Press reviews of former times, Germany
"Das Neue Blatt", dated 9.5.1957

"Bruno Groening - His word banishes illness" (1st issue)

Documentary report / Dr. Horst Mann

This must be made perfectly clear at the outset: It does not concern the person Bruno Groening. The magazine "Das Neue Blatt" does not want to join the choir of those, who effusively praise him as a healer or accuse him as a charlatan. Our task was: to investigate the healings of Bruno Groening - critically and incorruptibly, the aim being to finally find the truth. Because all suffering people are entitled to this truth.

The "Das Neue Blatt" thus opens up an exciting chapter in our immediate time. Then these are the facts:

• For more than ten years Bruno Groening has achieved provable healings. The number is not assessable. It runs into the thousands.
• This man appeared in court .several times because of the methods. They had to acquit him. With confidence he is now awaiting a new and very controversial court case.
• There are Groening Communities all over Germany. Their members look full of respect at this man, who not only gave them healing but also spiritual support.

The "Das Neue Blatt" talked with these people. We critically investigated the therapeutical results. We questioned physicians and scientists and we spoke with Bruno Groening himself. He voluntarily made material avaible to us that had not been avaible to anybody before.

The following took place on November 27th 1953 in the small village Ostenfeld, 14 kilometres east of Husum: heavy excitement was in the air of the room of the village inn. It grasped like iron clamps at the hearts of the people, who sat closely packed on benches and rows of chairs. It might have been a hundred, perhaps about a hundred and fifty.

They had come from Ostenfeld and from the neighbouring villages between Rendsburg, Schleswig, Husum and Kappeln. Word had quickly spread: Bruno Groening has arrived! He is said to have again healed sick people. Perhaps he could help me too, or the father with gout, or the child, that was so frail and at whom the doctor only shrugged his shoulders. These might have been the thoughts of the people who had assembled here tonight.

The dim light had difficulty in spreading through the room. It shone on faces full of expectation and belief. But it was also reflected in the eyes of sceptical and curious people. They did not expect anything special. They only wanted to be present in order to be able to take part in conversation in those long winter evenings of the year 1954. So little happened in these villages. The conversations were always about the same topics: weather, harvest, cattle and - illness. Yes, and everybody could eventually become ill - perhaps Bruno Groening might show a way out.

The murmuring of the voices broke against the ceiling of the overcrowded room and pushed the haze of smoke apart. Some had clenched hands as if praying.The others were cracking jokes to release their inner tension. Others took care of their sick relatives.

Only in the last row was it very silent. Here was a seriously sick person, who had been carried in. The pains tormented him so mercilessly, that he was not even able to sit. Blankets had been placed on the floor as a bed for him. People knew him. He was the farmer Thies Paasch from Norby. They also knew his cruel fate, the pains which held him prisoner and sometimes forced him to stay in bed for weeks.

Suddenly the murmuring stopped. Bruno Groening entered the hall. He appeared small with his height of almost 170 centimetres, almost fragile, as he walked towards a low platform with quick steps. His clothes were like his photos. Remarkable was only his massive head with the mop of curled hair und the big shining eyes, which were really burning in his lean and pale face.

And then everything was different to that which they had expected, those who had come because of curiousity or out of sheer sensation.

"My dear friends!" Groening addressed the assembly. And this voice was soft, melodic without drama or emotion. And the voice did not speak about the healings and the miracles which had been achieved by its owner. Neither did the voice commend nor praise him as the Messiah risen again to save the desparing people. He spoke about belief and its power. He spoke with simple words, which were understood, taken in and assimilated by everybody. He spoke in a figurative way and drew comparisons, but did not paint in loud colours and events.

He might have been talking for almost an hour. Nobody was watching the clock or did not feel involved. Then he turned to the individual listeners.

"Did you feel something?" he asked. The answers came quietly, slowly or with joy and affirmation. Some held balls, out of tinfoil in their cramped hands. The balls had been handed out before and the people reported of a peculiar feeling of warmth.The others spoke of a shaking or of painful jerks. Some others shook their heads with negation. Some wanted to tell their medical history. But the man in the dark silk shirt and the huge necktie knot was not always an attentive listener. Sometimes he interrupted them, almost brusquely: "I do not treat illnesses! Illness is disorder. Establish order with yourself and God and healing won‘t fail to come. Let us just talk about something good. Do you feel well in our circle!"

