For the past ten years, the Herrnhut Star has been fixed to the bell tower of Dionysius Parish Church during Advent. It is visible from afar in the dark because it is illuminated from the inside. This year, by the way, for the first time with energy-saving lights.
The star is named after the Moravian Church of the Brethren, which has its headquarters in Herrnhut in Upper Lusatia, a place founded by the descendants of the Evangelical Moravian Brethren on June 17, 1722. Refugees of faith from Bohemia and Moravia had found refuge there. In 1727 they founded the Renewed Brethren Unity to establish a new Christian community.
Five years later, missionary work began, while their children were sent to boarding schools, such as the Boys’ and Girls’ Institution in the colony of Kleinwelka or the Pädagogium in Niesky. The first Herrnhut stars were created there. When the Unity Boys’ Institution there celebrated its fiftieth anniversary in 1821, an illuminated star with 110 points floated in the courtyard. It didn’t hang during Advent, either, because the anniversary celebration took place from January 4 to 6, the Feast of Epiphany. While other churches displayed nativity scenes, this Star of Bethlehem fit into the plain, white halls of the Brüdergemeinde. Later, the star was also made in the boarding schools in Neuwied, Königsfeld in the Black Forest and Kleinwelka and hung up for the first Advent. The first stars bore the colors white and red – white for purity and red for the blood of Jesus Christ. (Wikipedia)