Over the Wall and back again

Jane's diary: Wittenberg, 20.11.1989
What a weekend! I was so tense on Thursday, the train to Berlin was late and I had to work hard to keep calm. Then to the foreigners' registration office at Alexanderplatz in East Berlin. Finally after a bit of to-do the man at the office gave me an exit and re-entry visa meaning I could go to West Berlin and come back to the GDR. I tried to phone West Berlin and it just wouldn't work. All lines engaged. It's been like that for days I reckon.

Walking along Friedrichstrasse towards Checkpoint Charlie I bumped into Christa Gengel (ecumenical officer of the Evangelical Church of the Union) and Keith Forecast (moderator of the United Reformed Church general assembly). Quite a ridiculous coincidence, the previous evening he had been preaching in Mansfield Chapel (in Oxford where I did my theology studies) and they had said, 'Of course you won't see Jane but if you do, tell her we miss her and give her our love'. Suddenly I felt a pang of homesickness for them all, miles away from German Sachlichkeit.

It was interesting to speak about the current situation with Christa Grengel. The woman who works with Christa looks well and relaxed, opening the borders really has opened people up. But Christa Grengel seems rather pessimistic about the way ahead - things are going too quickly, the church had proposed the gradual opening of the border and not the current free for all.

Were there any native Berliners in East Berlin at all? Everyone I tried to ask the way was Polish or Russian or from outside Berlin. Very odd.

Finally, after my interrupted evening I crossed at Friedrichstrasse, much quieter than earlier. So strange, the whole atmosphere was so different, much more friendly. It was so incredible to be on the S Bahn to Bahnhof Zoo in West Berlin. Then on to our friend Horst's where Stephen had arrived as well as other visitors from the GDR.

West Berlin was like I have never known it - but then it's never been like this. What an incredible atmosphere. All along the Wall people have their hammers and chisels and are making holes in it, taking chunks away to sell to the Americans - now the West Berlin police are doing their best to protect the wall. At Potsdamer Platz - what used to be the heart of an undivided Berlin, a new crossing point has been made, the Wall simply torn down. Nearby British solidiers are doling out free tea and coffee (a very British form of deterrence), with the East German border guards looking on.

A truly amazing weekend but at the end I had to walk back into East Berlin through Checkpoint Charlie by myself. Stephen came with me to the border and went through first but the border guards still wouldn't let him into the GDR. He came back out and said they had been much more friendly than the last time he had been refused entry but their records still said that he was "unwanted" in East Germany. So through the dark streets of East Berlin with tears on my cheeks to take the train back to Wittenberg.

Retribution or accountability?

Jane's diary, dateline 12 November 1989:

Three SED district officials committed suicide yesterday. I worry about Schadenfreude. Hunting down the guilty ones as if none of the rest of us are guilty - have the CDU, LDPD, NDPD (the block parties linked to the SED) done nothing over these years. Are they going to get away without having to confess? I wonder how many people would not have been involved in corruption in some form or another.

Two of the new central committee members have already had to resign - Cottbus and Halle in SED districts voted them out of office at their respective local levels and they've had to go. The reasons aren't all that clear but Boehme (district SED secretary in Halle) may have been voted out because of the appalling violence in Halle on 9 October. It still isn't out in the open whether he or the Stasi chief gave the order "to clear the centre" ( very euphemistic expression). People are now saying the Stasi should be sent to the factories. All that listening in to, watching and frightening people doesn't bear thinking about.

Yesterday I was in Jüterbog to interpret for two Americans from the United Church of Christ. Jüterbog is small has four very enormous and very beautiful old churches, one now converted into a library. It was an old Handelstadt and has similar architecture to my beloved Hansastädte. This area of Brandenburg is called Fläming - rolling countryside and woods. The name and the architecture indicating the Dutch connection. I'm extremely cross I have allowed myself to be talked into this although it has been interesting in all kinds of ways ...

More amazing pictures from Berlin. The West Berlin police and the East German Grenztruppen working together. More jubilation and of course all the litter and rubbish, bottles, paper plates.

In Jütterbog as all overt the GDR the State Bank and the police were open all day on Saturday and Sunday to cope with the queues of people. The Reichsbahn has laid on extra trains, in Leipzig they ran out of tickets for people travelling to Berlin. Each year GDR people can change 5 Marks at 1 to 1 for 15 DM. This is nothing. Can the government really afford to make the currency convertible, rampant inflation is sure to follow. The new economic proposals seem to suggest some kind of price reform. When? How quickly the next change.

