Pater Dr. Lothar Penners

Fotos: POS, Brehm © 2002

SCHOENSTATT, mkf. On January 2, 2003, the National Presidium (Germany) appointed the new Movement Director of the German Schoenstatt Movement. Father Dr. Lothar Penners, member of the Central of the German Schoenstatt Movement and moderator of the Schoenstatt League of University Graduates, will take up office on March 12, 2003.

A process of consultation with the different committees of the German Schoenstatt Movement, lasting several weeks, preceeded the appointment on January 2. The term of the previous Movement Director, Father Tilmann Beller, had ended on December 1.

Father Dr. Lothar Penners, born1942 in Fulda,  is a member of the Province Council of the Sion Province of the Schoenstatt Fathers, and director of the Department "Education and Culture" of the Schoenstatt Movement in Germany; Pedagogical and Ecclesial Workshops have his signature.

Next to his task in this department and at the Central, Father Penners holds a lectureship at the Theological College of the Pallottines in Vallendar, and at the University of Koblenz.

"Rush ahead to the wider circles – with the good news that God is a God of life!"

The dialogue with the Ecclesial Movements and the ecumenical potential of Schoenstatt – yet to discover and enfold – are two matters of special personal interest for Father Penners. To discover God's signs -  in the acceleration of time, in information patterns radically changed through  Internet and globalization,  in the dialogue of cultures and religions in Europe, that is to a growing degree marked by a religion no longer Christian, and a Christianity no longer religious: this was the key issue of Father Penner's talk during last year's October Week. It is possible that today's world and culture can be penetrated by Christian values, he said, and by Schoenstatt values as well: "The basic teachings of our Father can be passed on, when we work inductively, when we give an answer from life." His wish during the October Week in view of the German Schoenstatt Movement: "Rush ahead to the wider circles – with the good news that God is a God of life!"

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