10th Anniversary of Mission EineWelt
2017 is not only the year when the reformation anniversary takes place but Mission EineWelt will celebrate its own anniversary this year! The centre has now existed for 10 years in its current organizational form.
Foundation of the Center
On January 1, 2007, Mission EineWelt was founded in Neuendettelsau as a centre to foster partnership, development and mission of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Bavaria and to include the three former divisions, namely the church development service, presently known as department of development and politics, the Commissioner for Latin America, presently known as Latin America department and Missionswerk Bayern, the name of the preceding institution, currently known as under department for partnership and parish, intercultural mission and departments for other countries.
“Wir erklären Mission EineWelt” –
video about the centre (in german)
Close-Down of the “Missions- und Diasporaseminar”, the missionary and diaspora training seminar
In 1985, the missionary and diaspora training seminar at Neuendettelsau was closed down. Until then, nearly 900 missionaries and pastors had been trained in this place to work later on in North America, Eastern Europe, in Australia and New Guinea, in Brazil and East Africa and in Bavarian parishes, too.
House of the mission institution in Neuendettelsau
Foundation of “Bayerisches Missionswerk”, formerly known as Bavarian mission institution
The decision of the Bavarian synod dating back to 1971 was the basis for the foundation of the Mission Institution of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Bavaria. The tasks of the “Gesellschaft für Innere und Äußere Mission” (Society for Inner and Outer Mission) in New Guinea and the tasks of the ”Leipziger Mission” (Leipzig Missionary Society) in Tanzania were also integrated into this new institution.
The work relating to Brazil was transferred to the “Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Diasporadienste (AGDD)”, the work group for diaspora community services with its German abbreviation AGDD. The positions of the “Commissioner for Latin America” and of the “Managing Director of AGDD” had been vested in one and the same person until 1986 when the Commissioner for Latin America was assigned to the Bavarian Lutheran Church Office in Munich. With the foundation of our current Mission EineWelt center (2007), the department returned to Neuendettelsau.
Entrance “Bayerisches Missionswerk”
Foundation of the “Missions- und Diasporaseminar”, the missionary and diaspora training seminar
The mission institution was renamed and called henceforth “Missions- und Diasporaseminar”, specializing in the theological training of missionaries to work in New Guinea and later on also in Tanzania and for a pastor’s work in Brazil.
House- and live regulations of the mission institution Neuendettelsau
Training of “Pastors to work in Brazil“
In the mission institution of Neuendettelsau, pastors to work in Brazil were also trained to be assigned to Brazil later on by the Martin-Luther-Verein in Bayern, the so-called Martin Luther association in Bavaria. The roots of this work date back to pastor Otto Kuhr’s assignment in 1897.
Otto Kuhr with his family
Missionary Work in New Guinea
Already in 1852, the first missionaries were sent to Eastern Europe. As of 1875, they were also assigned to emigrant parishes in Australia where they assumed Evangelical and diaconic social and welfare tasks.
In New Guinea, formerly called Kaiser-Wilhelms-Land in German, missionary work started in 1886 with Johann Flierl. Johann Flierl sen. founded the first mission station in Simbang, German New Guinea. Tobias Kaboing and Silas Kamungsanga were the first natives to be baptized in 1899.
Johann Flierl with a group of local people in New Guinea
Foundation of the Missionary Institution
After having founded an institution to prepare for missionary work in 1846 in Nuremberg encouraged by Löhe, it was Friedrich Bauer’s concern (1812 – 1874) that the home of this training facility was to be located at Neuendettelsau. He bought an inn situated in the main road and converted it into a missionary facility.
The contemporaries of founding father Friedrich Bauer confirm that “he had a matter-of-factly nature and was of a modest appearance.”
Foundation of the “Gesellschaft für Innere Mission”, known as Society for Inner Mission
In 1849, Wilhelm Löhe called the “Society for Inner Mission” into life both as a missionary organization and a confessional movement. It was the ancestor of today’s “Gesellschaft für Innere und Äußere Mission im Sinne der lutherischen Kirche”, the Society for Inner and Outer Mission in the sense of the Lutheran Church.
It was Löhe’s intention not only to pastorally attend to the Evangelical fellow believers who emigrated to North America by means of this training facility for preachers but also to foster the building of Lutheran parishes.
Wilhelm Löhe
Beginning at Neuendettelsau
The roots of Mission EineWelt date back in history to the middle of the 19th century. At that time, Wilhelm Löhe (1808-1872) lived and worked as a pastor in this small place in Middle Franconia. He was the one who sent out the first “Emergency Helpers” Adam Ernst and Georg Burger to the USA.
Further assignments took place to Eastern Europe as of 1852 and to Australia as of 1860.
„Mission is nothing more than a church of God in motion“
