Kirchenkampf

Akita Suggagaki said:

I've been reading some Bonhoeffer, Barth, Bultmann, and Tillich and became more interested in the situation with the Christian church in Nazi Germany.

see Kirchenkampf - Wikipedia for a start.

"Hitler biographer Ian Kershaw wrote that, while many ordinary people were apathetic, after years of warning from Catholic clergy, Germany's Catholic population greeted the Nazi takeover with uncertainty, while among German Protestants, there was more optimism that the Nazi takeover would bring about a strengthened Germany might bring with it "inner, moral revitalisation". However, within a short period, the Nazi government's tensions with the Christian Churches was to become a source of dissatisfaction in more religious circles."

Such optimism proved disastrous.

"Nazis criticized Christian notions of "meekness and guilt" on the basis that they "repressed the violent instincts necessary to prevent inferior races from dominating Aryans"

In Hitler's eyes, Christianity was a religion fit only for slaves; he detested its ethics in particular. Its teaching, he declared, was a rebellion against the natural law of selection by struggle and the survival of the fittest."

Fifth stage (1939 to 1945)​

• More clergy were imprisoned
• Clergy were drafted into the military
• Church publications were censored or banned
• Services and functions restricted or banned

Christian churches can either support or threaten political regimes. One group gets persecuted while the other gets rewarded.

Click to expand...

Akita Suggagaki said:

I've been reading some Bonhoeffer, Barth, Bultmann, and Tillich and became more interested in the situation with the Christian church in Nazi Germany.

see Kirchenkampf - Wikipedia for a start.

"Hitler biographer Ian Kershaw wrote that, while many ordinary people were apathetic, after years of warning from Catholic clergy, Germany's Catholic population greeted the Nazi takeover with uncertainty, while among German Protestants, there was more optimism that the Nazi takeover would bring about a strengthened Germany might bring with it "inner, moral revitalisation". However, within a short period, the Nazi government's tensions with the Christian Churches was to become a source of dissatisfaction in more religious circles."

Such optimism proved disastrous.

"Nazis criticized Christian notions of "meekness and guilt" on the basis that they "repressed the violent instincts necessary to prevent inferior races from dominating Aryans"

In Hitler's eyes, Christianity was a religion fit only for slaves; he detested its ethics in particular. Its teaching, he declared, was a rebellion against the natural law of selection by struggle and the survival of the fittest."

Fifth stage (1939 to 1945)​

• More clergy were imprisoned
• Clergy were drafted into the military
• Church publications were censored or banned
• Services and functions restricted or banned

Christian churches can either support or threaten political regimes. One group gets persecuted while the other gets rewarded.

Click to expand...

Akita Suggagaki said:

I hope it is not a current theme anywhere. Except I guess China.

I am not even familiar with the church situation in Germany now. I am almost finished with A Layman's Guide to Protestant Theology by William E Hordern. In the larger context of things we are not so far removed from WWII. The power of populism is frightening and how it can appropriate religion.

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