“God will have thought of something”

adminonNovember 2, 2021January 5, 2022Leave a Comment

Jens Spahn at the Catholic Day in Munster 2018 © Rolf Vennenbernd

He was an altar boy, went to an Episcopal school and is a Catholic. And Jens Spahn would also have liked to become CDU chairman. An interview about faith, dealing with disappointment and the "meddling" of the official church in politics.

Interviewer: How great was the disappointment after the election results for the CDU party chairmanship??

Jens Spahn (Federal Minister of Health and CDU politician): I started out to win. We humans always find it nicer to win than to lose. At the same time I have seen the polls and could read the mood. There I was somehow already prepared for it.

Nevertheless, it was important to me to make this offer, this candidacy, to take on responsibility from the younger generation and to set my own themes. That has been done quite well in this trial. Overall, this has done the party good. That's why I'm at peace with myself.

Interviewer: You say of yourself that you are a convinced Catholic. Does faith help you in such situations of disappointment??

Spahn: Yes. In any case, it makes me more relaxed in all situations in life, even if one makes a small mistake or has a slip of the tongue. We humans have strengths and weaknesses. We make mistakes. We sometimes let ourselves be tempted. Knowing that you are always in someone's hands and that you are accepted as such, even with your weaknesses, is rearing. For me, being Catholic, especially in connection with politics, is above all a question of attitude, which also gives inner peace.

Interviewer: Do you feel safe in your church, when your church calls homosexuality a sin, for example, and thus rejects and condemns your own personal life model??

Spahn: I have known this for a few years as well. I always say to myself: The good Lord must have thought of something that I am the way I am. That is the decisive part for me, to be at peace with myself, my faith and my God, so to speak.

I take note of the statements I read these days from the Catholic Church, in part also from the pope. Sometimes I also wonder. But I also don't feel like getting upset about it anymore.

Interviewer: On which political ies are you guided by your faith?? Find concrete examples?

Spahn: There are seldom points where it really becomes very concrete. I don't think I can derive a Hartz IV rate from faith. So how high should it be. Whether five euros more or less.

But when it comes to the protection of life – these are, of course, ies that also concern me in the Ministry of Health – then it becomes very, very fundamental. And then I am also a Catholic.

I don't think we as human beings should define when life begins and how life is worth living. Every life has its right and its dignity and is worth living. We should not somehow get to the point – see euthanasia – of defining when life is no longer worth living. The moment a person presumes to want to define it, he plays God. This quickly creates an imbalance.

Interviewer: That is, that's where you bring the conviction from your faith into politics with you. Nevertheless, you wrote an article some time ago criticizing bishops who speak out on factual ies of the day's politics. Why?

Spahn: Because I think that sometimes the official church and the official representatives have to be careful that it's still about church and not that it's just another social association. Caritas is doing its work and so are many other Catholic associations. I myself am very involved in the KJG (Catholic Young Community). d. Red.) and in the BDKJ (Federation of German Catholic Youth, note. d. Red.) been. But when it comes to the church, to pastoral care and to faith, this is the decisive component.

My main concern is to find consolation. The questions "why", "where from" and "where to" are the core questions of faith and not the question how high the Hartz IV rate is. That one is important, but that one, in my view at least, is not first a question for bishops to comment on. Or the question of how we resolve certain everyday political ies, up to and including some debates on migration or security policy. If you are too often involved in everyday politics, then at some point, I believe, it is also more difficult to take a credible and credible position in the truest sense of the word on very fundamental ies.

The interview was conducted by Verena Troster.

Especially in the Corona crisis, ecumenism is a key. Bishop Heiner Wilmer is convinced of that. In the interview he talks about commemorating the dead and about what the church urgently needs to do right now.

Interviewer: The service will take the form of a celebration of light and will be livestreamed on the internet. How should the victims of Corona be remembered?

Heiner Wilmer (Bishop of Hildesheim): We will meet in the Mariendom in Hildesheim and create an ecumenical light celebration in a very small circle. The state bishop Ralf Meister from the Lutheran church and the prime minister Stephan Weil will be there. We will invite only 20 people, but the celebration will be broadcast to the country through the screens.

We will also invite representatives of the respective groups that care for the people suffering from Corona: Doctors and nurses from the medical practices, employees from the laboratories, aid and rescue services, policewomen, morticians, sextons, bus drivers, educators and teachers, people who stock the goods in the supermarkets and sit at the cash registers, and also young people who have made it their business to shop for and care for their elderly neighbors. So there will be very few in the cathedral.

