Weilmünster is a municipality in Limburg-Weilburg district in Hesse , Germany .
87-683: Weilmünster is among the most richly wooded places in Limburg-Weilburg. The forestry office looks after not only the State Forest but also twelve municipalities’ woodlands in the south of the Limburg-Weilburg and Lahn-Dill districts. The market community of Weilmünster lies on the north slope of the Taunus in the Weil valley, the Weil being a tributary to the Lahn . The nearest major cities are Wetzlar (20 km) to
174-486: A church tax , a surcharge on their normal income tax collected by the states of Germany and passed on to the respective religious body. The structure of the EKD is based on federal principles. Each regional church is responsible for Christian life in its own area while each regional church has its own special characteristics and retains its independence. The EKD carries out joint tasks with which its members have entrusted it. For
261-771: A (state) bishop . Only one member church, the Evangelical Reformed Church in Germany , is not restricted to a certain territory. In some ways, the other member churches resemble dioceses of the Catholic and Anglican churches, from an organisational point of view. Etymologically, the German word evangelisch means "of the Gospel", denoting a Reformation emphasis on sola scriptura , "by scripture alone". Martin Luther encouraged
348-616: A contribution to the reconciliation with the former war opponent of France in which they closed partnerships with French municipalities. Weilmünster elected Le Cheylard in the north of the department Ardeche in the Central Massif. This provincial town is situated at the mouth of the Thorne in the Eyrieux, a tributary of the Rhone, about 60 km to the west of Valence. After the union celebrations in 1963
435-567: A new connection to the rail network was considered for Weilmünster; however, there was no concrete followup to these plans. The Weilmünster Clinic is, with 680 staff, the greater community's biggest employer. The second biggest is the car supplier Reum in Audenschmiede. There are many family businesses here. There are a roadbuilding company, a furniture shop and a great number of small businesses and handicraft enterprises. Weilmünster's main centre supplies medical, shopping and school services, and it
522-663: A regular market is known to have been being held in Weilmünster. The community belonged to Nassau , and after the division of inheritance to Nassau-Weilburg. From 1806 it belonged to the Duchy of Nassau . In 1866 it passed to Prussia , becoming part of the Province of Hesse-Nassau . Industrialization began early. In the early 16th century there was an ironworks with a blast furnace in Weilmünster. Later came foundries and other metalworking businesses. This industrial development, however,
609-457: A regular exchange of groups of schoolchildren took place. Choirs, sports teams and official delegations from both municipalities visited the respective twin town. The people get a look received insight into the normal life of the families of the country in the neighbourhood. This led to numerous private friendships between the families. Only this can protect the continuity of town twinning. After more than 40 years of partnership, it only stays alive,
696-629: A significant contribution to Wiesbaden's water supply. The largest unit of the Taunus in terms of area, the Hintertaunus unit, is mainly composed of the black rock series of the Hunsrück slate and the Singhofen layers of the lower Ems tier, often greywacke-like sandstones as well as siltstone and claystone . Younger rocks are only exposed here in small occurrences near Usingen and on the very eastern edge of
783-666: A split in the 20th century and lost a bulk of its adherents in East Germany due to state atheist policies of the former East German government. After 1990, membership was counted and amounted to around the same number as the Roman Catholic Church. In the 21st century, membership in both the Evangelical Church and the Roman Catholic Church stagnates as more people are becoming religious nones. A 2019 study estimated that there were 114,000 unreported victims of sexual abuse in
870-692: Is a high-altitude landscape with dense forest cover, a harsher climate and poor soil in the Pferdskopf-Bergland ; but also the Usinger basin , a gently undulating, open basin landscape with fertile soil and a balanced climate. The Hintertaunus is divided into the Western and Eastern Hintertaunus by the Idstein Depression, which developed in the Idstein – Bad Camberg area. The Idstein depression widens towards
957-536: Is a mountain range in Hesse , Germany , located north west of Frankfurt and north of Wiesbaden . The tallest peak in the range is Großer Feldberg at 878 m; other notable peaks are Kleiner Feldberg (825 m) and Altkönig (798 m). The Taunus range spans the districts of Hochtaunuskreis , Main-Taunus-Kreis , Rheingau-Taunus , Limburg-Weilburg , and Rhein-Lahn . The range is known for its geothermal springs and mineral waters that formerly attracted members of
