St. Ludgerus Church

The Old Church on the Markt, officially the Protestant-Reformed Church of St. Ludgerus, is, together with the Frenswegen monastery, the oldest monument in Nordhorn in Lower Saxony.

The old church was preceded by a mission church of Saint Ludgerus. The present church was consecrated on 6 June 1445. Until the Reformation, the church building belonged to the Catholic diocese of Münster, but the county of Bentheim joined the Lutheran doctrine in 1544 under Count Arnold I. His successor, Count Everwijn, was relatively indifferent from a religious point of view, but his wife Anna was a strict religious Protestant. After the death of Count Everwijn, Anna became regent in 1562 and her son Arnold II went to the University of Strasbourg, where he came into contact with the teachings of Calvin. Probably out of respect for his Lutheran mother, he waited until after her death to introduce the Calvinist doctrine in the county. In accordance with the Calvinist interpretation of the second of the Ten Commandments, after the introduction of Calvinism in the county in 1588, all statues and images were removed from the churches and burned in Neuenhaus. Finally, in 1614, the frescoes of the apostles were painted over in the Ludgerus Church.

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