Quarter of German Christians sees fall of the Berlin Wall as a miracle of God
Germans stand on the Berlin Wall to celebrate its demolition. The banner reads: "Germany, only Fatherland". Photo EPA
Central Europe
A quarter of all the Germans still see the Fall of the Berlin Wall as a divine miracle. The Iron Curtain that separated the Eastern block from the Western world after World War II fell on November 9, 1989.
The majority of Germans (55 per cent) does not see the fall of the wall as a miracle of God. That was shown by a representative survey by the opinion research institute INSA-Consulere in the German town of Erfurt, as reported by Idea. That opinion is shared by most people both in eastern and western Germany.
Generations
The survey shows a significant difference between older and younger generations. Of Germans aged between 18 and 29 years old, 35 per cent says not to believe that the fall of the Wall was a miracle of God. Among 30- to 39-year-olds, this percentage amounts to 47 per cent. Among older respondents, the number of people not believing in a miracle of God is even larger. Of the group aged between 50 and 59, 62 per cent disagrees with the statement that God worked a miracle in 1989, and among people between 60 and 69, 63 per cent shares this opinion.
Christians seem to think the same way as their secular fellow-citizens. Only in the more conservative free churches, the majority of the members (52 per cent) believes that the coming down of the Iron Curtain was a miracle of God. Among Catholics and members of the Protestant Church of Germany, this group only amounts to 29 per cent of the members.
The fall of Socialism in the GDR brought much more freedom for churches and Christian believers in Eastern Germany.
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