SECTION 10
#17329247306841044-536: Is also there that the community nursing station and the local history parlour can be found. Weilmünster is home to a primary school which serves as a “midpoint school”, a coöperative comprehensive school with Hauptschule , Realschule and Gymnasium branches with years 5 to 9. Students from Weilmünster attend higher schools in Weilburg . Weilmünster has held market rights for more than 400 years and makes lively use of trade and market even today. People still flock to
1131-656: Is composed of pure, mostly black mudstone and embedded sandstone banks and occurs in stratigraphically different positions in the Upper Siegen and in the Ems. The bulk of the Hunsrück Slate is attributed to the Elm Lower Stage . It is known for its exceptionally well-preserved fossils and is locally well suited for use as roofing slate . . In the western Hintertaunus, the almost sand-free Hunsrück slate can be easily separated from
1218-425: Is divided according to morphology , geological structure , climate and partly by the prevailing vegetation into sub-landscapes that are more uniform in themselves. The cultural landscape, i.e. the natural landscape shaped by man, shows the following structure in terms of land use, the location and distribution of settlements and the course of traffic routes. In the south are the more wooded and higher parts, namely
1305-687: Is geologically divided from south to north into the units Vordertaunus unit (also northern phyllite zone or metamorphic southern edge zone), Taunus ridge unit and Hintertaunus unit. Finally, south of the Lahn, the Taunus natural region has a share in the Lahn trough and the Giessen nappe . The Vordertaunus Unit is a narrow zone of weakly metamorphic rocks such as phyllites, greenschists and sericite gneisses .[5] They are appear greenish through chlorite and epidote . The starting products of these rocks were mudstones and volcanic rocks . The rock strata occurring in
1392-705: Is practised in all 20 member churches with many women having been ordained in recent years. There are also several women serving as bishops. Margot Käßmann , former bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Hanover and Chairperson of the Council of the EKD from 2009 until February 2010, was the first woman to head the EKD. Blessings of same-sex marriages is practised and allowed in 14 of 20 and Blessing of same-sex unions are allowed in all other member churches. The EKD opposes abortion in most situations but believes it should remain legal. The EKD has undergone
1479-790: Is responsible to aid feeble sister churches, especially in Roman Catholic countries and the Protestant diaspora . It has separate branches internationally, the organization in Austria is still called the Gustav-Adolf-Verein. Brot für die Welt is responsible for international development aid. The umbrella of the Protestant Church in Germany comprises 20 regional churches: These bodies are termed Landeskirchen ("Regional Churches") though in most cases, their territories do not correspond to
1566-431: Is roughly 60 km. The Weiltalbahn , the former railway line from Weilburg to Grävenwiesbach (and on to Frankfurt) led through Weilmünster. Besides the railway station itself, the resort institution had its own halt. Within the community, a spur branched off this line to Laubuseschbach. Since then, all the tracks have been torn up without a trace, and the railway's right-of-way has in great parts been used to build
1653-452: Is the representative and governing body of the Protestant Church in Germany. The Council of the EKD has 15 members jointly elected by the Synod and Church Conference who serve terms of six years. The chairperson of the Council is the church's highest representative. The Church Conference is where member churches, through the representatives of their governing boards, can directly participate in
1740-550: The Anglican or Roman Catholic churches, however, else there is no common hierarchy supervising the member churches, who are legally independent equals with the EKD being their umbrella. Members of congregations within the member churches – like those of parishes within Catholic dioceses and those enrolled in Jewish congregations also enjoying statutory corporation status – are required to pay
1827-735: The British monarch 's role as the Supreme Governor of the Church of England . This changed somewhat with growing religious freedom in the 19th century, especially in the republican states of Bremen , Frankfurt (1857), Lübeck , and Hamburg (1860). The greatest change came after the German Revolution , with the formation of the Weimar Republic and the abdication of the princes of the German states. The system of state churches disappeared with
SECTION 20
