GERALDINE FAGAN
Editor’s note: 2020 marks 30 years since the reunification of Germany. Jubilant scenes at the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 usually illustrate that peaceful revolution, which precipitated the dissolution of the Communist G.D.R. (German Democratic Republic) in October 1990. Yet the key role played by East German Christians in these events—heralding the swift collapse of the entire Communist bloc—is often overlooked.
Largely for propaganda purposes, the G.D.R. authorities allowed churches exceptional latitude for grassroots community organization. Ironically, this gave rise to the many opposition initiatives—including prayer meetings and church rallies— that preceded the fall of the Berlin Wall. There was a dark side to this policy of lenience, however: East German churches were also surveilled to an exceptional degree by the G.D.R.’s Ministry for State Security, commonly known as the Stasi.
According to Berlin’s Stasi Museum, by 1989 the Ministry had more than 90,000 staff and a further 200,000 unofficial collaborators [German: Inoffizieller Mitarbeiter] among the general populace of some 17 million—a far greater reach than that of the K.G.B. in the Soviet Union. The Ministry’s Department XX/4 focused exclusively on infiltrating and undermining churches, particularly the majority Lutheran Church (see Elisabeth Braw, God’s Spies: The Stasi’s Cold War Espionage Campaign inside the Church, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2019).
Thirty years on—and despite massive Western investment and efforts towards institutional integration—levels of life satisfaction and optimism remain significantly lower in the former G.D.R. than in former West Germany (see John Gramlich, “How the attitudes of West and East Germans compare 30 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall,” Pew Research Center, 18 October 2019, www. pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/18/ how-the-attitudes-of-west-and-east-germanscompare-30-years-after-fall-of-berlin-wall/). Among concerning trends, a new and increasingly far-right political party, Alternative for Germany [German: Alternative für Deutschland], received roughly 20 percent of the vote in former East German regions in recent national and European elections—approximately double its support in former West Germany.
Despite massive parallel efforts to preserve and process Stasi records, the less visible legacy of spiritual damage wrought by the legitimized deception they document—including within churches and families—is still keenly felt. When it comes to former Stasi spies, justice has rarely been served, according to one Stasi Museum guide: “They disappeared into the land like rain.” In this and the next issue, the EastWest Church Report offers personal reflections on these matters from Christians in the former G.D.R.
