Obituary for Prof. Dr. Richard Schlüter

The Department of Catholic Theology at the University of Siegen mourns the passing of Prof. Dr. Richard Schlüter, who died on October 3, 2026. Born in 1943, Schlüter studied philosophy and Catholic theology in Frankfurt, Tübingen, and Münster. In 1985, he became a professor of religious education at the University of Siegen, where he also served as dean of Faculty I from 1995 to 1998. From 1994 to 1998, Schlüter also served as chair of the Working Group on Catholic Religious Education and Catechetics. In 2006, Richard Schlüter was forced to step down from his professorship at Siegen due to illness, but he never lost his interest in academia, as evidenced, for example, by his enrollment as a non-degree student in the medical program at Münster.

Richard Schlüter’s theological focus and passion was the ecumenical movement. Setting aside its theological aspirations, one could understand the ecumenical movement within Christianity as a grand exercise in peacefully and peace-promoting engagement with profound conflicts of conviction, which in the past were often resolved through deadly violence. As a Catholic Christian and theologian, one of Schlüter’s strongest motivations was to contribute to this project to the best of his ability within his field of expertise, religious education. He chose to focus on religious education, which he sought to rethink in numerous publications. This initially meant the necessity of critically engaging with the then-prevailing concepts of religious education and, above all, with the principle of denominationalism. With great foresight, he saw the future of religious education in shared ecumenical learning, which for him also meant that there needed to be denominational agreement on the curriculum, the teaching staff, and the student body. Considering the current dynamics in the design of this subject, Richard Schlüter had already, in the last decade of the last millennium, identified the issues that shape the current discussion regarding the structure of religious education. 

Just how far ahead of his time Schlüter’s ideas were became evident when he was appointed to the Siegen Chair of Religious Education in 1985. Obtaining the necessary church teaching license was by no means a foregone conclusion due to his criticism of the official church’s opposition to ecumenical religious education. In his view, this resistance was coming into ever sharper conflict with the results of theological dialogue among the churches, and not least with the realities of church and social life. Keeping a constant eye on the discussions in Protestant religious education and within the framework of the World Council of Churches in Geneva regarding ecumenical education, education and training—and especially the idea of ecumenical learning—Schlüter developed a concept of religious education that was increasingly oriented toward the survival needs of global society and the potential contribution of the churches to justice, peace, and the preservation of creation. This reorientation inevitably altered the significance of traditional theological controversies, which had served as the basis for the formation of denominational identity in both the individual and societal spheres. For Schlüter, this required more than just ecumenical openness in denominational consciousness; it demanded a transformation of that consciousness, through which denominational uniformity gives way to denominational plurality. Without a willingness to undergo a comprehensive transformation of identity—grounded in theology and spirituality—Christian ecumenism would remain limited to the exchange of pleasantries and the ritualized invocation of community rather than lived community. Schlüter’s work in research and teaching was dedicated to the ecumenical crisis unfolding in the midst of a conflict-ridden, fractured, and threatened world. 

With the passing of Richard Schlüter, we lose a religious educator who, at a time when ecumenical theology still entailed great personal risk in terms of church politics, courageously and consistently stood up for his convictions. The fact that he nevertheless received his church teaching license speaks to the moderation and wisdom with which Schlüter advocated his ideas. We will remember him as a far-sighted theologian and an ever-loyal colleague.

Heinz-Günter Stobbe & Ulrich Riegel