It is a macabre moment that shows how quickly political fanaticism turns into religious cult. Just hours after the assassination of the right-wing US activist Charlie Kirk, AfD politician Beatrix von Storch took to X to not only call for prayers but also to urge the Pope to canonize Kirk immediately. "Santo Subito!" she wrote - the cry with which Catholics in 2005 demanded the immediate canonization of Pope John Paul II. Von Storch's tweets read like a hagiography: people allegedly hated Kirk because he spoke the truth. The truth could not be murdered, God was the truth, his light would illuminate the darkness. In the evening she announced a vigil in front of the US Embassy in Berlin, called for candles and grave lights, and declared that Kirk's death would not have been in vain, that his message would be carried forward.
But Kirk's "message" was not one of reconciliation. Charlie Kirk was no martyr of truth but one of the most influential right-wing agitators in the United States. With Turning Point USA, he built a propaganda machine that systematically agitated against minorities, demonized queer people, and discredited democratic institutions. He defended the storming of the Capitol, called migrants an "invasion," and made his living by stoking hatred and further dividing society. When von Storch now elevates him to the status of a saint, it is less an expression of grief than an attempt to draw political profit from his death. It is the classic cult of martyrdom: a firebrand is turned into a prophet, a polarizing agitator into a martyr of truth. The fact that a Protestant is calling on the Pope to canonize an evangelical hardliner is bitter irony - and shows how religion here serves only as a backdrop.
Anyone who takes this death cult seriously misunderstands reality. Charlie Kirk did not die because he "spoke the truth" but because he lived in a society that he himself had helped to polarize to the extreme, where political hatred had long since become a weapon. To now celebrate him as a beacon of light means continuing to turn this spiral.
As a reminder of who we are actually talking about.
Investigative journalism requires courage, conviction – and your support.
Please support our journalistic fight against right-wing populism and human rights violations. We do not want to finance our work through a paywall, so that everyone can read our investigations – regardless of income or background.
English 
German 
Das, was Frau von Storch da betreibt ist in höchsten Maße grotesk. Allerdings greifen rechte und rechtslastige Medien den Mord an Charlie Kirk ebenfalls geflissentlich auf, um darauf hinzuweisen, wie gefährdet auch hier die Meinungsfreiheit Andersdenkender besonders durch die „Cancelkultur der Linken“ sei. So heute Nachmittag in einem Meinungsbeitrag eines Redakteurs der Neuen Osnabrücker Zeitung. Und wir werden sicherlich noch mehr dazu lesen können 🤢
Entschuldigung, ich musste lachen. Toller Artikel, aber warum liest man so etwas nicht in Deutschland? Danke für die Arbeit, die ihr euch macht.
„Von Storch“ …… vermutlich hat der Storch bei Lieferung zu oft fallen gelassen 🤣 Sorry, der musste einfach sein.
Die AfD, Partei der Unreligiösen, ruft den Papst an. Das katholische Überhaupt um einen Evangelikalen Hater heilig zu sprechen.
Also ironischer geht es wohl kaum noch, oder?
Oder entdeckt die AfD jetzt die Macht der Evangelikalen für sich?
Genug Predigen und Veranstaltungen halten sie ja auch schon hier ab.
Da kann man dann noch ein Spektrum verdummter Personen abgreifen.
Und die Junge Union postet doch in der Tat ein Kondolenzbild.
Habe ich von denen was zum Tod von Melissa Hortman und ihrem Mann gelesen? Nein?
Ich sage ja, die Masken fallen.