As of: January 23, 2024, 8:00 a.m
By: Andrea Beschorner
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Ecumenism is alive: The Korbinian Year 2024 was unofficially opened, so to speak, at the first ecumenical New Year's reception.
© Lehmann
Strictly speaking, the Korbinian year opened on Friday.
Not officially, without any fuss - and in the Protestant church, where the Catholic auxiliary bishop got in the mood for the special year.
Freising
- If the spirit of Saint Korbinian had been there on Friday when the Catholic and Protestant Churches once again shook hands in Freising and asked for the first ecumenical New Year's reception in Freising's history, he would certainly have been very happy with it.
And so the service in the Protestant Church of the Ascension of Christ, during which Auxiliary Bishop Wolfgang Bischof addressed the believers to talk about Saint Korbinian, was somehow the special start to a special year of celebration, the Korbinian Year.
And the service showed another special side in that it repeatedly conveyed socio-political messages - sometimes very clearly and sometimes between the lines.
“If we accept ideologies that deny the humanity of others, then we are betraying the word of the Lord,” said Dean Christian Weigl.
Pastor Heiko Blank took up the topic of ecumenism: “Today we want to give space for discussions and are gathered to pray for visible unity.” Because, as Pastor Daniel Reichel put it, “without each other, without love, we cannot move forward “.
And he assured one thing: “Ecumenism will not lead to the loss of denominational identity.” Rather, both sides would benefit from each other’s traditions.
Wolfgang Bischof looked back 1,300 years.
© Lehmann
Auxiliary Bishop Wolfgang Bischof then took the faithful on a journey 1,300 years into the past.
He was asked to “say something about Saint Corbinian.”
Telling the people of Freising something about Korbinian in Freising “is like carrying owls to Athens,” emphasized Bishop.
And so he did not so much undertake a journey into the life of the saint, but rather based his words on the celebrations of past centuries on this occasion.
The fact that such anniversaries are celebrated in the church at all is “thanks to our Protestant sisters and brothers, you started it,” said Bishop with a wink.
“We don't even know whether the year we are celebrating now is correct, 724 is arbitrarily set.
In 1724, the then Prince-Bishop Johann Franz Eckher of Kapfing and Liechteneck decided to proclaim the year in which he celebrated his 50th anniversary as a priest as the Korbinian Year.
At the center of the celebrations: the prince-bishop himself. The auxiliary bishop said: “I don’t know if we would want to celebrate like that today.”
Everything was different at the celebrations 100 years later: in 1824, secularization had taken full effect.
Another 100 years later, the festival was influenced by the Hitler Putsch and the political currents of that time.
And 2024?
“I hope that it will be an anniversary in which we will once again become aware that we are on the journey together as Christians.
I hope that we will be courageous to raise our voices where it is necessary so that developments in society do not become more and more extreme." Bishop's appeal: "Let us be messengers of hope - then we are close what Korbinian did back then.”
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And then we experienced something special again: There was thunderous applause for the auxiliary bishop's words before we moved to the parish hall to celebrate the unity of Christians in a very practical way during discussions.