Zygmunt Michelis

Grave of Zygmunt Michelis in Warsaw

Zygmunt Michelis (born March 17, 1890 in Bycz / Kujawen , † December 2, 1977 in Warsaw ) was a Polish Evangelical Lutheran clergyman , bishop - adjunct of the Evangelical Augsburg Church in Poland and precursor of ecumenical cooperation with the Roman Catholic Church .

Live and act

Michelis was born into a family of teachers and had in Tartu / Estonia in the theological field of local university graduated. There he was a member of the Polonia Corps . After serving as vicar at Trinity Church had worked in Warsaw, he received his ordination to the priest by Bishop Juliusz boy on December 8, 1912. In 1913 he was appointed administrator of the parishes in Mława and Przasnycz determined. A year later he took over the office of pastor in the parish of Lipno . In 1921 he became the second pastor in Warsaw. In the Warsaw Diaconate he held the position of deputy director. He founded the Evangelical Cooperative Bank and was its director. He was also editor and publisher of the Evangelical Messenger . In 1924 he took over the spiritual direction of the Warsaw Diaconate Tabita . In 1928 he had the motherhouse built in Skolimowo near Warsaw for this facility .

After the start of the Second World War , he was arrested by the Gestapo in 1939 and transferred to Warsaw's main prison , Pawiak . This was followed by imprisonment in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg . He was released after a year in prison. Then he founded the National Evangelical Council underground , which worked against the German occupation.

After the liberation from the Nazi regime , Michelis became pastor of the Holy Trinity Church, whose reconstruction is also due to him. In 1946 he founded the Polish Ecumenical Council , of which he was first President until 1960. In 1952 he was elected Bishop Adjunct of the Evangelical Augsburg Church. At the same time he was President of the Synod of his church from 1952 to 1957 . Michelis was a member of the Christian Peace Conference and participant in the founding assembly in 1958 in Prague . Engaged in the ecumenical movement, he worked with the Catholic weekly magazines Tygodnik Powszechny and Znak i Więź . He was among the participants in the first ecumenical services in St. Martin's Church in Warsaw.

After his retirement in 1963 he continued to work in the ecumenical movement. In the same year Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński allowed him to hold Lutheran services in the Church of the Sisters of the Sacrament in Warsaw. He gave his last sermon in St. Martin's Church of the Franciscan Sisters - Servants of the Cross in Warsaw on October 9, 1977.

Works

• Pismo święte Nowego Testamentu i Psalmy. Przekład ekumeniczny, Towarzystwo Biblijne w Polsce, Warszawa 2001.
• Sługa Słowa Bożego i Jedności Chrześcijan - Ks. Zygmunt Michelis. Warsaw 2003.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives:
2. ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: