The Monday Night Prayers of Leipzig

In the autumn of 1989, the Christians of St. Nicholas Church in Leipzig, East Germany, had been praying every Monday evening for six years. What began in 1982 as a small peace prayer service had swelled into something the Stasi could not contain. Pastor Christian Führer opened the doors each week to anyone who would come — ten people, then fifty, then hundreds, then thousands.

They were not sophisticated revolutionaries. They were ordinary believers, kneeling under vaulted ceilings, pleading with the Almighty to act. For years, nothing visible changed. The Wall still stood. The secret police still watched. Neighbors still disappeared. Yet they kept praying the ancient prayer of Isaiah: "Oh, that You would rend the heavens and come down."

By October 9, 1989, seventy thousand people filled the streets of Leipzig after the Monday prayer service, carrying candles in the darkness. The government had positioned troops. Everyone expected bloodshed. Instead, not a single shot was fired. One month later, the Berlin Wall crumbled.

A Communist official later admitted, "We were prepared for everything — except candles and prayers."