While Christian congregations are dwindling across Germany, there was standing room only on Sunday 6 September for morning service at an evangelical Lutheran church in Berlin.
Across Germany there has been a wave of conversions of Muslim asylum seekers from Iran and Afghanistan. Some estimates put the number of baptisms at 12,000 out of the 35,000 Iranians in the country.
The number of conversions has prompted suggestions that many are simply trying to improve the chances of being accepted for asylum, given the well-documented persecution of Christians in their native countries.
Congregation quadruples
Pastor Gottfried Martens has seen his congregation at the evangelical Trinity Church grow from 150 to more than 600 in just two years, describing the number of conversions as a ‘miracle’. He accepts that a small number might take his three-month baptism course to enhance their case, but says that, once in church, most people do engage and around 90% of converts continue attending after they have been baptised.
‘I know there are – again and again – people coming here because they have some kind of hope regarding their asylum’, Martens said. ‘I am inviting them to join us because I know that whoever comes here will not be left unchanged.’
Leila (32), originally from Tehran, said: ‘In Iran, if we change our religion, they kill us. We cannot say we want to be Christian in Iran. Only when we come here can we say we are Christian’.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Islam ‘belongs in Germany’ and that claiming to be Christian does not guarantee a successful asylum application.
