Bless Father these gifts, ”we sang fervently in the early 2000s. Not at the Kirchentag, but in our squat in Cologne. We had brought the Catholic hit from the Himmerod monastery, where we had spent a weekend. I had just returned to our occupied house with two colleagues, probably the only one of its kind in Germany that had a cross on each. If others were allowed to hang up their beliefs, then so was I. The next day we were evacuated. I went back to the monastery to relax. I had already got to know this during my turbulent youth, so I couldn’t shock the monks with squatting.
Church has always given me support, even during my home career. My mostly left-wing supervisors were stunned that I was going to church. When I realized that, I went even more often. Since my accommodation in the country was part of the educational concept, they had to drive me. I often stayed longer than the fair lasted. They waited angrily in the car.
How concerned they were with my practiced beliefs was shown in reports I stole from their offices. By then, they had studied all the crises and phases of rebellion of young people – and then a snot gear with going to church threw them off the concept. Others dye their hair and wear terrible clothes in order to unsuccessfully rebel. For me, the mass was enough for a successful rebellion.
In the home days I swore to God not to go under. A sentence arose in my head that stayed with me for a long time: You despise my God because he is the only one who stands by me!
Why should I leave an organization that was and is a support to me? A few squats and broken off training courses later, I was a writer, with a publisher and a literary prize. Hunched over my second novel, interrupted by reading trips to an educated bourgeoisie who listened in horror to my fictional lower-class stories, I asked myself: Should this be my life now? The pastor called from the Siegburg juvenile prison at the time: Can you take over our literature workshop?
“Do you trust me to do that?” I asked. “If you keep fifty young people quiet for an hour during a reading in jail, you create a literary workshop with your left hand.” That was in 2006. Since then I have been giving literary workshops for disadvantaged, mostly young people, in the whole of German-speaking countries. A priest saw a talent in me and didn’t want it to be buried.
Our show is just the best
Others go to meditation, to yoga or to a self-discovery group, I go to the rosary. It doesn’t cost anything and the monotonous prayer rituals clear my head after twenty minutes. There is something very calming about the Catholic Church, but not boring. I am missing something if I have not been to the mess for a long time. An anarchist friend defended me in front of his comrades with the words: Where’s the fucking problem? Miri goes to church and I go to FC Köln. Singing, incense, kneeling, singing, the candles, the jewelry, all the rituals – our show is simply the best.
I know a lot of shit happens in my club. Criminals and cover-ups belong in jail and the victims are immediately compensated. I have seen for myself – and not just once – that there are ass fiddles too. But the Catholic Church is my home. The only place in Germany where I have never been a victim of racism because of my dark skin.
In April last year, at half past one at night, I was suddenly handcuffed on the floor. As later read in the police report, a thirteen-year-old had observed two people who were trying to steal a bicycle. One of them was described by her as a “type of gypsy”. According to the protocol, I have black curly hair and a brownish complexion.
A policewoman insulted me several times. I was dragged to the front door and the handcuffs removed. I unlocked: Would it be good now? The officer said yes, but the officer wanted to go to my apartment. I asked for a court order. She went to the side, made a phone call and said she had it now. I didn’t think so. She snatched the key out of my hand: “What are you going to do, guys like you, nobody believes anyway.”
The two police officers came from the Cologne-Ehrenfelder Wache, which made negative headlines again in November 2021. I went public with my story. The policewoman had to pay 150 euros for coercion and trespassing. Regarding the racist insults, it was said that she denied it. Her colleagues did not want to have heard of it: Testimony against testimony.
So much empathy and calm
I experienced that as the writer Mirijam Günter in Cologne’s Ehrenfeld district, where an anti-racism flag hangs out of every second window. To date, not a mandate from the Cologne Council has commented on this. Unlike the Jesuit Herbert Graab, who wrote a letter with his Pax Christi group, not just to the police chief. Domkapitular Dominik Meiering took over my attorney’s fee and to this day still absorbs my sadness and anger about this event – with an empathy and calm that makes any thanks seem ridiculous.
The police apologized to me in writing. A WDR journalist asked me how the conversation was after meeting two representatives of this authority. “Oh,” I said in their presence, “the policeman wanted to know from me whether I had lost faith in the police after this experience. I answered him, I only believe in God anyway, and that’s hard enough. “
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