Project Details
Projekt
"Tobei - God sees your piggish!" Being Catholic in West Berlin between construction and fall of the Berlin Wall on the example of the parish of St. Matthias (Schoeneberg)
Applicant
Professor Dr. Thomas Brechenmacher
Subject Area
Roman Catholic Theology
Term
from 2020 to 2024
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 410907407
Using the large parish of St. Matthias (Berlin-Schöneberg) as an example, the subproject investigates how "being Catholic" in West Berlin developed between the construction and the fall of the Berlin Wall (1960-1990) in the area of conflict between politics, social and religious transformation. The social structure and everyday culture of a metropolitan church are analyzed in the interdependencies of their actors (bishops/clergy, believers, age- and function-specific groups) and related to the interpreted experiences of the "modern" and "divided" metropolis.Its special structure and history of development makes the parish of St. Matthias the object of investigation. Fundamental transformations of experiences of Catholics in West Berlin and its metropolitan "Diaspora" can be shown here, which stand for the diversity of Catholicism since the 1970s. The analysis is based on the criteria "semantics", "practices", "emotions", which allow to grasp the everyday experiences of believers. Thus, in addition to quantitative findings, such as the increase and decrease in church life participation, qualitative observations are made of how this and other processes were semantically perceived ("secularization"), and what practical and emotion-driven responses they triggered. The subproject investigates such a change of "being Catholic" on two interacting levels: an internal, parochial perspective and an external impact or interaction in larger (also non-church) contexts. What is needed is the conflicts, opposites and upheavals that took place on both levels and were reflected in semantics, practices and emotions. In addition, similarities and peculiarities of change become visible by comparing the situation in St. Matthias with the developments of other parishes in Berlin and within the diocese, and evaluating their significance for the "Being Catholic" to be explored in the joint project on the Federal Republic.The subproject can build on an exceptionally good source situation: the archive of St. Matthias, which has been passed on for 150 years due to a special juridical situation of the parish and without losses within the parish itself. No West Berlin Catholic parish has a comparable complete surviving archive.The research so far has not yet addressed the subject of being Catholic in West Berlin by reviewing traditional paradigms („the end of the milieu“), applying cultural-scientific approaches and methods, and with the overarching goal of redefining religious history as contemporary history. As a part of the overall research group proposal "Being Catholic in the Federal Republic of Germany, 1965-1989/90", the project enters new ground conceptually and methodically.
DFG Programme
Research Units
