Dear Friends,
Contents: 1) Obituary: Dr L. Siegele-Wenschkewitz
2) Forthcoming Conference: 30th Annual Conference on the Holocaust and the
Churches, March 4th – 7th
3) Book reviews:
a) S. Selinger, C.v. Kirschbaum and K. Barth
b) E. Voegelin, Hitler and the Germans c) N. Railton, German Evangelicals and
Third Reich
4)Book notes:
a) A. Lindemann, Esau’s Tears
b) B. Chiari, Alltag hinter der Front
c) ed.P. Smith, After the Wall
d) Kretschmar, Das bischoefliche Amt
e) Mensing, Pfarrer und Nationalsozialismus
5)Journal articles:
a) R. Shaffer, Japanese Internees
b) G. Besier, East German Churches
c) B. Schafer, East German Catholics
6) Correction: H. Kreutzer, Reich Church Ministry
7)Technical Note   1) It is with great regret that we learn of the recent death of Frau Dr
Leonore Siegele-Wenschkewitz (1944-1999) in Frankfurt, Germany. As a former
associate of the late Professor Klaus Scholder in Tubingen, she developed a
keen interest in the history of the Church Struggle, and published her
researches on this topic, most notably in her valuable study ‘Theologische
Fakultaeten im Nationalsozialismus’, Goettingen 1993. From 1983 she worked
as Moderator of Studies at the Evangelical Academy in Arnoldshain, near
Frankfurt, of which she became the Director in 1996. The numerous
conferences and seminars she helped to organize there played a significant
role in the life of the church in western Germany. At the same time she was
an adjunct professor at Frankfurt University, when she had an opportunity to
express her interest in the role of women in the church
She served for many years as a member of the Evangelical Church’s Board for
Contemporary History, and since 1988 was its vice-chairman. In view of the
sad illness of the chairman, she was called on to take a very active role in
the Board’s affairs in the last year of her life.
In 1999 she was awarded the Edith Stein Prize, and was fortunately able to
go to Gottingen to receive this honour and to deliver an appropriate speech
in recognition of Edith Stein on this occasion.

2) The 30th Annual Scholars’ Conference on the Holocaust and the Churches
will be held at St. Joseph’s University and the Adams Mark Hotel,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from Saturday, March 4th to Tuesday, March 7th.
The key note address on Sunday, March 5th will be delivered by Elie Wiesel.
Registration and information can be obtained from the Annual Scholars’
Conference, P.O.Box 10, Merion Station, Pa 19066, FAX 610-667-0265.   3a) Suzanne Selinger, Charlotte von Kirschbaum and Karl Barth. A Study in
Biography and the History of Theology. University Park, Penn: Penn.State
U.P. 1998. 206pp
Female theologians are still a rarity: how much more so seventy years ago!
The career of Charlotte von Kirschbaum, secretary and theological assistant
to Karl Barth for over thirty years, has long intrigued, and sometimes
scandalized, admirers of the most prominent Protestant theologian of the
20th century. Feminists have long accused Barth of exploiting “Lollo”, as
she was always known, and Suzanne Selinger, herself an accomplished
theological writer, shares a lot of the anger at what she sees as Barth’s
selfishness in not promoting von Kirschbaum’s own career. On the other hand,
Lollo herself was an intelligent, devoted and faithful interpreter of Barth’s often complex theology and accepted, apparently willingly, her
indispensable role as part of his household.
Suzanne Selinger recognizes that the secrets of their personal relationship
are hardly recoverable and instead seeks to elucidate more about their
professional links. She regrets that Lollo only published a small amount on
her own account, but senses in this accomplishment signs of the kind of
influence she may have had in her daily discussions with Barth. Selinger
rightly sees that, in order to achieve the kind of theological writing in
which he excelled, and especially in his great work _Church Dogmatics_,
Barth needed a dialogical partner – someone to function as sounding board
and, most characteristically, someone with whom to think things through. In
his earlier career, Eduard Thurneysen had played this role. But after Barth
moved to Germany, and needed more direct assistance in his academic affairs,
it was only natural that he should seek out someone whose sympathy for his
ideas and understanding of his mental processes and doctrinal positions, was
matched by an incredible capacity for more humdrum tasks. Not only did Lollo
type out Barth’s drafts, answer his letters, “manage” his students, organize
his timetable of meetings, lectures and speaking engagements, but even found
time to compile a vast collection of useful excerpts from a huge variety of
Christian writers, which could then be turned to at will.
Selinger is particularly good at tracing Lollo’s nuanced view of gender
issues, in the light of the christologically-based anthropology she shared
with, or adopted from, Barth. She certainly rejected the patriarchal view of
much of her German tradition-bound society, as also the romanticized view of
women as inherently dependent on men, or alternatively more religious than
man. Such stereotyping had to be rejected in favour of the kind of
relational existence of both men and women in response to God’s command.
In the later chapters, Selinger examines closely Barth’s doctrines of the
image of God, the gender question and his innovative theories of dialogical
personalism. Lollo’s contribution to such ideas is impossible to unravel,
but Selinger clearly believes she played a significant role in their
eventual formulation, especially in stressing the creativity of women,
including a mutual fellowship in the constructive building of community. To
understand all this, a close acquaintance with _Church Dogmatics_ is
recommended.
Charlotte von Kirschbaum was criticized, both in her time and since, by
feminists unable to comprehend her spiritual approach, who saw only
exploitation of her undoubted gifts by the dominant male. Yet she chose to
be freely herself for Barth – a perfect realisation of I – Thou
relationship. It was a one-sided partnership, yet clearly rewarding for
both. Perhaps, as Selinger suggets, Barth’s need to have Lollo’s constant
presence was the result of a weakness, a loneliness, which demanded the
company of the other. Her legacy is to be found buried in his comprehensive
theological work. It is not therefore to be disparaged.
JSC   3b) Eric Voegelin. Hitler and the Germans. Columbia: University of Missouri
Press, 1999.
This book is based on lectures Eric Voegelin gave at the University of
Munich in 1964, that are being published now for the first time. The
lectures were given in German, and they have been ably edited and translated
into English by Detlev Clemens and Brendan Purcell.
In this work, Voegelin seeks to address questions such as these: What were
the spiritual conditions in Germany which allowed Hitler to rise to power
and gain the support of so many average people?, Why did the Christian
churches respond to Nazism so weakly?, How did a regime rooted in illegality
and murder take over the legal system in Germany?, Why do intellectuals and
academics in Germany after the war have such a poor understanding of Nazism
as a spiritual phenomenon?, Why are many former Nazis who are war criminals
living openly and prospering in Germany after the war?
Those who are already familiar with Voegelin’s philosophy will find here the
basic concepts which he has developed elsewhere: human existence occurs “in
between” materiality and the transcendent realm of God; human beings have a
marked tendency to avoid living honestly with this reality of the “between”;
this leads them to create false “second realities” in which they attempt to
exist autonomously, apart from God; the flight from reality has led to the
modern neo-gnostic regimes of mass murder such as Stalinism and Nazism. In
these lectures, Voegelin focuses on the historical circumstances of Nazism,
making this volume more concrete and accessible than his other more abstract
and philosophical writings, which have a tendency toward dense argument and
complex terminology. This volume would serve very well as an introduction to
Voegelin for someone who has not read him.
There is a clear undercurrent of anger animating this text, which is
understandable given Voegelin’s personal history of persecution at the hands
of the Nazis. Voegelin doesn’t allow his anger to derail his central
purpose, however, which is to analyze the various dimensions of the “abyss”
into which Germany descended: the academic abyss, the ecclesiastical abyss,
and the legal abyss. In the academic realm, Voegelin’s principal target of
attack is P. E. Schramm, the historian who edited Hitler’s Table Talk.
Voegelin pillories Schramm for producing an “anatomy” of the dictator which
reveals a fundamental lack of understanding of the subject. This lack of
understanding is reprehensible in Voegelin’s eyes because the intellectual
tools needed for correct understanding were available to Schramm–in
classical philosophy, biblical theology, and the writings of contemporaries
such as Karl Kraus, Robert Musil, Thomas Mann, Hermann Broch, and Heimito
von Doderer.
Voegelin comments on the ecclesiastical situation in two substantial
chapters which are devoted to the Catholic and Protestant spheres. In each
case his critique is very harsh, emphasizing the idea that most Christians
knew of the persecution of the Jews by the Nazis and either applauded it or
did not care about it as long as they themselves were not being persecuted.
When the reach of the Nazis’ power did begin to negatively impact the
churches, then Christians all of sudden began to realize that they should be
concerned about their fellow human beings who are being murdered. Voegelin
reveals the narcissism at the root of this morale debacle as a massive
failure of the Christian church to hold fast to the central biblical
teaching regarding the creation of all people in the image of God. On pages
199-201, Voegelin puts forward a list of ten biblical and philosophical
points which are necessary to teach German clerics and theologians “the
elements of Christianity.” His wish for the use of this list: “Lower clergy,
copy it out daily ten times; bishops and theologians, daily a hundred times;
theologians who have received a Cross of Merit from the Federal Republic,
daily two hundred times until they have got it.”
Voegelin’s anger and sarcasm make the book lively, but they don’t set the
stage for a balanced and comprehensive historical account. He pays very
little attention to the Confessing Church, for example, mentioning
Bonhoeffer only in passing and Karl Barth not even once. His judgment that
there was “no good theology” being produced in Germany at the time seems
very odd in light of Barth’s works (162). But in hindsight, the impact of
the Confessing Church was minimal in stemming the tide of Nazism, and
Voegelin’s portrait of the situation is generally accurate. I make this
comment without being a historian of that period myself. I would be very
interested to read a review of this work written by such a person. It may be
that members of the historical guild will not be as favorable in their
attitude toward this work as I am, representing the guild of theological
ethics.
Charles Bellinger, Regent College, Vancouver   3c) Nicholas Railton, The German Evangelical Alliance and the Third Reich.
An analysis of the ‘Evangelisches Allianzblatt’, Bern: Peter Lang 1998, pp.
265 £27
Railton, who has already written an assessment of the German Free Churches
and the Third Reich, has now produced this revealing study of the German
Bible belt. Consisting of about one million adherents in the 1930s, and
stretching from the Saxon Erzgebirge through Thuringia and Hessen to Baden
and Wuerttemberg, it gave a depressingly rosy response to Hitlerism as a
force standing for ‘positive Christianity’. Railton shows us quite clearly
how much German evangelicalism (‘evangelikal’ used in its Anglo-American
sense can be dated only as far back as 1965) in its modern phase, beginning
with the loose inter-denominational Gnadau Association (1897) of Lutheran,
Reformed and United Church evangelicals and their new missionary press
(1890: c. 5,000), owed to the early modern and habitual German home-town
environment and mentality of Pietism, Moravianism and early
nineteenth-century Revivalism. Wilhelmine and Weimar successors, simply put,
could not adapt either spiritually or morally to the challenges posed by our
modern industrial age. It appears also that authoritarian political values
investing the ‘state’ and those who ran it with an almost divine aura
over-rode a religious ethos associated with being ‘born again’. The ideals
of 1789, western Liberalism, Marxism, Bolshevism, post-1918 democratic
republicanism and an alleged Jewish ‘materialism’ were lumped together, with
not so much as the odd tweak of conscience, as poisons. These supposedly
contaminated a German muscular evangelical post-1918 culture which drew its
main inspiration from the recent hurrah patriotism of Bismarck’s Second
Reich, and the ‘ we-are-so-hard-done-by’ interwar German Nationalist Party.
It does seem extremely odd today, that the two years 1933 and 1934, marking
Nazi ‘co-ordination’, should be seen by the German Free Churches and
evangelicals as giving far greater freedoms and opportunities than the years
of the Weimar Republic, which had awarded the Christian Churches and other
religions freedoms and financial support on a scale unheard of in Germany
before 1918. It repays to read again and again, however bleak one’s frame of
mind, this German ‘evangelical’ way of thinking and speaking during 1930-3.
Railton summarizes it in the following way: ‘Hitler talked of “God”, “the
Lord” and “Providence”, so now they began to talk of the “Zeitenwende”, the
“nationaler Aufbruch” and “Vorsehung”. The language of the Third Reich was
already becoming the language of German evangelicalism’ (p.27) Chapter vi,
‘Evangelical social concerns’, and chapter vii, ‘The Jewish question’,
recording adulation for Hitler as Mr Clean, and overt evangelical support
for Nazi public moral hygiene, meaning clearing the streets of pimps,
prostitutes, homosexuals, Jews and assorted riff-raff, and approval of Nazi
anti-abortion policy, pile a murky Pelion upon Ossa. The teaching of the
Bible, purged, one might add, of the Old Testament, seems to have been
completely dispensed with.
Nicholas Hope. (This review appeared first in the Journal of Ecclesiastical
History, July 1999, p. 612-3)   Book notes:   4a) A.S.Lindemann, Esau’s Tears: Modern anti-semitism and the rise of the
Jews, Cambridge University Press 1997. 568pp
The object of this large-scale history of anti-semitism is basically to take
issue with the prevailing view found in simplistic surveys such as those by
D.Goldhagen or Lucy Dawidowicz, which have blamed outside forces, including
the Christian church, for this phenomenon. Lindemann instead seeks to
advance the polemical and provocative view that some aspects at least of
this intolerance were due to the Jews’ own behaviour and their “rise”.
On the historical role of the Church, Lindemann makes the following
statement:
“One can unquestionably pinpoint Christian tendencies towards demonizing
Jews, but such tendencies are balanced by others. The evidence is hardly
persuasive that within Christian belief is contained a strongly determined
predisposition, drawing in all Christians, to violent hatred of Jews. In
modern times Christian peoples have differed enormously in their reactions
to Jews, from mild philo-Semitism to murderous loathing. This range of
sentiment cannot be convincingly connected to various traits within
varieties of Christianity, whether Catholic, Protestant, or Greek Orthodox,
sincere or lax, popular or elite.. . . Religion, though often seen as the
ultimate or fundamental source of anti-Semitism, is too elastic and
ambiguous a category to offer much more than conjectural, ahistorical and
woolly explanations, in which the preconceptions and emotional agendas of
the authors play a decisive role.” (p.xvi)   b) B.Chiari, Alltag hinter der Front. Besatzung, Kollaboration und
Widerstand in Weissrussland 1941-1944 Dusseldorf, Droste Verlag 1998
This belated study of the German occupation of White Russia (Byelorussia)
has a few pages dealing with the role of the church under Nazi rule
(pp103ff). As in the Ukraine, the initial hopes for deliverance >from the
Communists led to exaggerated expectations amongst the upper Orthodox clergy
which were soon enough disillusioned. As for the Catholics, who constituted
some 20%, they were always regarded as hostile, and were treated
accordingly. This is another mosaic in the wider picture of the fate of the
Soviet churches which still remains to be written up. But B.Chiari has
researched the Russian sources thoroughly as far as this aspect of his topic
goes.   c) ed. Patricia Smith, After the Wall. Eastern Germany since 1989,
Boulder,Colo. Westview Press, 1998
Detlef Pollack, a sociologist who teaches at Frankfurt an der Oder,
contributes a chapter on the situation of religion since 1989, which draws
on various interviews and samples to show that in fact the differences
between religious practices and beliefs in east and west Germany are not all
that great. Despite 40 years of deliberate secularization, the churches
survive, though noticeably weaker in eastern Germany. On the other hand the
anticipated loss to other faiths or cults has not happened. The expectations
of what the churches should be like are similar, and the level of
commitment, as for example to be seen in baptism or confirmation, are
remarkably constant, but can not lend comfort to those who had hoped that
the end of Communism would see a re-christianisation of the east German
society.   d) Georg Kretschmar, Das bischoefliche Amt. Gottingen: Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht 1999 355pp
The former Professor of Church History in Hamburg and Munich, and
subsequently the bishop of the revived Lutheran Church in the Baltic States,
has contributed these studies in the episcopal office which cover the office
of the bishop in the Early Church, its rediscovery and renewal of the
ministry during the Reformation era, and its ecumenical relevance.