On AK2 (the East German television news) the strange sight of the head of the police advising people to leave their cars on the edge of Berlin and to try to avoid the overcrowded crossing points. "Unless you have to go over now, then don't. Please believe me this new law will last so try to be patient". Wierd! Then an interview - a real interview - with Krenz about reunification. Basically he said this is Herr Kohl's problem and not mine, The GDR constitution is very clear on this issue. Whether Kohl should consider sorting out the Basic law is another matter and on which I cannot decide and which is not a GDR matter.

Interpreting for the Americans again this morning in small village churches. Thankfully a fairly straightforward sermon in easy language - I was surprised at how easily it all went. I was very thankful for the French onion soup at lunchtime, I got very cold in the first church where we preached. Winter has finally arrived, frost this morning and a real November mist, damp cold getting through to your bones. Somehow it had seemed as though the summer would last for ever but maybe the greenhouse effect isn't bad enough yet for that.

My feminist anger is dying down a bit now but if I get called "Fräulein" once again I might just boil over.

From East Germany to South Africa

It was not only in East Germany that weighty events were taking place in the latter months of 1989. In South Africa, too, the End Game had begun. In September 1989, the South African theologian John de Gruchy had been in New York where - together with a Marxist professor from the GDR - he watched the growing popular protests in the GDR and in his home county, an experience he described in 1997 at the Leipzig Kirchentag:

Redeeming the past in South Africa:
The force of truth, forgiveness and hope in the search for justice and reconciliation

In September 1989 my wife and I spent a sabbatical semester at Union Theological Seminary in New York. For a few days we were host to the director of the Marxist-Leninist Institute in Rostock. He belonged to a group of theologians and philosophers from the German Democratic Republic, which was visiting the United States. It was highly ironic that in this way a Marxist professor from East Germany and a white, Christian theologian from the anti-communist, apartheid-ruled South Africa should meet in the United States of America! Nevertheless, we were bound together during this week in a way that neither of us would have been able to foresee. For this was the week of weighty, world-changing events, both in East Germany and in South Africa.

As we sat together, the East Germans and South Africans, we watched the events together on American television!Among the reports shown that week there were two that were boradcast immediately after one another. The first showed television footage of protest meetings in Leipzig and the of East German citizens fleeing over the border into Czechoslovakia, and the second was the escalation of the protest marches against apartheid in Cape Town, my hometown. Whatever the reaction may have been of our East German guest we knew that this meant the beginning of the end of apartheid. On top of that, we felt that the dramatic events in Eastern Europe were taking place in the same historical context as the events in our country. And that should come true. For without the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989, it was unlikely that change would have taken place in South Africa at that time.

For good reason, the reunification of Germany and the transition to democracy in South Africa have been characterised as two of the main events in the formation of world politics in the late 20the century. Some even claimed that these events were the prelude to a new world order. Even if we are somewhat sceptical of this claim today, these events have undoubtedly changed the course of history, no matter how we evaluate them. Events of weighty importance took place in Germany and in South Africa, radically transforming our lives and the lives of many others throughout the world.

Anyone who has watched television reports about the pro-democracy protests in Leipzig or Cape Town, would have seen the presence of priests, pastors and even bishops - at least in Cape Town! - among the leaders. There were many others among the crowds that were there from Christian conviction and commitment. Yes, Christians, and some church leaders and groups have played a key role in those important events of the transition, just as they had been committed as the precursors of these changes.But we should be reminded that the contribution of the churches to the struggle against apartheid was far from clear, it was hesitant and ambiguous. Some churches even provided the theological justification of apartheid. Even those churches that were against apartheid, have hands that are unclean.

The churches have much to confess about guilt and failure. In the majority of cases, the Christian opposition to apartheid was left to prophetic loners, charismatic leaders, ecumenical bodies and quasi-religious organizations. Too often the churches hid behind such brave testimonies, prophetic, instead of getting involved prophetically in the struggle for justice and liberation.(Provisional translation from the German)

In his book Christianity and Democracy, de Gruchy has written about the parallels (and differences) between the transition in the two countries.

'What lies ahead of us?'

