Margot Käßmann

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Margot Käßmann
Käßmann preaching in Strasbourg, France, October 2015
Born
Margot Schulze

(1958-06-03) 3 June 1958 (age 65)
Education
Spouse
Eckhard Käßmann
(m. 1981; div. 2007)
Children4

Margot Käßmann (German:

Lutheran theologian, who was Landesbischöfin (bishop) of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Hanover in Germany. On 28 October 2009, she was also elected to lead the Protestant Church in Germany, a federation of Protestant church bodies in Germany.[a] She stepped down from both offices on 24 February 2010 following a drink-driving incident.[1][2][3] After serving as a "Reformation Ambassador" for the 500th anniversary of the Reformation
, she retired in 2018.

Biography

Käßmann was born Margot Schulze in

ASSIST
.

She participated as a youth delegate in the 1983 plenary assembly of the World Council of Churches (WCC) in Vancouver, where she became the youngest member of the central committee. Between 1991 and 1998, she was a member of the executive committee of the WCC.

After her ministerial ordination in 1985, she became the village pastor of Frielendorf-Spieskappel in the Schwalm-Eder-Kreis, together with her husband, from whom she was divorced in 2007.

Käßmann earned her Ph.D. under

Deutscher Evangelischer Kirchentag (German Protestant Church Congress). In 1999, she was elected bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Hanover; she was the first woman to hold this office. In 2006 she underwent a breast cancer
operation.

In 2002 she resigned from the WCC Central Committee after the results of a Special Commission on the participation of Orthodox churches in the WCC recommended that the term "ecumenical worship" be dropped, and that there be much clearer guidelines about what was termed "interconfessional common prayer".[4] She is currently a member of the central committee of the Conference of European Churches.

Margot Käßmann currently sits on the Advisor Board for the German Foundation for World Population.[needs update] In addition, she was involved as an ambassador for the 2006 FIFA World Cup for people with mental handicaps, held in Germany.

Käßmann is vocal in her objections to the political

far right. She argued for a ban on the National Democratic Party of Germany
claiming that the church ought not to "avert its eyes" as it had in 1933. She asked: "How can we tell young people that they should not support this party if it is officially permitted?"

In January 2009, Käßmann expressed the opinion that it might be better to tear down former and unused churches than to allow them to be used for purposes that could damage their image. As examples of such purposes, she mentioned conversion into restaurants, discothèques, or mosques. A reassignment to a synagogue, however, she found positive. After protests from Muslims, she slightly qualified her statement, saying: "If a Christian congregation is convinced that the use as a mosque can happen in deepest peace, I concur, but at the moment I do not see that possibility."[5]

In May 2010, Käßmann was a keynote speaker at the 2nd Ecumenical Kirchentag (German Evangelical Lutheran Church and Roman Catholic Church Congress) in Munich, Bavaria, where she also led the night prayer at Marienplatz on the final evening of the event.[6] She taught at Emory University from August – December 2010.[7] As of 1 January 2011, she was a guest professor at the Ruhr University Bochum where she had earned her PhD in 1989.[8]

Käßmann has supported, over the years, the Freya von Moltke Foundation in many ways. In 2011 she conducted a speech for Freya von Moltke's 100 birthday celebration in Cologne.[9]

She is a pacifist and believes there can be no

just wars.[10]

Family

Käßmann has four daughters. She was the first German bishop to file for divorce, in 2007, and on 6 August 2007 it was communicated to the church senate that her divorce was legally valid.[11] The church senate and the leadership of the Church of Hanover supported Käßmann and endorsed her continued tenure of the bishop's office, as did the leader of a conservative center.[12]

Chair of the Council of the Protestant Church in Germany

She was a member of the Council of the Protestant Church in Germany, and on 28 October 2009 she was elected Chair of the Council, the first woman in that position. She received 132 of the 142 votes cast, and said she wanted the church to be more contemporary and hoped to attract more people to it.[13]

Her election provoked negative reactions from the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church which declared that it was ready to suspend its dialogue with German Lutherans because of Käßmann's non-traditional views and her unusual status as a female Protestant bishop.[14]

On 20 February 2010, Käßmann was pulled over for driving through a red traffic light in Hanover. A blood test measured her

blood alcohol level at 1.54 per mille (1.54 g/L or 0.154%),[15] above the legal limit of 0.5 per mille (0.5 g/L or 0.05%).[16] Her license was confiscated immediately. Despite receiving a vote of confidence from the council of the Protestant Church in Germany, she stepped down from her office as leader of the Evangelical Church and as bishop on 24 February 2010.[17][18] The following month, Käßmann accepted a sentence comprising a fine of €8000 and withdrawal of her driver's license for a minimum of 10 months.[19]

Käßmann caused widespread comment and controversy in 2017 when she criticized right-wing political party AfD policy, saying at a Bible workshop during the Evangelical Church Convention:[20]

No longer a question, now it is clear. Women should have children if they are 'bio-German'. This is a new right-wing definition of native in accordance with the so-called little Aryan paragraph of the National Socialists: two German parents, four German grandparents. That's when you know from where the brown wind is really blowing.

