Pastor Silke Stürmer from Welzheim, Germany, will be visiting South Africa, and our congregation in particular from 27 January to 24 February. Below you will find her letter and some background information:

WISHES AND IDEAS FOR A STAY AT THE EV. LUTH. CONGREGATION STELLENBOSCH AND THE CAPE LUTHERAN CHURCH

When I express my ideas below about how I could contribute to your church, I do so with the proviso that I am not familiar with your situation. I do not know what interests you, where you need helping hands or a listening ear. I can only share what I can imagine would be beneficial – if this is not appropriate for your church, please let me know.

CHURCH SERVICES AND CONGREGATION EVENTS

A church congregation has many areas of work, one of the central areas being church services. This is where I would like to get involved: as a minister, I can of course preach, hold a service on my own, or prepare it together with a team, if there is one. Or I can simply participate in the service by reading, arranging flowers, etc. Being part of the service is definitely important to me, as it is usually the ‘centre’ of the congregation, where many people meet and exchange ideas. Do you have a church café afterwards? I would be happy to help out there as well. In general, I can well imagine cooking and baking for church festivals – I enjoy doing both and am good at them (provided you like German/Swabian cuisine ). If there are women’s groups or other community events with interesting topics, I am happy to organise an evening event. For example, I could give a presentation on the Sinti and Roma minority in our country (with a film) – or on our regional church (with a film) – or organise an evening on the topic of clichés and prejudices… There are many topics, and since I am also a filmmaker, I have several documentaries that I can show here. Of course, I can also offer Bible evenings.

PUBLIC RELATIONS AND TEXTS

Since I have also written articles for newspapers as a journalist for several years, I can also help here: texts for the website, the church newsletter, the newspaper… I don’t know what you have and whether it is needed. I can also help with making posters or programmes – unfortunately, I am no help when it comes to Instagram or other social media. I am a dinosaur in that respect!

PASTORAL CARE & SOCIAL WORK

When it comes to church services, community events or public relations work, the question naturally arises as to which language should be used. But this is even more important in pastoral care, because you can’t prepare your text in advance as you can for a sermon. If my English is good enough, I also enjoy visiting people – normal conversation shouldn’t be a problem at all. I would also like to get to know iThemba Labantu, but I admit that the words on the homepage intimidated me a little (‘In a dangerous country, Philippi has one of the highest murder rates, with residents exposed to daily extremes of violence’). Would I be able to find my way around there? I have already lived in a war zone (on the West Bank in Palestine/Israel) and I know that it is important to be familiar with areas where there is a lot of violence and to know the rules – is that possible in such a short time? I will probably need your support here.

CONCLUSION

During these four weeks, I would like to get to know people and accompany them for a short while in their lives – as much as is possible in such a short time. I would like to see how Christians live and celebrate far away from my church, and I would like to find out what worries and delights the people there. I bring with me a great openness towards people and a commitment – but also a history and limitations: I had a brain tumour and unfortunately know a lot about illness. Chemotherapy and radiation damaged my bones to such an extent that I now have a knee prosthesis, for example. I cannot stand and walk for long periods of time. That is also why I did not mention working with children and young people, as this usually requires a fair amount of fitness, and they don’t want an old wreck. Of course, I also have my own personal hopes and expectations. I would very much like to see something of this great country and travel a little on my days off, as far as possible. I might add one to two weeks of holiday to the four weeks – if my church and my family ‘allow’ it. These are my ideas. If you have completely different ones, I would be interested to hear them and hope to meet your expectations as well.

With warm regards Silke Stürmer