The Architecture of Faith under National Socialism: Lutheran Church Building(s) in Braunschweig, 1933–1945

2015 ◽  
Vol 66 (2) ◽  
pp. 340-371 ◽  
Author(s):  
FRIEDRICH WEBER ◽  
CHARLOTTE METHUEN
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Church Architecture ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Lutheran Church ◽  
Protestant Churches ◽  
Church Building ◽  
National Socialists ◽  
Building Community ◽  
The Church

It has frequently been assumed that church building ceased after the National Socialists came to power in Germany in 1933. This article shows that it continued, and considers the reasons why this was the case. Focussing on churches built in the Church of Braunschweig between 1933 and 1936, it explores the interactions between emergent priorities for church architecture and the rhetoric of National Socialist ideology, and traces their influence on the building of new Protestant churches in Braunschweig. It examines the way in which Braunschweig Cathedral was reordered in accordance with National Socialist interests, and the ambiguity which such a reordering implied for the on-going Christian life of the congregation. It concludes that church building was widely understood to be a part of the National Socialist programme for creating employment, but was also used to emphasise the continuing role of the Church in building community. However, there is still much work to be done to investigate the ways in which churches and congregations interacted with National Socialism in their day-to-day existence.

The National-Socialist Campaign Against Natural Law

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ernst Fraenkel
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Historical Significance ◽  
Christian Religion ◽  
National Socialists ◽  
Religious Elements

This chapter looks in detail at the rejection by the National-Socialists of Natural Law. The flat rejection of the rationalist traditions of Natural Law resulted in a conflict between National-Socialism and the advocates of Natural Law traditions. The chapter looks at the two opposing groups to try to fathom the historical significance of the National-Socialist attitudes toward Natural Law. In order to do this, it is stated, an examination of the role of religious elements in Natural Law is essential. However, it is argued, the religious elements are not the only consideration. While it is true that the Christian religion is both historically and doctrinally bound to Natural Law, rationalistic Natural Law is not necessarily dependent on the Christian notions with which it has often been associated. Both sides are discussed in detail.

Nazifying Christian Theology: Walter Grundmann and the Institute for the Study and Eradication of Jewish Influence on German Church Life

1994 ◽  
Vol 63 (4) ◽  
pp. 587-605 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susannah Heschel
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Protestant Church ◽  
The Third ◽  
Protestant Churches ◽  
Confessing Church ◽  
Church Life ◽  
The Church ◽  
Church Doctrine

The Third Reich's Kirchenkampf (church struggle) is sometimes mistakenly understood as referring to the Protestant churches' resistance to National Socialism. In fact, the term refers to an internal dispute between members of the Bekennende Kirche [Confessing Church (hereafter BK)] and members of the Deutsche Christen [German Christians (hereafter DC)] over control of the Protestant church. While not all members of the BK opposed Hitler's policies, the movement called for an autonomy of the church from National Socialist legal measures, particularly the racial laws, motivated both by theological and political considerations. The DC, by contrast, sought to introduce National Socialist policies and ideology into the church, especially Nazi racial laws, and modify church doctrine in accord with National Socialist ideology. Yet the antisemitism at the heart of the DC has been either ignored or marginalized by most historians. Indeed, some historians have incorrectly suggested that the DC underwent a dissolution at the end of 1933, from which it never recovered, or have presented the DC as a political creation of National Socialism, ignoring its theological roots.

Dimensions and Proportions in Egypt’s Byzantine Religious Architecture

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 35-57
Author(s):  
Ramez Boutros
Keyword(s):  
Church Architecture ◽  
Archaeological Material ◽  
Religious Architecture ◽  
Relative Chronology ◽  
Building Activity ◽  
Church Building ◽  
Byzantine Church ◽  
Materials Used ◽  
The Church ◽  
Written Sources

In the study of Egypt’s Byzantine religious architecture, modern scholarship has been focusing essentially on es- tablishing the typology of plans and their relative chronology. Church building activity has also been studied by using the written sources complimented by the archaeological evidence. is abundant Christian archaeological material shows an amazing variety and complexity in church designs. ere is a need of a rationalized analysis of the proportion ratios of the church buildings, and a necessity to focus on the dominant factors dictating its size, the type of its structure, and the quantities of materials used in its construction. e study of geometric shapes and the evolution of their sacred perceptions is yet another interesting facet of this type of architecture. e purpose of this paper is to explore new approaches in studying the proportion ratios and its correlation with the measuring units used in Byzantine church architecture and the existence of any symbolic concepts.

scholarly journals Space forming a community, community forming a space

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 26-51
Author(s):  
Zorán Vukoszávlyev
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Church Architecture ◽  
Spatial Form ◽  
Self Identity ◽  
Protestant Churches ◽  
Aesthetic Sense ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Church

The identity is expressed in a self-picture, which has visible and immaterial marks. The church architecture is the essential appearance form of this, because it represents not the individual but the community. It gives an account of the self-identity conscience of the church through the community. In this way, architecture gets a great task: physically visualising this immaterial identity. This picture is formed with respect to the technical and aesthetic knowledge.Does the basically recognizable protestant form exist? Are there ground-plans or spatial form elements, which are the obligate characteristics of these churches? Reflected well on the theological questions, we seek to detect what can determine the identity of the protestant churches in an aesthetic sense by a research highlighting the most important decesions on theological background and churches built in a term of a century.

