Anton Hellinger (16 December 1925 – 19 September 2019), known as Bert Hellinger, was a German psychotherapist associated with a therapeutic method best known as Family Constellations and Systemic Constellations. In recent years, his work evolved beyond these formats into what he called Movements of the Spirit-Mind. Several thousand professional practitioners worldwide, influenced by Hellinger, but not necessarily following him, continue to apply and adapt his original insights to a broad range of personal, organizational and political applications. Life Anton Hellinger was born into a Catholic family in Leimen, Baden, Germany, in 1925. Hellinger stated that his parents' "particular form of Catholic faith provided the entire family with immunity against believing the distortions of National Socialism." At age 10, he left his family to attend a Catholic convent school run by the Order of the Jesuits in which he was later ordained and that sent him to South Africa as a missionary. The local Hitler Youth Organization tried without success to recruit the teenage Bert Hellinger. This resulted in his being classified as 'Suspected of Being an Enemy of the People' In 1942, Hellinger was conscripted into the German army. He saw combat on the Western front. In 1945, he was captured and imprisoned in an Allied P.O.W. camp in Belgium. After escaping from the P.O.W. camp, Hellinger made his way back to Germany. Hellinger entered the Jesuits (Society of Jesus), a Catholic religious order, taking the religious name Suitbert, which is the source of his first name "Bert". He studied philosophy and theology at the University of Würzburg en route to his ordination as a priest. In the early 1950s, he was dispatched to South Africa where he was assigned to be a missionary to the Zulus. There he continued his studies at the University of Pietermaritzburg and the University of South Africa where he received a B.A. and a University Education Diploma, which entitled him to teach at public high schools. Hellinger lived in South Africa for 16 years. During these years he served as a parish priest, teacher and, finally, as headmaster of a large school. He also had administrative responsibility for the entire diocesan district containing 150 schools. He became fluent in the Zulu language, participated in Zulu rituals, and gained an appreciation for the Zulu worldview. His participation in a series of interracial, ecumenical training in group dynamics led by Anglican clergy in South Africa