In August last year I was waiting in the registry office of a small Swabian town.

The measure was full.

A few days earlier I had decided to leave the Catholic Church.

Just 30 minutes and 35 euros later I was - baptized, communed, confirmed - officially non-denominational in terms of tax law.

The official pointed this out to me: "I can't tell you anything about church matters, this is only about what we report to the tax office".

The first tensions between me and “church things” already existed at school.

The religious classes at the Catholic high school were taken on by a churchman who spent the time between the obligatory ecumenical services explaining to us why Christianity was absolutely superior to all other religions.

When the subject of abortion came up in the curriculum, he showed us a half-hour ultrasound of an abortion.

As a result, I was a staunch anti-abortionist for about four months.

It has a "Gschmäckle"

It was only later that I found out that we had seen a Catholic Church propaganda film and that my (short-lived) belief was based on disinformation.

From that moment on, I questioned everything I was taught in religion class.

So also when we were told that homosexuality is a sin that God did not want.

In the years that followed, I realized that the Catholic Church wasn't very particular about the charity it commanded.

The reports of child abuse, the abuse of nuns and the exclusion of queer people from the church community - that did not fit either my Christian or my political views.

I'm not asking for arbitrariness - just a general will to reflect on and renew the existing interpretations.

The more that became known about the decades-long cover-up of abuse cases, the clearer it became: the perpetrators are embedded in a system that protects them and silences the victim.

At first, expert opinions on misconduct in dealing with cases of abuse were kept under lock and key, then published expert opinions exonerated the very people who had commissioned them.

Where I grew up, they say: It has a "Gschmäckle".

Alienation is a continuous process.

I can't remember exactly what was the deciding factor in my visit to the registry office.

Every news story of new abuse cases, refusals to resign despite misconduct, every refusal to bless gay couples has contributed to this.

Of course, such a withdrawal is not a light-hearted decision: I weighed it up beforehand, considered whether it wouldn't make more sense if reforms were pushed from within?

On the other hand, I saw every day the tiny steps that church reformers are making, if at all.

I don't believe that the church will reform itself - its structures are too overgrown.

And so it was ultimately inevitable for me to leave.

For the tax office, I was exempt from church tax from that moment and that was the end of the matter.

However, the Catholic Church still had a lot to say to me.

A few weeks after leaving, I received a letter from the pastor of my home church.

At that point I hadn't been to a service there for so long that I couldn't think of a face to go with the name.

He expressed his regret, then followed the sentence: "Enclosed you will find a letter that we are sending to you on behalf of and under the responsibility of the German Bishops' Conference (DBK)." A remarkable sentence.

The pastor seemed to want to distance himself as much as possible from the letter from the DBK.

A wise man, this pastor.