Where were the Christians In Germany during WWII?

[The Gryphon]

It was a dark time and the stories of the wicked tend to get more attention, but there of course were notable people that would not let it triumph such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Oh if only all the Christians across all Europe would have stood as one and shouted NO! I don't believe Hitler or Benito Mussolini would ever have become near the tyrants they became.

There is no reward in the next life but they receive their reward here in this life. It is the government they serve not God. Although God gives authority to the government.

Question? Why did you mark Christian on you profile? What does being a Christian mean to you personally?

 

[MMDave3]

Not defending Nazis, but the phenomenon of soldiers enjoying slaughter is as old as mankind. As the saying goes, "War is Hell".

 

[The Gryphon]

HOLOCAUST: THOSE WHO DEFIED ORDERS TO KILL JEWS DID NOT DIE, RESEARCHER SAYS AT BYU.
By Sharon M. Haddock, Staff Writer

Read it all here> HOLOCAUST: THOSE WHO DEFIED ORDERS TO KILL JEWS DID NOT DIE, RESEARCHER SAYS AT BYU.

 

[Rhamiel]

Many Christians saw the huge numbers of Orthodox Christians killed by Communists in the Soviet Union, they saw Communists have a failed revolution in Germany in 1918 and 1919, they saw Communists burn churches and rape nuns in the Spanish Civil War

So with the Soviet Union growing and expanding, the German people wanted a strong party that could stand up to Marxism, but the Christians in Germany saw the problems with Capitalism from the failures of the Weimar Republic

So you can see why so many Christians supported Nazism

 

[DamianWarS]

Question? Why did you mark Christian on you profile? What does being a Christian mean to you personally?

because I serve and follow Christ

 

[timewerx]

The real question is, where are the Christians now when evil and money is running countries and the weak and poor continue to be oppressed / exploited by the rich and powerful?

Are you doing anything to find out about disturbing truth about our world?

 

[The Gryphon]

Many Christians saw the huge numbers of Orthodox Christians killed by Communists in the Soviet Union, they saw Communists have a failed revolution in Germany in 1918 and 1919, they saw Communists burn churches and rape nuns in the Spanish Civil War

So with the Soviet Union growing and expanding, the German people wanted a strong party that could stand up to Marxism, but the Christians in Germany saw the problems with Capitalism from the failures of the Weimar Republic

So you can see why so many Christians supported Nazism

 

[The Gryphon]

NO, I can not see why anyone would support Nazism if they had any understanding of what it was, what it intended, and especially today considering what it did! Torture and death within concentration camps were common and frequent. 11 million people were killed during the Holocaust (1.1 million children). 6 million of those victims were Jewish. Other groups targeted by the Nazis were Jehovah’s Witnesses, homosexuals, disabled people, and Roma. I have to admit I have a prejudice against Germans even today I had an elderly Jewish lady friend who was a German citizen that lived through the Concentration Camps. She immigrated to the U.S. were I was living and I noticed her concentration camp ID on her arm. She was a lovely dear lady that I loved to talk to. I could never let her know that her heavy German accent bothered me so as it was my problem not hers. I learned so much from her! She talked about Germany before, leading up to and during the war. She survived she said as a High Ranking German Officer chose her as a maid (unpaid of course) and only sent to camps near the very end of the war. I will say no more.

My father who I have spoken of here in other places had me work alongside a man for several summer between college semesters. He was on the Baton Death march and spent most of WWII in a Japanese Prison Camp. I'm not sure since I never dared ask if my father had asked him to talk to me since he knew I was in ROTC and eventually going into the Army or it was a combined effort between the two of them. Most WWII vets especially those who had been through what this man had DO NOT TALK to people about their experiences! This man could only eat baby food his digestive system was so messed up from what he went through. I honestly don't know how he survived. I will not share anything he told me as it is simply too horrible to put into print. If they wanted to harden me they certainly accomplished that. I spent nine months working side by side with that man and when we were alone he would start talking. Someone here started a thread saying she does not believe in evil. If she spent some time with my father's friend she would have nightmares.

