So unterschiedlich die Ladenkirche in Schwamendingen bei Zürich, die anglikanische St. Saviour's Church in Riga, die Citykerk Amsterdam, die
Evangelisch-Lutherische Gemeinde auf
Madeira und das Sharehaus Refugio der Berliner
Stadtmission sein mögen, gemeinsam ist ihnen, dass sie offen für alle sind, die
einen Ansprechpartner oder eine Ansprechpartnerin suchen. Die Mission – das klare
christliche Profil zu vertreten – zeigt sich im Dasein für andere, die mit
ihren Nöten zu uns kommen, denen wir als Christen begegnen und helfen, wie wir
es eben vermögen. Nicht immer war das allen Teilnehmer*innen eindeutig genug als
christlich zu erkennen. Ist es „nur“ Sozialarbeit oder "diakonisches Helfen",
wenn kein Gottesdienst auf dem Programm steht? Reicht Nächstenliebe? Lassen
wir das Evangelium zu weit in den Hintergrund treten?
Wir hätten noch lange weiterdiskutieren können. Mit so
vielen tollen Berichten hatten wir im Leitunsgteam nicht gerechnet. Dass etwa die Citykerk
und das Projekt Fresh Expressions erst
am letzten Abend im Programm Platz fanden - aber keinerlei Ermüdungserscheinungen
aufkommen ließen - war nicht geplant. Vielleicht ergeben sich noch mehr Gespräche
oder weitere Kontakte über unseren Blog hier oder per E-Mail. Vielleicht bilden wir
neue kleine Netzwerke, über die wir unsere Ideen und Visionen von Kirche
miteinander weiterhin teilen.
Last Sunday,
our conference with the Community of Protestant
Churches (CPCE) ended with Worship at Berlin Cathedral. The sermon fit our conference
topic: congregations … how to develop them, keep them alive, change them… it
seems like those were already concerns of the very first Christians. Our
conference enjoyed many interesting reports from communities and projects in
the Netherlands, Germany, Ukraine, Hungary, Romania, Switzerland, Latvia, and
the Czech Republic – all a good deal longer than we had allotted talking time,
but not a minute was boring, because the whole diverse group was highly
motivated. The enthusiasm of the younger participants was particularly
hope-inspiring for me, when they told us about very practical projects to reach
out to people formerly distanced from any kind of church and who took from our
excursion in Berlin what they could possibly implement at home. However, the
signal, that there are visions of church, a church that allows for change and
development, that can be a home for many, came also from us “middle old” and “old”
ones – retired would not be a fitting term, because our 65+ members of the group
were very much active in their communities.
While the
different projects (see the links in the German text above) were truly very diverse in their approach and activities,
they all had in common, that they aim to be open for all who seek contact. Some in our group had questions as to whether the Christian profile is visible enough. Are we doing "just" social or charity work? Do we place the Gospel, the Word of God too much in the background? Is "loving thy neighbour" mission enough? We would have liked much more time for discussion. There were
– to our happy surprise – so many reports that some ended up at the last
evening, and regrettably there was not enough time to discuss them all as much as we
would have wished. But maybe contacts can continue via our blog, possibly by E-Mail. Maybe we can see a few new small networks for the exchange of our ideas
and visions of Church.