Church Building and Architecture

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louis P. Nelson
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
British Empire ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Church Building ◽  
Long Eighteenth Century ◽  
The Church

Contrary to popular perceptions, the long eighteenth century was a period of significant church building and the architecture of the Church of England in this era played a critical role in religious vitality and theological formation. While certainly not to the expansive scale of Victorian church construction, the period was an era of significant building, in London, but also across the whole of the British Empire. Anglican churches in this era were marked not so much by stylistic questions as by programmatic concerns. The era produced the auditory church, designed to accommodate better the hearing of the sermon and the increasing importance of music in worship. There were also changes to communion practice that implicated the design of architecture. Finally, some few Anglicans considered the theological implications of historical inspiration but many more considered the role of sensibility and emotion in worship and in architecture as one of worship’s agents.

Building the Church and Missionizing in a ‘Religiously Indifferent’ Country: Korean Protestant Churches in Czechia

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 310-335
Author(s):  
Andrea Beláňová ◽  
Tomáš Havlíček ◽  
Kamila Klingorová ◽  
Zdeněk Vojtíšek
Keyword(s):  
Religious Faith ◽  
New Members ◽  
The Public ◽  
Protestant Churches ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
Main Barrier ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
Mixed Types ◽  
The Church

Czechia could be labeled as country of an indifferent approach to religious ideas, as religious faith is considered a private issue, and the role of religion in the public sphere is low. This article summarizes the first attempt to research Korean Protestant churches active in current Czechia. A total of fourteen churches is briefly overviewed stating that the churches are not successful in gaining new members throughout the Czech population. Also, a clear distinction cannot be drawn between diaspora and missionary churches, but rather mixed types can be observed. The findings show that the churches do not accommodate their mission strategies according to the religiously indifferent milieu in Czechia, mostly because the missionaries are not aware of this situation. Moreover, language is identified as the main barrier in communication. We conclude by stating that this topic is poorly understudied and difficult to follow due to its dynamic yet closed nature.

National Socialism and Fascism

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Irving Hexham
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Nazi Party ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Italian Fascism ◽  
Anti Semitism ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Press ◽  
Foreign Office ◽  
National Socialists ◽  
The 1950S

To appreciate that the various forms of fascism, particularly German National Socialism under Adolf Hitler’s Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP, National Socialist German Workers' Party commonly known as the Nazi Party; 1920–1945) and Italian Fascism under Benito Mussolini’s Partito Nazionale Fascista (PNF, National Fascist Party; 1922–1943), are embedded within modernism, one must first recognize that the reality and horror of the Holocaust has distorted our understanding of Nazism in three significant ways. First, until at least the early 1990s the crude anti-Semitism of National Socialists like Julius Streicher (1885–1946) and Johann van Leers (1902–1965) prevented scholars from taking seriously the notion that National Socialism is an ideology that intellectuals helped define. Secondly, because anti-Semitism did not obviously manifest itself among Italian modernists and fascists, it discouraged comparison. Thirdly, starting in the 1950s many surviving National Socialists, who were formerly passionate SS-intellectuals like Sigrid Hunke (1913–1999) (Poewe 2011) or like the head of the Press Division of Ribbentrop’s Foreign Office Paul Karl Schmidt (1911–1997) (Plöger 2009), among many others, reinvented themselves.

What the church betokeneth: Placing the people at the heart of sacred space

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Varnam
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Middle English ◽  
Sacred Space ◽  
Church Architecture ◽  
The People ◽  
Church Building ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church ◽  
Church Buildings

This chapter examines the debate over the relationship between the church building and its community in orthodox and Lollard texts. The chapter begins with the allegorical reading of church architecture in William of Durandus’s Rationale divinorum officiorum and the Middle English What the Church Betokeneth, in which every member of the community has a designated place in the church. The chapter then discusses Lollard attempts to divorce the building from the people by critiquing costly material churches and their decorations in The Lanterne of Liȝt, Lollard sermons, and Pierce the Ploughman’s Crede. The chapter concludes by examining Dives and Pauper in the context of fifteenth-century investment in the church, both financial and spiritual, and argues that in practice church buildings were at the devotional heart of their communities.

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