I have seen up close and personal what another person can do to another human being. Sometimes I have experienced nightmares myself, not so much anymore.

 

[The Gryphon]

because I serve and follow Christ

I have to apologize as I confused your post with someone else's post so the question was not meant for you. My sincerest regrets!

 

[DamianWarS]

I have to apologize as I confused your post with someone else's post so the question was not meant for you. My sincerest regrets!

my mistake, I re-read the post and I missed the quote from the other poster

 

[The Gryphon]

The real question is, where are the Christians now when evil and money is running countries and the weak and poor continue to be oppressed / exploited by the rich and powerful?

Are you doing anything to find out about disturbing truth about our world?

Sorry guy I am near the poverty level now myself. One paycheck away from homelessness. I'm ready to go home to be with the Lord. If I did not have good insurance I would be there now. Living of Social Security as all the savings are gone to the Doctors, Hospitals, and drug companies just to stay alive. I'm VERY tired and I don't like what I see for the future in this nation. I'm turning 69 and my wife is 72.

 

[rockytopva]

Hoping someone mentioned Dietrich Bonhoeffer...

 

[FireDragon76]

Perhaps they should have practiced there Christian Faith as Dietrich Bonhoeffer did.

Physician, heal thyself...

Bonhoeffer on Stupidity. . .Yet Again

When Bonhoeffer visited the US, he tended to only worship in African-American churches, where he felt that black people understood the Gospel truly. I believe little has changed since Bonhoeffer's day in this respect. While Nazi Germany's Christianity was disfigured and twisted, I don't believe America's is all that much different.

So I think this makes it understandable where the Christians in Germany were. Most of them were very conflicted, submerged in a religion that had little to do with mercy and grace, and everything to do with authoritarianism and nationalism.

 

[mindlight]

Where were the Christians In Germany during WWII?
Thursday, Sep 27th 2018

Chilling confessions of PoWs captured by the British have laid bare the brutality and excesses of ‘ordinary’ German soldiers in the Second World War.

A book of transcripts to be published in Germany next week reveals how the honour of its old army was lost amid the frenzy to be ‘perfect, pitiless Nazis’.

In the interrogation transcripts, the German soldiers speak of the ‘fun’ and ‘pure enjoyment’ of massacring innocent civilians and enemy troops.

If you dare read it all here> The 'perfect, pitiless, Nazi': Soldiers' interviews reveal how German troops driven by 'bloodlust' killed for fun | Daily Mail Online

Communism was evil as was much of the liberalism and decadence of post WW1 Germany (which Germans wrongly associated with the Jews).

If I had been a German soldier in WW2 I hope that I would have fought for my Country and on the grounds of article 47 of the German Military code would have had the courage to refuse orders to kill Innocents or people that were not combatants where no due process of law had been followed. Whether or not I would have survived the war is the other issue - most likely I would have been shot for disobeying orders. But Project Valkyrie and Bonhoeffer did not act Christianly in plotting to overthrow the sovereign German government by violence.

The Nazis are not the only evil from the twentieth century - Communism and Liberalism also brought evil.

 

[FireDragon76]

I have read Stalin killed more people in his Gulag prison camps than Hitler did in his concentration camps. Not much is spoken about these times. Religion was a crime under Stalin's Marxist atheist regime. Many of the people Stalin killed were Christians. They were sent to camps in Siberia to serve one or two seven years sentences of forced labor. Most did not survive seven years due to hunger and exposure to the cold. The USSR remained brutal for decades. To this day a reporter might be executed for criticizing the government.

Stalin actually made a certain peace with the Orthodox Church during the war. There is even a rumor he went to confession twice during the war.

Most that were sent to Siberia were sent for political reasons in general, not religion. He would eliminate people he suspected of disloyalty, or when he needed their resources.

By historic standards, Stalin was typical of the brutal leadership they considered just par for the course, which explains why so many people admired him decades later in Russia. Intrigue and murder are how Russian statecraft has always operated, this is nothing at all new.