e) The study by Bjorn Mensing, Pfarrer und Nationalsozialismus, which was
reviewed here by Prof.Gerhard Besier in November 1998, has now achieved a
second edition with a new publisher, Verlag C. u. C. Rabenstein, Bayreuth.
The author has taken the opportunity to make suitable corrections in the
light of a vigorous response, extending >from helpful additions by surviving
eye-witnesses to personal attacks and threats of legal action, even
anonymous denunciations.   5) Journal articles:   Jacques Kornberg, Ignaz von Dollinger’s Die Juden in Europa: A Catholic
Polemic against Antisemitism, in Journal for the History of Modern
Theology/Zeitschrift fur neuere Theologiegeschichte, Vol. 6 no 2, 1999,
pp.223-245
Kornberg, a professor at Toronto, brings to light a long forgotten lecture
given in 1881 by this most distinguished Bavarian academic, who
unfortunately had been excommunicated by the Vatican for his opposition to
the policies of Pope Pius IX. Kornberg sees this attack on the kind of
vulgar anti-Judaism in one persistent strain of Catholic thought as part of
Dollinger’s overall campaign against the ultramontane authoritarianism being
imposed by Rome. On the other hand, Dollinger still adhered to the kind of
triumphalism which looked forward to the eventual voluntary conversion of
Jews to (liberal) Christianity. The sentiments expressed are very
reminiscent of those adopted 8o years later at the 2nd Vatican Council, and
contributed to Dollinger’s recent
rehabilitation.   Robert Shaffer, Opposition to Internment. Defending Japanese American rights
during World War II, in The Historian, Vol 61, no. 3, Spring 1999, 597ff
This article describes the small number of sympathizers with the Japanese
Americans interned in 1942, often pastors and missionaries, who had some
contact with these congregations on the American West Coast, and sought to
alleviate their plight.   Gerhard Besier, The German Democratic Republic and the State Churches,
1958-1989,
in Journal of Ecclesiastical History, Vol 50, no 3, July 1999, p. 523ff
Designed to bring to an English audience the results of Prof.Besier’s
enormous volume of research into the fate of the East German churches under
Communist rule, this article is a valuable if much abbreviated summary. For
those who want to explore further, the footnotes give useful help.   Bernd Schaefer, State and Catholic Church in Eastern Germany, 1945-1989, in
German Studies Review, Vol. XXII, no 3, October 1999, p. 447ff
A useful summary of the Catholic Church’s position, on similar lines to the
previous item.   6) Correction: Following our notice in last November’s Newsletter of Heike
Kreutzer’s 1993 MA thesis on the establishment of the Reich Church Ministry
in 1935, the author has now kindly sent us her more recently completed PhD
thesis from Tuebingen University on the same topic, which is to be published
later this year. She has expanded her earlier work with a full analysis of
the documentation relating to the Church Ministry, which was for so long
unavailable in East German archives. Although her treatment essentially
stops in 1938, she again emphasizes her view that the Ministry’s failure and
its fate was already decided by that date. Her researches confirm in detail
what was already known – that the Minister, Hanns Kerrl, was an impulsive,
semi-educated, naive and bungling politician. Moreover, he was incessantly
caught in the cross-fire between the rival church camps, especially in the
Evangelical Churches, on the one side, and at the same time, sabotaged by
his supposed colleagues in the Nazi Party, who were much more skillful than
he at interpreting Hitler’s often contradictory tactics towards the
churches.
Kerrl started from the “idealist” position that the Churches and the Nazi
Party should be integrated more closely together. “True Christianity and
true National Socialism are identical” was typical of his approach, which
was found to be absurd not only by orthodox churchmen, but also by the Party
radicals. While Kerrl sought to bring the churches under state control, the
Party radicals sought to diminish or even to abolish them. Kerrl found his
only support in a handful of “German Christians”, but already by 1937, he
had been effectively outmanouevred and his grandiose plans aborted.
Heike Kreutzer’s contribution is to document the lamentable career of this
hapless Nazi minister in a manner which will not need to be done again. Her
viewpoint is not new, and suffers from a considerable amount of repetition.
Especially revealing is her account of the extent to which Kerrl was unable
to gain the loyalty of his own staff, which included at least three
clergymen regularly reporting on his actvities to the Gestapo. The official
in charge of Catholic affairs, a renegade priest, was a determined opponent
of the Concordat, and organized an extensive campaign to weaken the Catholic
Church’s institutional life, thus playing into the hands of the Nazi
extremists. On the Protestant side, the ministry’s officials did seem to
have more sympathy for their “clients’, but again proved ineffective against
the increasingly anti-church and anti-clerical camp led by Bormann, Goebbels
and Rosenberg.
Ms Kreutzer clearly shows how this Ministry and its officials were part of
the internecine rivalries within the Nazi power structures, which in the end
led to its complete subordination and failure. It would be nice to think
that this misbegotten attempt to use state power to manipulate and coerce
the churches had been defeated by the churches’ united resistance against
such unwanted provocation. But the evidence shows that this was not the
case. Not only did the Catholic Church, for example, welcome the close
association with the state by signing the Concordat with Hitler in 1933, but
successfully campaigned to have it upheld again in West Germany in the
1950s. And the experience in East Germany, where the Ministry for Church
Affairs, reappeared in a communist guise, was to prove equally lamentable on
both the state’s and the churches’part. It was not a chapter of church
history to be proud of.   7) Technical Note:
This Newsletter comes to you free, gratis and without cost. Anyone who is
genuinely interested in contemporary church history is welcome to subscribe,
whether or not they have teaching responsibilities in this area. As of
January 2000, we have 275 subscribers, whose geographical location is as
follows:
USA 103, Canada 61, Germany 44, U.K. 22, Australia 10, Sweden 4, Norway 3,
France 3, Denmark 3, Switzerland 2, Belgium, Netherlands, South Africa,
Poland, Austria, Ireland, Hungary, Finland 1 each, and a few in cyberspace.
The subscribers’ list is NOT made available to any other agency or
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The contents of the Newsletter may be freely distributed, provided that
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Written contributions or comments are most welcome and can be forwarded to
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Anyone desiring to unsubscribe should also so indicate to me, and not to the
list in general.   With best wishes
John S.Conway
jconway@interchange.ubc.ca

Newsletter – Vol V, no 4 – April 1999

Dear Friends,

Contents: 1) Book reviews: a) Jehovah’s Witnesses b) Brewer,Anti-Catholicism in N.Ireland c) Chandler, Terrible Alternative d) Recker, Bishop Berning 2) Thesis abstract: Jeff Zalar 3) Journal articles in Religion, State and Society 4) New books noted

1a) Hans Hesse (ed), Am mutigsten waren immer die Zeugen Jehovahs: Verfolgung und Widerstand der Zeugen Jehovahs im Nationalsozialismus, Bremen:Edition Temmen 1998, 447pp. DM48Klaus-Dieter Pape, Die Angstmacher: Wer (ver)fuehrt die ZeugenJehovahs?, Leipzig: St.Benno-Verlag 1998, 282 pp DM 26.80. Jehovah’s Witnesses (Watchtower Society) are a small Christian religious association with a history of over a 100 years’ activity in Germany. Today, they number more than 5 million believers world-wide. During the past five years, they have repeatedly made headlines in Germany because of their efforts – up to now unsuccessful – to gain the status of a corporation under public law.During both dictatorships, the J.Ws displayed remarkable resistance, and consequently suffered many casualties. In the early nineties, they went on the offensive in Germany, not only with respect to their legal status, but also by modifying the way they handle their own past. They became more open, co-operating with outside historians wishing to do research and pushing ahead some of their own historical projects. At the same time they modified their doctrines in some important areas. Unfortunately, these new social initiatives only stirred up latent prejudices and antagonisms still in existence among the major churches and other groups. So when in 1997 the J.Ws produced a video documentary entitled “Jehovah’s Witnesses Stand Firm against Nazi Assault”, emotions flared up. The Schulpsychologische Dienst (Centre for Educational Psychology)in Bremen circulated a somewhat awkwardly phrased letter,stating: “Although no doubt Jehovah’s Witnesses suffered torture,imprisonment and even death in the concentration camps under the Nazi regime, using this video documentary in schools cannot be recommended, because doing so would provide this sect with an opportunity to gain publicity for their organization.”When Jehovah’s Witnesses protested, the letter was withdrawn.But the Schulpsychologische Dienst would not drop its reservations. “The situation is complicated since the video documentary is about a religious association which is understandably interested not only in publicising their persecution but also their history, doctrines and organization”.Of course the fact that other films about the conduct of the churches during the Third Reich have been produced for as long as anyone can remember, films which also do not restrict themselves to the subject of persecution, is often conveniently ignored. The official institutions responsible for the approval of media for schools consulted six experts, including two “sect experts” from the major churches. The result was their decision not to let the film”get into the hands of pupils” and to recommend against distribution.Part B of Hesse’s book examines in detail the aspects of the film being criticised. One scholar in religious studies, not a member of the J.Ws, came to the conclusion: “In the light of Auschwitz and the Holocaust, if such an example of Christian integrity by a community of faith had not existed, then the credibility of Jesus’ teachings would have been put in doubt.” A “vindication” of Christianity by, of all people, the scorned J.Ws! Neither of the major churches can claim this distinction. Still, the facts speak for themselves. After some early attempts to adjust to the new”national conditions” in Nazi Germany, the J.Ws fiercely resisted all Nazi attempts to suborn their religious convictions.The first part of Hesse’s book reports that almost half of the 25,000 J.Ws in Germany suffered imprisonment or torture. More than 2000 were sent to concentration camps, where 250 were subsequently executed. Next to the Jews, the J.Ws statistically paid the highest price in terms of lives lost. There were solid reasons for this: “No other religious association resisted National Socialist pressure to conform with comparable unity and uncompromising character”. The reason why the fate of this group, persecuted with such animalistic force, has not been examined for over 50 years, is,according to Dietlef Garbe, historian and director at the Neuengamme (Hamburg) Memorial, because of “social resentment” against the Jehovah’s Witnesses. The second book under review takes a very different tack.Converts commonly tend to speak negatively about their former beliefs. Rarely does this tendency spread to the converts’ children.In the case of the Pape family, however, a whole clan has devoted itself to discrediting the group they were once part of. Guenther Pape, the father, at the age of nine, watched his parents being arrested by the Gestapo in 1936. He was then placed in a home for poor children. But from January 1946 onwards, he was a full-time worker for the J.Ws. After they were again bannedby the authorities of the GDR in 1950, he fled to the west. In the 1950s Guenther Pape fell out with the J.Ws and as a result was disfellowshipped. He subsequently wrote a strongly accusatory book against his former religious associates, entitled “I was a Jehovah’s Witness!” This was first published in 1961 and was reprinted some 15 times by 1993, but gave only vague reasons for the break such as “inner problems”, “external failure” and denunciations by the Witnesses. At Eastertide 1963 he converted to the Roman Catholic Church. Since the early 1970s, Pape – now in the employ of the Catholic Church – doggedly uses all his energy to warn whoever may be listening of the “deceptions, misrepresentations and falsehoods” of the J.Ws with a steady stream of books, brochures and lectures. His brother Dieter has been ardently pursuing the same goal in eastern Germany. Over the years they carried out energetic cross-border activities, even collaborating with the Stasito carry out their polemical attacks.. The Stasi records further identify Dieter Pape as an”unofficial co-worker” who attempted to justify the then existing ban on the J.Ws in the GDR “because of the provocative policies of the Watchtower Society, and their anti-democratic agitation in connection with other forbidden campaigns”. Interestingly a report of April 1962 by Stasi Lieutenant Teichmann relates a conversation with another “unofficial co-worker” code-named”Rolf”, in which Dieter Pape admitted that his brother could never have written his book without financial support. “The Catholic Church took over the finances”, he said. Guenther Pape’s son, Klaus-Dieter, a certified theologian employed by the Catholic Church, walks in the footsteps of his father and uncle. In the book under review, Klaus-Dieter Pape states that two papers he wrote in 1997 on the J.Ws’ “loyalty towards the law” were used by the experts advising the Federal Administrative Court, whose decision denied the J.Ws their sought-after status. A definite success for the Pape family business.Gerhard Besier, Heidelberg

1b) John D.Brewer with G.I.Higgins, Anti-Catholicism in Northern Ireland 1600-1998. The Mote and the Beam. London: Macmillan 1998. 248pp. John Brewer’s analysis of anti-Catholic prejudice in Northern Ireland proceeds along two dimensions, historical and sociological, and depicts the two central features which are deeply intertwined and mutually reinforcing: religious intolerance and secular/political antagonism. He shows how, ever since the early 17th century, settlers from England and Scotland brought with them the whole panoply of anti-Catholic arguments drawn from Reformation polemics, and used them to justify their struggle against the local Irish population. Every aspect of Roman Catholic doctrine and practice, as well as the iniquitous activities of the Pope, the priests and the Vatican, could be vilified and even if evidence was lacking, could be used to construct venomous conspiracy theories. The usefulness of such religious bigotry is readily apparent, since it can be used on any occasion, being timeless in substance and easily repristinated. In the twentieth century, secular and political antagonisms have been used to defend Northern Ireland’s minority against the danger of amalgamation with the republican south. But since the alleged devotion to a Greater Britain was and is subject to tensions,popular Protestantism formed the stronger bond with which to unite the whole anti-Catholic population. Brewer analyses the different sources of this religious antagonism, from the kind of Old Testament covenantal theology of the followers of Rev. Ian Paisley to disdainful liberal Protestants who deplore the backward superstitions of Irish Catholics. He makes the valid point that each party makes extensive use of the techniques of distortion, deletion, distance and denial to validate their polemics. Anti-Catholics have long since established what may be called a cognitive map or mid-set, which is serenely impervious to reasonable debate, and bears little relation to the actual Church doctrine as presently professed by Roman Catholics,or indeed to present political realities in the republic of Eire. It is clear that far too many minds have been made up for far too long,and fear of the future plays an enormous part in keeping them shut tight. Brewer’s attempt to put the record straight is clearly eirenicin purpose, and theologically evocative. But he knows very well that those who need to hear his skilful and scholarly words are unlikely to do so. And for them to admit that Catholic theology especially since the Second Vatican Council, has changed, would undermine their whole stance. As a sociologist, Brewer seeks to show how these particular prejudices have been mobilised at three levels: ideas, individual behaviour and the social structure. He offers interesting comparisons with antisemitism, showing how both forces could be used to expedite social and political goals in fostering group conflict. Because of the peculiar setting of Northern Ireland, anti-Catholicism has survived long after its equivalent in Britain (and elsewhere) has died out. At the same time the strength of this religious differentiation has slowed down the process of secularisation which could have altered the structural patterns. For many on both sides, Ireland remains locked in a religious conflict over unresolved centuries-old disputes, organised to reinforce minority ethnic defences, and bolstered by a huge armoury of invective. In Brewer’s view, the claim that anti-Catholicism is justified on scriptural grounds is based on lies, half-truths, ancient prejudices and out-dated conspiracy theories. His book’s sub-title is therefore very apt, and he concludes with a brief outline of the steps he thinks should be taken to produce a new and more harmonious way ahead in place of the vice-like hold of the past.JSC

