New bell for "international understanding" - the almost 500-year-old predecessor travels to Poland

Created: 05/12/2022, 12:02 p.m

By: Wolfgang Schörner

Together at the bell ceremony: (from left) Pastor Julian Lademann and Pastor Sandra Gassert from the Protestant Church, between whom the old bell stands, the Catholic pastor Bernhard Holz and Imam Benjamin Idriz.

© Wolfgang Schorner

The evangelical church in Penzberg has a new bell called "Völkerverständigung".

She was hoisted about 15 meters up into the church tower on Wednesday.

The almost 500-year-old predecessor bell called the "Lord's Prayer" can be brought back to Poland - once diplomats and lawyers have settled everything.

Penzberg – It was 12 p.m. when the small bell ceremony in front of the Evangelical Martin Luther Church began on Wednesday.

The group waited for the bell to ring from the nearby Catholic Christkönigskirche.

"They welcome the new bell," said Protestant pastor Julian Lademann.

The Catholic pastor Bernhard Holz and Imam Benjamin Idriz also came to the construction site for the ceremony.

The Our Father bell hung in the church for 70 years - it comes from Pomerania

The old bell rang for the Lord's Prayer in Penzberg for 70 years, said Pastor Lademann.

For the first time in 1952 at a confirmation ceremony.

The Penzberg Protestants had received the bell, which is said to date from 1563, as a replacement for a church bell that had been taken away to be melted down during the Second World War.

At that time, the people of Penzberg were allowed to fetch them from a “bell graveyard” in Hamburg.

According to Lademann, she originally came from a Protestant congregation in Pomerania, in present-day Poland, which had ceased to exist.

Today this once evangelical church is a catholic place of worship.

Their community now wants the old bell back.

Reclaim: Penzberger had to have a new bell cast

For the Penzbergers, this meant that they had to have a new bell cast - which happened last year.

On Wednesday, the time had come to lift the bronze specimen, which weighed around 160 kilograms, into the church tower by crane.

Stones had to be broken out in order to bring the lower, projecting part of the bell through the window openings.

A major intervention in the masonry was not necessary.

New bronze bell to call for peace and international understanding

Bells call people to prayer, said the Catholic pastor Holz at the ceremony.

They are the voice of God and would invite Christians, Muslims and people of other faiths to reflection and peace, added Imam Idriz.

The Protestant pastor Sandra Gassert expressed the wish that the new bell would “call people to peace and international understanding”.

Because its name should be "international understanding".

Lademann explained that this name had been chosen by the municipality a year ago.

The church already has a bell with the name "Peace".

Before we went upstairs, the pastor and the imam struck the first note with the clapper.

"It sounds nice," praised one listener.

Return to Poland - the matter is complicated

The old bell will remain in Penzberg for the time being.

The Protestant community in Penzberg has nothing to do with the trip to Poland.

That is now a matter for the Evangelical Church in Germany and the Foreign Ministry.

Pastor Lademann has noticed that the matter is complicated.

The Foreign Office has said that it is not so easy with Polish politics at the moment.

Above all, the legal side needs to be clarified.

Formally, the bell, which is now supposed to go to a Catholic community, belongs to the Protestant church because it was once a Protestant community in Pomerania.

The easiest way would be to give them as gifts, says Lademann – although the Penzbergers don't have a say in that.

He himself has no contact with the Polish community, but he knows where it is.

But he's not allowed to talk about it, says the pastor.

Renovation work in Martin Luther Church is still ongoing

Renovation work is currently underway at the Martin Luther Church.

The interior of the church should have been finished in May.

However, according to Lademann, static investigations of the ceiling took longer than expected.

Everything is fine with the ceiling statics.

However, the completion of the interior of the church was delayed.

In mid-July, he hopes, church services can be celebrated there again.

Until then, the Protestants move to the community center or the parish garden.

And for the upcoming twelve confirmation ceremonies, they are allowed to move to the Catholic Church in Steigenberg.