Who administers kreuz.net (cross.net) – a German
website which hides behind the “Catholic news” label to spread
anti-Semitic, homophobic, Holocaust revisionist and anti-Muslim
propaganda? Set on discovering who is behind this, Berlin-based publishing house Bruno Gmünder Verlag, which publishes books and magazines for homosexuals, is offering a reward of 15.000 Euro to whoever is able to provide information that can help reveal the website’s anonymous administrators.
The publishing house has also written to the German Bishops’ Conference, urging it to back the initiative and raise the reward sum.
Kreuz.net, which been online since 2004 and is hosted on an American server, describes itself as “an initiative of international private Catholic groups in Europe and the U.S. which serve the Church.”
The German Bishops’ Conference has often tried to distance itself from the ideas expressed on the portal. According to “Stop kreuz.net” (launched by Bruno Gmünder Verlag) campaign leaders, there are strong indications that ecclesiastical staff are behind the website’s content; it is even likely some have positions high up in the Catholic Church.
Homosexual theologian David Berger told Süddeutsche Zeitung that there is a German speaking bishop working for the website. Traces seem to lead back t Austria.
The website, which seems to express rather Lefebvrian ideas, even though there is no proof of a link, stands out for its ultra-conservative stance and radical rhetoric which borders on insulting: Protestants, for example, are called “Protestunten”, a word which combines “Protestanten” which means “Protestants” and “Tunte” which means “queer”/“fairy”.
Kreuz.net has been at the centre of criticism for years. Germany’s secret services have been keeping a close eye in it, with the same division that deals with right-wing extremism.
The final straw was a comment published after the death of German popular television comedian, Dirk Back.
In a piece entitled “Now burn in the eternal fire of hell”, Bach, a self-declared homosexual, was defined as a “disturbed homosexual” and a “degenerate”.
Following that comment, the website received a number of formal complaints.