Themen
- Opposition/Bürgerrechtsbewegung
- Kirche
- historische Aufarbeitung
- Ausreise/Ausbürgerung
- Staatssicherheit
Sprache
- Englisch
Biographical information
1950 Born in Oranienburg
1968 Abitur (equivalent to High school diploma or A-levels)
Until 1973 Studied theology at Humboldt University Berlin
1974–1980 Internship and pastorate in Thuringia
1974–1980 Participated in oppositional groups, such as the Youth Congregation (Junge Gemeinde) in central Jena and in reading circles
1980 Relocation to Frankfurt am Main
1981–1993 Pastor in Frankfurt am Main
1993–1999 Employment with the Stasi Records Agency (BStU) in Gera
1999–2004 Employment with the Church of the Brethren in Nigeria
2005–2015 Pastor in Mainz
Since 2015 Retired
From September 2023 One-year work engagement in Beirut/Lebanon – Unfortunately, Renate Ellmenreich is not available as contemporary witness in Germany during this time.
Profile
Although I neither joined the state-controlled youth organisation the Young Pioneers (Jungpioniere) nor the Free German Youth (FDJ, Freie Deutsche Jugend) and had no Jugendweihe (secular youth ceremony) either – I was nevertheless allowed to complete my Abitur and enrol at university because I was classed as a so-called "worker-peasant child".
Even as a schoolchild back in 1965, I already came into contact with the Ministry for State Security (MfS, a.k.a. Stasi). A Stasi agent was interrogating pupils one by one in the headmistress's office, after posters had been put up in classrooms commemorating the East German Uprising of 17 June 1953. Due to my involvement with the central Jena chapter of the Youth Congregation and with various oppositional circles, I increasingly became a target of Stasi surveillance, so that, eventually, I stopped refusing the resettlement in West Germany that I was being offered. After leaving the country, I maintained contact with oppositional groups in the GDR and joined West German peace and civil rights groups.
In 1981, the father of my daughter, Matthias Domaschk, died in the Stasi remand prison in Gera. The truth about the exact circumstances of this death remains unknown to this day. In 1990, I founded the "Rhein-Main" regional chapter of "Demokratie Jetzt" ("Democracy Now"), the only chapter in West Germany. Through my work at the Stasi Records Agency (which today is part of the German Federal Archives), I learned how to identify and critically research many of the GDR's injustices.