Jane's diary: 10 November 1989 later in the day

Today the SED declared itself in favour of an electoral law with free and fair elections and secret ballots. How many more rabbits can be pulled out of the hat this week. Perhaps Krenz has won himself a little breathing space with these measures over the past two days. It looks as if the whole episode yesterday wasn't intended as freedom of movement - the new travel law was supposed to come into force on 1 December in time for Christmas. Schabowski actually said those wanting to leave the GDR could do so via the GDR border instead of via Czechoslovakia. But the people took the ruling into their own hands and basically flooded the wall. Utterly sensational.

For each day people spend in the west (currently 30) they are allowed to change 1 GDR Mark into 1 DM but otherwise the GDR currency is not convertible. That alone may persuade people to leave. Who knows. Racketeering is likely to grow particularly if there is a price reform. Who knows? Earlier in the week I felt instinctively that a price reform must come but surely not until after Christmas. Political suicide to do it before things are moving so fast who knows what will happen next.

Of course all this has caught the West utterly on the hop (the Russians too, I reckon). It was interesting that as the interviews progressed during the day people tried to be more sanguine and reflective. Not succeeding a lot mind you. There is appalling ignorance in Britain of the GDR political system and structure summed up by Sue McGregor's question (a British radio journalist) to Pfr. Seidel in Leipzig this morning, "Has your party - the LDPD - been legalised yet?". reply - "Yes since 1947". Similarly the woman on the "Any Questions" radio programme pronouncing, "East Germany doesn't have an opposition party". Still she is only a high ranking civil servant.

The assumption in all the reunification debate is that the problem is East Germany becoming part of NATO. The problem is of course the thousands of Soviet troops in the GDR (of course there are the western troops in the Federal Republic). Then to cap it all Manfred Woerner of NATO says of course NATO's existence isn't threatened by these changes. It has contributed to the stability and without it this change wouldn't have taken place. What nonsense!

10 November 1989, 23:30

The central committee has in fact today announced economic reform - more consumer goods, gradual removal of subsidies. But the financial news tonight is spreading doom and gloom - hyperinflation and problems of quality and motivation of workers looks more and more likely - quite apart from crisis in public health and transport. Is it all going to go BONG?? Dear God, what lies ahead of us ...???

I went to talk to Friedrich (Schorlemmer) when I knew the BBC were going to interview me. He's ill and looked pretty ropey. Bloody RIAS phoned him at 5am this morning 'unangemeldet' - without notice. We spoke of the whole guilt question. Suddenly everyone's pointing the finger at SED leaders as if no one else contributed to all the problems here, as if most of the population hadn't gone to the polls and voted for the SED lists last May.

And the role of the church now? Balance? Keeping the peace? Besonnenheit - trying to get people to stay calm? Friedrich spoke of the need for Klage and Anklage- I'm not quite sure I understand this - lamentation in Biblical terms from the depths of our hearts - like in Psalms? Also accusation coupled with Besonnenheit.

Also he's very concerned that the church should confront the whole Zweistaatlichkeit question (the issue of there being two German states). What Germany? Very important for the church to give a lead. However I reckon there are lots of different tendencies within the church and that there are going to be all sorts of people coming out of the woodwork. We'll see.

Kohl say Germany is now free - our free German fatherland - I find talk like this very disturbing.

Let's wait and see: the central committee proposes electoral reform, a new media law, freedom of assembly, and bringing the state under parliamentary control.

If the wall really goes maybe reunification will be the only way that this country will survive. My heart is with all this historical day stuff. What really lies ahead? Will we still be able to afford food in February? Now Thatcher is saying, "It's a great day for freedom". What an overused and abused word freedom is.

... but the peaceful revolution continues

One of the most long standing misconceptiuons about the events of 1989 is that it was the opening of the Berlin Wall brought freedom to the people of East Germany, when it was the people of East Germany demanding and seizing freedom for themsleves. The other is that once the Berlin Wall was opened the peaceful revolution was over. Yet it was still the SED that held the levers of (state) power in the GDR, the Stasi had not been disbanded, political parties had not been allowed, there was no independent judiciary and there was no mechanism for freee and fair elections. Nor was it clear that all sections of the apparatus would still give up their power. This poster is for the founding assembly of New Forum in Prenzlauer Berg in east Berlin on 10 November - at the Gethsemane church as it happens. Throughout the autumn the new political parties and citizens' movements began to take shape. The Round Table that was to become the instance for the transfer of power from the SED to society was to meet for the first time only in December. the peaceful revolution continued.

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.

"Ich bin ein Berliner" - as seen by Plantu

This is the cartoon that featured on the front page of Le Monde of 10 November 1989 (dated 11 November) by its resident cartoonist, Plantu.

