David Capes
Long before you were born, this was happening!
Jürgen Schulz
Yes! They decided at some point that it was time to hand it over to others, to find a different legal entity. Because the ministry was just too big for them to be responsible only by themselves. They didn’t have the manpower or the means to keep it in a good shape. And that’s the reason why they started the foundation Lebenszentrum Adelshofen. So the Foundation of the Life Center Adelshofen and this is our campus in Adelshofen. That’s where our seminary is located, on that campus.
David Capes
It’s a place for retreats too, as well. As I read, it was a place for people to come and experience retreats and prayer times and experience community.
Jürgen Schulz
Yes. We have a daily prayer rhythm, three prayer times a day. In that sense, the religious order has their own house where they live. Some of the brothers and sisters are now in retirement age, or at such an age that they are not as active as they have been. So, we have our own prayer rhythm on campus, and often the religious order comes alongside with us, but sometimes they can’t. And so. we live together there with all the good and the bad that comes with a life together. Our life together is shaped by the understanding of Bonhoeffer’s Life Together. Now we have to bring it into the new future and in a German context that is getting more and more secular.
David Capes
And what’s happening now in theological education, generally in Germany,
Benjamin Marx
It’s a worldwide phenomenon in theological education. Seminaries are closing. In Germany, in the Lutheran church or the Protestant state church, if you want to become a pastor, (we call it der Pfarrer), then you have to go through the university system in order to become a pastor in that church. But the theological faculties are closing down because there are no students coming in. Just as an example, take Heidelberg or Tubingen. They used to have hundreds of theology students in Tubingen. And now I think it was five new students in Heidelberg, and around sixteen16 in Tubingen. It’s not a lot.
David Capes
It’s hard to maintain a robust faculty with small numbers of students, and the government’s not going to say that we can continue funding this.
Jürgen Schulz
Yes. I think that’s what people need to know about the German context, that the financial support is coming from the governmental side. The main support of my financial income for the universities, for the theological faculties, is state funded. And at some point, and the debate is now really going on, at some point, the question that we all need to face in Germany is, when will those faculties close? And even private institutions are under a lot of pressure. Theological education in private institutions in Germany, private seminaries, is still something that is not traditionally known in Germany. It’s a 20th century more or less phenomenon.
David Capes
So most of these schools were started in the 20th century?
Benjamin Marx
Yes, in the 1950s and 60s.
Jürgen Schulz
Not all of them. There are a few that have been around longer, but the strongest ones were either started by missionaries or, like our school, it was started by German people. That’s an interesting tradition of our school, and you can sense and feel it in the way it is done and run. In some sense, we would like to have more international people on faculty, just to bring in a bit more of the international flavor to the church body of Christ.
David Capes
Are most of your students from Germany itself?
Jürgen Schulz
Most of them.
David Capes
So instruction, then, is in the German language. But if you have international people coming in, that would be a little bit of a challenge. They’d have to all first of learn German to be able to receive instruction.
Benjamin Marx
Yes, as of right now. But in our faculty, we do have three, or four people who speak English fluently as well. So, we could offer some courses in English. And right now, there is somebody from Africa, I will not mention the region, who contacted us and asked if he could study with us. The response was, yes you can, but you need to know German to do that. So, he’s now in Germany. He will spend one year in Germany to learn German to then study with us. So, this is fantastic.
David Capes
Yeah, that is terrific.
Jürgen Schulz
All those who study theology know that German is a very important language to know if you want to read all the books from the past. I’m just kidding a bit here!
David Capes
Well, no, seriously when I came through, I had to learn to read theological German, and a good bit of my work was involving things that had been written in German but not translated into English.
Jürgen Schulz
At some point, our German students are required to follow English classes as well, so you can’t study in Germany only knowing German. It’s normal to sit in English lecturers as well. That’s also a chance for people to visit. Adults often want to come in the summer. So, while you have your summer break from May to August, spend a few weeks with us. We have guest rooms. That way you can stay and travel through the south of Germany. We are thinking about setting up a study week or so, and that will be done in English for international guests, because we are fluent also to teach classes in English.
David Capes
You’ve got some great instructors. I can tell just by sitting across from you today. So, if people want to know about Adelshofen and its work. We have people listening to the podcast in Europe and in Germany and many other places. Let’s say they want to know about Adelshofen and its work, or they’d like to study at a place that takes spiritual life seriously and not just an academic head knowledge. Which they would find with you, I believe. How would they reach you?
Jürgen Schulz
They would definitely. I’m very much convinced that this is a unique place, especially in the German speaking world. And if you want to know more, go to our website, it’s tsadelshofen.de.
David Capes
We’ll put that in our show notes, so that people can just click on it and link to your site.
Jürgen Schulz
If you show up at our website, you will see that we do not have a fully English translation yet and it has to do a bit with our history. This website is fairly new, as we are basically renewing everything since the foundation was started. We have a long list of things that need to be refreshed. But if you use Google Translate for instance, you will get the gist of it. We will put all the main information about us together. We will put that up in the next few weeks so we will have a proper English site version.
David Capes
And you also have a 501c3 organization here in the United States to help raise funds, because there may be people here in the United States that would want to support you.
Jürgen Schulz
And we will also put the link for that on the website. The organization is called smgi. It’s cyrenima ministry group. It was started by an American missionary with a nice German name, Rob Kraus. Robert Kraus, who is a German heritage missionary. They are our partners. They have a nice financial stream, where you can send the money to Germany at a very low fee. And so we very much appreciate the Ministry of smgi. We are in need of support as all the Germany’s missionary or a mission context, and theological education has traditionally always been for free. That’s part of the German culture.
And so we are definitely highly depending on donations, and especially when you learn more about the history of Adelshofen. We are right now in a $20 million fundraising season for the next few years. We call it Adelshofen 2035, because there is so much work to do. After the foundation took over the responsibility, we created a plan. Just the other day, it was really raining into our building.
David Capes
Yes, it was crazy so you have to get the roof fixed!
Jürgen Schulz
Yes, and we need to build a new building, because our library books are getting moldy. We were at the point where the question was, do we close down, or do we continue? And the people, especially the brothers and sisters, they trusted God and prayed and said, we will bring people in, and we trust that this story, that was always called the Awakening, will continue. Let’s carry the fire of the awakening to the next generation. And we still believe that God has great plans for Adelshofen, and that in this pivotal time as theological education is changing in Europe, Germany, all over the world. But also in the German context, in this very significant way, this is a time where, if we pray, seek the wisdom of God and make wise decision, we can shape the future. For that, we are looking for partners. We are praying for people who will come alongside, and we will serve diligently, faithfully and give our best here.
David Capes
This is exciting. I look forward maybe one day to seeing your campus. We’re so grateful for you, traveling through and sitting down with us to talk a little bit about your work. It’s exciting. To hear what has happened in the past and think about what is going to happen in the future. Ben Marx, Jürgen Schulz, thanks for being with us today on “The Stone Chapel Podcast.”
Benjamin Marx and Jürgen Schulz
Thank you. Thank you very much.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
