| has gloss | eng: Gods Acre (German Gottesacker, lit. Field of God) is an ancient Germanic designation for a burial ground. It has become the traditional name given to the graveyards of Congregations of the Moravian Church. The first Moravian Gods Acre was begun in 1730 on the western slope of the Hutberg (Hill of Watching) at Herrnhut Saxony in Germany, the Moravian Mother Congregation. As the Moravian Church spread around the world, they laid out their graveyards on hilltops, calling them Hutberg and naming the graveyard Gods Acre.The name comes from the belief that the bodies of the dead are "sown as seed" in Gods Acre, as in a field, so that they can rise again when Jesus Christ returns to the world. God's Acre is not literally one acre in size; many are larger or smaller. |