Breaking bread on the morning of 9 November

Jane: On the morning of 9th November 1989 I was one of the twenty or so ministry students at the Predigerseminar in Wittenberg. We had 10 day modules allowing for a four day weekend beginning after lunch on the Thursday. The Thursday mornings were for our "Auswertungsrunde". Believe me you cannot really understand the groan that this even now inspires in me unless you have been through this kind of evaluation with German theologians who are all direct and critical of the methodologies and content of what and how they are learning ... it is quite indescribable. Of the 25 of us sitting around the evaluation table that morning four people were founding members of three of the different new political parties in the GDR, several had taken part in the big Berlin demonstration on October 7th, one of our lecturers had been a speaker at the huge demonstration in Berlin on November 4th. These were some of the biggish fish in the small GDR pond.
Everyone around the table knew someone who had been imprisoned, several had seen the violence first hand. Together we had begun the prayers for renewal in Wittenberg, experienced and led Reformation Day and Buss und Bettag, learned about liturgy and preaching.
We were young but adults, full of hope, getting ready to have that hope dashed, cynicism was there under the surface. During the previous week we had begun to receive reports of the police brutality towards thos imprisoned in Berlin and Halle at the beginning of October. We had read some of those reports out at our morning prayers and wept and raged. Our emotions were elemental, we were living through a revolution yet everyone was away from home and would rather have been at home with their own peace and church groups, going on the demonstrations with their friends and family - apart from me ...
I had suggested - ever the liturgist - that we should end each 10 day module with a communion service. So after two hours of telling each other what we thought of one another in no uncertain terms, we moved from the painful evaluation table not to the upper but to the lower room where a simple round table is set with bread and wine.
I clearly remember Friedrich Schorlemmer bringing flowers to the table at the last moment and my being deeply moved by that. In my memory they were pinkish snapdragons, but perhaps my memory fails me - surely they could not have survived so far into the season, that must have been on a previous occasion, one eucharist speaks of and reminds one of another. I remember the flowers though, from one of those eucharists and I remember Friedrich's face and body as he place this offering of beauty on the table. (Dr B has my diary and we will see whether my memory was wrong.)
I presided at our round table eucharist and I spoke of remembrance, of my Grandfather being arrested in the Kristallnacht raids and taken away to Sachsenhausen concentration camp 61 years earlier. And so with stories of brokenness, pain and hope all around us, having shared hard and gentler words with each other, we broke bread and drank wine in memory of the one who was broken and shed for us.
Next to me as we prayed and felt the bread and wine in our mouths, my friend U began to sob, tears rolling down his face. He is not ashamed of his grief and emotion. As I think back to that morning my hand remembers the feel of his jeans as I placed my hand on his leg in an attempt not to quiet him but simply to offer comfort and in some strange way to say yes this is what it has been like.
Twelve hours later U and many of the others were spending the night at the impromptu street party on both sides of the wall. The feast of memory became the party of liberation.

Crosspost from the StranzBlog

Liturgy at the Berlin Wall

At lunchtime on 9 November, staff and others at the Ecumenical Centre met at the pieces of the Berlin wall in the garden of the ecumenical centre for prayers. The slabs of the Berlin Wall (one of which is shown in the picture) were a gift from the first freely elected government of the German Democratic Republic to the Conference of European Churches in recognition of the role played by churches in the peaceful revolution.

A visitor from outside the house asked "so which side was in the east and which in the west?" I explained that it would not have been possible to paint the eastern side with gaffitti. This led me to say during our prayers that we were lighting the candles on the wrong side - it was not Helmut Kohl who brought the wall down but people with ca ndles and courage on the other side! Even though the sun had come out I also said that the weather reminded me of an Iona peace liturgy for a rainy day - choose a symbol that will work on a wet day - not a candle! The wind did manage to blow out alot of candles - and the rain managed to deal with the rest later in the day.
I shamelssly plagiarised what Stephen has been writing on Holy Disorder to put together the simple liturgy. Using also my own diary extracts from that extraordinary year in the GDR - that's where the idea for using Psalm 126 came from. I also remember Friedrich Schorlemmer at the end of a particularly difficult day simply saying to us in Wittenberg, let's close this session by singing the Luther peace hymn which is why I chose Verleih uns Frieden gnädiglich to end with. I can remember being very moved by its wonderful minor melodies and the fact that everyone apart from me knew the words.
I also love the footnote at the bottom of The love of God is broad like beach and meadow - saying that the GDR government was concerned that the words of the hymn were criticising the state using religious language! It was good to sing one of Fred Kaan's hymns in translation after listening to a tribute to him on the radio last night.
So for 20 minutes at lunchtime we celebrated the spirituality of civil society that changed the world. coming home this evening I have heard a story of women walking together today across the peace line in Northern Ireland and of people trying to remove the wall in Palestine ... it seems right to use this anniversary as a starting point to overcome the barriers and divisions of our own times.

Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
and our tongue with shouts of joy;
then it was said among the nations,
‘The Lord has done great things for them.’
The Lord has done great things for us,
and we rejoiced. (Ps. 126)

Liturgy is here.

Posted by Jane Stranz.

Diary of a revolution

Wittenberg, GDR, Jane's diary dateline 7 November 1989 (Tuesday):

The official GDR news agency ADN is reporting that 23000 people left over the weekend. The Politburo meets on 10 November - many new members will have been elected. The situation at the top is drastic. Krenz is unlikely to hold onto his position for much longer. There's just no trust in him, but if he goes the chaos at the top will become even more obvious. But it seems difficult to think that he should stay just for the sake of stability.

Of course people like Otto Graf Lambsdorff (the leader of West Germany's Free Democratic Party) really don't help by telling the GDR to pull down the Berlin Wall. What utter nonsense, surely he realises that would be economic catastrophe. Of course in some way the Federal Republic is going to buy up the GDR anyway. Even before the Wende there were rumours of all sorts of entrepreneurs gambling on unification and buying up land. Of course it is very cheap here.

One of the other students led a meditation on Psalm 126 this morning. Very movingly she spoke of the almost dreamlike existence we all feel we are in at the moment, the changes, the unreality of this situation. But dreaming and dreams are important. Dreams are the roots of growing trees, the water and sap of our life.

...

Tonight it was the prayers for renewal again. It's strange. It seems normal to be in a church bursting at the seams. Tonight the phone rang three times. The caretaker came out and said, "The government has resigned!". Of course it doesn't mean that Krenz has gone, just that Willi Stoph and co. have stepped down. Tears came to my eyes as we sang, "Watch and pray". What is going to happen to this country? Who is going to take responsibility?

The justice commission of the central committee?, the Volkskammer? is going to look at the travel law again. As Gregor Gysi said yesterday, to be allowed to travel 30 days a year is not exactly a human right. People are not happy about it at all.

Things are moving so fast. A new electoral law might quieten things down but who knows? Maybe the leaders of the SED should wear sackcloth and ashes, as a symbol of what they have done wrong - how often will they have to say sorry?

Meanwhile the Trabbis are queuing up to leave into Czechoslovakia. Last night they crossed over at a rate of 500 an hour, today 200 an hour. How many more are going to go? How many will come back?

The synod of our regional church, the Church Province of Saxony, came up with some very thoughtful resolutions at its meeting, They sound a bit like the Barmen Declaration. I'm sure I can detect the hand of Heino Falcke behind them.

The Berlin Wall and the Ecumenical Movement

By Konrad Raiser (*)
The opening or fall of the Berlin Wall was an unexpected event for the people most directly affected, but even more so for the world at large. The ecumenical movement was no exception. However, the events in 1989 East Germany were to have a wide and long lasting impact on it that can still be felt today.

To be sure, large numbers of people from the former German Democratic Republic had left the country since the opening of the border between Hungary and Austria in the summer of 1989. Also, a growing network of civic groups, struggling for fundamental social and political change in the country, had emerged. They had benefited from the protection by the churches and were inspired by the ecumenical assemblies earlier in the year at Magdeburg and Dresden as part of the conciliar process on Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation.

Similar groups and movements had been operating in neighbouring countries already for some time. All of this had created a dynamic pushing for change, especially after the large, explicitly non-violent demonstration in Leipzig on Monday, 9 October 1989. But even then, few people expected that the wall would come down so soon, preparing the way for the end of communist rule not only in East Germany but in the entire region of central and eastern Europe and eventually overcoming the division of Germany and of Europe.

The series of events taking place in Europe from the summer of 1989 continuing well into the year 1990 and complemented by radical changes in South Africa and in other parts of the world had profound implications for the ecumenical movement. During the four decades following the First Assembly of the World Council of Churches (WCC) in Amsterdam 1948, ecumenical efforts for justice and peace had been conditioned by the antagonism of the two major power-blocks and its consequences for countries in the southern hemisphere.

