The Berlin Wall is open ...

Jane's diary: 1.15 am, 10 November 1989

The Berlin Wall is open!! Yesterday's new Politburo opened it this evening. The Iron Curtain too. I can't believe it. I had been interpreting all day for some American journalists in Wittenberg and fell asleep at 6 p.m. exhausted. I woke up at midnight and tried to get back to sleep. At 1 a.m. I switched on the radio. This is amazing. Soon East Germans will have more freedom of movement than I do, since I'm here with a single-entry visa. The other students had already gone home today for the long weekend back in their local churches. One of them is in Berlin. I wonder if he's going to go to West Berlin for the day. It's really strange.

17.00

The atmosphere is amazing. People's faces in the street even look different.

22.30

Crazy, things are moving so fast that it's impossible to settle down. There's an intense need to be with people to experience it together. People don't know whether to laugh or cry. It's like a strange fairy tale. I spent most of this afternoon waiting for a phone call from the BBC for an interview. Stephen phoned and we had a happy conversation early this morning. Amazing. It was brilliant to be able to share our stunned amazement.

Have just been watching the pictures on television. East and West German police working together to sort out the chaos, despite new "holes" in the wall there's total blockage because of the human traffic in both directions. People climbing over the wall, being helped by police with ladders. It seem like some kind of surreal sci-fi story. And then the pictures of Willy Brandt at the border, incredibly moving. What must he have been thinking as the people in the east hugged and greeted him. Mayor of West Berlin when the wall was built, did he think he would live to see this day., Tears rolled down my cheeks.

Behind all this celebration is very real uncertainty. What is going to happen?

Yesterday was a historic day - the Berlin Wall was opened. Fifty one years ago, my Berlin grandfather was arrested and taken to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp following the Kristallnacht of 9 November 1938, the "night of broken glass" of the attacks against synagogues, Jewish Germans and their property. It is strange to think that these two events will share an anniversary.

Posted by Jane.

There are walls that keep us all divided

In his statement to mark the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall, World Council of Churches general secretary Sam Kobia said tthat the message that Christian faith can inspire a resistance movement against fatalism and despair is as important today as it was then:

There are still many walls separating humankind: the "Demilitarized Zone" between North and South Korea, the "Security Wall" on the occupied territory in Palestine, but also the walls of injustice, racism and prejudice that separate rich and poor, stigmatize persons suffering from HIV and AIDS and destroy the lives of many people.

The BBC (hat tip to Ian Alexander) has put together a page depicting the walls and barriers around the world which are still standing - or have been put up - since 1989.: West Bank, Northern Ireland, Saudi Arabia, Ceuta and Melilla, Cyprus, Pakistan-Iran, Rio de Janeiro, US-Mexico, Korean Border, Western Sahara, Botswana-Zimbabwe.

The title of this post comes from a verse from the hymn, "The Love of God is broad like beach and meadow":

We long for freedom where our truest being
is given hope and courage to unfold.
We seek in freedom space and scope for dreaming,
and look for ground where trees and plants can grow.

The Love of God is broad ...

But there are walls that keep us all divided;
we fence each other in with hate and war.
Fear is the bricks and mortar of our prison,
our pride of self the prison coat we wear.

In the archives of the GDR State Secretary for Church Affairs there is a paper that expresses concern about this hymn and states that it must not be published in the GDR, describing the text as a means of trying to discredit the state using religious language.