The KREUZBUND Soc. Inc. (Germany)

Objectives of the Kreuzbund

The Kreuzbund Society Incorporated is the Catholic self-help and helpers' community for addicts, ex-addicts and their relatives in Germany. It is a specialized association of the German Caritas charitable institution and the numerically greatest German self-help organization for addicts. Kreuzbund is a member in the German Main Office for Addiction Problems (DHS).

The association aims at the prevention and after-care of addicts, problem users or drinkers and their relatives. The aim of the self-help groups is for individuals to achieve stable recovery, including personal growth and well-being. Objectives are the rehabilitation and integration of sufferers from addiction into family, profession and society. Kreuzbund contributes significantly to the consolidation of an abstinent lifestyle by offering useful leisure time activities without alcohol.

Self-help in addition to professional help for sufferers from addiction

At the moment the Kreuzbund is represented in Germany by 1,600 self-help groups and consists of some 15,000 members; these are complemented by another 15,000 persons (approximately) who come to the groups every week and who are not yet members of the association. Kreuzbund can be joined by anyone who sees the objectives and tasks of the association as positive; sufferers from addiction have to commit themselves to abstinence.

The help offered by Kreuzbund is essentially characterized by group work and conversation. The groups and the voluntary helpers are often the first institutions contacted by sufferers from addiction and their relatives who are looking for help. They become involved during out-patient or in-patient treatment and cooperate with professional specialists such as physicians, psychologists and social workers.

Kreuzbund is thus an important link and indispensable component of the system of help for sufferers from addiction. Years of experience and statistics have shown that the success of any therapy is positively influenced by the attendance at a self-help group. Approximately one third of the persons attending a self-help group manage to find their way to a life free of addictive substances without recourse to out-patient or in-patient treatment.

Some 90 per cent of the sufferers from addiction, who are long-term members of a Kreuzbund group, remain permanently abstinent. The relapse ratio is less than ten per cent.

The story of the Kreuzbund

Kreuzbund has its roots in the Catholic Church. Father Josef Neumann, a catholic priest, founded the Kreuzbund in the city of Aachen close to the border to Belgium and the Netherlands in 1896.

Josef Neumann had realized that much alcoholism was due to poverty, which was widespread at that time. He wanted to create a lively counterweight in the tradition which valued moderation and abstinence.  He, himself, chose an alcohol free way of life. As a result of this background the Kreuzbund was known as a wholly and entirely an "abstainers’ society" until the sixties of the 20th century. The members at that time practiced abstinence in solidarity without being addicts themselves.

Only when alcoholism was recognized as an illness by the WHO and by the German Supreme Social Insurance Tribunal in 1968, addicts themselves found their way to the Kreuzbund. The "abstainers’ society" Kreuzbund became the "self-help and helpers' community for sufferers from addiction". For more than 30 years the self-help aspect of Kreuzbund has grown while the concept of the “abstainers’ society” has taken a secondary place.

Office of honour as basis of the Kreuzbund activities

Kreuzbund is divided into groups, diocese and Land associations and the federal association. Some 6,000 members have taken over functions of honour, as group managers as well as in the managing committee. There is a close cooperation between the voluntary helpers and the few full-time employees in the federal head office at Hamm. These employees are responsible for putting into practice the basic elements and ideas of after-care in the self-help field and for administration and organization.

The qualification of the voluntary Kreuzbund helpers is continuously improved by training and further training. Advanced training and seminars are offered nationwide as well at diocesan, Land associations or at the local level.

Kreuzbund is a non-profit-making association. It is financed by its own resources (membership fees, donations) and by earmarked outside means contributed by public and church authorities.

Kreuzbund cooperates with the welfare associations as well as with institutions and people who care for sufferers from addiction and also with public health bodies, church, political groups and public administration.

Public relations work and representation of interests

The public relations work of Kreuzbund includes the communication of information, prevention and the representation of interests of sufferers from addiction. With respect to the issues of social and health policy, Kreuzbund sees itself as champion and spokesperson for people dependent on addictive substances. It is the objective of Kreuzbund to make the public at large sensitive to a problem-solving approach to issues relating to legal and illegal drugs.

Prevention is another focus. Kreuzbund gives information about the origin and the consequences of the misuse of addictive substances as well as about possible help, particularly in schools and businesses.

HEINZ-JOSEF JANßEN
(General Secretary)
GUNHILD AHMANN
(Head of section press and public relations work)
c/o Kreuzbund Inc - self-help and helpers' community
for sufferers from addiction and relatives (federal association)
Münsterstr 25, D-59065 Hamm/Germany
Phone: +492381/6 72 72-0;  Fax: -33
E-Mail: info@kreuzbund.de
Internet: www.kreuzbund.de