Honours

  • 2001: Käßmann received the preaching prize (Predigtpreis) for exemplary achievements in the area of the proclamation of the Gospel.
  • 2002: She received an honorary doctorate from the faculty of
    Hannover University
    .

Russia's war against Ukraine

After the start of the

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Käßmann repeatedly criticized the delivery of weapons to Ukraine, calling for a diplomatic solution to the conflict instead.[21][22] In February 2023, Käßmann was one of the initial signers of Manifest für Frieden, a petition calling for an end to military support to Ukraine.[23]

Published works

Notes

  1. ^ In the German context, "Evangelical" corresponds roughly to "mainline Protestant" rather than to "Evangelicalism" as understood in English-speaking countries.

References

  1. The Huffington Post
    . Retrieved 25 February 2010.
  2. ^ Boyes, Roger (25 February 2010). "Head of German Protestant Church, Margot Kässmann, quits after drink-drive case – Times Online". The Times. London. Retrieved 25 February 2010.
  3. ^ "German drink-driving bishop quits". BBC News. 24 February 2010. Retrieved 25 February 2010.
  4. ^ Ecumenical News International, 4 September 2002, ENI Bulletin 16, 11 September 2002
  5. ^ Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung, 22 January 2009. Muslime verärgert über Bischöfin Margot Käßmann Archived 5 January 2010 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 14 January 2010.
  6. ^ "evangelisch.de - Mehr als du glaubst!". www.evangelisch.de. Retrieved 14 March 2022.
  7. ^ "Ex-Bischöfin als Dozentin: Käßmann nimmt Auszeit an US-Uni". Der Spiegel. 23 April 2010. Retrieved 14 March 2022 – via www.spiegel.de.
  8. ^ "Nachrichten aus Niedersachsen". www.ndr.de. Archived from the original on 29 November 2010. Retrieved 14 March 2022.
  9. ^ "Freya :: Schirmherr und Gremien / Kuratorium - Kuratorium". Archived from the original on 7 October 2014. Retrieved 5 October 2014.
  10. ^ "How Pacifism Became a German Lifestyle | RealClearWorld". 20 June 2014.
  11. ^ "Bischöfin Käßmann erläutert Pastoren ihre Scheidung – Ehemann wird nicht von seiner Kasseler Stelle versetzt". Archived from the original on 23 March 2009. Retrieved 14 March 2022.
  12. ^ epd: Konservatives Zentrum unterstützt Bischöfin Käßmann Archived 19 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  13. ^ "German Protestant Church elects first woman as its leader". Deutsche Welle. 28 October 2009. Retrieved 29 October 2009.
  14. ^ "Russian Church is probable to suspend its dialogue with German Lutherans". 12 November 2009. Retrieved 24 February 2010.
  15. ^ Langer, Annette; Utler, Simone (23 February 2010). "Bischöfin Käßmann droht hohe Geldstrafe" [Bishop Käßmann faces heavy fine]. Spiegel (in German). Retrieved 18 April 2024.
  16. ^ Bronst, Sebastian (23 February 2010). "Bischöfin Käßmann nach Alkoholfahrt unter Druck" [Bishop Käßmann under pressure after drunk driving]. Welt (in German). Retrieved 18 April 2024. Das Ergebnis: 1,54 Promille Alkohol, zulässig sind höchstens 0,5 Promille.
  17. ^ "Top bishop resigns over driving drunk". Deutsche Welle. 24 February 2010. Retrieved 24 February 2010.
  18. ^ Moulson, Geir (24 February 2010). "German Protestant leader quits after DUI incident". Yahoo! News. Associated Press. Archived from the original on 27 February 2010. Retrieved 24 February 2010.
  19. ^ DPA (25 March 2010). "Käßmann akzeptiert Strafbefehl" [Käßmann accepts sentence]. Stern (in German). Retrieved 18 April 2024.
  20. ^ Breyton, Ricarda (29 May 2017). "'Fast schon krank' – AfD geißelt Käßmanns Nazi-Vergleich". Welt. Retrieved 19 April 2024. Keine Frage mehr, jetzt ist es klar. Frauen sollen Kinder bekommen, wenn sie 'biodeutsch' sind. Das ist eine neue rechte Definition von einheimisch gemäß dem sogenannten kleinen Arierparagrafen der Nationalsozialisten: zwei deutsche Eltern, vier deutsche Großeltern. Da weiß man, woher der braune Wind wirklich weht.
  21. ^ Sandra Schulz (24 March 2022). "Theologin Käßmann: Es braucht mehr Druck für eine diplomatische Lösung". deutschlandfunk.de. Retrieved 3 December 2022.
  22. ^ Andreas Öhler (24 September 2022). "Margot Käßmann: "Liebet eure Feinde – das gilt doch auch im Krieg"". zeit.de. Retrieved 3 December 2022.
  23. ^ Change.org: Manifest für Frieden

External links

Titles in Lutheranism
Preceded by Landesbischof of Hanover
1999–2010
Succeeded by