Online reports – Culture – A warrior priest of the homeless: Chaplain Cornelius Koch

© Photo by Longo mai

“Christianity in Action”: Chaplain Cornelius Koch with “Doina”

The book “An Uncomfortable Life” also documents the Swiss refugee policy of yesterday for those of today and tomorrow

From Ruedi Suter

His life was dedicated to the poor, the displaced and those seeking hope. That is why he became a clergyman, activist and terror for hard-hearted members of parties, authorities and churches: the Swiss refugee chaplain Cornelius Koch (1940-2001). Now we have a multi-layered portrait of the maverick thinker who spent 30 years trying to make Swiss asylum and immigration policy more humane.

Anyone can suddenly become a refugee. The best proof of this was himself: Cornelius Koch, born in Romania on July 26, 1940 to a Swiss father and a Romanian mother, fled to Switzerland in 1948 from Romania, which had been devastated by the Second World War. “That was the first time I realized what it meant to have a passport,” he later wrote. The families of my Romanian schoolmates could not simply go to an undestroyed country. In that respect, we were privileged.

He was also privileged because his grandfather, the twelfth child of a Thurgau farming family and unemployed knitter, had emigrated to Romania in 1900 to build a life there as an “economic refugee” and Swiss expatriate. His son, Cornelius Vater, a successful knitter, had to flee to Switzerland with his Romanian wife and three children. Koch's father had also become an “economic refugee”. Here, in Switzerland, little Cornelius experienced poverty, illness, discrimination and – at the age of 11 – his mother's traumatic suicide.

Fascinated by “Christianity in Action”

And so the boy who would become one of the most committed clergymen in Switzerland slowly grew into adulthood. As an altar boy, the clever 14-year-old worker's son wanted to become a worker priest, and his bigoted aunt paid for his high school education. But at 19, just before his high school graduation, he was thrown out of the boarding school for rebelling against the narrow-minded rules.

The young Koch then took his high school diploma in Freiburg, got a diploma in literature from the Sorbonne in Paris, fell in love with a girl there, but still completed the seminary in Lucerne – with a detour to Milan – always motivated by the “Christianity of action” of Abbé Pierre and Pope Paul VI, who again allowed priests to work in factories and on building sites. Student Cornelius, influenced by the Vietnam War and the student protests of 1968, found himself confronted with conflicting views on the sexual revolution and the Pope's condemnation of contraception and abortion. Then, on June 30, 1968, Cornelius Koch was ordained a priest by Bishop Anton Hänggi of the Diocese of Basel-Solothurn.

Born to help

This and how the pastor developed into an indomitable “refugee chaplain” is described in a 376-page book written by two companions and friends of the priest, who died in Basel on August 21, 2001 at the age of 61: Michael Rössler (55) and Claude Braun (49), both members of the Longo Mai cooperatives founded in Basel, for which Koch became an art “patron saint” right from the start and which owes many of its inspiration to him. “An Uncomfortable Life” is the title of this exciting work, which has been published at the right time, because right now countless people are trying to escape the misery at home and move to the happier north, hoping to be able to eke out a more dignified existence there.

We know that those who make it, who do not drown in the sea, do not die of thirst in the desert, do not fall victim to robbery and betrayal, have to overcome great hurdles after arriving in this country. And that there are even more problems because they also cause problems. But they all depend on just state structures, fair officials, committed institutions and people who help them to find their way in a previously unknown world and – if necessary – to receive protection. Cornelius Koch seemed to have been born for precisely this task.

“I can’t do anything else”

“Without my past, I would probably not have the sensitivity to refugees. Those who have been refugees in some form in their lives are inevitably the ones who get involved with refugees. I can't do anything else.” The experience of having to flee from blows of fate such as poverty, war, hunger or environmental destruction is often hard to understand for many lucky people who have been blessed with life. But when peace, contentment, work and prosperity become a matter of course, ignorance, xenophobia and insensitivity threaten.

Chaplain Koch experienced this and fought against it tirelessly and selflessly his whole life. As a vicar who looked after working-class families. As a supporter of the revolting left-wing apprentice and student organization “Hydra”. As a stubborn opponent of the “National Action against Foreign Infiltration of People and Homeland” (NA) and its spokesman and National Council member James Schwarzenbach, who was afraid of the “foreign infiltration” of Switzerland. As a defender of the factory workers in Schirmeck in Alsace who were threatened with closure. Or as a leading member of the “Free Places Campaign for Chile Refugees”, which was finally supported by parties, unions, cantons, churches, members of parliament and private individuals and which looked after the supporters of President Allende who had fled and the victims of the state terror of the putschist general Augusto Pinochet.