#17329247306841914-665: The Bunte Schiefer are greenish-grey or strikingly violet in color due to finely distributed hematite . Agnaths (jawless fish) found in the Bunte Schist are from the Gedinne (Lochkovian); just like the formation of the rock , they show a deposit of the colorful slate in rivers or lakes . The rocks of the colorful slate are found on the Großer Feldberg , where they were mined in tunnels to extract roofing slate (slate tunnel below
2001-701: The Eschbacher cliffs near Usingen are such a quartz vein ( Härtling ) exposed by erosion . This vein, also known as the Usinger quartz vein, can be traced over a length of about 12 km, making it one of the longest German quartz veins after the Bavarian Pfahl. The northwestern part of the Eastern Hintertaunus (Langhecker Lahntaunus) , which leads to the Weilburger Lahntalgebiet, belongs geologically to
2088-580: The Lahnmulde and is rich in magmatism . of mineral resources from the Middle Devonian such as iron in the form of red ironstone with up to 50 percent iron content, or river ironstone with up to 35% iron, as well as silver ore , roofing slate and diabase . The ore was mined in numerous mines here, as in the Montan area Lahn-Dill area ; some have been converted to visitor mines. The Mining that operated from
2175-515: The Protestant Church in Germany , is a federation of twenty Lutheran , Reformed , and United Protestant regional Churches in Germany , collectively encompassing the vast majority of the country's Protestants. In 2022, the EKD had a membership of 19,153,000 members, or 22.7% of the German population. It constitutes one of the largest Protestant bodies in the world. Church offices managing
2262-692: The Red Cross ). Quartzite sandstones are embedded in them, from which the Brunhildis rock on the summit of the Großer Feldberg consists. The Hermeskeil layers are exposed below the Großer Feldberg and consist of mudstones, weakly consolidated micaceous sandstones and quartzites of the Lower Siegen (Lower Pragian). They are covered by several 100 m thick layers of Taunus quartzite (Middle Siegen, Pragian/Emsian). The very weather-resistant rock forms many summits of
2349-622: The Rheingau and the Main-Taunus foothills form natural borders. The last three landscapes are part of the Rhine-Main lowlands. On the southern edge are the towns of Rüdesheim am Rhein , Wiesbaden , Hofheim am Taunus and Bad Homburg vor der Höhe at the junctions with the valleys of the Upper Rhine and Main ; the towns of Bad Nauheim and Butzbach are on the eastern edge at the junction with
2436-798: The Upper Ordovician and Silurian using uranium-lead dating . They are overlaid by the Eppstein slates of the Silurian and the Lower Devonian Lorsbach slates . At the very southern edge and in a small deposit near Mühlbach in the east of the Vordertaunus unit, limestones are exposed that are attributed to the Middle Devonian . To the north of the Vordertaunus is the Taunuscrest, also known as
2523-623: The Vordertaunus (naturally also called Vortaunus) and the Hohe Taunus (around Taunus main ridge ), where in the Feldberg massif the highest heights not only of the Taunus but of the entire Rhenish Slate Mountains are reached. That is why the climate here is rougher than in the upstream landscape areas - it is colder on average, it rains and, in particular, it snows more. The turbulent relief offers little space for settlements and agricultural use. On
2610-480: The Weimar Constitution (1919), which brought about disestablishment by the separation of church and state , and there was a desire for the Protestant churches to merge. In fact, a merger was permanently under discussion but never materialised due to strong regional self-confidence and traditions as well as the denominational fragmentation into Lutheran , Reformed , and United and uniting churches . During
2697-598: The Wetterau ; in the north on the Lahn the towns of Wetzlar , Weilburg , Bad Ems and Lahnstein border on the Hintertaunus ; in the west in the Middle Rhine is, among other things, Lorch at the seam (each in an anti-clockwise direction). The Taunus is a heterogeneous landscape area, but it is usually quite distinct from the surrounding landscapes and is classified as a main natural area unit group. The natural landscape
Weilmünster - Misplaced Pages Continue
2784-517: The government region of Stuttgart . The vast majority of German Protestants belong to a member church of the EKD. With 20,236,000 members in 2020, around 24.3 percent of all Germans belong to a member church of the EKD. Average church attendance is lower, however, with only around a million people (1.2 % of all Germans) attending a service on Sunday. The regional Protestant church bodies accept each other as equals, despite denominational differences. No member church runs congregations or churches in
