The French Friedrichstadtkirche, site of a heated debate on November 9, 1989
Photo: Imago/EPD/Rolf Zoellner
History can be quite cynical. There are a few hundred people arguing heatedly about how a country can reform, how socialism can be made more humane, more democratic and friendlier, while at the same time about a kilometer away as the crow flies a man quite inexperiencedly stutters a sentence that suddenly makes everything obsolete. As a result, it not only magically wiped out an entire country, but also turns the world upside down.
On November 9, 1989, members of the SED and the so-called block parties met with representatives of opposition groups and churches in the French Friedrichstadtkirche on today’s Gendarmenmarkt in Berlin to discuss a different GDR. This meeting came about largely at the initiative of consistory president Manfred Stolpe, who two days earlier in Geneva had assured the representatives of the Global South at the World Council of Churches that socialism would remain in the GDR and continue to stand by their side.
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The remarkable event on November 9, 1989 in Berlin was recorded. The material lay dormant in the archives of the former GDR television for over three decades until it was discovered, recovered and viewed by Christian Walther. The journalist recognizes the explosiveness of this authentic contemporary testimony and sets out to meticulously study the unedited footage and identify the speakers. This is easy for those who later made careers like Stolpe as Prime Minister of Brandenburg or Christine Lieberknecht as Prime Minister of Thuringia, Lothar de Maizière as head of the last GDR government and Rainer Eppelmann, its Minister for Defense. Others, however, disappeared relatively quickly from the public eye.
MDR provided Walther with an editing room for two days. He presented the final product, a 45-minute compilation, at a historical site in the presence of former participants. Before they could remember, the message in the Friedrichstadtkirche was: film off.
What is striking is that this meeting was very civilized, almost formal; It could almost have been a mini CDU party conference – with guests. At that time, for example, the atmosphere in the Gethsemane Church in Prenzlauer Berg, which was populated primarily by young people and occupied every last square meter of floor, was completely different: passionate, almost anarchistic. Here, however, Stolpe first sets the timetable before Gottfried Müller, editor-in-chief of the church newspaper “Glaube und Heimat” and initiator of the Weimar letter of September 10, 1989, which called for the democratization of the CDU in the GDR, explains: “What has been upside down for years We are now standing on our feet.” And: “I hope that on May 1st the leadership will overtake the people.” Horst Dohlus, State Secretary for Church Affairs (“a communist climbs the pulpit,” according to the film commentary) admits mistakes the SED in church politics, but also insists on successes. His prayer that evening: “I wish every communist a good Christian friend and vice versa.”
Eppelmann is outraged that one party claims to have absolute truth and wants “a dispute of concepts from now on,” to be fought seriously and in partnership. Erhart Neubert, theologian and co-founder of the Democratic Awakening, believes that one does not have to “do without the term socialism, but rather fill it with new content.” What is needed is “a round table at which we all sit together, including the old forces.” Lutz Hoyer from the Liberal Democratic Party of Germany (LDPD) calls for the deletion of Article 1 of the GDR constitution, in which the “leading role” of the SED was fixed. Jörg Hildebrandt, editor of the Evangelische Verlagsanstalt in Berlin, reads out the call for a referendum to abolish the SED’s claim to leadership. De Maizière is already announced as the new CDU chairman.
Konrad Weiß from Democracy Now again, it’s “very dizzying” in view of the many turncoats who turn up to 360 degrees (!). The filmmaker can imagine that for a transitional period “a woman like Christa Wolf will be the leading representative of our country.” Klaus Wolfram introduces the New Forum, which is the only new association that emerged from a popular movement. Konrad Elmer, co-founder of the SDP, calls times of upheaval the most exciting and beautiful. But: »We don’t have time. Today, thousands more have left our country.” Thomas Krüger, also a founding member of the new East German Social Democrats and later head of the Federal Agency for Civic Education, is generous: “I am in favor of allowing Saul to become Paul.” But they also frighten him many turncoats. And he wants “the bloc parties to stop blocking us.” Christine Lieberknecht calls for the rule of law and an independent judiciary. Church historian Joachim Heise, who founded the Berlin Institute for State-Church Research (BISKF) in 1993, admits to having joined the SED because it was founded by anti-fascists.
During the panel discussion after the film screening, Elmer complained that “our West German comrades were much more cautious than the West CDU leadership. If the elections to the People’s Chamber had been held in January 1990, we would have been ahead.” Marian Birthler criticizes the “recorders”‘ long silence: “The CDU was not allowed to appoint a minister in the GDR.” Werner Krätschell, superintendent in Pankow in 1989 and Moderator at the round table in Berlin, corrected: “Yes, Otto Nuschke, Deputy Prime Minister.”
None of the speakers in the Friedrichstadtkirche noticed that the Wall came down that night, November 9, 1989. Christine Lieberknecht was greeted by her husband at the train station in Weimar one night with the words: “I wasn’t sure if you were coming at all.” Why? “The wall is open.” Heise, whose birthday is November 9th, was greeted at home by his neighbor on the stairs with a cake and the surprise: “The wall is open.” The scientist foreshadows disaster: “Now everything is breaking together.
None of the speakers in the Friedrichstadtkirche noticed that the Wall came down that night, November 9, 1989. Christine Lieberknecht was greeted by her husband at the train station in Weimar one night with the words: “I wasn’t sure if you were coming at all.” Why? “The wall is open.” Heise, whose birthday is November 9th, was greeted at home by his neighbor on the stairs with a cake and the surprise: “The wall is open.” The scientist foreshadows disaster: “Now everything is breaking together.” For Krätschell, ultimately, the most important thing about that November 9, 1989 was that people, whether Christians or non-Christians, opposition members or law enforcement, took the commandment “Dona nobis pacem” to heart.
“A better GDR”, ARD media library
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