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Germany - (Europa)
(Druckversion)

Informationen über Germany

Hauptstadt
 Berlin
Fläche
 357021 Quadratkilometer
Einwohnerzahl
 82071000
Religionen
 Protestant 38%, Roman Catholic 34%, Muslim 1.7%, unaffiliated or other 26.3%
Christen (%)
 72.00
Protestanten (%)
 38.00
Reformierte (%)
 17.00

The evangelical churches in Germany have their origin in the Reformation of the 16th century. The main impulse came from Wittenberg. Most evangelical churches in Germany followed Martin Luther’s teaching. But other centers of the Reforma-tion — Zurich with Huldrych Zwingli, Geneva with John Calvin, and southern Germany, especially Strasbourg, with Martin Bucer — also had a lasting influence and led to the foundation of Reformed congr and denominations. In the course of later confessional conflicts the Ref churches became more and more minority churches. Only through the peace treaty of Westphalia (1648) were they legally recognized as a confessional group. Later, French-speaking refugees (Huguenots, Walloons) and Dutch immigrants founded new Reformed congr in several parts of Germany, especially in the north.
According to the generally accepted rule of that period, the territorial authority, the prince or the city magistrate, had the right to decide which faith the population had to follow. Though the political order has fundamentally changed in subsequent centuries, the system of territorial churches (Landeskirchen) continues to exist to this day. In the early 19th century, largely at the initiative of secular powers, Luth and Ref churches were brought together into united churches. After World War II the 24 evangelical Landeskirchen, while maintaining their internal autonomy, decided to establish the Evangelical Church of Germany (EKD), which allows them to act together and to represent common convictions in society and in the ecumenical movement.
The Ref churches constitute a minority within German Protestantism. Like all Reformed and Presb churches they have adopted a presbyterian-synodal church order. On the whole, the order of the Luth churches has developed in the same direction, but while for the Ref church order is the expression of their confession of faith and their particular understanding of the church, for the Luth churches the synodal order is understood more in the sense of parliamentarian representation within the church. The common confession of the Reformed in Germany is the Heidelberg Catechism. Today most Reformed Christians in Germany are part of one of the Landeskirchen. In some areas they maintain their separate confessional identity as Reformed congr, in other areas they are fully integrated into united churches. There are two autonomous Ref churches — the Church of Lippe and the Evangelical–Reformed Church of Bavaria and northwest Germany. In addition, there is a Reformed Free Church, as well as a number of free Reformed congr which form a federation of Ref churches.

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