Flags flutter in the wind outside Magdeburg's Catholic cathedral. "Love thy neighbor, dialogue, human dignity, solidarity. VOTE CONSCIOUSLY!", they proclaim. Just a few minutes' walk away, a sign on the building of the Protestant Cathedral Congregation reads: "DIVERSITY IS DIVINE." Other Protestant churches across the region display banners reading "Heart Instead of Hate."
For many months now, warnings about the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which is particularly strong in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, have been part of everyday church life. During a sermon at a pilgrimage event in September 2025, Magdeburg Bishop Gerhard Feige remarked almost in passing that pilgrims of hope do not cast their votes on a whim, "into the blue." He was interrupted by prolonged applause — blue is the AfD's party color.
The AfD holds a commanding lead in the polls ahead of the state election on September 6. The prospect of a government led by the party alone appears increasingly plausible. At the same time, Germany's domestic intelligence agency has classified the AfD's Saxony-Anhalt branch as a "confirmed right-wing extremist" organization.
Churches speak out against AfD
In Saxony-Anhalt, 10% of the population is Protestant and 3% is Catholic; only a few thousand people belong to the Muslim or Jewish faiths.
More than 85% of the state's 2.1 million residents have no religious affiliation, compared with a national average of 47%. Nevertheless, the churches play an important role as defenders of democracy — and that, apparently, is precisely what troubles the AfD.
With its so-called government program, adopted at a state party conference in April, the party launched a broadside against both the Protestant and Catholic churches. The program calls for an end to all state payments to the two churches and for the abolition of church tax collection by public authorities, a service for which the churches themselves pay.
In cases of so-called church asylum, where refugees seek shelter on church premises for fear of renewed persecution in their countries of origin, the AfD is calling for churches to be held financially accountable on a "permanent" basis.
The Protestant Academy of Saxony-Anhalt should also no longer receive any state funding whatsoever. The reason, according to the AfD, is its "political agitation in line with the established parties: climate dogma, gender ideology, and the rainbow cult." The academy is said to advocate "unchecked mass immigration." Yet in scarcely any German federal state is the proportion of foreign nationals as low as it is in Saxony-Anhalt.
From estrangement to open confrontation
The sharpness of the criticism goes far beyond anything typically heard from other regional branches of the Alternative for Germany or from the party's national leadership. Long gone are the days when representatives of the then-emerging party complained about not being invited to church congresses or Catholic conventions.
In February 2024, the plenary assembly of the German Catholic Bishops' Conference unanimously adopted a declaration entitled "Ethnic Nationalism and Christianity are Incompatible." In it, the bishops identified an ethnonationalist mindset within the AfD and spoke of a "genuine right-wing extremism." The document was prompted by the state elections scheduled to take place later that year in the eastern German states of Thuringia, Saxony, and Brandenburg. Now, in September 2026, elections are due to follow in Saxony-Anhalt, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin.
At present, the confrontation between the AfD and the churches is nowhere more intense than in Saxony-Anhalt.
For Bishop Feige, the AfD's current direction is "without question" an expression of ethnonationalism. "Until now, Saxony-Anhalt's motto has been 'Thinking Modern'. The AfD wants to replace it with 'Thinking German'," he told DW. "The AfD's election posters speak a very clear language: 'Save your country', 'Take your country back', 'Deport from day one!' What else could that be but ethnonationalism?"
The 74-year-old said he "could never have imagined that so many people today could once again be so easily led astray, or that arsonists, pied pipers and respectable-looking agitators could emerge, and that so many would fall for them."
As an example, Feige cited the so-called flag assembly that the AfD wants to reintroduce in the state's schools: the raising of the flag and the singing of the national anthem. "This existed during the Nazi era and was later adopted by the GDR," he said, referring to the former East Germany. "And now it is supposed to return? I find that inconceivable."
Both major Christian churches emphasize they are speaking out not against a particular party, but in defense of a Christian view of humanity. Whether the issue is climate protection and the safeguarding of creation or the treatment of strangers, the churches' interventions are "primarily not political messages, but Christian ones, and should not be interpreted as an endorsement of any particular political party," Friedrich Kramer, bishop of the Protestant Church in central Germany, recently told the online magazine Die Eule.
Religious freedom, according to the AfD
Jews and Jewish life, incidentally, are never mentioned in the government program. By contrast, Islam appears repeatedly. According to the AfD, it will "restore religious freedom to appropriate limits." Islam is described as a "religion alien to our culture." Freedom of religion, the party argues, does not oblige Germans to "fulfill every demand of the Islamic lobby."
Representatives of the state's Jewish association, which includes the synagogue of the Jewish community of Halle targeted in a 2019 right-wing extremist attack, as well as representatives of the largest mosque congregation in the state, declined to comment when asked.
Notably, the AfD's platform speaks of a "Christian mission" that, in its view, the churches supported by church tax, which it labels the "church-tax churches," no longer fulfill. This evokes the support that US President Donald Trump receives from influential evangelical and conservative Christian groups in the United States. In Saxony-Anhalt, however, there is only a limited presence of comparable religious milieus.
Why bishops are sounding the alarm
"A government involving the AfD would have devastating consequences," Kramer said. That is why, he added, cultural institutions and civil society organizations are joining forces to warn against the AfD.
His Catholic counterpart, Feige, likewise cautioned against "downplaying" the prospect of an AfD-led government. During the election campaign, he said, the party is presenting itself "with messianic ideas" and promoting slogans such as "Everything will be fine" or "Anything is possible."
Because the AfD's lead candidate, Ulrich Siegmund, "comes across as highly polished and enthusiastic," some people ask what could possibly be "right-wing extremist or dangerous" about him. "But behind him stand forces that give cause for concern," said Feige. "If an AfD single-party government comes to power here, it will be a pilot project. Then Saxony-Anhalt will become a gateway to national politics."
This article was originally written in German.