 

[Norbert L]

Where were the Christians In Germany during WWII?
Thursday, Sep 27th 2018

Chilling confessions of PoWs captured by the British have laid bare the brutality and excesses of ‘ordinary’ German soldiers in the Second World War.

A book of transcripts to be published in Germany next week reveals how the honour of its old army was lost amid the frenzy to be ‘perfect, pitiless Nazis’.

In the interrogation transcripts, the German soldiers speak of the ‘fun’ and ‘pure enjoyment’ of massacring innocent civilians and enemy troops.

If you dare read it all here> The 'perfect, pitiless, Nazi': Soldiers' interviews reveal how German troops driven by 'bloodlust' killed for fun | Daily Mail Online

I believe one of the bigger conclusions a person can draw from this is that these blood lust soldiers are people too. Given the chance within any political system, this segment of society will fill in the ranks to do "the job". Basically out of any large population on this world, you will find some people that take pleasure in shooting other people.

 

[dqhall]

Stalin actually made a certain peace with the Orthodox Church during the war. There is even a rumor he went to confession twice during the war.

Most that were sent to Siberia were sent for political reasons in general, not religion. He would eliminate people he suspected of disloyalty, or when he needed their resources.

By historic standards, Stalin was typical of the brutal leadership they considered just par for the course, which explains why so many people admired him decades later in Russia. Intrigue and murder are how Russian statecraft has always operated, this is nothing at all new.

Churches were destroyed, priests were executed or sent to the camps.
Soviet gulags revived the ancient tradition of Christian martyrs

 

[mukk_in]

Others may have already mentioned this, Col. Klaus Von Stauffenberg (a decorated soldier and hero of the North Africa campaign who tried to stop Hitler) was a devout catholic. It was believed that Field Marshall Erwin Rommel (the "Desert Fox") was an evangelical, while his wife Lucia was a devout catholic. I'm quite sure that all the German soldiers weren't Nazis. Peace in Christ .

 

[Dave L]

How many Christians in America support incinerating the Middle East today in behalf of Israel? Some even think it will speed Jesus' return.

 

[Mountainmike]

History teaches us the propensity of ordinary people to do heinous things.
So the message is dont point fingers at them, it is "dont think YOU are immune"

Nazi Germany was bad enough - but consider the Rwandan Genocide.
Ordinary people "hutu" hacked millions of "tutsi" to death with machetes.
No mercy. Old . Children. Pregnant women. All of them.

It got out of hand so quickly.
One group branding the other as "cockroaches"

Even children were hacked to bits in Rwanda with the mantra "remember - the child of a snake is still a snake"
Many of them were Christians.
There were so many bodies, there was noone left to bury them.

All Christians might be interested in the books
"Left to Tell" and "Led by Faith" by Immacullee ilibagiza.


For all christians
Her tale of survived without ending up hating, and how she forgive those who hacked her family to bits.

And how her faith got her through.
I urge all to read, as a warning.

For Catholics
There is a story of "our lady of Kibeho" who prophesied the troubles and rivers of blood, a few years before it started . Her unheeded words to repent.


In books on psychology eg "influence: the psychology of persuasion - Cialdini" there are chilling proven experiments on how ordinary people can be persuaded to torture by the power of those they think are in "authority".
You and Me.

Here in the UK I see on social media vile language of hate in the interparty rhetoric
One MP has died here: could it also happen here?

The message:
We must never forget... in the wrong situation it we could all slip down the slope. ALl of us. Men have the power to be evil. Its why our Lord came.

Where were the Christians In Germany during WWII?
Thursday, Sep 27th 2018

Chilling confessions of PoWs captured by the British have laid bare the brutality and excesses of ‘ordinary’ German soldiers in the Second World War.

A book of transcripts to be published in Germany next week reveals how the honour of its old army was lost amid the frenzy to be ‘perfect, pitiless Nazis’.

In the interrogation transcripts, the German soldiers speak of the ‘fun’ and ‘pure enjoyment’ of massacring innocent civilians and enemy troops.

If you dare read it all here> The 'perfect, pitiless, Nazi': Soldiers' interviews reveal how German troops driven by 'bloodlust' killed for fun | Daily Mail Online