Baptist Pastor in Gronau, Germany, Researches History of Colonia Dignidad

The origins of Colonia Dignidad are closely tied to the Baptist church in Gronau, in North Rhine-Westphalia, where Michael Gordon serves as pastor of the Evangelical Baptist Church. According to the report, about 140 adults and children from that community migrated to southern Chile starting in 1961 and founded the colony. The settlement is now called Villa Bavaria.

Gordon is researching the early history of the colony. He says he is collecting old documents, church records, letters, magazine and book materials, and witness accounts to “rebuild a puzzle.” He told DW that the departure of families and members left the Gronau congregation diminished and divided. One aim of his work, which he plans to publish as a book, is to tell the community what happened and to help former and current residents “understand their own history and that of their parents.” He presents it as a way to face the past and move toward the future.

The report describes founder Paul Schäfer as a preacher who traveled through Germany and Austria in the 1950s and had built a home for children and young people near Cologne, which served as a front for attracting parishioners. After reports of child abuse, Schäfer left Germany, and the report says he convinced or deceived adults and children to follow him. In southern Chile, about 300 kilometers south of Santiago, he built a settlement that the report describes as a fortress. The allegations against him include slave labor, sexual abuse, forced medication, torture and murder. He was imprisoned in 2005. The report says some 25 settlers, out of more than 100 who returned to Germany, went back to Gronau, and their testimonies inform Gordon’s project.

Gordon spent two weeks in Villa Bavaria last year. He said he met many former residents and was moved by their suffering, and that some of them had family ties to Gronau. He also found the graves of former members of his church in the colony’s cemetery. Asked how a criminal group could emerge from a religious community, Gordon said that in principle it was not a criminal group, but that Schäfer’s growing negative influence was decisive. He said the core group numbered only 40 to 60 of the roughly 300 residents, that half had come to Chile as children, and that some adults were tricked into going or went only because their children or spouses wanted to. “The way of life in Cologne Dignity did not correspond to the desire and dream of the great majority of those who emigrated,” he said.

Gordon is also critical of the German government’s offer of 10,000 euros in aid to each victim. He wrote to Foreign Minister Heiko Maas and to three members of the parliamentary commission on Colonia Dignidad. He received a reply only from parliamentarian Renate Künast, who telephoned him personally; in his view she showed commitment and concern for the victims. He also said it was hypocritical that Germany is praised for its embassies in Prague, Budapest and Warsaw, which sheltered East German citizens seeking to leave, while settlers in Chile had to seek refuge at the Canadian or Argentine legations, “because the German embassy in Santiago had been heavily influenced and infiltrated by Paul Schäfer for decades.” Gordon recalled that letters, press reports and family requests about the sect sent to authorities and courts over the years went unanswered: “Nothing happened.”

Gordon said the German payment does not address retirement security. He said the victims he spoke with told him they need security for old age, and that those who came as children had worked for 30 to 40 years in the colony. He also argued that Germany and Chile both have outstanding debts, and that filmmakers producing documentary and fictional works about the colony should help fund aid for victims. The report notes that, in Gordon’s view, compensation does not resolve every question. The creation of a museum, memory site and documentation center, Chile’s responsibility, and the needs of Chilean victims remain unresolved.

Source: Read the original report (translated from Spanish)