Thomas Paul Schirrmacher | |
---|---|
Born | |
Nationality | German |
Citizenship | German |
Employer(s) | World Evangelical Alliance, Martin Bucer Seminary |
Known for | Christian moral philosophy, human rights, religious freedom |
Spouse | Christine Schirrmacher |
Thomas Paul Schirrmacher (born 25 June 1960) is a German Christian moral philosopher and a specialist in the Sociology of Religion and religious freedom. He is known as a global human rights activist and holds a chair in Theology (Ethics, Missiology, World Religions).
Schirrmacher serves the World Evangelical Alliance as secretary general and as chair of the Theological Commission. He is also an Anglican realignment bishop.
Since 2014 he is president of the International Council of the International Society for Human Rights [1] and of the International Institute for Religious Freedom. [2]
Thomas Schirrmacher was born on June 25, 1960 [3] to the German professor of Telecommunications engineering Bernd Schirrmacher and his wife Ingeborg. His grandfather is the history professor Friedrich Wilhelm Schirrmacher while his great-grandfather is Carl Friedrich Schirrmacher, Director of the Danzig St. Petri School. [4] The Schirrmacher family are Huguenots who were exiled from Salzburg in the 18th century and subsequently settled in Danzig, Prussia.
Thomas Schirrmacher is married to Christine Schirrmacher who is a professor of Islamic Studies in Bonn, Germany.
Thomas Schirrmacher studied theology from 1978 to 1982 at STH Basel (Switzerland) and since 1983 Cultural Anthropology and Comparative Religion at University of Bonn. He earned a Drs. theol. in Missiology and Ecumenism at Theological University (Kampen/Netherlands) in 1984, and a Dr. theol. in Missiology and Ecumenics at Theological University of the Reformed Churches (Kampen/Netherlands) in 1985, a Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology at Pacific Western University [5] (today: California Miramar University) in Los Angeles (CA) in 1989, a Th.D. in Ethics at Whitefield Theological Seminary in Lakeland (FL) in 1996, and a Dr. phil. in Comparative Religion and Sociology of Religion at University of Bonn in 2007. In 1997 he got honorary doctorates (D.D.) from Cranmer Theological House and in 2006 from ACTS Academy of Higher Education in Bangalore.
Between 1982 and 1986 Schirrmacher was pastor of several church communities in Bonn. From 1996 to 2018, Thomas Schirrmacher was rector of the private Martin Bucer Seminary, a theological seminary seated in Bonn (Germany) with campuses in several countries [6] which he founded, and where he continues to teach systematic theology (especially ethics) as well as comparative religion studies and is vice president for International Affairs. From 1994 to 1998 Schirrmacher was professor of missions at the Philadelphia Theological Seminary, known today as Reformed Episcopal Seminary, and since 1995 he is professor for systematic theology at the Whitefield Theological Seminary. [7] He is also a professor for the sociology of religion at the West University of Timişoara [8] and lecturer in the Advanced Programme “Human Rights and Religious Freedom” at Oxford University (Regent's Park College, Oxford). [9]
Schirrmacher was chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Gebende Hände gGmbH (German: Giving Hands charitable Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung), an internationally active relief organisation, and now is its senior advisor. [10] He is member of the commission for religious freedom of the World Evangelical Alliance. He also is their speaker for human rights. [11] According to media he is one of the leading experts on the topic of persecution of Christians. [12] Several times he was speaking as expert on human rights in the German Parliament. [13] In October 2015 he was the only evangelical member of the Catholic synod on family led by Pope Francis. [14] He is president of the International Society for Human Rights, [15] manager of the Religious Liberty Commission of the German and the Swiss Evangelical Alliance, and president of the International Institute for Religious Freedom (IIRF) [16] with regional offices for most continents: Brasilia (Latin America), Brussels/Bonn (Europe), Cape Town (Africa), Colombo and Delhi (Asia), which cooperates with the UN Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Religion or Belief. [17]
In 2016 he was ordained as bishop of the Communio Christiana [18] (a church in the Anglican realignment). [19] On October 27, 2020, Schirrmacher was elected the next General Secretary of the World Evangelical Alliance. His term of office began in March 2021. [20]
Another main focus of the work of Schirrmacher besides religious freedom in the area of human rights is the fight against human trafficking.