1c) ed. A.Chandler, The Terrible Alternative. Christian Martyrdom in the twentieth century. London: Cassell 1998 186pp Last summer, over the entrance to Westminster Abbey, ten new statues of modern Christian martyrs were unveiled. They serve as a reminder that more Christians have died for their faith in this century than in any other age. The Abbey authorities sought to mark this fact by paying tribute to a small representative group of figures from all parts of the world and all branches of the Church. Some of them, like Martin Luther King, are household names. But others are virtually unknown outside their own localities, such as the teenaged girl on a native reserve in South Africa whose steadfast decision to worship Christ led to her persecution and death at her tribe’s hands. All are commemorated for their courage and readiness to choose, not the road of passive acquiescence, but the terrible alternative of facing up to persecution, knowing that death could well result. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the leading German theologian executed by the Nazis in 1945, was one such martyr, deliberately plotting to overthrow the Nazi regime by violence as the only way to save Christianity. So too, Maximilian Kolbe, recently canonised by Pope John Paul II, chose to give up his life in order to save another man in the awful circumstances of Auschwitz. The stories of these ten martyrs are told in this new book,edited by the Director of the George Bell Institute in Britain, when ten scholars describe the special circumstances of these martyrs’ sacrifice. These essays are particularly helpful for the information they provide on the lesser-known figures, such as Esther John, a Pakistani young woman who was killed in 1960 by unknown murderers, presumably because she had left her Muslim family and refused to return. So too, the clash of values led to the martyrdom in 1973 of Wang Zhiming, a member of the minority Miao group in southwestern China, where a flourishing Christian culture established by western missionaries was attacked by the zealots of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Wang Zhiming’s public execution was watched by an audience of 10,000, most of them Christians, compelled to attend in order to frighten them into submission. But his witness only strengthened the faith of the church, and the overthrow of the “Gang of Four” brought a reversal of official policy. The brutal deaths of Archbishop Janani Luwum of Uganda and Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador were deliberately caused by their resolute opposition to the arbitrary lawlessness of the oppressive regimes in their countries. So too ideological hatred led to the death of Grand Duchess Elizabeth at the hands of Soviet Communists in 1918, or the unsung martyrs of Papua New Guinea at the hands of Japanese military invaders in 1942. These men and women chose to face martyrdom in their pursuit of faith and justice in the violent world of this century.Their biographies bring to life a sense of the vast moral and human tragedies of our age when terrible alternatives confronted Christians in so many parts of the world. Their names are now joined in the great tradition of Christian martyrs, whose witness remains a compelling example of commitment and dedication for the generations to come. As Archbishop Romero succinctly remarked shortly before he was assassinated: “Martyrdom is a grace of God that I do not believe I deserve. But if God accepts the sacrifice of my life, let my blood be a seed of freedom and the sign that hope will soon be reality. Let my death, if it is accepted by God, be for the people’s liberation and as a witness of hope in the future”.JSC

1d) Klemens-August Recker, “Wem wollt ihr glauben?” Bischof Berning im Dritten Reich. Paderborn; Schoningh 1998 525pp There are a number of biographies of Third Reich Catholic bishops and this is one of the best. Recker gets right to the point,discussing those questions we want to know about: antisemitism,racism, the Holocaust, and the failure of resistance. The appendices have some important documents and the study is nicely indexed. The first two hundred pages of the book deal with Berning’s shifting attitude towards Nazism and Hitler. Like other bishops, at first negative, Berning became optimistic after his 1933 meeting with Hitler, two years his junior. The Fuhrer assured the bishop that he would do what the church had wanted to do to the Jews for centuries – procure their elimination. Berning did not respond to this, but was enthusiastic when Hitler promised good church-state relations. Recker points out that German Catholics did not understand why their leaders had reversed themselves after the Concordat, and does not fail to mention Catholic criticism on this score. Berning’s optimism was in any event short lived. By 1934 he opposed Nazi racism, and did so officially in a pamphlet and from the pulpit. This led to conflict with local NSDAP leaders -especially over racism. The next section of the book – chapters dealing with the increasing alienation of the church from the state – the author is at pains to situate Berning’s anti-Nazism in the context of that of his peers within the German hierarchy. Secularization of church schools, the issue of schoolroom crucifixes, and attacks on the clergy were a few of the issues which led to Pius IX’s encyclical of 1937, Mit Brennender Sorge. Cardinal Bertram, head of the German Bishops’ Conference, wanted Berning to be a member of the team sent to Rome to draft this document because he thought of Berning as a competent negotiator. But the Pope rejected this suggestion outright. In fact, Berning turned out to be more of a critic of the Nazi regime than Bertram had thought. Regarding antisemitism, Berning preached “Christian humanism”. The bishop and the local Nazi officials in Osnabruck squared off over the cleric’s catechism statement that salvation came from the Jews. By 1938 Berning had explicitly rejected Nazi neopaganism and racism from his pulpit, insisting that the state must follow the laws of God. The war years put Berning to the test, as it did all German church leaders. His response was ambiguous at best. Recker looks first at the issue of the war itself. Berning praised Hitler for his aggressiveness in Austria and Czechoslovakia but remained silent about Poland and subsequent blitzkrieg attacks in the west and north. But by 1940 the bishop sounded hawkish: “If everyone does his duty at home and at the front, the war will be victorious for us”(274). And when Operation Barbarossa got underway, Berning wholeheartedly joined the chorus against the anti-Christian Bolshevists. It became a war against atheism and for Christianity. Bishop Berning was even more ambiguous about euthanasia and the Jews. Although not as compromising as Cardinal Bertram on the former issue, he put up no real resistance as did his neighbouring bishop, Galen, of Munster. Much worse was Berning’s record regarding the Jews. While subordinating race to the supernatural order and affirming that Germans were a mixed race, the bishop called pagans and Jews bitter enemies of the cross. Recker is highly critical of Berning in this regard,pointing out that the bishop had to have known that his anti-Judaic statements would only compound the situation of the Jews,subjected for years to antisemitic pogroms and propaganda. Instead of immunizing Catholics against antisemitism, the bishop in effect, opened the door for it. After Margarete Sommer apprised Berning about the destiny of the deported Jews, the bishop spread the word to other west German prelates. The hierarchy then fell into intramural wrangling over what to do. This is well-known to us now, but what role did Berning play? In 1941 he urged that all bishops protest the treatment of the Jews from their pulpits on Passion Sunday. This foundered because of opposition from Cardinal Bertram and bishops Buchberger and Groeber. Recker disagrees with Fr.Ludwig Volk, the now deceased dean of German Catholic historians, affirming that Berning tried to change Bertram’s mind and bring him around to Bishop Preysing of Berlin’s hardnosed opposition to Hitler and to the crimes of the Holocaust. In general,Recker’s biography does not alter our notion of why the church leaders failed to protest. Bertram was the “Hemmschuh”. Yet, Recker does point to other evidence which certainly played a part in the bishops’ minds. Top Nazis informed them in no uncertain terms that if they did not watch out what they said,their priests would be made to suffer. Some, like Galen, ignored this threat and spoke out against euthanasia. But Recker’s appendix contains three letters written to Berning from Luebeck priests in 1943 on the day of their execution for treason against the Nazi state. The effect of these martyrs’ letters on the bishop must have been bone-chilling. The alternatives for the church leaders were clear: keep silent; or see the priests they themselves had ordained pay the penalty of death; or put their own heads on the block. Recker’s conclusions are sharply worded but not always easy to find. He affirms that the bishops’ anti-Judaism could easily be viewed by many Catholics as akin to Nazi antisemitism, but this comes at the end of a short chapter on the Sinti and Roma! (359). I was pleased to see that Recker carried his biography through to the post-war period, especially because here he formulates his judgments about Berning and other Catholic bishops regarding the Holocaust. In his view, the bishops were only responsible, not guilty, for what happened to the Jews. They should not have left the faithful in the dark about the Nazi’s brutal atrocities.Unfortunately, after the war, these church leaders were unwilling to accept any personal responsibility for the crimes of their country, or to lead their followers in any widespread acknowledgement of their nation’s guilt.                               Michael Phayer, Marquette University, Milwaukee

2) Thesis abstract: Jeff Zalar, Georgetown University,102705.1001@compuserve.com”My dissertation, directed by Prof. Roger Chickering, is the first historical-cultural study of the Association of Saint Charles Borromeo in Wilhelmine Germany, 1890-1914. Founded in 1844,the Borromeusverein was the largest independent founder of libraries and reading rooms and the most influential advocate of broad intellectual consumption among the Catholic population. By advocating Catholic exposure to the great works of German culture and promoting the habits of mind associated with the German tradition of self-cultivation or Bildung, the Borromeusverein hoped to erode the image of the retrograde, ill-bred Catholic common among the Protestant majority, and thereby to relax the social restrictions and institutional barriers they faced. It insisted on the need for Catholics to be well-versed in the German cultural canon in order to participate fully in the social and institutional life of the Second Reich. It therefore set in motion a revolution in religious attitudes, especially among the Catholic middle class, that shook the censoriousness and deference that had governed Catholic education and cultural engagement in the 19th century.The main sources of my research are institutional papers, extensive episcopal correspondence, reports from local chapters, documents from related organizations, a number of Catholic journals, and memoirs. I am working primarily at the archives of the Borromeusverein in Bonn and in diocesan archives elsewhere.I am also using the archives of the Volksverein fur das katholische Deutschland in Moenchen-Gladbach to determine the relationship between these two associations devoted to, among other things, the cultural disposition of German Catholics. As my study investigates the connection between social class, religious values,and perspectives on education, I have developed a highly differentiated approach to these sources, including social history,the phenomenology of spiritual experience, and discourse analysis,which makes for a fresh and comprehensive study of the Borromeusverein an as important transmitter of educational values and religious mentalite.An article analysing the cultural-religious discourse of the Borromeusverein is due to appear shortly in “The Catholic Historical Review”.

3) Journal articles:Victor Conzemius, Protestants and Catholics in the German Democratic Republic, 1945-90: a comparison, in Religion, State and Society Vol 26, no 1, March 1998.A notably balanced and wise evaluation by a veteran ecumenical scholar, who shows how the two churches took different roads to living in the communist regime of the GDR. He has percipient criticism of both, and at the same time calls for more research comparing the responses of the churches to both the Nazi and the Socialist dictatorships.

The Orthodox Churches and the Ecumenical Movement.Several articles in Religion, State and Society, Vol 26, no 2, June 1998 outline the complex and sometimes conflictual relationship of the various Orthodox Churches with Protestant churches in the west, and particularly with the Geneva-based World Council of Churches. Highly sobering reading.

4) New books noted:ed. Klaus Koschorke, Christen und Gewurze, Vandenhoeck &Ruprecht, Gottingen 1998 The links between western missionaries and ancient Christian communities on other continents.

Sebastian Muller-Rolli, Evangelische Schulpolitik in Deutschland 1918-1958. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Gottingen 1998

Heather Warren, Theologians of a new world order. Reinhold Niebuhr and the Christian Realists 1920-1948, Oxford U.P. 1997A notable history of the American theologians’ involvement with the Ecumenical Movement in the first half of this century.

ed Martin Greschat, Personenlexikon Religion und Theologie Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Gottingen 1998A very useful pocket-sized reference book with brief biographical details of international scope and all centuries

ed.R.H.Stone and M.L.Weaver, Against the Third Reich. Paul Tillich’s wartime radio broadcasts into Nazi Germany, Louisville,Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press 1998, 275 pp.A useful translation of this source for Tillich’s political/theological views on Germany during the war.

Very best wishes for a blessed Easter to you all,

John S.Conwayjconway@interchange.ubc.ca.

Dear Friends,

Contents: 1) Editorial 2) Book reviews: a) L.Xi, Conversion of missionaries in China b) P. Blet, Pie XII c) L.Arrington, Adventures of a Church Historian 3) Journal articles a) M.Greschat, Widerstand 4) Another martyr commemorated

1) Regular readers of this Newsletter will have noticed that a lot of attention has been given to the affairs of the German churches.In part this is due to the fact that my own research interests, for the past thirty-five years, have been engaged by the complex and often tragic developments in these churches throughout this century. At the same time, it is also due to the really remarkable and continuing plethora of publications by German church historians. Few countries have been so well served by their church historians as Germany, due to the well established position this field has in university circles, as well as to the generous support from a number of highly reputable publishers. The number of impressive volumes which appear every year is quite outstanding, and as such sets a good example to all of us in other countries, where alas the external circumstances are not so favourable. But of course we must also add that the appetite among readers must also be responsible, which is an excellent sign. Paradoxically, this interest in church history seems to be growing at a time when the effects of a secularised retreat from church allegiance, especially in the”new” provinces in Germany, is notable. As Andreas Holzem pointed out in the recent issue of the journal KirchlicheZeitgeschichte (p.70), “the immense research publications since the beginning of the 1960s undertaken by the Catholic Kommission fur Zeitgeschichte have explored the development,organisation and activity of Catholicism as a social force from the background of its social change and the political events and catastrophes of the 19th and 20th centuries. Such works have contributed significantly to a true evaluation of the Church’s stance, even though so far the undoubted fact of the erosion of its position in society has not been tackled as a subject for research”The same could largely be said of the Protestant community in Germany too. Yet, at the same time, the vitality of all these scholarly endeavours does much to contradict the assumptions of many secular historians, in both Europe and North America. As the distinguished Harvard church historian, William Hutchison noted in the same issue of Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte (p. 139), “European historians have been sure that religion in the modern era simply cannot be important. [They] have not merely ignored religion; until quite recently they thought that, in most of Europe, religion had done the decent thing and died out. A correlative idea was that the Americans, being more innocent and foolish, had not yet extirpated the infamous thing but would do so in time”. So in fact, these German efforts, as for instance in such series as Konfession und Gesellschaft, have helped to put the subject of religious history back into the historiographical picture, for which we should all be grateful. My object, in editing this Newsletter, has been to try and maintain an international and interdenominational balance, while at the same time keeping abreast of the new publications. Since Germany has produced, and still produces, so many new works, I expect we shall still have a preponderance from this one country, but trust you find the reviews of these impressive achievements to be of help. However, this month, I am very glad to have contributions about other churches for you, and want to express my thanks to Cyril Powles and Jay Hughes for their valuable assessments. Editor

2a) Lian Xi, The Conversion of Missionaries: Liberalism in American Protestant Missions in China, 1907-1932.University Park,PA: Penn.State U.Press, 1997 xiv +247 pp This is an interesting book for several reasons. It is written by a scholar from mainland China who was attracted to the subject through contact with an American professor at his university (Fujian Normal). The author does not seem to have any connection with the present Christian movement in China, but writes from the stand-point of someone looking at the missionary movement from the non-Christian Chinese side. At the same time, he takes exception to the conventional wisdom in his country that Christian missions represented a “disguised cultural imperialist thrust across the Pacific”. Such a position, he feels, “detracts from the richness of the story of the missionary movement.” (xi) His thesis that contact with Chinese culture changed certain missionaries from an initially aggressive fundamentalism to a more open (“liberal”) attitude toward non-Christian religion is interesting, particularly for the early dating of this change, though there are certain problems with his analysis. The book is divided into two parts. An Introduction sets out the author’s plan and states his thesis, that “the self-sufficiency and vitality of the Oriental traditions challenged the nineteenth-century view of heathen wretchedness . . .[and] undermined the confidence and sense of purpose, or ‘cut the nerve’ (as conservative missionaries repeatedly warned), of American Protestant missions.” (10) The first three chapters give case studies of three early missionaries – Edward H.Hume, a medical missionary, Frank J.Rawlinson, an evangelist, and Pearl Buck, in education – who began their careers in the early part of this century as conventional evangelicals but later became so ‘liberal’ (the author’s term) that they could no longer remain within their denominational mission. The second part, also consisting of three chapters,generalizes from the three cases to argue that the trend toward liberalism spread among other missionaries, many of whom returned to the US to propagate a new gospel of the “union of Religions” (the title of Chapter 6). This process coincided with the emergence of biblical criticism and the social gospel in America and led to tensions, not only within denominational missionary headquarters, but within the denominations as a whole. Fundamentalism as a theological position arose as a reaction tot his process, resulting in a polarization between conservatives and liberals. The latter saw Christianity as one religion among many and, in the Chinese situation, sought to produce a union between American Christianity and Confucianism-Taoism-Buddhism which the author (borrowing a term from the conservatives) labels as ‘syncretism’. The majority, however, both in the mission-field and at home, probably stood somewhere in between the two extremes. This middle-of-the-road position resulted in a new theology of mission which included a push toward ecumenism, as missionaries in the field established organs of cooperation like the National Christian Council and the Church of Christ in China. A strong motive for accommodation cam from the rise of nationalism following the overthrow of the Manchu Dynasty. This nationalism, strongly anti-religious in nature, focussed on the missionary institutions as representative of foreign domination and the hated unequal treaties. The liberal missionaries reacted by pushing for more Chinese leadership in the institutions and with sympathy for China’s ancient religious traditions. In the light of later experience, it is ironic that this resulted in the “liberals”identifying with the very elites (represented by leaders like ChiangKai-shek) who would form the resistance to liberation following the end of the Pacific War. Only a few of them (in this book Henry Luce represents the supporters of the Chiang regime, while Sherwood Eddy – though not so identified in this study – came to support the Communists) were able to move with Mao Zedong and Chou En-lai toward a vision of a New China. It is also interesting that the Canadian ‘liberals’, most of whom were grouped around West China Union University in Chengdu, tended to go with Mao. This reviewer has some difficulties with the use of the term ‘liberal’, and its associated expression ‘syncretism’, in this study.They have obviously been accepted from their critical use by conservatives, and are not exactly defined. Moreover they do not take account of the range of theological positions that would lay so-called liberals open to being so labelled. At the extreme left would be those like Pearl Buck, whose theological position one might call humanist-universalist, but from there one could go on to describe as liberals anyone who did not subscribe to biblical literalism or who could say, as most theologians of mission today would say, that God’s revelation has not been confined to Christianity. As far as the term ‘syncretism’ is concerned, this is properly used of the amalgamation of Christianity with incompatible elements from other religions. In this study,however, it is used for what we would today call religious pluralism or relativism. Another problem, this time of emphasis, occurs in the weighing of liberalism vis-s-vis conservatism in this study. In a footnote (fn.60,p.148) the author quotes a colleague (Gu Chang-sheng) as saying that “Fundamentalists . . .continued to dominate the missionary enterprise after the 1920s”. The experience of the Christian movement in China today would seem to bear this judgement out, as conservative evangelicalism predominates,especially in the rural regions. But because this is a study of liberalism, an unwary reader might conclude, as did another writer whom our author quotes, that “taken as a whole, conservatives were far ‘outweighted’ by liberals.” [148] Some striking differences emerge when one comes to compare the history of Christianity in China with Japan. Because Christianity in Japan appealed mainly to the elites who were dispossessed at the time of the Meiji Restoration of 1867,missionaries were forced to recognise Japanese leadership at a much earlier date in the eighties and nineties of the last century.The Meiji government, which had established its own religious authority in a divine emperor, kept tight control of organs like education, prohibiting religious education in mission schools in 1899, a full generation before similar legislation in China. At a popular level, there is a curious way in which missionaries in China identified more closely with their country of adoption than did those in Japan. The continental culture seems to have been able to accept foreigners, making them feel at home more easily than did the tightly knit society of Japan. Or perhaps, as this book argues,Chinese culture was self-confident enough to accept foreign elements if they were willing to go half way.

