Weimar

September 8

On Sat morning I said goodbye to Berlin, Mark and Andrew and headed west. First stop Weimar. Goethe and Schiller’s city though Bach, Mozart and Luther spent some time here too it turns out. What a beautiful town. I walked down in to town from the train station, a comfortable enough little hike and found a hotel to stay at. I decided to stay at a nice, little hotel to pamper myself. It was right in the middle of town, the Hotel Anna Amalia. It was perfect. After getting settled there, I started exploring the town, walking around, figuring things out, looking, discovering. There was a big event happening at the theater at the marketplace, an open house type thing so there was a bit of action going on there. When it started raining I went to a café restaurant and had some lunch. I found Goethe’s house and had a tour and just really took in a bit of the atmosphere of the town. In the evening I went to a literary/musical evening. It was in a room of one of the palaces, also at the marketplace. Three artists read Goethe poetry and played music to go along; 2 violins and a harpsichord. They weren’t the best ever musicians and the woman reading the poetry was sometimes difficult to follow but it was a lovely atmosphere and seemed an appropriate thing to do in Weimar. After the little concert I thought it would be nice to have dinner somewhere. There seemed to be some nice restaurants in the area that all advertised some sort of dish with Pfifferlinge (type of mushroom) which was very appealing to me. But after having walked in to a few I noticed they were all full, with groups of friends or couples and romanticly lit tables and I felt kind of self-conscious and silly somehow going in there on my own. Plus they were really all full. So I got a Thüringer bratwurst on a bun at the marketplace where the party was happening and happily went upon my way. Getting back to my hotel room I had a lovely shower, read my book and slept well.

In the morning I decided to go to church at the Jakobskirche, partly because I’d missed the earlier service at the Stadtkirche. And I’m glad that I did. There was a nice atmosphere at the Jakobskirche, a small congregation but some young people, (as in 20’s, 30’s maybe) and they were friendly. There were two things in the service that spoke to me particularly. Well three. First we sang “Lobe den Herren”, which was just cool. Then I was taken by the creed. Instead of saying the Apostle’s creed we sang a Credo that I really liked. I copied it down.

Ich glaube: Gott ist Herr der Welt,
der Leben gibt und Treue halt.
Er fügt das All und bringt die Zeit,
mein Vater in der Ewigkeit.

Ich glaube: Gott erwählte Christ
den Sohn der unser Bruder ist;
weil seine Liebe allen gilt,
hat er sein Werk am Kreuz erfüllt.

Ich glaube: Gottes Schöpfermacht
hat uns den Ostersieg gebracht,
denn alles was mein Glaube sieht,
spricht seine Sprache, singt sein Lied.

Ich glaube: Gott will Menschen sehen,
die ganz auf seiner Seite stehn.
Sein Abendmahl in Brot und Wein,
lädt alle Welt zur Hoffnung ein.

Ich glaube: meine Taufe weist
auf Gottes Wirken durch den Geist.
Ich seh im Spiegel seiner Schrift
Die Wahrheit, die mein Leben trifft.

Wir glauben: Gott setzt Zeichen ein
und läßt uns die Gemeinde sein,
die bis zum Ende Treue halt,
zum Leben für die ganze Welt.

And at the end of the service, the minister in his blessing, spoke of God as being like father and mother. That openness to the possibility that God is greater than we have been able to or can understand, impressed me in this little church in this town in Germany. It moved me forward then to write the letter to St George’s that I’d been meaning to write since I’d missed the last bible study class in June. It was raining again. Went to a café, had a latté and a yummy piece of cake, pulled out my laptop and wrote it all down. I realized after I’d almost finished that I’d written it all in German! It seemed natural to do so. And then I translated it in
to English.