Eine Kirche der Angst vor dem Fremden in mir

“We commemorate the future deceased, who desired to achieve much, no sooner than he had departed again. A person like us, like you, like me, like everyone – and in that also special. He was who he was, no more, but still, who can say that about themselves? Many are dead, many are undead, we at least have not yet been buried. Halleluja!” In his Fluxus oratorio “A Church of Fear of the Stranger in Me” for the first time Christoph Schlingensief addresses the cancer with which he had been diagnosed that year. Fear is the rock on which Schlingensief builds his church. Within it, the former altar boy not only explores his relationship with God, but most of all his relationship with himself. Thus begins a journey inside himself. Transcendence and transparency are on collision course: the church space is copied from that of his home congreation Herz Jesu in Oberhausen. He creates images, confessions and liturgies that detect the intruder and approach the fear of death. Those taking part include Margit Carstensen, Angela Winkler, Komi Mizrajim Togobonou, Karin Witt and, in the cast of the Ruhrtriennale Version from 2008, also Christoph Schlingensief.