Cyril Powles. Vancouver

2b) Pierre Blet S.J, Pie XII et la Seconde Guerre mondiale d’apresles archives du Vatican. Paris: Perrin 1997 343pp n.p The death of Pius XII on October 9, 1958, brought unanimous praise of his work for peace and relief of suffering during the Second World War. Jewish leaders repeated their thanks, which had been expressed during the war and climaxed at its conclusion,for his unremitting efforts to save their people from extermination. However, publication of Rolf Hochhuth’s play “Der Stellvertreter” in 1963 reversed this positive image. Overnight the Pope became the hero of a black legend. He was here depicted as standing mute and inactive during the war, motivated either by political calculation or cowardice, in the face of bureaucratically planned mass murder which he could have prevented with a single flaming protest. In 1964, Pius’ successor, Paul VI, confronted with what he knew from his own close collaboration with Pius XII throughout the war to be a grave falsification of history, ordered the publication of everything in the Vatican archives which could shed light on his predecessor’s actions. An international team of four Jesuits,including the author of this book, produced twelve volumes of documents between the years 1965 and 1981. As Blet writes in his Foreword, however: “Fifteen years after the publication of the final volume many of those who speak or write about the Holy See during the war remain unaware of the contents of these volumes, or even of their existence.” Blet’s book is an attempt to make the record more widely known. Drawing on these volumes of Vatican documents, but also on published collections of documents from other government archives,as well as on memoirs, articles, and monographs, Blet has produced a narrative history of the Holy See’s wartime role. The account is largely devoid of commentary. Blet limits his interpretation to the minimum necessary for intelligibility. A footnote at the beginning of each chapter lists the sources for the material which follows. The Pope’s wartime policy was not neutrality (which could imply indifference) but impartiality, which enabled him to judge events and nations according to truth and justice. At times, however,he stretched impartiality to the limit: informing the British government in January 1940 that a group of German generals was prepared to replace Hitler if they could be assured of an honorable peace; warning Britain, France, and the Low Countries of Hitler’s impending attack in May 1940. Those communications were secret. Not so the Pope’s telegrams of sympathy to the Belgian and Dutch sovereigns following Hitler’s attack. When Mussolini threatened the Pope with “the gravest consequences” for this supposed breach of neutrality, Pius said that he was not afraid to go to a concentration camp and had had revolvers pointed at him before (as nuncio in Munich in 1919). In the same interview the Pope said that he wanted to speak words of “flaming protest” against the well known Nazi atrocities in Poland. He had refrained only to spare the victims further suffering. Following Hitler’s attack on his erstwhile ally, Stalin, in June 1941, the Pope refused repeated demands that he endorse a crusade against Bolshevism. And he assured American Catholics that while the previous papal condemnations of communist ideology remained in force, these need not limit support for the Soviet Union now invaded by a power whose leader, like Stalin, was the declared enemy of Christianity. The desire to save as many victims as possible explains the Pope’s public reserve. But he was not silent. His clearest protest came in his 1942 Christmas broadcast pleading for “those hundreds of thousands who, through no fault of their own but simply by reason of their nationality or race are marked for death or progressive destruction.” Well understood at the time (the speech earned the fulsome praise of the New York Times and angry condemnation by the Nazis as “one long attack on everything we stand for”), these words are either unknown today, or simply ignored. Pius repeated this protest in his speech to the Cardinals on June 2, 1943, protesting against acts deleterious for “those destined for extermination simply because of their race or nationality”. For those who wanted him to speak louder or more often, he added in the same speech that everyone of his public utterances had “to be considered and weighed for its possible effect on those who are suffering”. Much of this book recounts the feverish and unremitting efforts of the Holy See, through its nuncios in various countries, to save as many victims as possible. The archives report the attempts,seldom their results. Flaming protests would have been counter-productive – as the Dutch bishops learned, to their sorrow, when their public protest against Nazi persecution of the Jews in July 1942 brought immediate acceleration of the deportations to Auschwitz. In a rare comment, Blet quotes the judgment of the Israeli historian Pinchas Lapide (in his 1967 book The Last Three Popes and the Jews) that Vatican diplomacy, pursued necessarily in secrecy and directed by Pius XII, saved 860,000 Jews from death. At the 1975 Holocaust conference in Hamburg, Lapide told this reviewer that this figure was based on six months’ research in the Yad Vashem Holocaust archive in Jerusalem and added: “If the leaders of other churches had done only what Pius XII did, several hundred thousand more Jews might have survived the war.” Despite the dispassionate tone, the book has many dramatic high points. An English translation would be welcome. It is unlikely, however, to change many minds. Confident that they occupy the moral high ground, the critics of Pius XII have long since concluded that he is guilty as charged. They insist that his defenders prove a negative. How much of the unremitting clamour to “open the Vatican archives” is motivated by the desire to pursue scientific history? How much comes from people unwilling to be moved by evidence or facts who wish to rummage at will until they find some document which, taken out of context or read without knowledge of the conditions under which it was written, supports the verdict rendered in advance: that Pius XII is co-responsible for the death of six million Jews? Until these questions are resolved the Holy See’s caution seems fully justified.

John Jay Hughes, Archdiocese of St Louis, Missouri, USA

2c) Leonard J.Arrington, Adventures of a Church Historian,Urbana: U.of Illinois Press, 1998, 249 pp Leonard Arrington’s incisively-written, and obviously sincere,memoir describes his service to the Church of Latter Day Saints, i.e.Mormons in Utah. His career took him from a professorship in economic history at Utah State Agricultural College to becoming the Church’s Official Historian in Salt Lake City. His account not only gives snatches of Mormon history in their heartland, but also provides an interesting commentary on those qualities – intense personal piety, a puritanical morality, enormous energy and a strong social commitment to their fellow Mormons – which enabled this once persecuted and exiled sect to become a highly successful and wealthy community with a world-wide outreach. It is not his purpose to analyse the rigid orthodox doctrine practised by Mormons, nor essentially to raise questions about the authoritarian pattern of leadership in the Church, which, since many Mormon leaders live to a great age, on some occasions turns into a form of theological gerontocracy. Rather he seeks to elucidate the dilemmas he faced as an official denominationally-employed historian. As a professional scholar Arrington sought to break out of the encapsulated and inward-looking Mormon community to present a picture of their rich history which would be acceptable to the outside scholarly world. He was therefore disconcerted to discover that some of the Mormon hierarchy believed his more professional works to be too “humanist” or “liberal” and lacking in sufficient spiritual experiences or faith-promoting stories. Behind this lay their conviction that all Mormon history should first and foremost have an edifying purpose, preferably indicating that supernatural rather than natural causes were responsible for Mormon successes. No hint of unsavoury behaviour, even if a century old, should be published lest the Mormon religion be brought into disrepute. Such forceful criticism from elderly “integristes” “watching over the Church, defending the Lord’s anointed, and protecting a sacred stewardship”, who really wanted narratives saturated with scriptural allusions and a total abstinence from controversial episodes, naturally placed Arrington in an invidious position. After his years of faithful and devoted service to the cause, and trying to do his job under conflicting pressures, he says he felt like a mouse crossing the floor where elephants are dancing. In some ways, it seems, this memoir was written to justify his own point of view. This account raises very clearly the difficulties of writing church history with its competing impulses to satisfy scientific objectivity and denominational loyalty. Perhaps Arrington was naive in believing he could reconcile the two, or underestimated the strength of the ingrown defensiveness of the guardians of the Mormon community, some of whom imposed rigid restrictions on what could be written as well as who had access to the church archives, even though they were not particularly well trained or aware of the historian’s goals and purposes. The evidence here presented of distrust and suspicion of historical scholars amongst a few of the Mormon hierarchy can hardly enhance this sect’s reputation in the wider world. But it also raises the wider question of when and to what extent church historians can or should be influenced by the desire to protect the faith of their readers. For this reviewer, Klaus Scholder’s maxim is persuasive:”Truth may be painful for the church, but untruth is even more so.”In this sense, Arrington’s Adventures may have a lesson for us all.Sadly Leonard Arrington died early last month in Salt Lake City.JSC

3a) Martin Greschat, “Kirche und Widerstand gegen der Nationalsozialismus” in Zeitschrift fur Geschichtswissenschaft,Vol 46, no 10, Oct 1998 A useful summary of the debate about the extent of resistance activities against Nazism within the German Churches.Greschat rightly points out that the resolute defence of the church’s autonomy by both Catholics and the Confessing Protestant Church cannot be taken to mean an equally resolute rejection of Nazi policies in general, including their antisemitism. Indeed, there is evidence enough that many staunch Confessing Church, as well as Catholic, supporters approved Hitler’s secular aims. Greschat examines how these matters were reflected in the text books for religious education produced after the war, and shows a development away from the pietistic church-centred view of the 1950s to a wider perspective in later years, when the question really changes from: how much did the church protect its own institutional way of life, to : how much did it join and promote a wider opposition to Nazi racism and terrorism?By such a standard, the answer is: not much. JSC

4) Another martyr commemorated.(The following report comes from the Catholic Historical Review,Oct.1998). During Pope John Paul II’s pastoral visit to Austria last Junehe declared blessed three more servants of God in Vienna. One of them was Sister Maria Restituta Kafka, who was born in Brno on May 10, 1894, and grew up with her family in Vienna. As a nurse she came into contact with the Franciscan Sisters of Charity (the Hartmannschwestern) and entered their congregation in 1914. From 1919 she worked as a surgical nurse and gained a reputation not only for professional skill but also for care of the poor and oppressed. She even protected a Nazi doctor from arrest which she thought was unjustified. After the Anschluss she made her total rejection of Nazism clear and public. She called Adolf Hitler a “madman”. When she hung a crucifix in every room of a new wing of a hospital,the Nazis threatened to have her dismissed unless the crosses were removed. After her community argued that she could not be replaced, she remained as also did the crucifixes. Sister Restituta was soon arrested, however, and accused not only of hanging the crosses but also of having written a poem mocking Hitler. On October 28, 1942, she was sentenced to death for “aiding and abetting the enemy in the betrayal of the fatherland and for plotting high treason”. Later she was offered her freedom if she would leave her religious congregation, but she refused. When Martin Bormann was asked to commute her sentence, he rejected the request, saying,”I think the execution of the death penalty is necessary for effective intimidation.” While awaiting death, she cared for the other prisoners, as even communists later attested. After various requests for clemency were rejected by the authorities, Sister Restituta was decapitated on March 30, 1943.

With sincere regards, and best wishes for a blessed Lent,

John S.Conwayjconway@interchange.ubc.ca

Dear Friends,

I fear that some of you may have been disappointed if you tried to access the Index to past issues on our web-site, which has been out of order. We hope to take remedial steps. Looking over the books reviewed in the past year, I note a tendency to concentrate on German affairs. I hope to do better in 1999, but want to take this opportunity to thank all of you who so kindly, and without remuneration, were persuaded to review books for our members. The responses have been so positive that I very much hope you will continue. Ed.

Contents: 1) Modern Martyrs’ Monument 2) Book reviews: a) Chandler, The Moral Imperative b) Hayes, Holocaust education c) Baginski, Religious policy in French-occupied Germany 3) Journal articles: a)M..Greschat, Church policy in the French zone of occupation 1945-49 b) W.Husband, Soviet atheism c) D Ackermann, Catholics in Hanover d) D.Novak, Jews and Catholics e) P.Prein, Moravians in Africa f) U.R-Braun, Ludwig Ihmels 4) Book notices – Hexham, Concise Dictionary

1) Last July, in the presence of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth and other notables, ten newly-carved statues of twentieth century martyrs were unveiled on the west portal of Westminster Abbey ,London’s most historic and prestigious Anglican church. The desire of the Abbey’s Dean and Chapter was to record the fact that this past century has been a period of heroic suffering and persecution for many Christians. To mark this, ten representative figures were chosen on an international and ecumenical basis. These figures are- from left to right – Maximilian Kolbe (Poland, d.1941), Manche Masemola (South Africa, d.1928), Janani Luwum (Uganda,d.1977),Grand Duchess Elizabeth of Russia (Russia, d.1918), Martin Luther King (USA,d.1968), Oscar Romero (El Salvador, d.1980), Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Germany, d.1945), Esther John (Pakistan, d.1960),Lucien Tapiedi (Papua-New Guinea,d.1942) and Wang Zhiming(China, d.1972). The statues themselves were designed by the British sculptor Tim Crawley, and the unveiling ceremony was preceded byan impressive Concert of Remembrance, when the premiere performance of a new De Profundis by John Hardy was given,specially composed for this occasion. In conjunction with these events a notable book of tributes was published – The Terrible Alternative. Christian Martyrdom in the Twentieth Century, London and New York: Cassell 1998.Edited by our list-member, Dr Andrew Chandler, this collection of essays by noted scholars will be reviewed here later, and should be helpful in providing information about the lesser known figures here commemorated.