Ecumenical organizations, especially the WCC and the Conference of European Churches had tried to maintain links with the churches in the countries under Communist rule. Their witness for peace under the threat of nuclear confrontation had finally borne fruit. The 1990 Paris Charter for a "new Europe" appeared to herald in a new world order of peace and justice and a process of genuine disarmament began to take shape.

But the transformations in Europe and in other parts of the world had come so suddenly that neither governments nor the churches were sufficiently prepared for the new situation. The countries and churches, liberated from oppressive ideological and political constraints, had to find a new identity. In many instances this led to sharp internal struggles, especially between those involved in or complicit with the former system and those who had struggled for liberty, justice and human rights.

Ecumenical organizations came under scrutiny as well in view of their relationships with representatives of the former system and their lack of effective support for the struggles of dissident movements. In some cases, "ecumenism" even became a term to be avoided. Internal tensions developed particularly in many of the Orthodox churches leading to the withdrawal of the Orthodox churches in Georgia and Bulgaria from membership in the WCC.

Soon after the fall of the Berlin Wall the second Gulf war in 1991, the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia as well the rapid progression of the process of globalization presented the ecumenical witness for justice and peace with unprecedented new challenges. The fragile order of the "cold war" years had been replaced by a new "world disorder".

In recognition of the important, and in some cases decisive ways in which the churches had contributed to the peaceful revolution in central and eastern Europe as well as to the ending of the apartheid regime in southern Africa, the ecumenical movement accepted the challenge to overcome violence as its special vocation. That the Decade to Overcome Violence should have been officially inaugurated in February 2001 in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin was therefore a symbolic tribute to the peaceful revolution that brought down the Berlin Wall.

* The Rev. Dr Konrad Raiser, a Lutheran theologian from Germany, is a former WCC general secretary (1993-2003). This contribution first appeared on oikoumene.org:

http://www.oikoumene.org/en/news/news-management/eng/a/article/1634/the-fall-of-the-berlin-wa.html

Where were you on 9 November, Frau Kässmann?

I was in Geneva where I was taking part in preparations for the World Council of Churches' World Convocation on Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation. I was overwhelmed with joy and though: what a miracle that this process has had such an effect. It was one of the reasons why the protests in the GDR remained peaceful. Three days later I returned to my country parish in Hessen where we we looking after people from the GDR, people who had escaped via Hungary and the Embassy in Prague who had been lodged in a vacation home nearby.

Bishop Margot Kässmann, newly elected chairperson of the council of the Evangelical Church in Germany

- From a questionnaire of public figures asking where they were when the wall was opened, published in the Rheinischer Merkur.

History from above

I have just finished listening to a BBC progamme How the Wall Fell, in which John Tusa brought together key protagonists of the moves towards the opening of the Berlin Wall and German unity for a reunion discussion about the decisions that led to the 9 November 1989 ... except that there was no one from the GDR there - US, Soviet, British and West German diplomats and politicians got in on the act, but the only person really to mention the role that the people of the GDR themselves had in the events was the British ambassador, who referred to the demonstration in Berlin on 7 October and who said the East German people had played an amazing role in ensuring that the events passed off peacefully (and also who noted that given the state violence in October it was by no means clear whether there would be a peaceful outcome to the events). No one, but no one from the GDR there - neither from the SED side (Schabowski comes to mind, though there are others) nor from the opposition - Markus Meckel who was a co founder of the Social Democratic Party in the GDR and then the foreign minister who was in the 2+4 talks from the GDR side. ... maybe it was just a "technical" problem in that their English wasn't good enough.

A people rise up, and are air brushed out of history ...

What does a world without walls look like?

That's the question posed by Rise&Fall, a mobile art installation and dance event commemorating the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall. The exhibition features modern digital artwork interpreting the theme 'bringing down walls/breaking down barriers' (both literally and symbolically) and music performed by Turkish-German DJ/Producer, DJ Ipek Ipekcioglu (www.djipek.com). Events take place from 4 November to 1 December in New York, Miami, Boston, Washington, DC and Los Angeles. There's still time until 30 September for artwork submissions. Art from 11 countries relating to the theme 'breaking down barriers' has already been submitted. Artists, from amateur to professional, are invited to submit digital versions of their art produced in a full range of mediums along with a short description of what 'bringing down walls' means to them - either as directly related to the Berlin Wall or on a more symbolic, personal, cultural or social level.