2871-411: The 17th to the 20th centuries has now ceased. In the eastern Taunus between Idstein in the west and Usingen in the east, from the late Middle Ages to the early 20th century, there was a large number of pits in which there was mining of varying intensity on post-varistic, i.e. only after the varistic orogeny ore veins formed in the late Jurassic and early Cretaceous. The last active lead and silver ore mine,
2958-827: The EKD and formed the League of Evangelical Churches in the German Democratic Republic (German: Bund der Evangelischen Kirchen in der DDR , BEK), in 1970 also joined by the Moravian Herrnhut District. In June 1991, following German reunification , the BEK merged with the EKD. While the members are no longer state churches, they enjoy constitutional protection as statutory corporations , and they are still called Landeskirchen , and some have this term in their official names. A modern English translation, however, would be regional church . Apart from some minor changes,
3045-457: The EKD and the Catholic Church in Germany combined. The 95% confidence interval comprises 28,000 to 280,000 victims. According to a study published in 2024, pedophilic members of the EKD have sexually abused at least 9,355 minors since 1946. Putting this figure into context, the coordinator of the study clarified that this number of cases was only the tip of the iceberg. The average age of
3132-667: The EKD members, concluded the Leuenberg Agreement , also the then 21 EKD members introduced full communion for their parishioners and ministry among each other. Since also the regional Protestant churches in East Germany had signed the Leuenberg Agreement, thus the then ten members of the Federation of Protestant Churches in the German Democratic Republic practised full communion with the EKD members too. Ordination of women
3219-414: The EKD. The member churches ( Gliedkirchen ), while being independent and having their own theological and formal organisation, share full altar and pulpit fellowship , and are united in the EKD synod , but they act as individual members of the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe (CPCE). Boundaries of EKD churches within Germany partially resemble those of
3306-431: The European aristocracy to its spa towns . The car line Ford Taunus is named after it. The Taunus is the southeastern part of the Rhenish Slate Mountains . The low mountain range is about 75 km long from southwest to northeast and about 35 km wide across it from northwest to southeast,it covers an area of about 2700 km . In the west, the Upper Middle Rhine Valley borders the Taunus and separates it from
3393-433: The Giessen Nappe, which lies flat today, on rocks from the Hintertaunus and the Lahn Mulde is of even greater extent. Their rocks are not otherwise found in the Taunus, they must have been deposited south of the Vortaunus and were thrust at least 25 km over the Taunus and Hintertaunus, possibly significantly more due to large-scale considerations. In addition to the deformation of the layers, these are clearly metamorphic in
3480-427: The Heftrich pit with the Hannibal and Hasdrubal tunnels, was closed around 1924. Exploration drilling carried out by the Hessian State Office for Soil Research in the 1980s no longer provided any indication of deposits worth building. Due to its hardness, the Taunus quartzite was often mined in the past, currently only one quarry near Köppern is in operation. Some limestone and diabase quarries are still in operation in
3567-522: The High Taunus, which mainly consists of Lower Devonian clastic rocks . It is composed of the stratigraphic sequences Graue Phyllite , Bunte Schiefer , Hermeskeilschichten and Taunusquarzit . The Lower Devonian sub-layer only appears in two small outcrops, metavolcanites of the type found in the Anterior Taunus rocks. The Graue Phyllite consist of slates and sandstones . They contain impressions of Upper Silurian brachiopods and corals and were deposited in shallow water . The clay slates of
Weilmünster - Misplaced Pages Continue
3654-432: The Hintertaunus in the Oberkleen area. The geology of the Hintertaunus is not as well known as that of the Vortaunus and Hochtaunus in the south or that of the Lahnmulde in the north due to the often monotonous sandy and slate rocks that form only a few continuous reference horizons and provide hardly any index fossils . The Hunsrück slate refers to a rock facies occurring mainly in the Hunsrück and Hintertaunus, which
3741-417: The Lahn valley towards the Limburg Basin and is also known as the Goldener Grund in the northern area, probably because agriculture found more favorable conditions here. The relief is gently undulating, the soil is fertile due to the high proportion of loess and the climate is milder due to the basin location. The Taunus (main unit group 30) is subdivided in terms of natural space as follows: The Taunus