2a) ed. A.Chandler, The Moral Imperative. New Essays on the Ethics of Resistance in National Socialist Germany 1933-1945.Widerstand: Dissent and Resistance in the Third Reich. Boulder, Co:Westview Press 1998, 124pp. This slim volume contains six essays that were presented in1 995 at a conference to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. For the occasion, the George Bell Institute,University of Birmingham, brought together distinguished religious leaders, academics and publicists from North America, Britain and Germany to hear papers on “Christianity and Resistance: Nazi Germany 1933-1945”. A splendid introduction by Andrew Chandler places the essays in a broader setting of the pre-1933 history of church-state relations in Germany, and the post-1933 political realities of the Nazi dictatorship and the churches’ response. Students will be grateful for the many references that lead further into the subject. Churches specialize in the business of discerning evil. Yet they did little of that when public policy in Nazi Germany became overtly evil. In a chapter on “The role of the churches in the German Resistance Movement”, John Conway sees in this ‘reluctant resistance’ of the churches, especially the Protestant ones, a legacy of their tradition to back up civil authority. This tradition peaked during World War I, when the churches invested their moral capital in support of German militarism and imperialism. Through the defeat of these secular causes, the churches forfeited their claims to moral leadership in Germany. They now dedicated their energies to preserving their organization and doctrine. This protective attitude made the Churches blind to the need to defend the secular values and political ideals of the liberal republic. Instead they could find in the Nazi agenda old and new ideals to champion: nationalism, anti-liberalism, anti-parliamentarism, anti-communism and revisionist foreign policy. This agenda also appealed to Catholics, whose greater mistrust the Nazi regime neutralized in mid-1933 by the Concordat. Conway also points out how the regime’s early and blatant terrorism helps one understand the churches’ subsequent quietism. While Conway sees in the commitment of the churches in World War I a compelling explanation for their global failure in the Nazi era, he is of course aware of the exceptional instances of heroic resistance by clergy and laity. This is the theme of the chapter on ‘Laity and Churches in the Third Reich’ by Beate Ruhm von Oppen. Among the resisters, she cites H.J.von Moltke as one who did not count the churches out. He expected that their resistance would grow as Nazi persecution increased. He also assigned to the churches a role in the moral renewal after the war,and included Protestant and Catholics in the broad coalition he assembled to draft programmes for a defeated Germany, As an example of lay resistance on the humblest level, Ruhm v. Oppen pointed to the untutored religious obstinacy of the peasant Franz Jaegerstaetter in Austria, who refused to ‘fight for a regime that was fighting against the church’, and was beheaded. He had faith first,and resisted the evil that threatened its core; Moltke first recognised the evil, and in resisting it grew in faith, as his letters, edited so brilliantly by Ruhm v.Oppen, show. In a chapter ‘Church, Religion and the German Resistance’,Klemens von Klemperer maintains that all institutions tend to conform, or to collaborate with the regime under which they exist.Therefore, it would be wrong to expect en bloc resistance from the military, industry, civil service or even the churches. Nevertheless,some in the German Resistance expected more than accommodating quietism from church leaders, and demanded that the Church not be ‘silent like a dumb dog’. That was the conclusion of exceptional church leaders outside Germany (Berggrav, Oslo). While the churches failed to lead, those who took up resistance found that religion gave them strength in their dangerous and lonely stance. Klemperer calls this turning to religion “Spirituality -Frommigkeit”. He cites striking instances of how personal piety, deepening over time, sustained resisters, with or without a religious background. And as they realized that the Nazi regime meant to destroy religious and secular human values they became aware of how much Christianity and Humanism had in common. That helps to explain the ‘piety’ of socialists, who found strength in prayer or the Eucharist. One traditional blend of Christian and secular values that inspired a prominent social group to resist is the subject of Klaus-Jurgen Muller’s chapter on ‘Prussian elements in the German resistance’. His focus is on the Prussian conservative and military tradition, a backward-looking world view peculiar to an exclusive social class (gentry) and profession (army). Both bear enormous responsibility for bringing Hitler to power, partly because their Prussian virtues – duty, service to the state, pietist self-appraisal -failed early on to expose Hitler. Later, these same values inspired courageous men to organize bold plots against him. While it is useful to be reminded that one time Prussian virtues had admirable components, we cannot forget they were shared by a class that had forfeited its claim to leadership in the last decades of the Empire. Peter Hoffmann assessed ‘The Persecution of the Jews as a motive for Resistance against National Socialism’. His unrivalled knowledge of the sources is evident in the end-notes – among them judicious bibliographic mini-essays. The chapter sums up the anti-semitic policies and coercive resolve of the Nazi system – to oppose the one meant to face the other. While this rule applied to all manner of resistance, anyone who showed concern for the fate of the Jews defied the central belief of the Nazi regime. Hoffmanngives a wealth of detail showing that some first challenged the Nazis’ anti-semitic policies, (Goerdeler) and were then led to inform and protest (the Scholls); but others became more resolved to end the regime when they learned about the fate of the Jews. This is what police interrogators concluded after 20 July 1944, as was also evident in the testimonies in the People’s Court. In these most harrowing circumstances, resisters explained their actions by referring to the racist policies, especially the murder of the Jews.Hoffmann states that ‘the crimes of the regime, in particular the deliberate murder of the Jews’ (p.91) was the most powerful factor motivating the plotters against Hitler’s life. That could explain why so many who took part in the July 1944 plot had not acted in earlier years. The final chapter is by Ursula Buttner, ‘An unknown case of resistance; the rescue of Jews in Christian-Jewish mixed marriages’, which deals with examples of resistance at the most personal level:Christian spouses shielding partners whom the Nazi law deemed to be Jewish. Although progressively marginalised, the Jewish partner had a measure of safety – as long as the marriage held. As public pressure to divorce or cast adrift the Jewish spouse increased, so did suicide. But in 1943 in Berlin, when these Jewish spouses were rounded up for deportation, their families rallied and obtained their release after a mass protest of more than a week in front of the central collection point. Is there a similar example of mass civil disobedience in the Third Reich? Resistance calls for personal moral commitment. In the Third Reich, resistance could range from tyrannicide to protest on behalf of a spouse. Some resisted very early (Moltke), others late(Stauffenberg). The question remains: why did these persons make their commitment? What sets them apart from relatives and friends with whom they had grown up, learning the same values at home, in school, church and university? Before 1933 none could have singled out the likely candidates for resistance activity. Yet those who did resist were undoubtedly inspired by ethical norms and religious beliefs that were common knowledge. What set them apart was that they recognized evil and were inspired and sustained in their determination to do something about it. The essays in this collection show that, as the perils of resistance escalated,commitment to Christian beliefs deepened.Erich J.Hahn, University of Western Ontario.

2b) Stephen R.Haynes, Holocaust Education and the Church-related College. With a foreword by Franklin H.Littell. Westport, Conn:Greenwood Press 1997, 185pp Stephen Haynes, a young Presbyterian minister now teaching at a church-related college in Tennessee, is fully persuaded of the maxim adumbrated a generation ago by Professor Franklin Littell that the Holocaust is not just a Jewish, but also a Christian tragedy, not least because of the importance of the Jewish-Christian bond and the historical complicity of Christians in antisemitism. His book is a study of how far this perception has taken root in church-related colleges in the U.S.A. In 1994 he conducted a nation-wide survey of such colleges, asking about the inclusion of Holocaust education in their curriculum. His findings are highly ambivalent, namely that there is a lack of institutional commitment to such courses in many colleges, or that the initiative largely stemmed from interested faculty members. Indeed Holocaust education at church-related colleges would appear to be negatively correlated with religious aspects of college identity. It is Haynes’ aim to suggest how an effective Holocaust education can help to give an more authentic Christian dimension to church-related higher education. For one thing, no one teaching or learning about the Holocaust can avoid a personal crisis of identity, out of which a new spirituality can grow, including a widening of intellectual and moral horizons, and an ability to be moved by others’ pain, along with a sense of personal responsibility for alleviating such pain. The church colleges’ own religious traditions can be resources for humanizing pedagogy and encouraging such broader sensitivity, if properly fostered. By so doing, such an education could help to counter the indifference, apathy or relativism, or worse still the racially-motivated collaboration, which marked the response of so many secular universities and their graduates to the Holocaust, and other outbursts of racial intolerance, in the 1930s and 1940s, and the danger of which still exists today. JSC

2c) Christophe Baginski, La politique religieuse de la France enAllemagne occupee (1945-1949), Villeneuve-d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion 1997, 344 pp.(This review translated from the French by Editor) This work consists of a 1996 doctoral thesis from the University of Lille III. It is an acute study, though lacking in the kind of conclusions which might have provided a more synthetic overview of an already complex subject. But the treatment is new and rigorous, based on German and French archives, from which one can learn a lot about a topic hitherto little treated. What strikes one is the highly improvised character of French religious policy in the zone occupied by General Koenig’s troops, compared to the American and British policy in their respective zones. This was due principally because France only received its occupation zone at the Potsdam Conference in August 1945, and had therefore to adapt to these new circumstances without time to weigh up the attitude to be adopted towards the German churches. The task was therefore delicate. The author shows very well that the churches were the only institutions in German society to survive the general disaster,particularly the Catholic church thanks to its supranational character and its links to the Holy See, whereas the Protestant churches were fragmented by their purely German structure.Furthermore they were entrenched in those areas where their spiritual authority was strong: Catholics represented 62.5% of the French zone’s population, compared with the Lutherans’ 34.8% – in other words an impressive majority. The situation was far >from simple. The churches had supported the Nazi regime, possibly more out of conformity or weakness rather than out of ideological conviction. But the number of those who resisted, especially at first, was very few. Denazification was therefore necessary, just as in the rest of German society. The churches, however, quickly distanced themselves from the Nazis’ crimes, refusing to recognise any share of responsibility, and instead stressing their acts of resistance,which, no doubt, may have been real, but were not on the scale one could have wished. However, the French joined their allies in a deceptive stance, by agreeing that the churches could be regarded as having supported the resistance movement. Was this just naivete?Certainly not. In French eyes, the churches had two advantages: first, they represented a bulwark against Nazi paganism, and after 1947,against communism. It was necessary to make them supporters of the occupation policies. So the French authorities quickly allowed freedom of worship, and the re-opening of seminaries and theological faculties. They organised a very limited and discreet purge of the clergy, here studied in detail. In return they demanded that the German churches should ease relations with the occupation authorities, and restrict themselves purely to the religious arena. However, it was soon clear that, in asking for alleviation of the occupation’s rigours, or in appealing for a prompt return of prisoners, the bishops were engaging in political affairs. The French authorities took a very firm line. The author seeks to show that, in general, relations were correct, even benevolent on the part of the French. After consulting with the Holy See, they agreed to recognise the validity of the 1933 Reich Concordat. They ensured that no church lacked supplies for celebrating the Eucharist, which was a considerable achievement at a time of great penury. Charitable works were authorized and even encouraged, as was youth work. Finally, the French sought to buildup Christian political parties, but on condition that the Centre Party,which had voted plenary powers to Hitler in 1933, should not reappear. They avoided adopting too punitive a policy, but rather believed, like their allies, that this would be an effective way of combating the increasing menace of communism. At the same time, this benevolence could hardly conceal other French objectives, such as their desire to separate both the Catholic and Protestant churches of the Saar from the rest of Germany. It is a pity that the author did not give more space to this issue, which was central to the French occupation authorities. It would have been good to describe this situation more exactly, as it provided an overlap between the religious and political spheres, as part of France’s desire to detach the Saar from Germany in order to establish it as a kind of satellite state. Nevertheless we owe Christophe Baginski a debt for so competently filling a historiographical void with this solid and pertinent work which allows us to understand more fully the complexity of Franco-German relations in the immediate post-war period.Francis Latour, Paris

3a) Journal article: Martin Greschat, “Die Kirchenpolitik Frankreichs in seiner Besatzungszone”, 2 parts, in Zeitschrift fur Kirchengeschichte, Vol 109, nos 2 and 3, 1998. This same subject is explored by one of Germany’s leading church historians in a two part article, which is notably more critical of French policy. Greschat shows that French dreams of restoring its European status rested on the exploitation and dismemberment of western Germany, thus fulfilling the unfinished business of 1919. At the same time, the Germans would need to bere-educated to learn to abandon their long-held nationalism, or their admiration for former heroes, up to and including the Nazis. Such goals now appear fantastic, and Greschat rightly repeats the already known facts about the lack of competence both in theory and practice, of the French occupation authorities. Relations with the churches were cool and correct, but suffered from ambivalence: on the one side the French tried to win them over to French goals, even while propagating the view that Church and State should be rigidly separated as in France. The British and Americans were criticised for believing that the churches should be encouraged to help in building up a new sense of democracy. Such political activity was highly problematic in French eyes. Suspicion of clerical resurgence, especially Catholic,was evident. While the churches were expected to condemn Nazism, they were not to be allowed any political expressions on current policy. Not surprisingly, this policy ran into serious opposition from the still nationalistically minded German bishops,who now saw their role as the advocates for the “oppressed” victims of the occupation policy. Their unwillingness to accept any blame for Germany’s crimes, which were ascribed solely to a few Nazis,only made the situation more tense. But the church leaders were increasingly prepared to engage in political protest, if only to makeup for past failures. Such a stance not surprisingly caused tensions. On the other hand, Greschat notes that efforts to foster peace and reconciliation were made by a valiant French Jesuit, who evaded the military government’s regulations, and in turn such moves widened the German church members’ horizons. So too the chief Protestant chaplain, Marcel Sturm, established good relations with the Confessing Church members, even though he saw that they too were still overly nationalistic. “Ils ne peuvent pas chanterouvertement “Deutschland uber alles”, main c’est reste la melodiede leur coeur”. Karl Barth’s strictures about the German churches and about the disastrous effects of Lutheranism were widely accepted by the French Protestant officials. Where, as in the Palatinate, the local church leaders showed no willingness to come to terms with their past, the French authorities intervened forcibly,dismissed the acting bishop and installed their own favourite. But at the same time, they declared that true German repentance would be met with friendship and assistance. Greschat pays tribute to Sturm’s efforts to combine his pursuit of French political aims with the encouragement of the Confessing Church’s theological programme, in a sincere effort to rebuild the German Protestant churches in the French zone. In theend, such ambitions failed, but the personal witness certainly helped to build bridges towards a better future. JSC

3b) William Husband, Oregon State University: “Soviet Atheism and Russian Orthodox Strategies of Resistance, 1917-32”, in Journal of Modern History, March 1998, p 74 ffThis article usefully explores how Russian workers and peasants employed resistance and circumventions to protect their traditional beliefs and practices against the changes imposed by the new Bolshevik regime after 1917.

3c) Detlef Schmichen-Ackermann, “Katholische Diasporazwischen Ruckzug und Selbstbehauptung in der NS Zeit” in Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, Vol 49, no7/8, July 1998, p.462.Ackermann examines the extent of collaboration and/or resistance amongst the Catholics in the “exile” of north Germany around the city of Hannover during the Nazi period. A helpful local study.

3d) David Novak “Jews and Catholics: Beyond Apologies” in First Things, no 89, January 1999, p 20 This assessment of the recent Vatican statement “We remember” by a sympathetic Jewish scholar, rightly points out that the Catholic church is now calling for an active work of repentance and reconciliation, which has far more theological significance than an apology, designed to bury the past, ever could have. But Novak also rightly makes the point that the document would have been stronger if it had simply not raised the still disputed issue of Pius XII’s diplomatic actions during the Second World War – an issue which it could not possibly have treated adequately.

3e) Phillip Prein, “The Moravian Invention of an African Missionary Object” in German History, Vol 16, no 3 1998,p.328ff. This piece describes how far national and racial ideas penetrated German church circles with the example of the Moravian mission to southern Africa. These missionary leaders left behind their previous emphasis on individual conversions, and now began to dream of converting a whole Volk, with surprisingly romantic idealism.

3f) Uwe Rieske-Braun, “Ludwig Ihmels und die soziale Frage” in Zeitschrift fur Kirchengeschichte, Vol 109, no 3, 1998. This article sketches the career and ideas of the Bishop of Saxony(1922-33) and his stance on social questions, particularly in connection with the ecumenical conference in Stockholm in 1925.Rieske-Braun rightly shows that Ihmels was one of those conservative church leaders whose reluctance to support the democratic advances or peaceful foreign policy of the Weimar Republic led directly to their enthusiasm for the Nazi victory in 1933.

4) Book notices:Irving Hexham draws attention to the new edition of his Concise Dictionary of Religion,second edition Regent College Press,Vancouver 1999, first published in 1993. At the same time he has made it available on the website: http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~nurelweb/concise/INDEX.html This compendious work is a scholarly attempt to provide a glossary of most of the world’s religions, which dexterously combines incisiveness and outspokenness.

Since it is the season of the Epiphany, and although not really a 20th century subject, I draw your attention to the splendid account,beautifully illustrated with black and white photographs, by Richard Trexler, The Journey of the Magi. Meaning in History of a Christian Story, Princeton University Press 1997, 278pp, which ends with the triumphant return of the Magi’s relics to Cologne Cathedral through the almost entirely bombed out streets of that city in 1948. “The magi will come again, when the West needs to justify a new world order. . .Once again, the journey of the magi would culminate in resurrection”.With best wishes to you all. The next issue will appear a few days late – but better so than never!

John S.Conwayjconway@interchange.ubc.ca.

Dear Friends,I fear that some of you may have been disappointed if you tried to access the Index to past issues on our web-site, which has been out of order. We hope to take remedial steps. Looking over the books reviewed in the past year, I note a tendency to concentrate on German affairs. I hope to do better in 1999, but want to take this opportunity to thank all of you who so kindly, and without remuneration, were persuaded to review books for our members. The responses have been so positive that I very much hope you will continue. Ed.

