. Mary .
In 1924, a church aid association was founded at the church with the aim of broad social engagement: a day care center (on Hönower Wiesenweg) and a soup kitchen could be set up and an aid service for war wounded could be offered.
During the Nazi era , the church interior was decorated with swastika flags , and mass weddings for SA members also had to be carried out. But the parish soon resisted this development: Pastor Martin Niemöller held devotions here, and in 1940 a Jew was even baptized; the pastor had to endure corresponding restrictions.
Towards the end of the Second World War, the church was badly damaged; it could not be restored afterwards because the church grounds were in the restricted area that the Red Army had set up as a location for their military administration in Germany . The house was now used as a warehouse and horse stable, but was not willfully destroyed. The Soviet city commander Pyotr Dibrowa made the church available to the government of the GDR again in 1955. It handed this over to Heinrich Grüber, the representative of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany, in the presence of the community on May 23, 1955 . In addition to the church, this included the rectory and sexton's house as well as the kindergarten. With the help of many young volunteers from four countries as part of an ecumenical construction camp, as a forerunner of the “ Action Reconciliation ”, the roof was repaired, and a little later the gallery , the windows and the floor. The church received a new pulpit and new stalls, and the altar was restored. Colored windows based on designs by Gerhard Olbrich were used. On July 15, 1956, Bishop Otto Dibelius was able to rededicate the church; it was now named " For the good news ".
Soon after the political change in the GDR , in 1991 and 1993/1994, extensive repairs and renovation work were carried out, from the tower fortification to the installation of underfloor heating , the cleaning of the windows and the corresponding painting work. A solemn service on the 1st of Advent 1994 announced the completion of the renewal.
Interior
The anteroom to the church is used for church services in the smallest circle, but also for music evenings (a harpsichord is available) or as a family get-together with a coffee bar.
Church interior
The large church space is spanned by a simple vault, two iron chandeliers in the form of a crown of thorns hang from the ceiling .
An altarpiece as a tapestry in red and white shows biblical scenes. The altar table is decorated with an antependium (front altar cloth) that was embroidered by a member of the community. A metal altar cross , a baptismal font with a copper baptismal bowl and a modern wood carving "Christ with the Crown of Thorns", which is a gift from the Hungarian partner community Kosd , decorate the rectangular choir with barrel vaults .
The windows in the choir are modern colored glass works and illustrate the themes of “water” (left side) and “bread” (right side). Inside the church you will also find plaques commemorating those who died in the First World War.
organ
In the church building from 1910, an organ from the Wilhelm Sauer company from Frankfurt (Oder) with 32 registers in two manuals was installed. During the non-ecclesiastical use of the church by the Soviet Army between 1945 and 1955, the organ was dismantled; its whereabouts have not been clarified. After the church was returned to the congregation, it was necessary to procure a new organ. It turned out to be a stroke of luck that a "churchless" musical instrument was found, which was the work of the organ builder Johann Peter Migendt , which he had built in 1755/1756 for Princess Anna Amalia of Prussia .
After completion, this instrument, known as the Amalien organ , was first placed in the Berlin City Palace and twelve years later in the Palais Unter den Linden , then in 1788 as a donation to the Palace Church in Wendisch Buch (today: Berlin-Buch ), where it stood until 1934 was almost forgotten. The plans to move to the Nikolaikirche in Berlin , which is why the Schuke company had been commissioned to renovate the building , were not carried out because of the war. A multiple implementation of the instrument in the Berlin city center ( coin , St. Mary's Church ) saved it from destruction.
The parish of Karlshorst received this well-preserved baroque organ as a gift and installed it on the gallery, on June 19, 1960 the organ was consecrated. The instrument is Berlin's oldest, largely original, organ. Between September 2009 and December 2010 the organ was restored in the Wegscheider organ workshop in Dresden . The organ, which can also be heard during concerts, is also a training instrument for church music students at the Berlin University of the Arts .
Parish hall
In connection with the increased social activities of the Karlshorster parish, a separate parish hall became necessary. In addition, in 1925 the church council bought the so-called Princely House at Eginhardstrasse 7-11, a private house built in 1894, for 110,000 marks , and had it redesigned. The rather defiant-looking building was named Wartburg . In 1927, on the initiative of the pastor, an "Evangelical People's Library" was opened here.
Because at the end of the Second World War the SS was storing weapons and ammunition in this house, the Red Army had the entire building blown up in 1945. Since the actual church had been in the Soviet restricted area of Karlshorst since 1945 and was therefore not usable, the parish council decided in 1948 to rebuild the parish hall in a simplified manner so that it could be used for church services; construction was completed in 1951.
After the church building in Weseler Strasse was returned to the community in 1955, the church administration office of the Lichtenberg church district and, from 1976, the Lichtenberg superintendent found accommodation in the community center. The high rooms of the house were divided in 1984/1985 by adding a false ceiling, so that from then on the Protestant kindergarten had its home here. After 1990 the building was transferred to the Diakonisches Werk Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia and converted into a senior citizens' residential complex.
In 2003, a two-story villa at Lehndorffstrasse 11–15, which was the residence of the Japanese ambassador to the GDR from 1974–1989, was expanded as a new parish hall. In 2006 the parish hall was named Lothar Kreyssig House . The sexton house is also used as a community office for the diverse activities of the community at the Karlshorst site. A table , children's, youth and senior citizens' get-togethers, street parties and other thematic events (women's circle, men's circle, wind circle, etc.) are regularly organized .
literature
- "To the good news". Evangelical parish Berlin-Karlshorst. Bock & Kübler, Fürstenwalde 1995. (in the holdings of the Lichtenberg Local History Museum)
- The architectural and art monuments in the GDR, capital Berlin II. Institute for Monument Preservation at Henschelverlag, 1987.
- Jan Feustel: Walks in Lichtenberg. Haude and Spener, 1996, ISBN 3-7759-0409-3 .
- Festschrift 100 years of Karlshorst Church 1910–2010 . Evangelische Paul-Gerhardt-Kirchengemeinde Lichtenberg (Ed.), Berlin 2010.
Web links
- History and news about the Amalien organ
- Website of the Paul Gerhardt congregation: history of the church in Karlshorst
- Entry in the Berlin State Monument List with further information
Individual evidence
- ^ Five design sheets by Alfred Messel for the Evangelical Church Berlin-Karlshorst in the archive of the Architekturmuseum der TU Berlin ; Retrieved April 8, 2010.
- ↑ General Dibrowa handed over the church. In: Neue Zeit , May 24, 1955, p. 2
- ^ Karlshorster Church is consecrated. In: Neue Zeit , July 15, 1956, p. 8
- ^ Erhard Bergt: Diplomats in Karlshorst (II). In: Karlshorster , No. 24, September 2009, p. 5.
Coordinates: 52 ° 29 ′ 7 ″ N , 13 ° 31 ′ 42 ″ E