3828-412: The Lahnmulde and Dillmulde typical rocks of this time such as Schalstein , Massenkalk and deck diabase absent here. The greywacke occurring here and at other places in the eastern Hintertaunus cannot or can hardly be distinguished from the Carboniferous Kulm greywacke and are considered by some scientists to be the remains of the ' Viewed 'Giessen Ceiling . The strata of the Taunus were formed in
3915-445: The Revolution, when the old church governments lost power, the People's Church Union ( Volkskirchenbund ) was formed and advocated unification without respect to theological tradition and also increasing input from laymen . However, the People's Church Union quickly split along territorial lines after the churches' relationship with the new governments improved. It was realised that one mainstream Protestant church for all of Germany
4002-580: The Taunus range are Bad Schwalbach (formerly Langenschwalbach ) mentioned in documents dating back to the 16th century, Bad Ems , one of the most reputed therapeutic spas in Germany since the 17th century, as well as Bad Weilbach , where a spring reached wide fame for some time. By the 19th century the most famous spa towns in the area were Wiesbaden , Bad Homburg vor der Höhe, Bad Nauheim , and Bad Soden am Taunus . Evangelical Church in Germany The Evangelical Church in Germany ( German : Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland , EKD ), also known as
4089-460: The Taunus ridge ( Altkönig , Kleiner Feldberg , Glaskopf ), but also individual rock elevations (such as the Hohle Stein ). The Celtic ring walls and the rubble heap on the "White Wall" on the Altkönig consist of Taunus quartzite. The fractured groundwater of the Taunus quartzite is of local interest for water extraction. They are dammed by the underlying Hermeskeilschichten and pumped through groundwater tunnels. Four such groundwater tunnels make
4176-440: The Vordertaunus are divided from north to south into the metavolcanic sequence, the Eppstein slate and the Lorsbach slate. The oldest sedimentary rocks of the Taunus are the phyllites of Bierstadt from the lower Ordovician era, known only from a borehole in Wiesbaden , with an age of about 480 million years determined by the evidence of spores . The volcanic rocks of the metavulcanite unit are younger, they could be dated to
4263-428: The Vordertaunus – the latter clearly decreases to the north. In later uplift phases between the Late Jurassic and the Tertiary , cross-fractures were applied perpendicular to strike. The rift valley of the Idstein Depression divides the Hintertaunus into an eastern and western part, while the Limburg Basin divides the Lahn Mulde as it sinks. Some of the fractures are now filled with quartz . The free-standing rocks of
4350-421: The Weil Valley Bicycle Path. The spur line, too, can now be used by hikers, cyclists or inline skaters. In Weilmünster, the last witnesses to the railway are the old station building and the walled-up tunnel portals. The stone arches of the viaduct stood until August 2007 when they had to give way to a road-widening project. Within the framework of the reactivation of the Grävenwiesbach-Brandoberndorf railway line,
4437-475: The area of another member church, thus preventing competing with each other for parishioners. The only exception is the Evangelical Reformed Church, which combines Reformed congregations within the ambits of usually Lutheran member churches, which themselves do not include the eventual local Reformed congregations. Thus, for example, a Lutheran moving from a place where their parish belongs to a Lutheran member church, would be accepted in their new place of domicile by
SECTION 50
#17329247306844524-400: The arms is modelled on the Weilmünster Evangelical church. The golden lion with the seven billets was the coat of arms borne by the former Duchy of Nassau. It is known that today's arms were already borne shortly after the Thirty Years' War as an official seal. The community's flag has two coloured stripes in orange and blue, alternating at a point one third the way down the flag, which has
4611-423: The communities of Villmar and Weinbach (all three in Limburg-Weilburg). Weilmünster's main centre, also called Weilmünster (3,543 residents in 2021), is the biggest of the constituent communities in this community of roughly 9,000 inhabitants, to which a further eleven centres belong. The other Ortsteile (with 2021 population) are: Until about 150 years ago, Heinzenberg, which now belongs to Grävenwiesbach,
4698-482: The community's three yearly markets, the Frühlingsmarkt (“Spring Market”, held in March), the Bauernmarkt (“Farmers’ Market”) and the Martinimarkt . Moreover, sporting events such as the Weiltal-Marathon in April, and the autofreie Weiltal (“carfree Weil valley”, held on a Sunday in August) keep drawing visitors to the community, as is also the case with the Weiltalweg and the new recreational vehicle campsite. Other events include: Taunus The Taunus