Contents: 1) Modern Martyrs’ Monument 2) Book reviews: a) Chandler, The Moral Imperative b) Hayes, Holocaust education c) Baginski, Religious policy in French-occupied Germany 3) Journal articles: a) M..Greschat, Church policy in the French zone of occupation 1945-49 b) W.Husband, Soviet atheism c) D Ackermann, Catholics in Hanover d) D.Novak, Jews and Catholics e) P.Prein, Moravians in Africa f) U.R-Braun, Ludwig Ihmels 4) Book notices – Hexham, Concise Dictionary

1) Last July, in the presence of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth and other notables, ten newly-carved statues of twentieth century martyrs were unveiled on the west portal of Westminster Abbey, London’s most historic and prestigious Anglican church. The desire of the Abbey’s Dean and Chapter was to record the fact that this past century has been a period of heroic suffering and persecution for many Christians. To mark this, ten representative figures were chosen on an international and ecumenical basis. These figures are- from left to right – Maximilian Kolbe (Poland, d.1941), Manche Masemola (South Africa, d.1928), Janani Luwum (Uganda,d.1977), Grand Duchess Elizabeth of Russia (Russia, d.1918), Martin Luther King (USA, d.1968), Oscar Romero (El Salvador, d.1980), Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Germany, d.1945), Esther John (Pakistan, d.1960),Lucien Tapiedi (Papua-New Guinea, d.1942) and Wang Zhiming (China, d.1972). The statues themselves were designed by the British sculptor Tim Crawley, and the unveiling ceremony was preceded by an impressive Concert of Remembrance, when the premiere performance of a new De Profundis by John Hardy was given,specially composed for this occasion. In conjunction with these events a notable book of tributes was published – The Terrible Alternative. Christian Martyrdom in the Twentieth Century, London and New York: Cassell 1998. Edited by our list-member, Dr Andrew Chandler, this collection of essays by noted scholars will be reviewed here later, and should be helpful in providing information about the lesser known figures here commemorated.

2a) ed. A. Chandler, The Moral Imperative. New Essays on the Ethics of Resistance in National Socialist Germany 1933-1945.Widerstand: Dissent and Resistance in the Third Reich. Boulder,Co:Westview Press 1998, 124pp This slim volume contains six essays that were presented in 1995 at a conference to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. For the occasion, the George Bell Institute,University of Birmingham, brought together distinguished religious leaders, academics and publicists from North America, Britain and Germany to hear papers on “Christianity and Resistance: Nazi Germany 1933-1945”. A splendid introduction by Andrew Chandler places the essays in a broader setting of the pre-1933 history of church-state relations in Germany, and the post-1933 political realities of the Nazi dictatorship and the churches’ response. Students will be grateful for the many references that lead further into the subject. Churches specialize in the business of discerning evil. Yet they did little of that when public policy in Nazi Germany became overtly evil. In a chapter on “The role of the churches in the German Resistance Movement”, John Conway sees in this ‘reluctant resistance’ of the churches, especially the Protestant ones, a legacy of their tradition to back up civil authority. This tradition peaked during World War I, when the churches invested their moral capital in support of German militarism and imperialism. Through the defeat of these secular causes, the churches forfeited their claims to moral leadership in Germany. They now dedicated their energies to preserving their organization and doctrine. This protective attitude made the Churches blind to the need to defend the secular values and political ideals of the liberal republic. Instead they could find in the Nazi agenda old and new ideals to champion: nationalism, anti-liberalism, anti-parliamentarism, anti-communism and revisionist foreign policy. This agenda also appealed to Catholics, whose greater mistrust the Nazi regime neutralized in mid-1933 by the Concordat. Conway also points out how the regime’s early and blatant terrorism helps one understand the churches’ subsequent quietism. While Conway sees in the commitment of the churches in World War I a compelling explanation for their global failure in the Nazi era, he is of course aware of the exceptional instances of heroic resistance by clergy and laity. This is the theme of the chapter on ‘Laity and Churches in the Third Reich’ by Beate Ruhm von Oppen. Among the resisters, she cites H.J. von Moltke as one who did not count the churches out. He expected that their resistance would grow as Nazi persecution increased. He also assigned to the churches a role in the moral renewal after the war,and included Protestant and Catholics in the broad coalition he assembled to draft programmes for a defeated Germany, As an example of lay resistance on the humblest level, Ruhm v. Oppen pointed to the untutored religious obstinacy of the peasant Franz Jaegerstaetter in Austria, who refused to ‘fight for a regime that was fighting against the church’, and was beheaded. He had faith first,and resisted the evil that threatened its core; Moltke first recognised the evil, and in resisting it grew in faith, as his letters, edited so brilliantly by Ruhm v. Oppen, show. In a chapter ‘Church, Religion and the German Resistance’, Klemens von Klemperer maintains that all institutions tend to conform, or to collaborate with the regime under which they exist. Therefore, it would be wrong to expect en bloc resistance from the military, industry, civil service or even the churches. Nevertheless,some in the German Resistance expected more than accommodating quietism from church leaders, and demanded that the Church not be ‘silent like a dumb dog’. That was the conclusion of exceptional church leaders outside Germany (Berggrav, Oslo). While the churches failed to lead, those who took up resistance found that religion gave them strength in their dangerous and lonely stance. Klemperer calls this turning to religion “Spirituality -Frommigkeit”. He cites striking instances of how personal piety, deepening over time, sustained resisters, with or without a religious background. And as they realized that the Nazi regime meant to destroy religious and secular human values they became aware of how much Christianity and Humanism had in common. That helps to explain the ‘piety’ of socialists, who found strength in prayer or the Eucharist. One traditional blend of Christian and secular values that inspired a prominent social group to resist is the subject of Klaus-Gorgon Muller’s chapter on ‘Prussian elements in the German resistance’. His focus is on the Prussian conservative and military tradition, a backward-looking world view peculiar to an exclusive social class (gentry) and profession (army). Both bear enormous responsibility for bringing Hitler to power, partly because their Prussian virtues – duty, service to the state, pietist self-appraisal -failed early on to expose Hitler. Later, these same values inspired courageous men to organize bold plots against him. While it is useful to be reminded that one time Prussian virtues had admirable components, we cannot forget they were shared by a class that had forfeited its claim to leadership in the last decades of the Empire. Peter Hoffmann assessed ‘The Persecution of the Jews as a motive for Resistance against National Socialism’. His unrivalled knowledge of the sources is evident in the end-notes – among them judicious bibliographic mini-essays. The chapter sums up the anti-semitic policies and coercive resolve of the Nazi system – to oppose the one meant to face the other. While this rule applied to all manner of resistance, anyone who showed concern for the fate of the Jews defied the central belief of the Nazi regime. Hoffmann gives a wealth of detail showing that some first challenged the Nazis’ anti-semitic policies, (Goerdeler) and were then led to inform and protest (the Scholls); but others became more resolved to end the regime when they learned about the fate of the Jews. This is what police interrogators concluded after 20 July 1944, as was also evident in the testimonies in the People’s Court. In these most harrowing circumstances, resisters explained their actions by referring to the racist policies, especially the murder of the Jews.Hoffmann states that ‘the crimes of the regime, in particular the deliberate murder of the Jews’ (p.91) was the most powerful factor motivating the plotters against Hitler’s life. That could explain why so many who took part in the July 1944 plot had not acted in earlier years. The final chapter is by Ursula Buttner, ‘An unknown case of resistance; the rescue of Jews in Christian-Jewish mixed marriages’, which deals with examples of resistance at the most personal level:Christian spouses shielding partners whom the Nazi law deemed to be Jewish. Although progressively marginalised, the Jewish partner had a measure of safety – as long as the marriage held. As public pressure to divorce or cast adrift the Jewish spouse increased, so did suicide. But in 1943 in Berlin, when these Jewish spouses were rounded up for deportation, their families rallied and obtained their release after a mass protest of more than a week in front of the central collection point. Is there a similar example of mass civil disobedience in the Third Reich? Resistance calls for personal moral commitment. In the Third Reich, resistance could range from tyrannicide to protest on behalf of a spouse. Some resisted very early (Moltke), others late (Stauffenberg). The question remains: why did these persons make their commitment? What sets them apart from relatives and friends with whom they had grown up, learning the same values at home, in school, church and university? Before 1933 none could have singled out the likely candidates for resistance activity. Yet those who did resist were undoubtedly inspired by ethical norms and religious beliefs that were common knowledge. What set them apart was that they recognized evil and were inspired and sustained in their determination to do something about it. The essays in this collection show that, as the perils of resistance escalated, commitment to Christian beliefs deepened.Erich J.Hahn, University of Western Ontario.

2b) Stephen R.Haynes, Holocaust Education and the Church-related College. With a foreword by Franklin H.Littell. Westport, Conn:Greenwood Press 1997, 185pp Stephen Haynes, a young Presbyterian minister now teaching at a church-related college in Tennessee, is fully persuaded of the maxim adumbrated a generation ago by Professor Franklin Littell that the Holocaust is not just a Jewish, but also a Christian tragedy, not least because of the importance of the Jewish-Christian bond and the historical complicity of Christians in antisemitism. His book is a study of how far this perception has taken root in church-related colleges in the U.S.A. In 1994 he conducted a nation-wide survey of such colleges, asking about the inclusion of Holocaust education in their curriculum. His findings are highly ambivalent, namely that there is a lack of institutional commitment to such courses in many colleges, or that the initiative largely stemmed from interested faculty members. Indeed Holocaust education at church-related colleges would appear to be negatively correlated with religious aspects of college identity. It is Haynes’ aim to suggest how an effective Holocaust education can help to give an more authentic Christian dimension to church-related higher education. For one thing, no one teaching or learning about the Holocaust can avoid a personal crisis of identity, out of which a new spirituality can grow, including a widening of intellectual and moral horizons, and an ability to be moved by others’ pain, along with a sense of personal responsibility for alleviating such pain. The church colleges’ own religious traditions can be resources for humanizing pedagogy and encouraging such broader sensitivity, if properly fostered. By so doing, such an education could help to counter the indifference, apathy or relativism, or worse still the racially-motivated collaboration, which marked the response of so many secular universities and their graduates to the Holocaust, and other outbursts of racial intolerance, in the 1930s and 1940s, and the danger of which still exists today. JSC

2c) Christophe Baginski, La politique religieuse de la France en Allemagne occupee (1945-1949), Villeneuve-d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion 1997, 344 pp.(This review translated from the French by Editor) This work consists of a 1996 doctoral thesis from the University of Lille III. It is an acute study, though lacking in the kind of conclusions which might have provided a more synthetic overview of an already complex subject. But the treatment is new and rigorous, based on German and French archives, from which one can learn a lot about a topic hitherto little treated. What strikes one is the highly improvised character of French religious policy in the zone occupied by General Koenig’s troops, compared to the American and British policy in their respective zones. This was due principally because France only received its occupation zone at the Potsdam Conference in August 1945, and had therefore to adapt to these new circumstances without time to weigh up the attitude to be adopted towards the German churches. The task was therefore delicate. The author shows very well that the churches were the only institutions in German society to survive the general disaster,particularly the Catholic church thanks to its supranational character and its links to the Holy See, whereas the Protestant churches were fragmented by their purely German structure.Furthermore they were entrenched in those areas where their spiritual authority was strong: Catholics represented 62.5% of the French zone’s population, compared with the Lutherans’ 34.8% – in other words an impressive majority. The situation was far >from simple. The churches had supported the Nazi regime, possibly more out of conformity or weakness rather than out of ideological conviction. But the number of those who resisted, especially at first, was very few. Denazification was therefore necessary, just as in the rest of German society. The churches, however, quickly distanced themselves from the Nazis’ crimes, refusing to recognise any share of responsibility, and instead stressing their acts of resistance,which, no doubt, may have been real, but were not on the scale one could have wished. However, the French joined their allies in a deceptive stance, by agreeing that the churches could be regarded as having supported the resistance movement. Was this just naivete?Certainly not. In French eyes, the churches had two advantages: first, they represented a bulwark against Nazi paganism, and after 1947,against communism. It was necessary to make them supporters of the occupation policies. So the French authorities quickly allowed freedom of worship, and the re-opening of seminaries and theological faculties. They organised a very limited and discreet purge of the clergy, here studied in detail. In return they demanded that the German churches should ease relations with the occupation authorities, and restrict themselves purely to the religious arena. However, it was soon clear that, in asking for alleviation of the occupation’s rigours, or in appealing for a prompt return of prisoners, the bishops were engaging in political affairs. The French authorities took a very firm line. The author seeks to show that, in general, relations were correct, even benevolent on the part of the French. After consulting with the Holy See, they agreed to recognise the validity of the 1933 Reich Concordat. They ensured that no church lacked supplies for celebrating the Eucharist, which was a considerable achievement at a time of great penury. Charitable works were authorized and even encouraged, as was youth work. Finally, the French sought to buildup Christian political parties, but on condition that the Centre Party,which had voted plenary powers to Hitler in 1933, should not reappear. They avoided adopting too punitive a policy, but rather believed, like their allies, that this would be an effective way of combating the increasing menace of communism. At the same time, this benevolence could hardly conceal other French objectives, such as their desire to separate both the Catholic and Protestant churches of the Saar from the rest of Germany. It is a pity that the author did not give more space to this issue, which was central to the French occupation authorities. It would have been good to describe this situation more exactly, as it provided an overlap between the religious and political spheres, as part of France’s desire to detach the Saar from Germany in order to establish it as a kind of satellite state. Nevertheless we owe Christophe Baginski a debt for so competently filling a historiographical void with this solid and pertinent work which allows us to understand more fully the complexity of Franco-German relations in the immediate post-war period. Francis Latour, Paris

3a) Journal article: Martin Greschat, “Die Kirchenpolitik Frankreichs in seiner Besatzungszone”, 2 parts, in Zeitschrift fur Kirchengeschichte, Vol 109, nos 2 and 3, 1998. This same subject is explored by one of Germany’s leading church historians in a two part article, which is notably more critical of French policy. Greschat shows that French dreams of restoring its European status rested on the exploitation and dismemberment of western Germany, thus fulfilling the unfinished business of 1919. At the same time, the Germans would need to be re-educated to learn to abandon their long-held nationalism, or their admiration for former heroes, up to and including the Nazis. Such goals now appear fantastic, and Greschat rightly repeats the already known facts about the lack of competence both in theory and practice, of the French occupation authorities. Relations with the churches were cool and correct, but suffered from ambivalence: on the one side the French tried to win them over to French goals, even while propagating the view that Church and State should be rigidly separated as in France. The British and Americans were criticised for believing that the churches should be encouraged to help in building up a new sense of democracy. Such political activity was highly problematic in French eyes. Suspicion of clerical resurgence, especially Catholic,was evident. While the churches were expected to condemn Nazism, they were not to be allowed any political expressions on current policy. Not surprisingly, this policy ran into serious opposition from the still nationalistically minded German bishops,who now saw their role as the advocates for the “oppressed” victims of the occupation policy. Their unwillingness to accept any blame for Germany’s crimes, which were ascribed solely to a few Nazis,only made the situation more tense. But the church leaders were increasingly prepared to engage in political protest, if only to makeup for past failures. Such a stance not surprisingly caused tensions. On the other hand, Greschat notes that efforts to foster peace and reconciliation were made by a valiant French Jesuit, who evaded the military government’s regulations, and in turn such moves widened the German church members’ horizons. So too the chief Protestant chaplain, Marcel Sturm, established good relations with the Confessing Church members, even though he saw that they too were still overly nationalistic. “Ils ne peuvent pas chanterouvertement “Deutschland uber alles”, main c’est reste la melodiede leur coeur”. Karl Barth’s strictures about the German churches and about the disastrous effects of Lutheranism were widely accepted by the French Protestant officials. Where, as in the Palatinate, the local church leaders showed no willingness to come to terms with their past, the French authorities intervened forcibly,dismissed the acting bishop and installed their own favourite. But at the same time, they declared that true German repentance would be met with friendship and assistance. Greschat pays tribute to Sturm’s efforts to combine his pursuit of French political aims with the encouragement of the Confessing Church’s theological programme, in a sincere effort to rebuild the German Protestant churches in the French zone. In the end, such ambitions failed, but the personal witness certainly helped to build bridges towards a better future. JSC

3b) William Husband, Oregon State University: “Soviet Atheism and Russian Orthodox Strategies of Resistance, 1917-32”, in Journal of Modern History, March 1998, p 74 ff. This article usefully explores how Russian workers and peasants employed resistance and circumventions to protect their traditional beliefs and practices against the changes imposed by the new Bolshevik regime after 1917.

