Rome to beatify anti-Nazi priests, but not a Lutheran

Residents of the northern German city of Lübeck have long taken pride
in four native sons—three Catholic priests and a Lutheran pastor—who
were beheaded in quick succession on November 10, 1943, by the Nazi
regime.

The commingled blood of Catholic priests Johannes Prassek,
Hermann Lange and Eduard Müller and Luth­eran pastor Karl Friedrich
Stell­brink spawned an ecumenical cooperation between the city's
majority Luth­erans and minority Catholics that still lasts.

The
Vatican's decision to beatify the three priests on June 25—but not
Stellbrink—is testing that ecumenical spirit, and some religious leaders
worry that the event could drive a wedge between the two communities.

"People
worry that the priests who are beatified will be seen as higher than
Stellbrink, and that the focus will be on the three, not the four," said
Constanze Maase, pastor of Luther Church in Lü­beck. "We recognize that
beatification is an important part of the identity of the Catholic
Church. But there is a sadness, because it makes the ecumenical work
more complicated," he said.

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Prassek was a 30-year-old chaplain at
Lübeck's Sacred Heart Catholic Church when he met Stellbrink, a
47-year-old pastor at the nearby Luther Church, at a funeral in 1941.
They had a shared disapproval of the Nazi regime, and Prassek soon
introduced Stellbrink to his two Catholic colleagues, Lange and Müller.

The
four clergymen were active but discreet in their anti-Nazi activities,
speaking out against the Nazis and distributing pamphlets to close
friends and congregants.

That changed when the British Royal Air
Force bombed Lübeck on March 28, 1942. After Stellbrink spent the night
tending to the wounded, he went to his church to celebrate Palm
Sunday—and attributed the bombing to divine punishment.

Stellbrink
was arrested a few days later, followed soon after by the priests. All
four were sentenced to death. Rather than fear their executions, the
four were said to have died as happy martyrs, confident that they were
going to be with God. "Who can oppress one who dies," Prassek wrote in a
farewell letter to his family.

Many observers credit the four clergymen with spawning a German ecumenism that had been almost unheard of until then.

"They
didn't create a big movement, but they were very influential within
their churches, and they planted the seeds of ecumenical cooperation in
Germany," said Franz Mecklenfeld, a priest at Sacred Heart. The church
held its first memorial mass for the martyrs on November 10, 1945, and
included the Lutheran Stellbrink in its remembrances.

In postwar
Lübeck, Lutherans and Catholics jointly celebrated the men with memorial
masses and formed ecumenical discussion groups. The Luther Church
erected an exhibit to all four men in 1993. The Sacred Heart Church
commemorates all four in its crypt and is planning a larger exhibit
later this year.

But many Lutherans, including Stell­brink's last
surviving daughter, worry that putting the three priests on the path to
sainthood may relegate the Lutheran pastor to obscurity.

"Many
Christians, including me, are disappointed that the current pope seems
to be doing little for the ecumenical solidarity of churches, especially
regarding Lutherans," wrote retired Lutheran pastor Heinz Russmann in
an editorial published by a Lübeck news website.

"All four should be beatified," said Russmann, a veteran of the city's ecumenical dialogue. "When that doesn't go, then none!"

Among
the best-known Catholic critics of the beatification is Hans-Lothar
Fauth, a former Dominican monk who later opened a nightclub and became a
city politician. After he couldn't get the city and church groups to
pay for a memorial to all four martyrs at Lü­beck's 12th-century city
hall, he bankrolled one in 2004.

Mecklenfeld said concerns over
the beatification are not "unfounded," but said it need not derail
ecumenical relations. He noted that several Roman Catholic cardinals are
scheduled to at­tend a special Lutheran service planned to honor
Stellbrink the day before the June 25 beatification.

He added that
German-born Pope Benedict XVI contributed to the ecumenical spirit by
speaking of all four men together, rather than just three, when he
received Germany's new ambassador to the Holy See last Sep­tember.

Lutheran
leaders agreed that ecumenical relations could be maintained, but said
it would require extra effort. "We're celebrating this together," said
Maase.  —RNS