Station 2: Go!
The Lord says:
„Go – to the land I will show you. I will bless you, and you will be a blessing”
(Genesis 12,1-3).
Ansgar in Haithabu: “great joy in this place". Ansgar founded a church in Haithabu or nearby around the year 849 and arranged for a pastor. This first church in ancient Denmark was made of wood and was probably quite small. Its existence is well documented in written sources, but not yet archaeologically proven. From Haithabu, Ansgar and other missionaries drove north. Many journeys lead to uncertain territory...
Since 2011, the Ansgar Memoria has commemorated Ansgar's mission and the importance of his work for the reconciliation between peoples and the European culture as a whole: “144 steel rods, a sacred, symbolic Number in the Bible, anchored precisely in the ground, gaining height towards the middle, mark out a structure that – seen from a distance – is corresponding to a simple shed, but dissolves more and more as you approach and is deprived of its purpose. Just a memorial stone, with one embedded simple bronze cross, in the geometric center of a regular octagon as a bench, forms a calm pole. Poles gather around it: spears – swords – people? Their points carry a cross: (yet) not big enough to protect everyone, but big enough to cast the shadow of a cross on this place." (Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Peter Hense, Architect of Ansgar Memoria)
Inscription of the stele (in Latin, Danish and German):
“Men and women gave up their superstitious idolatry, they converted to faith in the Lord and were baptized, and great joy arose in this place.”
(Rimbert, Life of Ansgar, chap. 24)
Go and set out on your way!
Set off like Ansgar and discover: wherever you go – you are not alone.
Ansgar’s Path will also help you to find traces of it – so let's go!
"You can only understand life backwards, but you have to live it forwards." (Søren Kierkegaard).
Here, Ansgar has been given a monument – almost as if his "territory had been marked". Would that be in his spirit...? What could a monument look like – for you? Built for your life's motto, your heart's affair or your work? Would it be big or small, artistic or simple? Made of what material? What would suit you?