August Pieper (theologian)
August Pieper ( born March 14, 1866 in Mountain Evers, now part of Meschede, † September 25, 1942 in Paderborn, Germany ) was a German theologian and Association Chairman of the People's Association for Catholic Germany.
Life and work
Pieper was born as the first of thirteen children of a smallholder's family. One of his brothers was the priest and early National Socialist Lorenz Pieper. After graduating he put in Rome from a double doctorate in theology and philosophy. Since 1890, he devoted himself in Bochum as a chaplain in particular the pastoral care of the laboring population. He was an employee of Franz heat in the People's Association for Catholic Germany. As its director, he developed the organization in the federation headquarters in Mönchengladbach. It developed also a printing and publishing. Under his leadership, the People's Union by 1914 developed into the largest Catholic social organization in the world with over 800,000 members.
Operation of the club initially mainly anti- Socialist propaganda, he sat under the direction of Pieper more and more for the equality of workers and was in the Catholic milieu to a proponent of practical social work. In this context, he advocated against fierce opposition in the so-called union dispute for the Christian Trade Unions. For the practical work of the organization was one of the national dissemination of scientific and other knowledge in brochures and courses. Numerous officials of the Christian trade unions as Jakob Kaiser and Karl Arnold owed the club basic knowledge.
Pieper represented from 1907 to 1918 the constituency Cologne - land for the Centre Party in the Prussian Chamber of Deputies and from 1907 to 1918 the constituency Krefeld in the German Reichstag.
After the First World War, care religious and moral forces became more important than supporting pillars of a new political and economic order for the beeper. For this and other reasons he joined in 1918 as Director General of the People's Association back. This was also reflected in the work of the People's Association. Already in the 1920s lost this importance and after 1933 was smashed by the Nazis. Pieper still trying to act as an author of a Catholic weekly paper in Paderborn on social Catholicism and died alone in 1942.
Writings (selection )
- Public education efforts - your need and their agents. Mönchengladbach, 1899.
- Sociale Conferenzen among the clergy - your organization and activity; With e Anh: Recommended fonts f sociale Praesides and teaching courses in workers and journeymen associations. Mönchengladbach, 1902
- Servant question and servants clubs. Mönchengladbach, 1908.
- Democratic demands and German freedom. Mönchengladbach, 1918.
- From the workers' movement to the working class. Mönchengladbach, 1920.
- The German nation state and the form of democracy. Mönchengladbach, 1923
- The idea of the state of the German nation. Mönchengladbach, 1929