The people and their helpful soul

The two authors interviewed numerous contemporary witnesses and fellow campaigners of Koch, also quoted dissidents or opponents such as Federal Councillor Kurt Furgler and always placed the chaplain's work in its historical context. The free space campaign Koch had a particularly strong influence on Chilean refugees, note Braun and Rössler: “Due to the positive reactions of the population, he came to the conclusion that one could always appeal to their willingness to help in times of need. In this context, he often spoke of a 'sleeping giant' that could awaken at any time. Xenophobia, on the other hand, was deliberately stoked by individual parties and conscientious officials for political reasons, which “actually did not correspond to the soul of the people.”

Wherever there was need in the Swiss refugee system, Cornelius Koch was always present and committed over the next two decades, with the many wars and conflicts in Latin America, Africa, the Near and Middle East and Asia: in the early 1980s in the “Working Group for Turkish Refugees”, as a founding member of the European Committee for the Defense of Refugees and Guest Workers (CEDRI) and as a fellow campaigner in the “Action for Rejected Asylum Seekers” of the legendary couple Peter and Heidi Zuber (1984). At this time, Koch met the courageous Bishop of Chiapas (Mexico), Samuel Ruiz, whom he supported in his fight for the rights of the indigenous people from 1994 onwards.

Criticism and accusations against the chaplain

Cornelius Koch and his supporters helped a huge family of countless refugees – South and Central Americans, Indians, Kosovo Albanians, Kurds, Congolese, Eritreans, Tamils ​​and others – often against the will of the authorities or to the displeasure of his diocese and some bishops. In 1987, Koch founded the Asile-Asyl-Asilo initiative against the tightening of the asylum law and then inaugurated the “Swiss reception office for refugees Como-Ponte Chiasso” – for rejected refugees at the Swiss border. This was followed by the opening of the “First Swiss Refugee House” near Como for asylum seekers who had been rejected by Switzerland, against the will of Federal Councillor Elisabeth Kopp, who was repeatedly criticized for her harshness.

As a journalist, I have witnessed various actions by the cosmopolitan Koch, including his commitment to the Kurdish families who were threatened with deportation in 1991 and who were hidden in the “peace village” of Flüeli-Ranft. There, in the presence of the media, filmmaker Xavier Koller presented them with the “Oscar” with which “Hollywood” had honored him for his filmed refugee drama “Journey of Hope”. The gesture, as beautiful as it was public, was later overshadowed by the discovery of the hiding place and the arrest of the Kurdish families: it brought Koch the painful accusation of amateurism and media greed.

The authors describe in detail how much the priest suffered and how many church leaders distanced themselves from him, as well as his later commitment to the undocumented and finally his bone cancer, his struggles and his death in Basel's Claraspital.

Uncompromising humanity

Reading “An Uncomfortable Life” also reminds the reader, not least in a stimulating way, of the multifaceted and sometimes dramatic stories of Swiss asylum and immigration policy between 1971 and 2001. Based on the combative life of Cornelius Koch and numerous interviews with contemporary witnesses, it shows a divided Switzerland: on the one hand, those in power with their orders and obligations, which they try to fulfill without emotion in the name of the state; on the other, the motivated and helpful people who courageously try to help refugees and asylum seekers who have been down on their luck, sometimes against blatant prejudice or against unjust regulations and in any case at great personal sacrifice.

Although active Longo members, Michael Rössler and Claude Braun attempt to describe Koch's life from a neutral perspective. However, they call out mistakes they perceived at the time, which they still consider to be injustice today. For example, Federal Councillor Elisabeth Kopp and Peter Arbenz, delegate for refugee affairs, describe their ruthless actions as the “infernal duo of asylum policy”. The great appreciation of Koch's commitment to those who campaigned for refugees, undocumented people and asylum seekers is expressed in the numerous quotes – including those from the clown Dimitri, who wrote the foreword. The writers Dürrenmatt, Charlotte Kerr, Otto F. Walter, Hans A. Pestalozzi and Franz Hohler, refugee helper Anni Lanz, pastor Peter Walss, journalist Jürg Meyer, Longo mai co-founder Hannes Reiser, historian Georg Kreis and others also express themselves pointedly about the refugee chaplain they have grown fond of.

Since the refugee situation in Switzerland will certainly continue to worsen and more and more people will flock to Europe, reading this biography, published by Zytglogge and edited by its director Hugo Ramseyer, is almost a must: It provides important insights into the growing complexity of the refugee problem. Last but not least, this book about Cornelius Koch's life proves to the powerless and those seeking hope that humanity can always be lived – even when the evil and the constraints seem overwhelming.

Basel book launch: Sunday, May 29, 2011, aperitif 5 p.m., concert/reading 6 p.m., in the Kaisersaal, Spalenberg 12, Basel.

Cornelius Koch, refugee chaplain: 376 pages, with picture strip, 36 francs, ISBN 978-3-7296-0819-1

27 May 2011

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