{"id":928,"date":"2018-02-01T20:06:04","date_gmt":"2018-02-01T20:06:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/missions.nalcnetwork.com\/?p=928"},"modified":"2018-01-22T17:09:41","modified_gmt":"2018-01-22T17:09:41","slug":"light-life-and-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/missions.nalcnetwork.com\/light-life-and-love\/","title":{"rendered":"Light, Life, and Love"},"content":{"rendered":"
Kurt Reuber\u2019s Stalingrad Madonna – Christmas 1942<\/em><\/p>\n By Pastor Bjoern E. Meinhardt<\/strong><\/p>\n I was visiting Zarephath Lutheran Church in Volgograd (formerly Stalingrad), Russia, in September 2005. As I met with members of the congregation, my eyes were drawn to a work of art on the wall of the fellowship hall.<\/p>\n I had seen the drawing before \u2014 in history books and art history books \u2014 but I have to admit that I had not paid much attention to it until then, when I saw it in the context of the city in which it had originated.<\/p>\n Kurt Reuber drew \u201cThe Stalingrad Madonna\u201d during the Christmas of 1942, as the Battle of Stalingrad raged on. The German inscriptions around the margins of the work read: \u201cWeihnachten im Kessel 1942. Festung Stalingrad. Licht, Leben, Liebe<\/em>\u201d \u2014 Christmas at the Siege 1942. Fortress Stalingrad. Light, Life, Love. The German word Kessel<\/em> literally means \u201ckettle\u201d or \u201ccauldron.\u201d As a military term it refers to an area that has become encircled during combat and translates as \u201csiege.\u201d<\/p>\n The Battle of Stalingrad was one of the fiercest and bloodiest of World\u00a0War II. The name Stalingrad evokes the very epitome of sorrow and grief. Christmas is probably the last thing that comes to mind in association with this place.<\/p>\n Christmas and Stalingrad do not seem to go together. And yet, Christmas arrived during the battle, which lasted for 200 days (between July 1942 and February 1943). Even on Christmas, the fighting continued. For the scope of this article, we will not concern ourselves with the details of the battle, which serve merely as the context in which the Stalingrad Madonna was created.<\/p>\n When Ute Tolkmitt-Reuber, the daughter of Kurt Reuber, went to Volgograd in 2005, she visited a museum that featured a replica of General Field Marshall (Generalfeldmarschall<\/em>) Friedrich Paulus\u2019 command post. She was surprised to see that the exhibit contained photos of her father, a copy of the Madonna, as well as other items pertaining to her father.<\/p>\n She wanted to know why her father was a part of the Paulus-Museum. The director of the museum gave her the following explanation, \u201cGeneral Paulus was the one<\/em> German responsible for the deaths of a vast number of people on both sides. Kurt Reuber was the other<\/em> German, who even in the perceived enemy, saw a fellow human being and turned toward their needs.\u201d Though it was forbidden, Reuber provided medical treatment to Russian civilians and prisoners of war.<\/p>\n Who was Kurt Reuber, this \u201cother German\u201d?<\/p>\n He was born on May 26, 1906, in Kassel, a city about 200 kilometers (120 miles) north of Frankfurt. He was a Lutheran pastor, a medical doctor, and an artist. Reuber studied Protestant theology after his high school graduation (Abitur<\/em>), eventually earning a Ph.D. in the field of theology.<\/p>\n