Johannes Gossner

Johannes Evangelista Gossner (14 December 1773 – 20 March 1858), German divine and philanthropist, was born at Hausen near Augsburg. He was educated at the University of Dillingen. He, like Martin Boos and others, came under the spell of the Evngelical movement promoted by Johann Michael Sailer, the professor of pastoral theology. After taking priests' orders, Gossner held livings at Dirlewang (1804-1811) and Munich (1811-1817), but his evangelical tendencies brought about his dismissal and in 1826 he formally left the Roman Catholic for the Protestant communion. As Reformed (Calvinist) minister of Bethlehem's Church (1829-1846), a Lutheran and Reformed simultaneum in Berlin, he was conspicuous not only for practical and effective preaching, but for the founding of schools, asylums and missionary agencies. Lives of Gossner have been written by Bethmann Hollweg (Berlin, 1858) and Hermann Dalton (Berlin, 1878).