The Great Scandal: Christianity's Role in the Rise of the Nazis

[mwb970]

by Gregory S. Paul

“You know what happens when atheists take over—remember Nazi Germany?” Many Christians point to Nazism, alongside Stalinism, to illustrate the perils of atheism in power. At the other extreme, some authors paint the Vatican as Hitler’s eager ally. Meanwhile, the Nazis are generally portrayed as using terror to bend a modern civilization to their agenda; yet we recognize that Hitler was initially popular. Amid these contradictions, where is the truth?

A growing body of scholarly research, some based on careful analysis of Nazi records, is clarifying this complex history. It reveals a convoluted pattern of religious and moral failure in which atheism and the nonreligious played little role, except as victims of the Nazis and their allies. In contrast, Christianity had the capacity to stop Nazism before it came to power, and to reduce or moderate its practices afterwards, but repeatedly failed to do so because the principal churches were complicit with — indeed, in the pay of — the Nazis.

Most German Christians supported the Reich; many continued to do so in the face of mounting evidence that the dictatorship was depraved and murderously cruel. Elsewhere in Europe the story was often the same. Only with Christianity’s forbearance and frequent cooperation could fascistic movements gain majority support in Christian nations. European fascism was the fruit of a Christian culture. Millions of Christians actively supported these notorious regimes. Thousands participated in their atrocities.

What, in God’s name, were they thinking?

http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/paul_23_4.html

[TexasLawyer]

1. Scalia suggests church/state separation equals Nazi Germany

Anyone who reads history knows that Hitler manipulated people by appealing to his sick interpretation of Christianity. I guess Antonin Scalia missed school that day.

http://blog.au.org/2004/12/did_scalia_skip.html

Not satisfied merely misinterpreting the legacy of the founders, Scalia then cryptically asked "Did it turn out that by reason of the separation of church and state, the Jews were safer in Europe than they were in the United States?" He answered himself, saying, "I don't think so."

[2Design]

2. exactly and it is on the rise again and again the christians are in

denial and willing to send us all to our deaths - they are so delusional - it is a cult and getting worse

[Nothing Without Hope]

3. Bookmarked- very interesting. Re American fascism, see this article

here:http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1501226

Not the same emphasis as the historical study of the connections between German fascism and religion that you linked to, but well worth re-reading. It was originally written and, I assume, posted here about 6 months ago.

The Ghost of Vice President Wallace Warns: "It Can Happen Here"
by Thom Hartmann
(snip)
Although most Americans remember that Harry Truman was Franklin D. Roosevelt's Vice President when Roosevelt died in 1945 (making Truman President), Roosevelt had two previous Vice Presidents - John N. Garner (1933-1941) and Henry A. Wallace (1941-1945). In early 1944, the New York Times asked Vice President Henry Wallace to, as Wallace noted, "write a piece answering the following questions: What is a fascist? How many fascists have we? How dangerous are they?"

Vice President Wallace's answer to those questions was published in The New York Times on April 9, 1944, at the height of the war against the Axis powers of Germany and Japan.
"The really dangerous American fascists," Wallace wrote, "are not those who are hooked up directly or indirectly with the Axis. The FBI has its finger on those. The dangerous American fascist is the man who wants to do in the United States in an American way what Hitler did in Germany in a Prussian way. The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power."
(snip)