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Back in my little village in East Germany, behind the Iron curtain, when church attendance was sparse and life for any believer was one of constant repression, it was the courage of the philosopher-theologian Bonhoeffer and his hymn, written at the turn of the year, which gave me hope. His New Year hymn was always part of our end of year church service, when the little flock met in our house church on New Year’s Eve to receive the last blessing of the old year. At midnight my family went outside to ring the big bells in the bell tower on the cemetery lawn, It was realy just a short shed that looked like a steeple and sat on the ground near where the church once stood before the Second World war destroyed it. Oh, how I miss those bells. We older siblings took turns pulling the ropes of the two heavy bells, to ring the village from the old into the new year. The villagers always waited until the bells turned silent to begin their fireworks - the official way Germans welcome the New Year. Von guten Mächten wunderbar geborgen (translated as “By gracious powers wonderfully sheltered” or “By gentle powers lovingly surrounded”) is a much-loved hymn that is widely sung in German-speaking lands at the turn of the year, and it has guided us into the New Year also here also during our New Years’ retreats and 12 Days of Christmas Contemplations since. The protestant theologian, church leader, and resistance member Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote these inspiring and melancholic words as a prayer toward the end of his 2-year imprisonment by the Nazis. He sent it to his family as an encouragement and profession of faith in December of 1944, just eight weeks before he was executed (and four months before Nazi Germany’s capitulation) at a time when much of Germany had been turned to rubble by the allied powers. Bonhoeffer’s life, witness, and death gives the song special resonance at the turn of the year. Especially in a year such as this. In another year filled with worry and war, where people are burdened and frightened by their personal and political situation, when whole families are buried under rubble and children are orphaned every single day somewhere in this world, in a year that we leave behind with grief and gratitude, I cannot think of a more comforting text. It acknowledges the pain and offers comfort and courage. It allows us to both hold our sorrows and cradle hope: “Surrounded by such true and gentle powers. So wondrously consoled and without fear, Thus will I spend with you these final hours And then together enter a new year. The worries of the old year still torment us. We’re troubled still by long and wicked days. Oh Lord, give our frightened souls the healing For which You’ve chastened us in many ways.” — D. Bonhoeffer https://almutfurchert.substack.com/p/by-gracious-powers-wonderfully-sheltered-01d