Ideas, not failures: That is the motto of Pastor Josef Fegg from the Rottenbuch Parish Association.
And he has enough ideas to convey to his believers in the four parishes of Rottenbuch, Böbung, Wildsteig and Schönberg a little bit of normality in everyday church life, which is jumbled up due to the corona.
Rottenbuch
- Much to his regret, the traditional and popular children's Bible days, which for many years have always been held on the third fasting weekend from Friday to Sunday, were canceled last year.
“It was just then that the first lockdown began,” Pastor Fegg recalls.
Last year it was too short notice to offer any alternative action.
But this year, true to his motto, Fegg had a wonderful idea of how to offer children these popular Bible days in a different way: He put out children's Bible day bags in his four churches that could be taken home.
In normal times, the weekend of the children's Bible days is a thing that is well organized down to the last detail.
One of the four congregations always organizes the action.
During the three days, the children from the first to the sixth grade go through different stations on a specific topic offered by the pastor.
There will be handicrafts, singing, sporting activities and a lot of talking, and in this intensive course the children will learn together about a biblical topic in a playful way.
Over 50 helpers are on duty every time - it is a special weekend for the entire community.
The end is always a joint service “That is the highlight.
There is a lot of singing and laughing, ”says Pastor Fegg.
The pastor was very preoccupied with not being able to do all that this year either.
He still wanted to teach the children about the Children's Bible Days this year.
And he had the idea to equip bags with material for the children so that they could deal with this year's motto "Angels, the messengers of God" with the family.
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The angels made by the children as part of the children's Bible days hung on a red string.
through the church.
© Wahl-Geiger
The bags contained, among other things, a letter on the subject, handicraft instructions for an angel, a baking recipe for angel muffins, many questions and stories about angels, a sheet to color in, the song “Where people forget each other, heaven touches and earth ”from the praise of God, a text“ Jacob looks up the ladder to heaven ”and other beautiful things.
In order to cope with this enormous amount of work, members of the youth center under the direction of Maria Stanek in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, with whom Fegg is in constant contact, helped.
"The response to the bags was enormous," says Fegg happily.
Only a few of the 200 packed bags were still on display in the church.
He estimates that at least 160 children took part in his special children's Bible day.
And also the traditional closing service of the children's Bible days was well attended in compliance with the applicable hygiene regulations in the Rottenbuch church.
Fegg also had nice ideas for its design: the children's angels they had made themselves hung on a long string in the church.
There was a wooden treasure chest in front of the altar.
The children were then allowed to place their prepared prayers and wishes in it, which were "given to God in the Easter fire" during Easter vigil, as Pastor Fegg told the children.
REGINA WAHL-GEIGER
