Migration und Religion - Religiöse Gruppen und Mobilität (German Edition)

'They Need Our Help': Germans Angered by Christian Persecution

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The passage of such a law would mean that people from the Balkans wouldn't have to apply for asylum if all they really wanted was to find work in Germany. That, Laschet said, is something that needs to change. But, he added, you also have to understand the people in Germany: Many of them are afraid. Of course Laschet is right. Such fears are human. The feeling "There are too many of them" can be found everywhere and it is nothing new.

At the end of the 19th century, for example, huge numbers of Poles came, resulting in fears in Germany of being overwhelmed.

Back then, the worry was that too many Catholics were coming. In , over 12 million Germans were expelled from areas Germany lost possession of as a result of World War II and homes had to be found for them in what remained of the country. In , fully I think about that sometimes when I see older "concerned citizens" from eastern Germany on television.

I believe them when they say they are afraid. I believe it is sincere. A racist who is a racist because of deeply felt fear is still a racist. I left Dusseldorf with Laschet's melody still playing in my ear. It took a while, but he thinks the country is on the right track. I was soothed by Armin Laschet's unimpeachable agenda. But not even my political hero, it would seem, is able to answer my question as to whether this country has become friendlier to foreigners in the last 20 years. I have just been called too often in recent years with requests to write about this issue.

Each time, the central problem -- namely, the unspoken sentiment: These key words are often accompanied by radical political rhetoric. We foreigners were once told that, to become a German citizen, newcomers had to "know more than just the word 'welfare. Then, potentially criminal foreigners were to be detained, even if they hadn't yet done anything wrong.

There's been talk of intelligence tests for migrants, of forced relocation to avoid the development of ghettos, of forcing imams to preach in German, of deporting people who didn't pass a German language test, of cutting social benefits for non-Germans. As I said, it is tempting to believe what Laschet says. In the final analysis, that would mean that the right-wing populist party AfD, the anti-Muslim group Pegida and arson attacks on refugee hostels were merely the final twitches of a Germany that is fading into the past -- that it will soon be over.

If things are getting better all the time, at some point they will be good -- and someday, our grandchildren will be amazed at the stories we tell.

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftungen in Bundesländern

Just like I am amazed today that women were once not allowed to vote. Or that homosexuality was a crime. Or that children were raised with the belt. Maybe we will, in fact, believe at some point that someone named Mohammed al-Fatih would make a perfectly good German chancellor. I continue my journey to Leipzig, to the next person who is an expert on foreigners.

Oliver Decker is a psychologist, sociologist and philosopher. He received his PhD, became a professor and has focused his academic attentions for the last 13 years on right-wing extremism and xenophobia. Last year, he published his latest study, which was widely quoted in the press. Germans have become less xenophobic. Anti-Semitism, sympathy for National Socialism, support for a dictatorship: That seemed to be the answer to my question.

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung

Right down to the decimal point. Decker is a calm man with a penchant for holding forth in long and complicated sentences.

We order something to eat, but before our food comes, Decker makes it clear to me that Laschet is wrong. Sinti, Roma and Muslims, for example, are more disapproved of than they used to be, he says. According to Decker, many Germans feel there are two types of foreigners: Americans, Britons, French and Spaniards all integrate well, find work and pay taxes.

But if people believe that newcomers don't contribute, they are rejected even more than before. Someone once called it "Usefulness-racism. Decker says that the German identity is deeply bound up with the economy. If that is threatened by immigration, acceptance begins to fall," he says. I will be interested to see what studies find a few years from now. I don't know if my parents are right, if the politician Laschet is right or if the sociologist Decker is right.

I simply don't know. Maybe I've been thinking about this issue for so long that I simply can't imagine it will ever go away. That it may really cease to matter where somebody is from. That a German landlord will no longer immediately hang up when someone with a Turkish name calls looking for an apartment. Maybe we are currently experiencing a great moment, the birth of a brand new Germany. A country that doesn't just put on colorful wigs but which also opens its heart.

Götter ohne Pass. Religiöse Vielfalt und neue Migration in Deutschland

It could be that this country is currently showing the heart and the largesse of which my parents often spoke -- and which, to be honest, I never really saw. I hope that is the case. I don't want the attacks on asylum hostels to determine my viewpoint. But I also don't want everyone to act as though everything were totally fine just because refugees are being welcomed to Munich with pretzels.

For as long as I can remember, I have had the feeling that the majority of Germans don't actually want foreigners here. Right now, that is changing. Whether it is changing for good, I don't know. Whether it has to do with the fact that Germany is doing better than almost every other country on the planet and that's why people are so relaxed? What really gives me hope is one single number: Over 30 percent of people in Germany under the age of 15 have immigration backgrounds.

When they get married in 20 years, it is theoretically possible that half of the people living in the country won't be so-called "biological Germans. Discuss this issue with other readers! Show all comments Page 1. Yet German politicians have traditionally been reluctant to grant political asylum to persecuted Christians. A recent exception is a program launched in Germany over the last two years granting asylum to 2, Christian refugees from Iraq. But, for persecuted Copts, Germany has never been an easy refuge. More than anything else, he adds, that explains why asylum applications from Egyptian Coptic Christians are so rare.

In , an administrative appeals court in the western state of Saarland ruled that "Christian Copts in Egypt are not subject to any political persecution as defined under German asylum law. Even in the case of converts -- who Muslims view as traitors to God -- not all German judges have ruled in favor of refugees. In May , for example, an administrative court in the northwestern city of Minden ruled in favor of the asylum petition of an Egyptian woman who had come to Germany in The woman had converted to the Coptic faith two years earlier.

When her ex-husband found out, he tried to take away their two sons.

But the woman managed to leave Egypt with her sons in the nick of time. Germany's government is also aware of such cases, but so far only the country's churches and human rights organizations have consistently criticized the persecution of Christians. There, she pointed out that many people in Germany are unaware of the fact "that Christians are the world's most persecuted religious group.

Migration —Religion — Integration. Buddhistische Vietnamesen und hinduistische Tamilen in Deutschland. Pathways of Migrant Incorporation in Germany. Online-Version Glick Schiller, N. Transnational Perspectives on Migration: International Migration Review, Vol. Islamisches Gemeindeleben in Berlin. Online Version Levitt, P. God needs no passport. Immigrants and the Changing American Religious Landscape.

Afrikanische Kirchen in Deutschland.

Conceiving and researching Transnationalism. Ethnic and Racial Studies. The Emergence of Superdiversity in Britain. Pfingstlich-charismatische Migrationsgemeinden in Deutschland.

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