BERLIN (AP) — A performance inside a Catholic cathedral in Germany earlier this month that featured raw, plucked chickens wrapped in diapers onstage — and the country's president and the local archbishop in the audience — has prompted the church and municipal leaders to apologize that the show “hurt religious feelings."
The show, "Westphalia Side Story,” was part of a May 15 celebration to mark the 1,250th anniversary of Westphalia, a region in northwestern Germany.
Video footage shows one woman and two shirtless men singing “Fleisch ist Fleisch” (“Meat is meat”) — apparently spoofing Austrian band Opus' 1984 pop song “Live is Life” — with scythes and dancing with the dead chickens on a stage in front of Paderborn Cathedral's altar.
Performance company bodytalk said in a statement Friday that the show featured work-in-progress excerpts from “Westphalia Side Story" — which references the American musical "West Side Story."
The finished show, which will premiere in September, is supposed to be part of the 1,250th anniversary’s cultural programming.
“It was not meant to be a spoof at all,” bodytalk cofounder Rolf Baumgart said in an email to The Associated Press. “As Westphalia is a rural dominated region with a turbulent history our research was focused on that.”
The spectacle also prompted an online petition — signed by more than 22,000 people by Friday afternoon — that asks Paderborn Archbishop Udo Bentz for a personal apology, as well as penance. The signers also want him to reconsecrate the cathedral after it was “desecrated by this performance.”
In a statement posted online to the cathedral's website more than a week after the performance, the Regional Association of Westphalia-Lippe and the church's leadership said that the content of the performance wasn't known to the organizers or the venue.
The cathedral, the statement said, is often host to cultural events and has begun an internal review. They also promised to more carefully vet proposed events in the future.
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier's office didn't immediately return a request for comment on Friday.
Philipp Jenne contributed to this report from Vienna.
This grab taken from video shows performers dancing as they hold raw, plucked chickens wrapped in diapers, inside Paderborn's cathedral, Germany, Friday May 16, 2025. (RTL via AP)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Federal agents carrying out immigration arrests in Minnesota's Twin Cities region already shaken by the fatal shooting of a woman rammed the door of one home Sunday and pushed their way inside, part of what the Department of Homeland Security has called its largest enforcement operation ever.
In a dramatic scene similar to those playing out across Minneapolis, agents captured a man in the home just minutes after pepper spraying protesters outside who had confronted the heavily armed federal agents. Along the residential street, protesters honked car horns, banged on drums and blew whistles in attempts to disrupt the operation.
Video of the clash taken by The Associated Press showed some agents pushing back protesters while a distraught woman later emerged from the house with a document that federal agents presented to arrest the man. Signed by an immigration officer, the document — unlike a warrant signed by a judge — does not authorize forced entry into a private residence. A warrant signed by an immigration officer only authorizes arrest in a public area.
Immigrant advocacy groups have conducted extensive “know-your-rights” campaigns urging people not to open their doors unless agents have a court order signed by a judge.
But within minutes of ramming the door in a neighborhood filled with single-family homes, the handcuffed man was led away.
More than 2,000 immigration arrests have been made in Minnesota since the enforcement operation began at the beginning of December, said Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told Fox News on Sunday that the administration would send additional federal agents to Minnesota to protect immigration officers and continue enforcement.
The Twin Cities — the latest target in President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement campaign — is bracing for what is next after 37-year-old Renee Good was shot and killed by an immigration officer on Wednesday.
“We’re seeing a lot of immigration enforcement across Minneapolis and across the state, federal agents just swarming around our neighborhoods,” said Jason Chavez, a Minneapolis city councilmember. “They’ve definitely been out here.”
Chavez, the son of Mexican immigrants who represents an area with a growing immigrant population, said he is closely monitoring information from chat groups about where residents are seeing agents operating.
People holding whistles positioned themselves in freezing temperatures on street corners Sunday in the neighborhood where Good was killed, watching for any signs of federal agents.
More than 20,000 people have taken part in a variety of trainings to become “observers” of enforcement activities in Minnesota since the 2024 election, said Luis Argueta, a spokesperson for Unidos MN, a local human rights organization .
“It’s a role that people choose to take on voluntarily, because they choose to look out for their neighbors,” Argueta said.
The protests have been largely peaceful, but residents remained anxious. On Monday, Minneapolis public schools will start offering remote learning for the next month in response to concerns that children might feel unsafe venturing out while tensions remain high.
Many schools closed last week after Good’s shooting and the upheaval that followed.
While the enforcement activity continues, two of the state’s leading Democrats said that the investigation into Good's shooting death should not be overseen solely by the federal government.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and U.S. Sen. Tina Smith said in separate interviews Sunday that state authorities should be included in the investigation because the federal government has already made clear what it believes happened.
“How can we trust the federal government to do an objective, unbiased investigation, without prejudice, when at the beginning of that investigation they have already announced exactly what they saw — what they think happened," Smith said on ABC’s "This Week."
The Trump administration has defended the officer who shot Good in her car, saying he was protecting himself and fellow agents and that Good had “weaponized” her vehicle.
Todd Lyons, acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, defended the officer on Fox News Channel’s “The Sunday Briefing.”
"That law enforcement officer had milliseconds, if not short time to make a decision to save his life and his other fellow agents,” he said.
Lyons also said the administration’s enforcement operations in Minnesota wouldn't be needed “if local jurisdictions worked with us to turn over these criminally illegal aliens once they are already considered a public safety threat by the locals.”
The killing of Good by an ICE officer and the shooting of two people by federal agents in Portland, Oregon, led to dozens of protests in cities across the country over the weekend, including New York, Los Angeles, Washington D.C. and Oakland, California.
Contributing were Associated Press journalists Giovanna Dell’Orto in Minneapolis; Thomas Strong in Washington; Bill Barrow in Atlanta; Christopher Weber in Los Angeles; and John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio.
A woman gets into an altercation with a federal immigration officer as officers make an arrest Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
A federal immigration officer deploys pepper spray as officers make an arrest Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
A family member, center, reacts after federal immigration officers make an arrest Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
Bystanders are treated after being pepper sprayed as federal immigration officers make an arrest Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
A family member reacts after federal immigration officers make an arrest Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
Federal agents look on after detaining a person during a patrol in Minneapolis, Minn., Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (Christopher Katsarov/The Canadian Press via AP)
Bystanders react after a man was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents during a traffic stop, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Robbinsdale, Minn. (AP Photo/John Locher)
People stand near a memorial at the site where Renee Good was fatally shot by an ICE agent, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
A man looks out of a car window after being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents during a traffic stop, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Robbinsdale, Minn. (AP Photo/John Locher)
Border Patrol agents detain a man, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
People shout toward Border Patrol agents making an arrest, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
Demonstrators protest outside the White House in Washington, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026, against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who fatally shot Renee Good in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey holds a news conference on Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
Protesters react as they visit a makeshift memorial during a rally for Renee Good, who was fatally shot by an ICE officer earlier in the week, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