Interviewer: On Sunday, Christ the King will be celebrated and also the Protestant Sunday of the Dead. How important it is that the commemoration is ecumenical?

Wilmer: Ecumenism is a key for us here. Personally, I am of the firm opinion that only ecumenism can help us here. It is a witness to our faith. Jesus tells us: "I want you to be one". It is precisely the need, precisely Covid-19 that forces us to stand together even stronger. You urge us to witness the Gospel even more strongly together and to stand up together. From my humble point of view, we can no longer afford a Christianity that is not ecumenical at all.

Interviewer: Representatives of professional groups that are particularly challenged in the pandemic will be invited. Is this also a way of saying thank you?

Wilmer: Our subtext is quite simple: the Church says thank you. As churches, we say thank you to the people who stand up and look away from themselves, who are with the people, with those affected, with those who are ill, and who have also accompanied people to their deaths. Some are now additionally taking care of the relatives. We want to say thank you to all these people, but also pray for those who have died. We want to remember the dead and also pray for the bereaved and be there for them. That is very important to us.

Interviewer: How do you personally feel about the situation now: is the church doing enough for those affected by the Corona crisis?

Wilmer: I believe that the church is on the way very massively. Above all, the Church is very much there in the home: with small actions, phone calls, visiting service, flowers, candles, mail, WhatsApp groups. These are all small scenes and scenarios. There is no microphone, no camera and no picture. A lot of things happen in secret.

I know so many wonderful young people who care for elders. I know so many women and men who are committed to the church, who are inventive and break new ground. I can only be very, very grateful to everyone. I think it's great how people here stand together to be there for each other, to stand in solidarity, both inside and outside the church. They see those who no one thinks about. Nevertheless, there is still too much loneliness, too much coldness. Our task is to provide more warmth in the country.

The interview was conducted by Michelle Olion.

Ranging from verbal humiliation to rape and murder. Violence against women has many facets. In Latin America, a toxic cocktail of power, machismo and poverty is exacerbating the situation. This is where today's International Day Against Violence Against Women has a special meaning.

"They attacked me, beat me and took away important documents. Because they were masked, I could not recognize them." Cristina Auerbach Benavides should be taught a "lesson" on that summer day in 2007. The theologian and human rights activist was caught in the crossfire of powerful interests because she campaigned for the rights of the mostly female family members of the 65 miners killed in a mining accident in the Mexican state of Coahuila in February2006. Since then, the Catholic woman has been subjected to repeated attempts at intimidation and regularly receives threatening phone calls. Open brutality, on the other hand, is demonstrated by the "feminicidios," murders of women, with which the city of Ciudad Juarez on the border with the United States has achieved sad international fame. It is thanks to the efforts of artists such as actress Jane Fonda that the world is talking about the more than 400 unsolved, mostly sexually motivated murders of women in the last 15 years. "As a sign of recognition", Esther Chavez Cano therefore also understands the gesture of the Mexican government, which awarded the 78-year-old this year's National Human Rights Award last week. Chavez Cano is honored for her work on behalf of the vulnerable women of Ciuaded Juarez at the Casa Amiga women's shelter, which she runs. "The state is doing something" Women's rights activist Cristina Auerbach is skeptical of such honors. Often they aimed only at the message, "the state does yes what". But she welcomes the award for Chavez because it keeps the many unsolved murder cases in the public eye. However, it should not be overlooked that the less brutal forms of sexual harassment are a mass phenomenon. It is particularly common in the workplace. But women could do little to counter this through official channels. One reason: "The unions are firmly dominated by men". Disproportionate violence against women is not limited to Mexico. Non-governmental organizations in neighboring Guatemala have reported more than 400 murders of women this year alone, compared to 590 in 2007. Capital crimes are also piling up in tiny Costa Rica: According to official data, 13 "feminicidios" were already registered there in the first half of 2008, compared to 17 in all of 2007. There is also alarming news from Argentina, where human rights activists have registered 92 murders of women this year. When men see their livelihood threatened Auerbach sees the causes of this threatening trend in the poverty and lack of perspective that affect many people. Mexico, he said, is a country of contrasts, "where the majority of people, whether men or women, have few rights and few opportunities to succeed". The emancipation of women in the labor market is not the least of the challenges. "When women penetrate men's domains, as has happened in recent years, men naturally see their power and even their existence threatened."It is true that violence against women is widespread worldwide, adds Esther Chavez Cano. But in Latin American countries like Mexico, the problem is particularly virulent, he says. In the mixture of impunity for the perpetrators, corruption, macho culture and poverty, she fears, "the suffering of women will not stop anytime soon, despite all the days of action.".

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