4785-432: The course of the Variscan Orogonese foliated , scaled and in the southwest-northeast strike saddles and troughs folded. The folds are predominantly northwestvergent . Widespread to the northwest, the rock series were thrust onto younger ones. Thus, at the fault zone of the Taunuskamm overthrust , the entire length of the southern Taunus nappe-like was thrust over rocks of the Younger Lower Devonian. The overthrust of
4872-424: The decisions of the first National Synod , via their unambiguous partisanship in successfully backing Ludwig Müller for the office of Reich bishop. He did not manage, however, to prevail over the Landeskirchen in the long term. The Confessing Church arose in resistance to the Nazi regime's ideology. After the installation of Hanns Kerrl as minister for church matters in a Führer-directive of 16 July 1935 and
4959-425: The execution of these tasks, the Church has the following governing bodies, all organised and elected on democratic lines: The Synod is the legislature of the EKD. It has 126 members: 106 elected by Landeskirchen synods and 20 appointed by the council. These 20 are appointed for their importance in the life of the Church and its agencies. Members serve six year terms and the synod meets annually. The EKD Council
5046-426: The face of atrocities committed by Hitler's regime. In 1948, the Protestant Church in Germany was organized in the aftermath of World War II to function as a new umbrella organization for German Protestant churches. As a result of tensions between West and East Germany , the regional churches in East Germany broke away from the EKD in 1969. In 1991, following German reunification , the East German churches re-joined
5133-619: The facility's staff for having taken part in the Nazi murder of the sick were suspended in 1953. The old community of Weilmünster in the former district of the Oberlahnkreis was merged in the 1970s with other communities into the greater community of Weilmünster. Of today's constituent communities, Möttau had its first documentary mention in 802, Laubuseschbach in 897, Wolfenhausen in 1194, Essershausen in 1233, Lützendorf in 1234, Dietenhausen in 1301, Ernsthausen in 1309, Laimbach in 1344, Langenbach in 1335, Rohnstadt in 1355 and Aulenhausen in 1565. The municipal election held on 14 March 2021 yielded
5220-533: The federation are located in Herrenhausen , Hanover , Lower Saxony . Many of its members consider themselves Lutherans. Historically, the first formal attempt to unify German Protestantism occurred during the Weimar Republic era in the form of the German Protestant Church Confederation , which existed from 1922 until 1933. Earlier, there had been successful royal efforts at unity in various German states, beginning with Prussia and several minor German states (e.g. Duchy of Nassau ) in 1817. These unions resulted in
5307-416: The first united and uniting churches, a new development within Protestantism which later spread to other parts of the world. When Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933, his administration tried to reorganize the old confederation into a unified German Evangelical Church as Hitler wanted to use a single Protestant church to further his own ambitions. However, a division emerged between the Reichskirche , led by
SECTION 60
#17329247306845394-443: The following results: The community's arms in their current form were conferred on 1 July 1935 by the Chief President ( Oberpräsident ) of the Province of Hesse-Nassau and on 30 September 1983 they were confirmed by the Hessian Minister of the Interior. At the same time, through a separate document, the community of Weilmünster (Oberlahnkreis) was granted the right to bear the title Marktflecken (“Market Community”). The church in
5481-464: The foundation of the – in the end not materialising – Protestant Reich Church , the DEK played more or less no further role. In 1948, freed from the German Christians' influence, the Lutheran, Reformed (including the German Reformed Church / Reformierte Kirche ) and United churches came together as the Protestant Church in Germany at the Conference of Eisenach. In 1969, the regional Protestant churches in East Germany and East Berlin broke away from
5568-406: The locally competent congregation within another member church, even if this church and its local parish are Reformed or of united Protestant confession, with Lutheran being exchangeable with the two other respective Protestant confessions within the EKD. This is due to full altar and pulpit fellowship between all EKD member churches. In this the ambits of the member churches resemble dioceses of
5655-403: The mostly shallow and fertile soils , which developed from acidic rock , there is mainly forest here. The Vortaunus is more inconsistent than the main ridge, it is morphologically more fragmented and the bays of the foothills divide it more. Hintertaunus is the name given to the area north of the Hoher Taunus up to the Lahn valley . The landscape here is lower and less mountainous than in
