I'm sure you won't want to miss it! <smile>
Blessings,
Randy

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

July 14, 2008



ONCE AGAIN: GERMAN DAYS IN OCTOBER AT CONCORDIA SEMINARY



ST. LOUIS—The Center for Lutheran Theology and Public Life (CLTPL) in St.
Louis will host a unique conference called “German Days at the Sem” on
Oct. 24-25 on the campus of Concordia Seminary. The two-day event marks
the second of a series of 10 significant events, which will be held every
fall leading up to the 500-year anniversary of the Reformation on Oct. 31,
2017.



The theme of this year’s “German Days II” is “Faith and Politics in
Luther’s Land - and Here” and will address a theme pertinent in this
election year - the impact of religion on public life. Scholars and
prominent statesmen from both sides of the Atlantic will discuss the
influence of Germany’s Christian heritage on its national affairs and the
political life in the European Union. They will also recall the importance
of new religions and neo-paganism in Nazi ideology, and the anti-Christian
nature of Hitler’s regime.



One topic of particular interest to Americans in the light of the
impending U.S. elections will be the constitutional aspect of America’s
and Europe’s religious roots. “Similarly, the troubling question will be
raised whether there might exist parallels between the growing role of
paganism—and especially Satanism—in contemporary U.S. life and the
ideological realities that prevailed in Nazi Germany,” said CLTPL director
Dr. Uwe Siemon-Netto, moderator of this conference.



Keynote speakers will be Dr. Hans Apel, Germany’s former Finance and
Defense Minister, and Minnesota Supreme Court Justice Barry Anderson.
Other presenters include Rev. Christian Meissner, national executive
secretary of the Protestant caucus of Germany’s governing Christian
Democratic Union; Rev. Larry Nichols, a leading Lutheran expert in cults
and Satanism in the United States; Professors Irving Hexham and Karla
Poewe of the University of Calgary in Canada, both specialists on the
influence of new religions on Nazi Germany; Dr. Mark Ruff, associate
professor of history at St. Louis University and a foremost specialist on
the Christian and specifically Catholic youth in postwar Germany, and  of
the struggle of Christians under the Nazis;  and Professor Michael Rutz,
editor-in-chief of Rheinischer Merkur, one of Germany’s most distinguished
newspapers. Several Concordia Seminary faculty and staff members will also
participate.



The conference will also feature a Winzerfest (wine festival), organized
in cooperation with the town of Hermann, Mo., the heart of Missouri wine
country; plus exhibitions and presentations of the Concordia Historical
Institute, the German American Heritage Society and Concordia Publishing
House.



“German Days at the Sem” will begin with a bilingual matins service at
9:40 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 24, in the Seminary’s Chapel of St. Timothy and
St. Titus. The conference will conclude on Saturday with a Bach at the Sem
performance in the Seminary’s Chapel of St. Timothy and St. Titus. One of
the works on the program will be of particular relevance to the theme of
this event – a Bach chorus for the induction of civil officers.



The Center for Lutheran Theology and Public Life is the successor of the
Concordia Seminary Institute on Lay Vocation. CLTPL is an affiliate of the
Seminary; its mission is to project Lutheran thought to the secular realm.



For more information, call Chad Lakies at (314) 505-7238, e-mail
center1@..., or visit the Seminary’s Web site at www.csl.edu.