The picture here comes from the Rise&Fall Web site: http://www.rise-fall.com/news_post.php?id_art=54

A new Wall to mark 20 years since the opening of the Berlin Wall

The German Embassy in Washington has set up a special Facebook page to mark 1989:

The fall of the Berlin Wall 20 years ago marked the beginning of a new era in history. It was the end of the Cold War, the beginning of a fully united Europe and proof that peaceful change is possible, even in the moment when it seems most unlikely.

Among the usual Facebook type things it includes a discussion on the role of leaders in peaceful change, and a chronology on the Facebook "Wall" of the opening Berlin Wall in November 1989:
http://www.facebook.com/freedomwithoutwalls?v=wall

"My dear Christian friends in East Berlin"

These were the words spoken by the US civil rights activist Martin Luther King when he preached in the Marienkirche when he visited East Berlin in 1964, on one of the most tense days in the divided city since the building of the Wall in 1961. Chrismon, the German Protestant monthly magazine, has an article on its Web site about how King arrived in an American limousine without notice at Checkpoint Charley, and was eventually let in after half an hour by a stunned border guard after he was able to prove his identity with an American Express card (his passport was being held by the US authorities in West Berlin to prevent him crossing into the East) was back at the hotel, presumably). Shortly before King's visit to East Berlin, East German police had exchanged fire at the wall with the West Berlin police and US military as a heavily wounded 21 year old reached the West. King who was in West Berlin to address a commemoration ceremony for the John F Kenndy at the Waldbühne had hurred to the scene of the event.

In East Berlin King addressed a Marienkirche full to overflowing - the doors were closed 2 hours before the start of the service, news of which had spread only by word of mouth. The crowds who couldn't squeeze in were urged to go to the nearby Sophienkirche were a second service was arranged at short notice. Georg Meusel, a peace activist in GDR times who now coordinates the Martin-Luther-King Centre in Werdau, recalls in Freitag how King spoke of the civil rights movement in the United States, Gandhi's philosophy of non-violent resistance that inspired the US activists, "who would prefer to go to jail with dignity than live with humiliation and without equality". King ended his sermon with the words, "In this faith we can hew a stone of hope from the mountain of despair ... In this faith we will work together, pray together, stand up together for freedom in the certainty that we will be free at last". Meusel commented:

Although neither Martin Luther King nor his audience imagined the events in the GDR in 1989, a minority in the peace and civic rights groups and in the churches in the following years internalised the message of non-violent conflict resolution.

King's visit to East Berlin was on 13 September 1964. 25 years later, a group of civic rights activists in the GDR met to announce the formation of "Demokratie Jetzt", just one of the actions of non-violent resistance during autumn 1989. An event to mark this anniversary was held on 13 September 2009.

Michael Haspel, the director of the Evangelical Academy in Thüringen, has produced a study that compares the role of the Protestant churches in the GDR and the black churches in the US civil rights movement: Politischer Protestantismus und gesellschaftliche Transformation. This is a summary of an article by Haspel in the Forschungsjournal Neue Soziale Bewegungen:

The Protestant churches in the German Democratic Republic and the Black churches in the civil rights movement in the United States are two among very few examples for non-fundamentalist Protestant churches which were decisively involved in processes of social transformation. In both cases it was paramount that the churches were developed institutions with substantial resources at hand in order to play an important role in the respective social movements. In order to explain why the churches were willing to commit their resources for the sake of the social movements, in this analysis it is argued that a decisive development in the mode of theological reflection took place. In both cases theological contextualisation in the given situation was the presupposition for the involvement of the churches in the social movements.

(Photo: Chrismon)

The Berlin Wall

Today marks the 48th anniversary of the building of the Berlin Wall, and the almost-20th-anniversary of its opening during the GDR's autumn revolution. Marking the anniversary, the Links Verlag has produced a book about the victims who were killed trying to get over, under, or through the wall. As the book points out, some of the victims became known through the media. But even today the number, the identity and the fate of the victims is largely unknown. How many people actually lost their lives at the wall? How did they die? Where did they come from? How were their families or friends dealt with? This is a handbook setting out biographical details about the lives and deaths of the victims at the wall. The authors have systematically drawn up upon the relevant files and the Stasi archives and have also conducted interviews with family members and contemporary witnesses.