Up until a few months ago, I had never heard of Dorothee Soelle, a German theologian (1929-2003). Now I own one of her books (Essential Writings), I’m reading it enthusiastically, and I’m posting this blog about her! I thank Robert Ellsberg in the April issue of Give Us This Day for introducing her to me. To understand my sudden fascination with Soelle, let me begin with a little background on her.

Dorothee Soelle was fifteen when World War II ended. As the Nazi crimes became better known, she was filled with an “ineradicable shame”: the shame of “belonging to this people, speaking the language of the concentration camp guards.” Like many others of her generation, she pondered the great question: “How could this have happened?” And “If God is all-powerful, why didn’t he stop this?” At the University of Cologne, she majored in theology, philosophy, and literature, eventually earning her Ph.D. She became a university lecturer at Cologne while also becoming very active in the political issues of her day: the Vietnam War, the arms race, anti-semitism, sexism, and other forms of authoritarianism and oppression. From 1975-87 she also taught 6 months every year at the Union Theological Seminary in New York City.

What was Soelle’s answer to the question, “If God is all-powerful, why didn’t he stop the atrocities of the Nazis–or all evils, for that matter?” Her answer was: because “God is not an all-powerful King.” This answer shocked some people, because that image of God as an all-powerful king was not only very popular, it was scriptural. She went on to say that God is not far removed from us. Rather, God is in our midst as “one who suffers in us, with us, and through us.” God is suffering along side of us. She viewed Jesus on the cross as the great example of God’s union with all who suffer political violence, oppression, trauma. Furthermore, she said, God needs our hands to heal what is broken in the world.

Soelle’s theology was an embodied theology, one deeply rooted in the world. Every morning she prayed with her Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other. She always asked herself, “Where is God in the suffering of the world? And “What does love require of us in our times?” She, along with a few other like-minded friends, organized a weekly ecumenical service called “Political Evensongs.” These meetings were dedicated to prayer and lectures on contemporary social issues. Soelle believed God answered our prayers primarily by “inspiring action in our hearts and hands.“

Soelle criticized traditional Christianity’s idea of sin which confined sin mostly to personal morality. This limited view failed to recognize sin’s social dimension. She wrote, “Sin has to do not just with what we do, but what we allow to happen.” She had been appalled that Nazism arose in Germany, an essentially Christian country–mostly Lutheran and Roman Catholic. How could her fellow country men and women have gone to church every Sunday while simultaneously allowing their neighbors to be rounded up and shipped to extermination camps? (Remember, of course, that not all church leaders and ordinary citizens were silent. In Dachau alone, there were “clergy barracks” that held over 2,700 clergy. And countless non-Jewish neighbors also disappeared into the night for speaking out against Hitler and his policies and for haboring Jews. But some historians say such resistance was too little, too late.)

Solle wrote extensively about mysticism. She believed mysticism was not reserved for a few select people living in desert caves or monasteries. Rather, she “democratized mysticism” as a gift available to all. She defined mysticism not as a new vision of God, “but a different relationship to the world–one that has borrowed the eyes of God.” Soelle also believed that women have special insights to offer the primarily patriarchal theology and spirituality of her day. As the mother of four children, for example, she was well-acquainted with the pains of childbirth. She asked, what enables a woman to endure the labor pains of childbirth? And answered, it is her hope for the life of her child. So too, she believed our pain and suffering can be transmuted into giving birth to something new.

Some say we are known by the company we keep. Four examples of Soelle’s “company” include several Medieval female mystics such as Marguerite Porete (burned at the stake for heresy in 1310), Lutheran pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer (hanged by the Nazis for treason in April 1945), Latin American Liberation Theologian Gustavo Gutierrez, and American “Creation Spirituality” theologian, Matthew Fox.

Susan Rakoczy, a South African professor of theology, called Dorothee Soelle “one of the most important spiritual-political figures of the 20th Century.” I’ll conclude this reflection with four more thoughts by this remarkable woman:

“God does not dominate. God accompanies.”

About excessive consumerism: “If my hands are fully occupied in holding on to something, I can neither give nor receive.”

“Joy, laughter, and delight are so powerful because, like all mysticism, they abolish conventional divisions.”

Some see “a miracle as an external intervention that suspends the laws of nature.” But Soelle says, “Mystical amazement, on the other hand, sees the original miracle in being itself, in creation, in a rose blooming.”

For reflection:

What is your initial reaction to this reflection? Positive? Negative? Somewhere in between? Can you explain why?

Does anything about Dorothee Soelle’s writings, resonate with your own beliefs? Does anything contradict what you believe? Does anything make you say, “Wow!” or “I never looked at it that way before.”

Do you ever pray with scripture placed alongside the news of the day? If so, what happens when you do? If you’ve never tried this, would you like to try this?

Does just being alive ever seem like a miracle to you? Have you ever experienced something in nature that you would readily call a miracle? If so, could you share that experience with us below?

Soelle often referred to St. Theresa of Avila’s prayer, “Christ has no hands on earth but yours.” Here is that prayer set to music and sung by John Michael Talbot, “St. Theresa’s Prayer.” I love this prayer/song so much, I use it for nearly all my retreats.

I invite you to share your thoughts below. Your fellow readers and I always enjoy reading the comments!