Ulrich Töpfer

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Ulrich Töpfer (born November 24, 1953 in Meiningen ) is a social worker and German politician at Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen . He is the state manager of the Federation of Protestant Youth in Central Germany ( EKM ).

Ulrich Töpfer was the initiator of the turning movement in Meiningen, member of the 15th Federal Assembly for the election of the German Federal President in 2011 and, as an opposition activist and activist of the turning point and peaceful revolution in the GDR, is a recognized persecuted in the GDR.

Life

Ulrich Töpfer was born in Meiningen in 1953 and grew up in Römhild . Because of his Christian upbringing, he refused to join the pioneer organization and the FDJ . After completing his vocational training as a construction worker with a high school diploma, he completed a four-year deacon training as a church worker for community development and youth work in the Johannes Falk House in Eisenach . He then began to work in Meiningen as district youth warden of the Evangelical Lutheran parish for the Meiningen church district. At that time he married his wife Sybille and had a son, a daughter was born in 1981.

As an avowed pacifist , Töpfer submitted an application for military service without a weapon during his school days and was thus drafted as a construction soldier in 1979 . Töpfer saw his work as a church worker as political work and began to work in the opposition in the GDR in 1981 after returning from military service . After the " Swords to Plowshares " campaign, he organized the peace decade , from 1982 the peace prayers in the Meiningen city church and in 1983 he was a co-founder of the "Discussion Group for Peace and Ecology" in the Protestant rectory in Meiningen. The State Security of the GDR ( MfS ) became aware of Töpfer and in 1982 initiated the “Operative Clergy Personnel Control”, which in 1984 became the “Clergy Operative Process”.

At the time of the turning point in 1989/1990, Ulrich Töpfer was one of the organizers of the peace prayers and numerous demonstrations (see: Wende in Meiningen ). In 1990 he was one of the founders of the Green Party in Meiningen, which later became part of Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen . Since Töpfer was subjected to reprisals by the state security as an opposition activist in the GDR, he is recognized as a persecuted person in the GDR.

Church, Politics and Society

Ulrich Töpfer has and had numerous functions in social life.

  • State Managing Director of the Federation of Protestant Youth in Central Germany (bejm)
  • Head of the “Peace Prayers” in the Meiningen town church since 1982
  • Head of the “Discussion Group for Peace and Ecology” since 1983
  • Deputy chairman of the State Youth Association of Thuringia
  • Member of the State Youth Welfare Committee of Thuringia
  • 1st Deputy Mayor of the City of Meiningen (since 2012)
  • Group leader of the Greens in the Meiningen City Council (since 2004)
  • Group leader of the Greens in the Meiningen district assembly (1990–1999 and since 2009)
  • Chairman of the one-world association Meiningen
  • Moderator of the Alliance for Democracy and Tolerance
  • Member of the “Thuringian Eco Heart” and the BUND
  • Founding member of the Democratic Awakening in Meiningen in 1989
  • Founding member of the Green Party in Meiningen in 1990

Honors

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Website of the Federation of Protestant Youth in Central Germany
  2. ↑ Green parliamentary group in Thuringia
  3. ↑ Glaube + Heimat , Mitteldeutsche Kirchenzeitung, October 8, 2009.
  4. ↑ Horst Strohbusch : The light came from the church, the turning point in Meiningen . Verlag Börner PR, Meiningen 1999, ISBN 3-930675-19-6 .
personal data
SURNAME Potter, Ulrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German social pedagogue and politician (Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen)
DATE OF BIRTH November 24, 1953
PLACE OF BIRTH Meiningen