Bruno Groening went from table to table, from chair to chair. Then he turned away.

A call from the last row stopped his step. "Mr. Groening, you have forgotten somebody." That was the mayor and district administrator of the municipality Owschlag who had risen up now and was pointing to Thies Paasch, who was lying on the floor behind him.

Groening approached the sick man, bent down and asked the question he had also asked the other listeners: "Did you feel something during the session?"

The man who had been forced to the floor by his pains, nodded his head. "Yes", he then said. "I suddenly felt very hot. Only half my left leg remained ice-cold. And after that there was a tingling in my right hand."

Groening nodded. Nothing more. No motion, no consolation, no hint. With rapid steps he crossed the hall.

Then somebody in the midst of the spectators shouted: "We thank Mr. Groening by rising from our seats! "Chair legs were scraping, tables were being moved.

And then the unbelievable happened. Thies Paasch rose. He got up like all the other healthy persons.Suddenly his face was as if freed. He refused the help of his neighbours with both hands. He wanted to make it on his own. And he made it, without any difficulties, any effort and without any pain.

He stood upright and looked laughingly, almost triumphantly at the concerned faces of the people around him. Then he walked towards the bar with sure steps . "A brandy, Landlord" he ordered. He almost screamed in a voice filled with shock, hope, jubilation: "A brandy, Landlord!"

Norby, 18th of April 1957

In front of me I have a folder full of thank you letters to Bruno Groening. It contains 58 medical reports from people who all regarded this man as their healer and saviour from serious diseases. They came from a small district, from Ostenfeld and the neighbouring villages. The reports cover the time from Winter 1953 to Spring 1954. They have been written by farmers, housewives, drivers, bricklayers and other craftsmen. They also tell of wonderful healings of children.

My intellect does not want to believe what my eyes read. It is just unbelievable. The people enumerate their diseaseses, they report of heart- and blood circulation defects, rheumatism, varicose veins, open wounds, headaches, skin rashes, thrombosis, inflammation of the hip joints, obesity, paralysis, skin indurations, damaged discs, complaints of the gall bladder and tuberculosis. A cruel list of illnesses- which all shall have been healed by Bruno Groening.

I hesitate. My eyes are caught by the name of Thies Paasch, that man who, almost three years ago after a lesson of Bruno Groening, suddenly got up and felt healed. I read:

Thies Paasch, Norby

What has become of this man? Has this spontanous healing really proved to be a permanent one? Is it in fact a miraculous healing or was the source of pain only dried up by the power of the moment, the belief suddenly raised by Bruno Groening, and did it come back again perhaps even more intensively?

A few hours later I am sitting in the parlour of a farmhouse in Norby face to face with him. A fresh, cheerful man, he could just as well be 40 as 50 years old. He has just returned from Husum by train and bicycle, where he attended a driving school.

He talks freely. His first statement already saves my question, as to whether the healing has continued. "From the bottom of my heart I am grateful to Mr. Groening. It is due to him, that I like to do my work again and that I am healthy."

Thies Paasch has every reason for that. When he once more recounted the time of his suffering I realized the complete seriousness of his illness. He had left no stone unturned at that time after his first collapse during the war. That rheumatism had been increasing. A spinal curvature appeared. His doctors could only give relief by injections.

"At that time I did not see a way out." remarked Thies Paasch. "I had to face too many painful setbacks. When the name Bruno Groening had then been mentioned I knew and felt: Only he will be able to save me! This I believed while being carried into the car to go to Ostenfeld and while suppressing my pains."

"Have you been to see the doctor again? "I asked the tanned farmer, who meanwhile energetically goes about his really not easy work again.

Thies Paasch started laughing. "Why should I do that?" is his counterquestion. "I just feel healthy, absolutely healthy!"

Nevertheless I later on asked a doctor, who had been treating him with injections for a longer period of time. "That is right", he said. "Mr. Paasch had been ill. Among other things he had a neuralgia. To be healed he needed a powerful impulse. This might have been given to him by Groening.

My curiousity was caught. Was this case an exceptional case, an isolated success? I went to see other patients- and experienced new surprises. This I am going to report about next week.