100th birthday of Birger Forell - Germany / Federal Republic of Germany 1993 - 100 Pfennig

Birger Forell was born on September 27, 1893 in Söderham on the Swedish coast north of Stockholm. After completing his middle schooling, he prepared himself for the Abitur and passed his matriculation examination in December 1915 as an external student at the Stockholm Gymnasium "Norre Latin". In January 1916, he moved as a student, the Swedish University of Upsala, which he left after the theological-philosophical exam to expand in Tübingen and Marburg his knowledge. In 1921, Birger Forell passed the two theological exams. He was ordained in Upsala and went first as a sailor pastor to Rotterdam and later as a pastor to Tillinge. In the winter of 1927/28, the Marburg religious scientist Professor Rudolf Otto took him as his assistant on a religious scientific research trip to India. Because of the death of his son, he broke off the journey and returned to his wife back to Sweden. In 1929 he went to Berlin as ambassador pastor and pastor of the Swedish community. During the time of the great economic crisis and the devastating unemployment Forell helped not only many Swedes, but also many Germans. In 1933 his parsonage became the meeting place of the oppressed, to whom he not only gave comfort and advice. He was able to hide numerous persecuted people of National Socialism and get them a saving passport abroad. He stood on the side of the Confessing Church. In 1942, the Gestapo had constantly monitored the house and telephone and had to return to Sweden. In the middle of the Second World War, the World Council of Church Forell called for the care of German prisoners of war in England. This activity took him from one camp to another, where he held services, visited the wounded and the sick, and conducted pastoral discussions with the desperate and downcast. He also arranged for the prisoners to set up a college camp to train young theologians and later recognize the exams taken at Norton Camp. In the fall of 1945 Birger Forell came across the plight of the refugees and expellees on a short trip through Germany. From then on he not only organized aid for the POWs in England, but also campaigned for private aid for his fellow countrymen in Sweden. Since 1947 Forell was due to his good contacts with the English to one of the initiators of the founding of the refugee city Espelkamp. In 1951 he decided to give up the security of his parish in Boras in order to devote himself entirely to the help of the desperate in Germany. He founded the "German-Swedish Refugee Relief", which helped the resettled peasants in particular to resettle. Time and again he gave lectures in Sweden, described the conditions in post-war Germany and "begged for help." "It must be clear to everyone that in the present situation the greatest suffering must be endured by the part of the population in Germany who bears no responsibility for the war, for example, of young children." He endeavored to free the needy man from that what oppressed him, what paralyzed him, so that he regain confidence in himself, to prove himself again in dealing with the things of this world. Forell has been a great pastor. At the same time, he thought and acted across the borders as a great European. On July 4, 1958, Birger Forell died and was buried in the village cemetery of Onsala south of Gothenburg. (Text: Birger-Forell-Stiftung e.V. Bonn, source: Harald von Koenigswald: Birger Forell, Eckart Verlag, Witten and Berlin 1962)