Herbert Walter: Someone with a lot of heart and sometimes hard edges

Created: 11/24/2022, 9:47 p.m

By: Joerg Domke

A personal highlight: Herbert Walter (right) with Cardinal Marx at the dedication of the new altar in St. Margaret © J.Dziemballa

Herbert Walter (63) has been the pastor of St. Margaret in Markt Schwaben for almost 25 years to the day.

There will be a reception on Saturday.

A review that is sometimes also suitable as a laudatory speech.

Markt Schwaben – Just recently, Herbert Walter, officially on his first day on vacation, quickly welcomed around 40 seniors from the Catholic parish of St. Margaret in the newly renovated parish hall for a cozy afternoon.

Later, he said, he had to go to the kindergarten for St. Martin's.

And it's not until the next morning that things really get going: Jordan as the destination.

A slight murmur ran through the auditorium... Jordan.

That's not exactly a holiday destination from the catalog for normal Otto travelers.

For the Swabian chaplain, such tours, better known as educational trips, are more of a hobby.

As does gardening.

If you looked for the pastor, as some still call him, on Mondays, on his only official day off, you would find him 99.9 percent of the time in the parish garden on Webergasse.

Somewhere near the vegetables maybe.

Maybe also between the chard, which he sometimes brought to the local Italian for professional processing, or his lovingly tended flowers.

A great hobby.

educational trips

Yes, gardening: The 63-year-old has often been in the headlines of this newspaper.

Even when he once succeeded in breeding his own fuchsia, which one could safely call Herbertinus Walterinensis, if one does not take the Latin so precisely and has a portion of humor/irony.

At least here it becomes obvious that Herbert Walter, born in 1959 in Pürten/Waldkraiburg as one of eleven children of his parents, first completed an apprenticeship as a gardener after secondary school.

And only afterwards felt that there could be more to the complete fulfillment of a life;

Of his life.

Expressed in a nutshell, this means: late vocation seminar in Waldram, priestly ordination in 1988 in Freising, first communion on July 2, 1988 in Waldkraiburg, then chaplain in Lenggries, later youth pastor in the district of Traunstein and, since November 30, 1997, pastor of St. Margaret in Markt Schwaben .

If you do a quick calculation now, you'll get it straight away: Yes, that's exactly 25 years.

Officially, this isn't something that needs to be particularly celebrated.

Certainly not to be compared with a silver priestly jubilee, as the chairwoman of the parish council, Stefanie von Usslar, never tires of emphasizing.

But with a view to 25 years of pastoral service in a parish, did you want to go back to business as usual?

A second passion: the garden

No: That's why on Saturday, November 26th, after the evening service in St. Margaret, under the direction of Herbert Walter (he's back safely from Jordan and then formally on duty again) there will be a relaxed standing reception from around 7:15 p.m in the parish hall for all who want to be there.

In any case, it can be assumed that one or the other will attend the appointment.

And also intends to present whether Herbert Walter likes so much limelight or not.

There may not be a thunderstorm of praise and recognition for 25 years of Markt Schwaben, but nowadays you have to earn even a light rain of laudators.

In any case, Pastor Walter deserved it.

But where do you start now?

Maybe regularly in the morning, no almost every day, in a café near the parish center?

What if he, Pastor, stops by for a quarter of an hour right after church and listens to the regular audience or tells the story himself?

You could perhaps call something like this a testimony of lived, honest closeness.

As approachable as Walter's funeral speeches.

The fact that he always succeeds in finding often very personal and at the same time honest, emphatic words for the deceased has impressed many in the market community.

Just like his conversations as a pastor, which members of the community who know Herbert Walter particularly well and are a little closer to him like to describe as conversations with depth.

Someone who doesn't shy away from conflict when it comes to the matter at hand

What the jubilee is repeatedly attested to: relatively modern theological points of view, team spirit, transparency.

And perseverance.

In 1997, Herbert Walter did not choose to become a construction expert as a part-time job during his quarter of a century in the market town.

Today the parish has a renovated church, a modernized rectory and a repaired organ.

And that's also Walter's merit.

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But it is also true that Herbert Walter was not and is not someone who avoids conflicts when it comes to the matter at hand.

He had repeatedly shown a clear edge even to the local political leadership.

Example: When it came to the small Maria-Hilf chapel, which at times threatened to go under in the middle of the large construction site for the new school.

Herbert Walter in front of an urn wall in the Swabian cemetery.

© Johannes Dziemballa

Or when a kindergarten management once believed that the actual act of church consecration was not really wanted at an inauguration ceremony.

Herbert Walter, representing the Catholic side, sometimes stayed away.

On the other hand: people who treat him, Walter, openly and positively, who do dedicated and good work for the community and who live honesty and sincerity - Herbert Walter seems to "reward" them with an equally honest, friendly bond.

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