Our History

The Beginning

Our church history began in the 1960's as a prayer group which was led by Thelma Treml, an American lady, whose father was a pastor. On marrying an Austrian and coming to live in Salzburg, she felt the need to offer spiritual nourishment in English. As an active

member of the Lutheran Church in Salzburg, she led a Bible study every Sunday throughout the year and a small English service every other week on Saturday, at which she preached. She also felt that social time after worship was essential and started the custom of coffee time hospitality on Saturdays and Sundays. At that time visiting British pastors came to preach in the church during the summer months, for tourists and ex-pats.

Establishing a church

As this community grew, the need for a permanent pastor was felt and in 2001 Lutheran Pastor Richard Solberg and his wife Valeria responded to the call. They spent five years with us, during which time our congregation grew steadily and the process of becoming the Salzburg International Christian Fellowship (S.I.C.F.) as a fully recognized church began. A constitution was negotiated successfully with the National Austrian Lutheran Church which granted to us the status of an International „Personalgemeinde“ with theological affiliation but financial independence. Since 2006 we have been blessed with several different retired pastors from English speaking countries who came to minister to us for a couple of years.