3c) Detlef Schmichen-Ackermann, “Katholische Diaspora zwischen Ruckzug und Selbstbehauptung in der NS Zeit” in Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, Vol 49, no7/8, July 1998, p.462.Ackermann examines the extent of collaboration and/or resistance amongst the Catholics in the “exile” of north Germany around the city of Hannover during the Nazi period. A helpful local study.

3d) David Novak “Jews and Catholics: Beyond Apologies” in First Things, no 89, January 1999, p 20. This assessment of the recent Vatican statement “We remember” by a sympathetic Jewish scholar, rightly points out that the Catholic church is now calling for an active work of repentance and reconciliation, which has far more theological significance than an apology, designed to bury the past, ever could have. But Novak also rightly makes the point that the document would have been stronger if it had simply not raised the still disputed issue of Pius XII’s diplomatic actions during the Second World War – an issue which it could not possibly have treated adequately.

3e) Phillip Prein, “The Moravian Invention of an African Missionary Object” in German History, Vol 16, no 3 1998,p.328ff. This piece describes how far national and racial ideas penetrated German church circles with the example of the Moravian mission to southern Africa. These missionary leaders left behind their previous emphasis on individual conversions, and now began to dream of converting a whole Volk, with surprisingly romantic idealism.

3f) Uwe Rieske-Braun, “Ludwig Ihmels und die soziale Frage” in Zeitschrift fur Kirchengeschichte, Vol 109, no 3, 1998. This article sketches the career and ideas of the Bishop of Saxony (1922-33) and his stance on social questions, particularly in connection with the ecumenical conference in Stockholm in 1925.Rieske-Braun rightly shows that Ihmels was one of those conservative church leaders whose reluctance to support the democratic advances or peaceful foreign policy of the Weimar Republic led directly to their enthusiasm for the Nazi victory in 1933.

4) Book notices:Irving Hexham draws attention to the new edition of his Concise Dictionary of Religion,second edition Regent College Press,Vancouver 1999, first published in 1993. At the same time he has made it available on the website: http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~nurelweb/concise/INDEX.html. This compendious work is a scholarly attempt to provide a glossary of most of the world’s religions, which dexterously combines incisiveness and outspokenness.

Since it is the season of the Epiphany, and although not really a 20th century subject, I draw your attention to the splendid account,beautifully illustrated with black and white photographs, by Richard Trexler, The Journey of the Magi. Meaning in History of a Christian Story, Princeton University Press 1997, 278pp, which ends with the triumphant return of the Magi’s relics to Cologne Cathedral through the almost entirely bombed out streets of that city in 1948. “The magi will come again, when the West needs to justify a new world order. . .Once again, the journey of the magi would culminate in resurrection”.With best wishes to you all. The next issue will appear a few days late – but better so than never!

John S.Conwayjconway@interchange.ubc.ca.

Dear Friends,
With this issue of our Newsletter, we come to the completion of Vol. IV.
Editing these issues has been a labour of love for me, which has been
sustained largely because of the encouragement I have received from so many
of you. Let me assure you all that I continue to welcome your contributions,
so that we can more fully produce a truly international and
interdenominational bulletin of value to our world-wide readership from
Poland to Western Australia.
I shall be returning to Vancouver in mid-month, so individual correspondence
may be somewhat disrupted. But I want to take this opportunity to wish each
and all of you my very best wishes for a blessed Christmas and a happy and
successful New Year.
Contents: 1) Repetition of invitation to supply biographical resumes
2) Forthcoming International Historical Conference
3) Journal issue
4) Thesis abstract: Karl Barth. Covenanted Solidarity. M.Lindsay
5) The Erosion of Conscience
6) Book review: M.Kalusche, Der Schloss an der Grenze
1) Repeat invitation to supply biographical and research interest
information.
As we noted last month, list-members are invited to become better known to
each other by sending in a short resume of your career and research
interests, along with your e-mail and postal addresses, and home page if you
have one. Please send this to Randall Bytwerk
The results can be read at
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/bytw/conway.htm
2) Forthcoming conference
It is not too early to take note of the opportunity to take part in the next
meeting of the International Congress of Historical Sciences to be held in
Oslo, Norway from 6th-13th August 2000.
The whole programme can be obtained from
thomas.evensen@hi.uio.no
This is the largest most ecumenical gathering of the world’s historians, so
its themes have to be very broad and general. But one of the major subjects
to be discussed will be “Millennium, time and history” including a section
on ‘eschatology, millennial movements and visions of the future”, while
among the special topics are “Religion and Gender” and “Christian Missions,
modernisation, colonisation and de-colonisation”.
In addition a number of affiliated organisations will hold simultaneous
meetings. Amongst these should be the Commission Internationale d’Histoire
Ecclesiastique Comparee (CIHEC). If I can establish contact with any of this
group’s executive, I will and get more details of the two-day programme, and
how to contact the organizers.
3) Journal issue:
The Journal for the History of Modern Theology/Zeitschrift fuer neuere
Theologiegeschichte, Volume 5, no 2 1998 has now been published and includes
the third part of a deocumentary edition of the exchange of letters between
Rudolf Bultmann and Gerhard Krueger 1924-1974, also interesting reviews of
new books in our field. The web-site is
http://www.degruyter.de/journals/znthg/index.html
4) Thesis abstract
Covenanted Solidarity. The theological basis of Karl Barth’s opposition to
Nazi antisemitism and the Holocaust.
In the historiography of Holocaust and Church Struggle studies, the figure
of Karl Barth occupies a strangely marginalised position. Historians have
acknowledged his seminal role in the founding and leadership of the
Confessing Church, including his pivotal involvement in the writing of the
Barmen Declaration. Thus, his significance as a ‘Founding Father’ of the
ecclesiastical campaign against the Nazi regime has been widely recognised.
Conversely, his vehement rejection of National Socialist antisemitism and
the resultant Holocaust, as well as his forceful advocacy on behalf of the
persecuted Jews, have received scant attention. Historians have displayed an
unwillingness to encounter in any penetrating depth the theological issues
involved in Barth’s position, and have shied away from Barth’s massive
“Church Dogmatics” in which his most profound defences of the Jews are
located. The results of these failings has been that most historical
monographs about Nazi antisemitism and the Holocaust that do mention Barth
do so in critically negative fashion, usually assuming that Barth was either
anti-Judaistic himself or simply uninterested in the question.
This thesis counteracts this received wisdom by presupposing that any
historical assessment of Barth must take in utter seriousness his
theological work on its own grounds. Consequently, while the thesis falls
within the discipline of history, it is the theological bases of Barth’s
resistance to Nazism and its antisemitism that forms the material core of
the project.
This approach focusses not only on Barth’s explicitly political pamphlets,
but also on his dogmatic theology from the early 1920s through the “Church
Dogmatics” period. It looks not only at how Barth treats the motif of
“Israel” but, more importantly, how his conceptions of revelation,
Christology and election stand in self-conscious antithesis to the
voelkisch, Nazified versions of the same. The National Socialists adopted
and then perverted these theological motifs in an effort not only to deify
the regime and Hitler, but also to demonize the Jews and thus to justify
their extermination. This thesis seeks to show that Barth’s usage of these
concepts was both a recapturing of the theological orthodoxy and, as well, a
basis from which his defence of the Jews could be, and was, launched.
The other central element is the demonstration that Barth was no mere
armchair theologian, but was socially and politically active throughout his
career. This theme is developed by showing how Barth’s pro-Israel
hermeneutic found practical expression during the Nazi years. This was no
aberration, but rather the extension of Barth’s social(ist) praxis from his
earlier pastoral work in rural Switzerland.
There are undoubtedly points at which Barth’s theological and practical
political can be criticised. Nevertheless the overwhelming weight of
evidence shows that, in contrast to previous historical assessments, Barth
was both actively involved in resisting Nazi antisemitic violence, and that
this praxis was grounded securely in his profound Christocentric theology.
Mark Lindsay, Dept of History, University of Western Australia.
5) The Erosion of Conscience
On a recent visit to the University of Western Ontario, Prof Peter Baehr of
Memorial University, Newfoundland, had these pertinent comments on the
problem of the loss of moral standards in Nazi Germany, as discussed by
Hannah Arendt in her well-known book “Eichmann in Jerusalem”:
A particularly disturbing fact for a civilisation ostensibly based on
Judaeo-Christian principles, is that such principles were not sturdy enough
to forestall the Holocaust, Though the Nazis themselves were decidedly
anti-Christian, Germany had been a Christian region, with Christian
traditions, for centuries. What had then happened to the commandment: Thous
shalt not kill? To be sure this injunction had everywhere been previously
qualified to allow for capital punishment or war. But the Jews were not
criminals in the conventional sense – they had broken no law until they were
put outside of it – or in a position to assault Germany. In her book “The
Origins of Totalitarianism”, Arendt delineated a number of historical, macro
elements that had prepared the way for the temporary triumph of the Nazis,
among them the disintegration of the nation-state, the emergence of
minorities and millions of stateless peoples, and the development of racism
which denies the common origins of Man. All of these had weakened the
conventions, customs and traditions on which moral scruples are based.
In “Eichmann in Jerusalem” Arendt deepened the analysis by providing a
phenomenology of the factors and phases by means of which conscience is
eroded, to such an extent that it is only exceptional people who are able to
behave “normally”.
Arendt was emphatic that someone like Eichmann “commits his crimes under
circumstances that make it well-nigh impossible to know or to feel that he
is doing wrong” But what were these “circumstances” that disabled people
like Eichmann from knowing or feeling that they were doing wrong?
Concentrating primarily on the environment within which Eichmann and people
like him moved, Arendt enumerated a number of factors that contributed to
the erosion of conscience. The first of these was linguistic. A conspicuous
feature of the bizarre world inhabited by the Nazi hierarchy was a roster of
slogans and catch-phrases – the SS motto “My Honor is my Loyalty ” – that
leant their deeds an inflated importance, and that substituted the plain
fact of murder with “language rules” (euphemisms like ‘final solution’
‘special treatment’, ‘resettlement’) whose purpose was to conceal the
enormity of what was being done.
During the war, the slogan was “the battle of destiny for the German people”
(der Schicksalskampf des deutschen Volkes) “coined either by Hitler or by
Goebbels, which made self-deception easier on three counts: it suggested,
first, that the war was no war; second, that it was started by destiny and
not by Germany; and third, that it was a matter of life and death for the
Germans, who must annihilate their enemies or be annihilated”.
Moreover, it became evident that such terminology had survived the war when,
during Eichmann’s trial, his defence counsel, Dr Robert Servatius declared
Eichmann “innocent of charges bearing on his responsibility for ‘the
collection of skeletons, sterilizations, killings by gas, and similar
medical matters'” Whereupon Judge Halevi interrupted him: “Dr Servatius, I
assume you made a slip of the tongue when you said that killing by gas was a
medical matter” To which Servatius replied: “It was indeed a medical matter,
since it was prepared by physicians; it was a matter of killing, and
killing, too, is a medical matter”.
Second, and relatedly, the Nazis created amongst their functionaries a
pseudo-morality through warping a component that all ethical ideas contain:
the notion of obligation and sacrifice. Such a grotesque twist was required
precisely because the majority of murderers were not “sadists or killers by
nature”. Members of the Einsatzgruppen, for instance, the mobile killing
units of the SS, were typically reasonably well-educated, Himmler’s
stratagem for dealing with feelings of pity they may have harboured
consisted in ramming home the message, not “what horrible things I did to
people!” But rather “what horrible things I had to watch in the pursuance of
my duties, how heavily the task weighed upon my shoulders!. And since it was
an unpleasant “task” for which “sacrifice” was required, and not a pleasure
experienced for its own sake, such a rationalisation could assume the
tincture of duty and anaesthetise other moral qualms. A similar phenomenon
was evident amongst those who built the installations of mass death. In many
cases, these were the same functionaries who had been involved in the
euthanasia drive to which around 50,000 Germans had fallen victim between
December 1939 and August 1941. The phraseology of “mercy killing” which
justified this policy – and which, again, implied that the killers were
working with an elevated motive – prepared them well for their next job.
Third, the sheer fact of war itself, the multiplication of death it
involved, and the ever-present sense that one’s own life now hung in the
balance, lessened the value of life more generally.
Fourth, and finally, the atmosphere of collusion was so complete – among the
Nazi Party hierarchy, the Foreign Office, legal experts, the Ministry of
Finance – that there was nothing, and no-one, to convince Eichmann that he
was doing anything wrong. The absence of dissenting opinions, the fugitive
and opaque character of resistance, such as it was, spun a cocoon in which
crime was transformed into orthodoxy. Who, Eichmann asked, was he to
protest? The very success of the regime made obeying it seductive, and a
virtue out of opportunism. But the situation was made even worse, Arendt
argued, because of the way the Jewish Councils cooperated with the Nazi
functionaries in the deportation of their own people. Through the practice
of establishing privileged categories of Jewish persons – “German Jews as
against Polish Jews, war veterans and decorated Jews as against ordinary
Jews, families whose ancestors were German-born as against those recently
naturalised, etc ” – through formulating various exceptions, the Jewish
leaders had seemed to accept the rule. As a result, it was all too easy for
the Nazi functionaries to feel “that by being asked to make exceptions, and
by occasionally granting them, and thus earning gratitude, they had
convinced their opponents of the lawfulness of what they were doing”.
“Nobody”, Eichmann explained, ” came to me and reproached me for anything in
the performance of my duties. Not even Pastor Gruber [a Protestant minister
with whom Eichmann had negotiated, and who gave evidence at the trial: PB]
claims to have done so . . . He came to me and sought alleviation of
suffering, but did not actually object to the very performance of my duties
as such”. For Arendt, this and other episodes revealed “the moral collapse
of Jewish society”. And accompanying it, of course, was the moral collapse
of Christian society too. Peter Baehr, Memorial University of Newfoundland.
6) Book review:
Martin Kalusche, Das Schloss an der Grenze. Kooperation und Konfrontation
mit dem Nationalsozialismus in der Heil- und Pflegeanstalt fuer
Schwachsinnige und Epileptische Stetten i. R.. Heidelberg:DWI Verlag 1997
(Diakoniewissenschaftliche Studien, Bd 10) 412 pp DM 32-
(English summary: Ed. The tragic history of the mistreatment and even murder
of the mentally-ill in Nazi Germany is now being explored more fully,
especially on the local level. Many of these patients were placed in
church-run institutions, such as the one at Stetten in Wuerttemberg, which
is the subject of this capable analysis. The author makes clear that the
clash of loyalties between Christian compassion and Nazi racial demands was
felt by all the staff, but particularly by the directors. He gives a full
account of the dilemma of Pastor Ludwig Schlaich, but suggests that his was
not a strong personality able to withstand the constant pressures to
conform. Stetten showed how easily all in charge got used to the poisonous
impact of Nazi ideas. The initial Nazi programme in 1934 was for compulsory
sterilization of Stetten’s patients as a “sacrifice for the sake of national
health purity”, as Schlaich justified such steps.
From May 1940 onwards, the deportations from Stetten began, despite
ineffective protests. Within seven weeks nearly half the inmates had been
put to death. The author rightly expresses his inability to describe
adequately their feelings, or the conflicts felt by the hospital staff,
especially when heartrending choices had to be made in the hopes of saving
some of the victims.
The third part of the book is more analytical and discusses the whole issue
of “euthanasia” in its wider context, as also a comparison with the story at
other German institutions. The author successfully combines an
identification with the theme’s subjects, but also a due scholarly distance.
“Stetten” ist fuer viele Menschen in Wuerttemberg ein Synonym fuer eine
Anstalt, aus der zur Zeit des Nationalsozialismus behinderte Menschen zur
Ermordung abgeholt wurden. “Stetten” – das verbindet sich schliesslich mit
einer zentralen Gestalt, Pfarrer Ludwig Schlaich (1899-1977), dem
Hauptprotagonisten dieses Buches. Basierend auf einer 1100 Seiten dicken
Chronik der Anstalt Stetten widmet sich der Autor in acht Kapiteln der
Grundfrage: “Wie war es moeglich, dass vor zwei Generationen fast die
Haeflte der Bewohnerinnen und Bewohner verschleppt und auf der Schwaebischen
Alb ermordert werden konnte? Inwiefern war die Anstalt Stetten an den
nationalsozialistischen Verbrechen an behinderten Menschen beteiligt?”
(S.16)
Drei Hauptteile sind es, in denen diese Frage aus jeweils veraenderter
Perspektive angegangen wird. Im ersten Teil “Leben und Arbeiten in der Heil-
und Pflegeanstalt 1933-40” (S 33-142) orientiert Kalusche die Leser ueber
die Vorgeschichte der Anstalt Stetten wie ueber die Hauptpersonen. Er
informiert ueber die finanzielle Situation der Anstalten. Stetten ist im
Dritten Reich ein oekonomisch prosperierendes Unternehmen, was aber durch
grosse Sparsamkeit und einer damit einhergehenden Verschlechterung von
Lebens- und Arbeitsbedingungen erkauft wird. Dabei orientiert sich der Autor
stark an dem Begriff der “Grenze”. Er thematisiert ihn am
(Nicht-)Verhaeltnis der Anstalt zur Gemeindee Stetten, wie er auch die
Grenzen der geistlichen Gemeinschaft in Stetten aufweist: Mitarbeiter und
Bewohner gehen getrennt zum Abendmahl; viele Bewohner, die nicht konfirmiert
werden koonten, sind vom Abendmahl ausgeschlossen.
Ein erster Hohepunkt des Buches liegt im zweiten Kapitel, in der Stetten als
Teil der NS-Volksgemeinschaft untersucht wird. Dabei wird deutlich, wie sehr
NSBO und KdF die “Betriebsgemeinschaft” Stetten praegen wollen. Natuerlich
muss sich im Herbst 1937 auch die gesamte Mitarbeiterschaft sich auf Hitler
verpflichten. Zweifellos – so folgert der Autor – war nach dem Willen der
Verantwortlichen die Anstalt Teil des NS-Volksgemeinschaft. Daneben steht
jedoch, und dqs wirkt vielfach paradox, die Feststellung, dass hier
weiterhin im Rahmen des christlichen Menschenbildes der eigene Wert jedes
behinderten Menschen vertreten wurde, was der Autor zu Beginn des dritten
Kapitels mit vielen Belegen zeigt. (S.120) Hier wie an vielen anderen
Stellen wird die schwierige Gratwanderung Ludwig Schlaichs deutlich, die
zwischen dem Kosten-Nutzen-Aspekt und der positiven Bedeutung der
behinderten Menschen entlang fuehrt.
“Brauchbare-Auslese” heisst der Begriff, mit dem sich Schlaich
auseinandersetzen muss. Zusammenfassend muss Kalusche feststellen, dass bei
aller Paradoxie Stetten nicht der Ort war, an dem sich aus christlichen
Glauben, Ablehnung des NS-Terrors und einem Patriotismus, der Freiheit und
Menschenwuerde verpflichtet ist, eine Widerstandshaltung entwickeln konnte.
Er konstatiert vielmehr eine allmaehliche “Gewoehnung an das Gift des
Nationalsozialismus” (S.145)
Der zweite Teil der Arbeit, der den nationalsozialistischen Verbrechen an
den Behinderten in Stetten gewidmet ist (S 143-323) thematisiert zunaechst
in beklemmender Weise Begruendung und Realisierung der von der Inneren
Mission weithin begruessten Zwangssterilisierung. Der Autor beleuchtet
dieses Thema unter anderem aufgrund einer Rundfunkreportage, einem
“Hoerbericht aus der Heil- und Pflegeanstalt Stetten i/Remstal”, die die
Sterilisierung subtil an die Hoererschaft bringen will, spaeter gleichwohl
doch nicht ausgestrahlt wird. Im weiteren geht er auf den Kreis der
Sterilisierten ein, wie auch auf die traumatischen Folgen der
Sterilisierung. Der Autor zieht aus Schlaich’s Stellungnahmen und
praktischer Taetigkeit die Einsicht, dass ausgehend von einer politischer
Entscheidung fuer das Dritte Reich die theologische Urteilsbildung eindeutig
korrumpiert worden sei. So wird die Unfruchtbarmachung von Schlaich als
Bewaehrung des “Erbkranken” als Christ und “Volksgenossen” interpretiert,
als “Opfer” fuer den Staat, “um die weitere Untergrabung der Volksgesundheit
durch die Erbkrankheiten zu verhindern”. (Vortrag Schlaich 27.1.1935 in
Stuttgart, zit. bei Kalusche, S.196)
Am 22 Mai 1940 beginnt die Deportation von Bewohnern der Anstalt Stetten.
Sieben Transporte schildert Kalusche in seinem Buch, nicht ohne die
Korrespondenz der Anstalt mit den Angehoerigen zu dokumentieren. In diesen
Zusammenhang kann nur der Autor recht gegeben werden, wenn er schreibt:
“Dabei stossen wir immer wieder an die Grenzen dessen, was im Rahmen einer
wissenschaftlichen Arbeit moeglich ist. Wie soll es gelingen, das Schicksal
der Deportierten und Ermordeten, aber auch die Todesangst der mit dem Leben
Davongekommenen angemessen zu schildern? Wie ist es moeglich, dem tragischen
Konflikt gerecht zu werden, den die Anstaltleitung aushalten muss, wenn sie
Menschenleben opfert, um andere zu retten?” (S.286).
Der Autor resuemiert, dass die Leitung der Anstalt Stetten mit den
Deportation rechnen musste. Als die ersten Transporte angekuendigt werden,
habe man gegen die Deportation beim Reichsstatthalter und beim
Innenministerium interveniert, wenngleich weithin ohne Erfolg. Auch die
Bemuehungen der Angehoerigen waren nicht ganz fruchtlos, wenngleich sie
wenig daran aenderten, dass in zwoelf Wochen fast die Haelfte der
behinderten Menschen umgebracht wurde. Ende 1940 wurde die Anstalt Stetten
beschlagnahmt. Viele der in anderen Anstalten verlegten Menschen wurden dort
Opfer der “Euthanasie”.
Abschliessend geht der Autor im dritten Teil auf Fragen von Widerstand und
Nonkonformitaet ein, beleuchtet Schlaichs verklaerende Schrift
“Lebensunwert” aus dem Jahre 1947 und vergleicht Stetten mit anderen
Einrichtungen der Inneren Mission in Sueddeutschland. (S.324-384)
Das Buch endet mit der Frage nach zeitgenoessischen Herausforderungen in
Form von sieben sehr bedenkenswerten Thesen. Unter anderem konstatiert er
hier “Formen von Gewoehnung und Korrumpierung” und fordert ein offensives
Umgehen mit der “Realitaet eines internationalen
biotechnologisch-industriellen Komplexes”. Die wichtigste Einsicht aus der
Geschichte der “Vernichtung lebensunwerten Lebens” liege wohl darin, “dass
ein Verbrechen, auch wenn man annimmt, es sei zu gross, um jemals begangen
zu werden, dennoch veruebt werden kann” (S.384)
Nur wenige Buecher aus dem Bereich der Kirchlichen Zeitgeschichte, die in
den vergangenen Jahren erschienen sind, koennen sich mit dieser Heidelberger
Dissertation messen. Das gilt auf drei Ebenen. Zum einen liest man selten
eine so geglueckte Synthese vonb Identifikation mit dem Thema und
wissenschaftlich notwendiger Distanz. Zur anderen is beeindruecken, dass
sich der Autor nicht von herkoemlichen Schablonen blenden laesst, sondern
tief in die Quellen eindringt, um die Wahrheit herauszufinden. Schliesslich
bleibt er nicht in einer unverbindlichen historischen Beschaeftigung stehen,
sondern schafft es, im besten Sinne einen Lernprozess anzustossen. Dem
Rezensenten bleibt nur, die Lektuere dieses Buches vorbehaltlos zu
empfehlen.
Rainer Laechele, Riesengebirgstr.2, D 73457 Essingen, Germany
Rlaechele@t-online.de
It only remains for me to wish you all the compliments of the season, and to
hope that we shall all meet again in 1999.
Sincerely,
John S.Conway
jconway@interchange.ubc.ca