5742-407: The northeast, Limburg (25 km) to the west and Frankfurt am Main (50 km) to the southeast. Weilmünster borders in the north on the towns of Weilburg (Limburg-Weilburg) and Braunfels , in the east on the community of Waldsolms (both in the Lahn-Dill-Kreis ), in the south on the communities of Grävenwiesbach , Weilrod (both in the Hochtaunuskreis ) and Selters and in the west on
5829-449: The old-Prussian Union assumed independence as a consequence of the estrangement among them during the Nazi struggle of the churches . This turned the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union into a mere umbrella, being itself a member of EKD (and the BEK, 1969–1991) but covering some regional church bodies, which were again themselves members of EKD (and the BEK, 1969–1991). Since 1973, when many Protestant churches in Europe, including
5916-488: The ownership of the Buderus firm when it was founded, and until 1930 it was one of the firm's most important locations. During Nazi Germany , the mentally ill and handicapped of the 1897 Landesheil- und Pflegeanstalt Weilmünster (English: State Medical and Care Facility ) were forcibly sterilized and systematically underfed or killed with drug overdoses. From 1937 to 1945, more than 6,000 people died there, among them all Jewish patients. Preliminary proceedings against
6003-416: The part of the Lahnmulde that belongs to the Taunus. In addition, there are countless smaller quarries to supply the local population with building blocks. The Roman Limes was built across the Taunus. The Saalburg , a restored Roman castellum, now houses a museum. After the fall of the Limes (in 259/260 AD), the Alamanni settled in the range and for this reason there are some Alemannic cemeteries in
6090-408: The pro-government German Christians , and the Confessing Church , which opposed state control of the church. Other Protestant churches aligned themselves with one of these groups, or stayed neutral in this church strife. The postwar church council issued the Stuttgart Declaration of Guilt on 19 October 1945, confessing guilt and declaring remorse for indifference and inaction of German Protestants in
6177-501: The proportions 5:2. The point where the colours alternate is overlaid with the community's coat of arms. The colours recall the colours flown by the former Duchy of Nassau. [REDACTED] Le Cheylard , Ardèche , France since 1963. Since 1963 the market town Weilmünster is associated with the southern French municipality of Le Cheylard. However, the first contacts between representatives of both municipalities go back till 1959. At that time many towns and municipalities tried to make
6264-462: The residents, 540 (6.0%) were foreigners, of whom 148 came from other EU countries, 314 from other European countries and 81 from other countries. By 2020, the share of foreigners had increased to 8.9%. In 2011 5,329 residents were Protestants (59.0%), 1,479 were Catholics (16.3%) and 2,230 were others (24.7%). Weilmünster lies on Bundesstraße 456 on which Weilburg and Bad Homburg vor der Höhe can be reached. The distance to Frankfurt Airport
6351-574: The sandy rocks of the Singhofen layers, in the east, rocks in the Facies of the Hunsrück slate recede. Transposed volcanic tuffes and ashes , the so-called porphyroides , are integrated into the Singhofen layers, they can be traced in some cases over several tens of kilometers. The Middle Devonian to Lower Carboniferous of the Usinger Mulde is only about 250 m thick and strongly tectonically disturbed, in
6438-414: The southern Taunus. Between the valleys, some of which are quite deep, there are pronounced plateaus (leveled areas) with heavy agricultural use. Since mostly only the slopes of the valley are forested, the Hintertaunus is generally more open. The landscape of the Hintertaunus is more inconsistent because of its different elevations. This is clearly evident in the eastern Hintertaunus. Here, for example, there
6525-535: The southern foothills of the Taunus ( Eschborn ). This area of the Taunus became part of the Frankish confederation of Germanic tribes after the Battle of Tolbiac around 500 AD. In past centuries the Taunus became famous among aristocrats for its therapeutic hot springs . Certain towns in the area, such as Bad Homburg vor der Höhe with its Kurpark , have geothermal spas that were formerly renowned. Other spa towns in
6612-637: The states of the Holy Roman Empire and successor forms of German statehood (to the most part 1815 borders ), due to the historically close relationship between individual German states and churches. As for church governance, the Lutheran churches typically practise an episcopal polity , while the Reformed and the United ones a mixture of presbyterian and congregationalist polities. Most member churches are led by