He speaks with church leaders like Pope Benedict XVI, [21] Pope Francis, [22] and the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I and gives lectures all around the world. He is considered one of the architects of the so-called “Christian witness in a multi-religious world”. [23] He is also consultant of the Faith and Order Commission, the Theological Commission of the World Council of Churches, chair of the Board of Advisors of the Central Council of Oriental Christians in Germany (ZOCD), [24] and Member of the International Committee of the Global Christian Forum. [25] Schirrmacher is also a member of the World Council of Religions for Peace [26] and of the Institute for the Freedom of Faith & Security in Europe (IFFSE) founded by Jewish rabbis. [27]
He has authored and edited more than 100 books, which have been translated into 18 languages. [28] [29]
Schirrmacher received the following honours:
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Christian fundamentalism, also known as fundamental Christianity or fundamentalist Christianity, is a religious movement emphasizing biblical literalism. In its modern form, it began in the late 19th and early 20th centuries among British and American Protestants as a reaction to theological liberalism and cultural modernism. Fundamentalists argued that 19th-century modernist theologians had misunderstood or rejected certain doctrines, especially biblical inerrancy, which they considered the fundamentals of the Christian faith.
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The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) is an interdenominational organization of evangelical Christian churches, serving more than 600 million evangelicals, founded in 1846 in London, England, United Kingdom to unite evangelicals worldwide. WEA is the largest international organization of evangelical churches. The headquarters are in Deerfield, Illinois, with UN offices in New York City, Geneva, and Bonn. It brings together 9 regional and 143 national evangelical alliances of churches, and over one hundred member organizations. Moreover, the WEA includes a certain percentage of individual evangelical Christian churches. As of March 2021, the Secretary General of the WEA is German theologian Thomas Schirrmacher.
Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York (UTS) is a private ecumenical Christian liberal seminary in Morningside Heights, Manhattan, affiliated in Columbia University. Since 1928, the seminary has served as Columbia's constituent faculty of theology. In 1964, UTS also established an affiliation with the neighboring Jewish Theological Seminary of America. UTS confers the following degrees: Master of Divinity (MDiv), Master of Divinity & Social Work dual degree (MDSW), Master of Arts in religion (MAR), Master of Arts in Social Justice (MASJ), Master of Sacred Theology (STM), and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD).
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Helmut Richard Niebuhr is considered one of the most important Christian theological ethicists in 20th-century America, best known for his 1951 book Christ and Culture and his posthumously published book The Responsible Self. The younger brother of theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, Richard Niebuhr taught for several decades at the Yale Divinity School. Both brothers were, in their day, important figures in the neo-orthodox theological school within American Protestantism. His theology has been one of the main sources of postliberal theology, sometimes called the "Yale school". He influenced such figures as James Gustafson, Stanley Hauerwas, and Gordon Kaufman.
John Warwick Montgomery is an American-British lawyer, professor, Lutheran theologian, and author living in France. He was born in Warsaw, New York, United States. Montgomery maintains multiple citizenship in the United States, United Kingdom, and France. From 2014 to 2017, he was Distinguished Research Professor of Philosophy at Concordia University, Wisconsin. He is currently Professor-At-Large, 1517: The Legacy Project. He was named Avocat honoraire, Barreau de Paris (2023), after 20 years in French legal practise. He continues to work as a barrister specializing in religious freedom cases in international Human Rights law.
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Christine Schirrmacher is a German academic who specialises in Islamic studies. She is professor of Islamic studies at the University of Bonn and at the Evangelical Theological Faculty (ETF), Leuven.
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