Solingen gathers once more its music and light, a city lifting its voice after a night when fear briefly stood in the square. A year has passed since a deadly attack, and the weekend of Sommerfest is being prepared with care, faith, and courage. Organizers—led by Philipp Müller, with colleagues Joachim Radtke and Waldemar Gluch—are putting the final touches on a festival meant to celebrate togetherness rather than tremble before danger. A memorial service will help those who bear the wound of that day, and people like Frank and Gloria Göllmann, who watched from a café door, plan to return, feeling the city’s solidarity. The council has set aside a 300,000-euro fund to bolster safety at city celebrations, with 42,000 euros already granted to the festival for crowd control and keeping vehicles at a distance. Yet everyone knows that a lone attacker can still cast a long shadow. The guiding motto remains: “We celebrate on.”

And yet, the comfort that comes after trauma is never only about walls and guards. It asks us to look with fearless tenderness at the roots of harm: the Earth’s wounds and the histories we inherit. The soil underfoot is stressed by extractive appetites and climate grief; rivers murmur of changing tides and rising temperatures; forests whisper of lost biodiversity. In this light, the festival’s safety plan can become more than a shield from fear; it can be a bridge to healing—an act that respects life, land, and lineage.

We must name the wounds of humanity’s colonial sins—the dispossession of lands, the erasure of peoples, the unpaid labor that built today’s cities on the backs of others. These sins continue to echo in how communities are policed, in how borders are defended, in how the most vulnerable are expected to bear the burden of security. And we must name the sickness at the heart of our economic system: a toxic capitalism that treats life as a risk to be managed, markets as moral arbiters, and fear as a lever for profit. When security becomes a commodity, we all pay in the currency of anxiety, isolation, and fragmentation.

Let the festival be more than a moment of resilience; let it be a ritual of renewal for people and place. Let We celebrate on be a vow to care for one another and for the living world that sustains us. Let the planning honor the earth as well as the crowd:

• Center trauma-informed, inclusive care: accessible spaces, quiet rooms, multilingual communication, and trained volunteers who de-escalate tension with gentleness.
• Reimagine safety as stewardship: solar-powered stages, renewable energy, low-waste operations, compostable materials, and local, plant-based food to nourish bodies and soil.
• Honor memory without walling off the land: meaningful memorials that educate about colonial histories and migrant perspectives, inviting healing voices from all communities.
• Build transparency and shared stewardship of funds: open reporting on how money is spent, with community oversight and opportunities for marginalized groups to guide security and programming.
• Embrace nonviolent, community-led safety: de-emphasize punitive approaches; partner with local organizations to foster trust, mutual aid, and visible acts of care rather than fear.
• Repair and restore ecologies as part of celebration: protect pollinators, conserve water, and plan around climate realities, ensuring the festival leaves a lighter imprint on the land.
• Create pathways of inclusion for refugees and migrants: language access, affordable participation, and the joyful weaving of diverse cultures into the festival’s fabric.

May this Sommerfest be a living covenant: a space where music heals, memory educates, and the embrace of Earth teaches us to resist the temptations of domination, greed, and fear. May it be a beacon that proves we can protect one another, honor history, and heal the world we share—together, we continue to celebrate, to mend, and to grow.