Mission History

Silesian Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession

The origins of the Silesian Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in the Czech Republic go back to the Reformation. Students studying in Wittenberg brought the ideas of Lutheranism to Silesia. The duke of Silesia favoured the Reformation. After the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) and the Counter Reformation, the church continued to exist illegally in the mountains. It endured two centuries of repression.

During Luther’s time, the principles and practices of Lutheranism started to spread over Tesin Silesia, a mountainous area in the northwest corner of the Czech Republic. Since 1610 it was subject to the Counter Reformation.

Beginning in 1524, Lutheran teachings started to spread through the Tesin Silesia region of what is now the Czech Republic. With the support of Vaclav Adam, a prince of the Piast House from Tesin, the Evangelical Church in the region developed and thrived. In 1690, the Counter Reformation moved into the region, seized all Lutheran churches, prohibited worship, and expelled pastors from the country. This lasted for half a century, during which time the followers gathered in the mountains and forests to worship secretly. After the Toleration Act of 1781, construction of churches began anew.

Even in modern times, religious freedom was slow to come. During the 20th century the Silesian Evangelical Church passed through five stages of identity: up to 1918 it was part of the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in Austria; from 1918 to 1920 it belonged to the Lutheran Church in the new Poland; from 1920 to 1938 it was autonomous within the new Czechoslovakian Republic; from 1940 to 1945 it was part of the Evangelical Union Church in Breslau. After the war, it finally became officially recognized as an equal among the other churches in the CSSR.