6699-728: The term. From the Peace of Augsburg in 1555 to the end of the First World War and the collapse of the German Empire , some Protestant churches were state churches . Each Landeskirche (state or regional church) was the official church of one of the states of Germany , while the respective ruler was the church's formal head (e.g. the King of Prussia headed the Evangelical Church of Prussia's older Provinces as supreme governor), similar to
6786-466: The territories of the member churches today reflect Germany's political organisation in the year 1848, with regional churches for states or provinces that often no longer exist or whose borders changed since. For example, between 1945 and 1948, the remaining six ecclesiastical provinces ( Kirchenprovinzen ), each territorially comprising one of the Old Prussia provinces , within the Evangelical Church of
6873-634: The union was confirmed and renewed since 1963 first in 5/30/2003 in Le Cheylard and in 5/21/2004 in Weilmünster with big participation of the population in attractive ceremonies. The official local committees can support and promote, but the partnership remains vividly only if many citizens are interested in our twin town in future. According to the 2011 census, 9,038 residents lived in Weilmünster on May 9, 2011. According to age, 1,560 residents were under 18 years of age, 3,648 were between 18 and 49, 2013 were between 50 and 64, and 1,815 residents were older. Among
6960-533: The use of this term alongside Christian . The German term evangelisch corresponds to the broad English category of Protestant rather than to the narrower evangelical movement (in German called evangelikal ), a subset of Protestantism distinct from the mainline . English speaking churches such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada likewise retain this use of
7047-865: The victims is 11 years. Confessions of EKD parishioners Protestantism is the major religion in Northern , Eastern and Middle Germany , with the Reformed branch predominating in the extreme northwest and Lippe , the Lutheran branch in the north and south, and the United branch in Middle and Western Germany . While the majority of Christians in Southern Germany are Catholic , some areas in Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria are predominantly Protestant, e.g. Middle Franconia and
7134-581: The western Hunsrück . In the north, the valley of the Lahn (Giessen-Koblenzer Lahntal ) with the Limburg Basin forms a very sharp scenic border to the northern Westerwald . In the east, the Giessen Basin (southernmost part of the West Hessian Uplands ) with Dießenbach and Kleebach border to the north, the Wetterau with Wetter and Nidda to the south of the slate mountains; in the south,
7221-484: The work of the EKD. The Church Office is the administration of the EKD and shall the business of the Synod, Council and Conference of the EKD. Main divisions : The EKD Church Office has approximately 200 employees. The EKD holds various charities ("Hilfswerke") under its auspices. The Gustav-Adolf-Werk (GAW) (Gustaphus Adolphus Union formerly) was founded 1832 in Leipzig as the first and eldest such organization and
7308-591: Was a federation of independent bodies, the Church Union's work was limited to foreign missions and relations with Protestant churches outside Germany, especially German Protestants in other countries. In July 1933, the German Evangelical Church ( Deutsche Evangelische Kirche , DEK) was formed under the influence of the German Christians , a pro- Nazi religious movement. They had much influence over
7395-522: Was also one of Weilmünster's constituent communities. In 1217, Weilmünster had its first documentary mention as Wilmunstre . It was, however, by this time already a sizeable village with its own church. History hints that the Fulda Monastery , which had holdings in the village, had this church built sometime in the 9th century. The church that stands today was built in the early 16th century, and its square defensive tower sometime around 1300. As of 1601,
7482-665: Was impossible and that any union would need a federal model. The churches met in Dresden in 1919 and created a plan for federation, and this plan was adopted in 1921 at Stuttgart . Then in 1922 the then 28 territorially defined Protestant churches founded the German Evangelical Church Confederation ( Deutscher Evangelischer Kirchenbund , DEK). At the time, the federation was the largest Protestant church federation in Europe with around 40 million members. Because it
7569-465: Was short-lived. While the road through the Lahn valley was expanded and the Lahn was channelled, Weilmünster, which lay off these arteries, fell behind. The building of the Weilstraße (“Weil Road”) in 1860 came too late, and the railway only reached Weilmünster in 1908. In 1421, there was a forest smithy in Audenschmiede. It developed itself into a nationally important smithy that, in 1798 passed into
#683316