Keeping Faith Alive in Communist East Germany: A Case Study in Practical Theological Education

Abstract The Protestants in Communist East Germany who strove to bring about the reform of the state were upheld by a theology that was rooted in Dietrich Bonhoeffer's vision of a "church for others" in the midst of the world. The intimate and dialectical interconnection they made between their faith and their practice in daily life gave them the courage to stand by the truth amidst the deceptions on which the "real existing socialism" of the regime rested. Believing that there is nowhere where the transforming love of God is not to be found and nurtured by theological education about and through practice, members of the church played a prophetic role that significantly helped to enable the growth of the protest movement of the 1980s.