Dear Friends,

Twice this month I have had the pleasure of making the personal acquaintance
of several List-members, hitherto known only from cyber-space. In Grand Rapids,
Michigan, where I went for a visiting lecture, Randy Bytwerk suggested that we should try to use
this technology to get to know each other better. He even and most kindly volunteered to set up the
mechanics to make this happen. by establishing and maintaining a website.(See below:
Networking: Item 2 ). So may I urge you all to take advantage of this generous offer, which I feel
will help to advance our interest and research in contemporary church history.

Contents:

1) FDR Conference, Hyde Park,N.Y., Oct.1998
2) Networking for Association List-members
3) Book reviews

a) U.Gerrens, Medizinisches Ethos und theologische Ethik
b) B, Mensing, Pfarrer und Nationalsozialismus
c) E.W.Lutzer, Hitler’s Cross
4) Bonhoeffer new Home Page
5) Conference on “Europe: Divided or United”, July 1999
6) A Communist invokes the Power of Prayer

1) The recent conference organised by the Franklin and Eleanor
Roosevelt Institute at Hyde Park, New York on the topic of “FDR, the Vatican and the Roman Catholic
Church in America, 1933-1945” proved to be a highly interesting occasion. First, because our
discussions took place in FDR’s home and library, surrounded by the memorabilia and even the
documentation of his presidency, which gave a very special aura. Second, because the
distinguished participants comprised representatives of the State Department, including three present
or former U.S. Ambassadors to the Holy See, members of President Kennedy’s family, an envoy
from the Vatican’s Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, several noted
Catholic priests, and a stimulating group of professors from California to Prince Edward Island.
The Canadian contingent from Vancouver, Ottawa, Toronto, New Brunswick and P.E.I. made
excellent contributions. It was also good to meet several listmembers there.
F.D.R. was and is both attractive and enigmatic. Some papers described
how this Hudson Valley aristocrat with his social reformist leanings dealt with the largely
blue-collar and Irish Catholic working class who so largely sustained the Democratic Party for
opportunistic and self-serving interests. Even more interesting were the ambiguities involved
in Roosevelt’s attempts to recruit the Catholic Church internationally for the changing
demands of his diplomatic goals. The American government’s involvement with the Vatican,
in the absence of any regular diplomatic mission, began through sending Myron Taylor as a
Personal Representative to Pope Pius XII in early 1940. But there was considerable
opposition at home, and Roosevelt was obliged to leave the relationship ambivalent, especially
when Pius refused to give his support to American war aims. We heard conflicting views about
Pius XII’s diplomatic priorities, and can expect debate to continue on this subject.
The conference concluded with a special session on the recent Vatican
document “We Remember: Reflections on the Shoah”, whose theological premises were not
surprisingly warmly applauded by such an audience. The whole affair was magnificently organised by David Woolner of the
University of Prince Edward Island and Marist College, who arranged for the banquet to be
held in the former Jesuit Novitiate nearby – a huge religious edifice, where Teilhard de
Chardin is buried in the cemetery, but which is now used as a highly superior cooking school! Sic
transit gloria!

2. Networking: Randy Bytwerk writes:
During a recent visit to Calvin College, John Conway noted that even he does
not know personally all of the members who receive this Newsletter – largely because
the numbers have grown so rapidly – and that it would be useful perhaps to have a brief
information on subscribers available. I volunteered to take on this task. If you would like to post
a brief paragraph identifying yourself and your interests, email address, and home page should
you have one, I will post that information at this address:
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/bytw/conway.htm
I will simply paste in what you send to me, so do proofread.

3a) Uwe Gerrens, Medizinisches Ethos und theologische Ethik. Karl und
Dietrich Bonhoeffer in der Auseinandersetzung um Zwangssterilisation und “Euthanasie” in
Nationalsozialismus. (Schriftenreihe der Vierteljahrshefte fur Zeitgeschichte, Bd 73),
Munich: Oldenbourg 1996
(This review appeared first on H-German@h-net.msu.edu on 9 Oct 98)

Uwe Gerrens’ work is an interesting contribution to the rapidly expanding
body of literature on eugenics and “euthanasia” in the Nazi period. Though it
originated as a dissertation in theology, it is more historical than theological in flavour. Gerrens’
use of archival and other primary sources, for example, is impressive, though his command of the
English-language historiography on his topic is a little limited.
While most works on eugenics and “euthanasia” focus on the perpetrators,
this one analyses the activities and ideas of two prominent opponents of Nazi
eugenics policies. Karl Bonhoeffer, professor at the University of Berlin, was one of the leading
psychiatrists in Germany in the early twentieth century.. His son, Dietrich, became a leading
theologian in the Confessing Church during the Nazi period. Despite their common opposition to Nazi
policies and their love for each other, Karl and Dietrich were miles apart in their world views and
interests. Karl was a careful scientist uninterested in religious matters, while Dietrich’s whole
life revolved around religion. Karl rarely discussed philosophy or ethics publicly, while
Dietrich considered work on ethics his life’s task. Thus Gerrens is obliged to reconstruct the father’s
medical ethics from his actions, while Dietrich’s writings reveal his views on medical ethics.
Other significant differences between the two emerge from this study. Karl
was so steeped in eugenics, which permeated the psychiatric profession in early
twentieth-century Germany, that he did not hesitate to refer to the mentally ill as
_Minderwertigen_ (inferior ones) in his writings. An essay he wrote after the Nazi period attempted to
rescue eugenics from its disreputable association with Nazi policies. The influence of eugenics
thinking on Dietrich, on the other hand, was negligible.
Despite these differences, Gerrens discovers significant common elements in
their medical ethics. Both opposed the Nazi Law for Hereditary Health, because it
called for compulsory sterilisation of those with hereditary illnesses. Both were
vigorous opponents of the Nazi “euthanasia” programme. Most of their criticism was surreptitious, of
course, but Gerrens effectively documents how they vainly tried to stymie Nazi policies. Many
scholars already know how Dietrich tried to halt Nazi encroachments on the church, but Gerrens
interestingly shows how his father unsuccessfully tried to ward off the Nazi takeover of the
psychiatric profession. Gerrens believes that both opposed Nazi eugenics policies on similar
grounds, upholding a view of human rights that rejected the state’s violation of individual
prerogatives, including the right to marry and reproduce.
Gerrens’ stress on the commonalities tends to obscure some fundamental
differences which he recognises but nonetheless de-emphasizes. Karl objected to
compulsory eugenics measures partly because he did not believe that eugenics laws could
accomplish as much as proponents promised. Sceptical scientist that he was, he did not think
eugenics had proven itself sufficiently to warrant legislation. Thus his opposition to eugenics
proposals was pragmatic and flexible, and he clearly endorsed voluntary eugenics. Dietrich’s
theological opposition to eugenics measures was more principled and permanent, being grounded in the
traditional Judeo-Christian doctrine of the sanctity of human life.
Richard Weikart, California State U., Stanislaus, Cal.

3b) Bjoern Mensing, Pfarrer und Nationalsozialismus. Geschichte einer
Verstrickung am Beispiel der Evangelisch-Lutherischen Kirche in Bayern (AKZ,Reihe B:Darstellungen, Bd
26) Gottingen:Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 1998. 290 pp. DM 68.

Wie es mit der hohen “Anfaelligkeit der evangelischen Pfarrerschaft fuer
die NSDAP” und ihrer “politischen Vorbildwirkung auf die evangelisch-kirchliche
Bevoelkerung” stand, ist im allgemeinen bekannt. Mensing moechte es in seiner regionalgeschichtlichen
Studie fuer die Pfarrerschaft in rechtsrheinischen Bayern genauer nachweisen. Dafuer
wertete er die “Entnazifizierungsakten” aus, deren Luecken er aus den Bestaenden des ehem.
Berlin Document Centre auffuellte.
Ausserdem zog er dort eine Stichprobe von etwa 10 Prozent der bayerischen
Pfarrerschaft, die 1934 1,775 Geistliche umfasste. Weiterhim durfte er per
Sondergenehmigung die landeskirchlichen Personalakten von 245 Pg.-Pfarrern benutzen. Schliesslich
sah er die Gestapo-Akten von 92 bayerischen Pfarrern aus dem Staatsarchiv Wuerzburg
ein, und wertete Briefwechsel und zeitgenoessiches Schriftum aus. Endlich verschickte er im
November 1984 und in September 1988 jeweils verschiedene Fragebogen an bayerische Pfarrer, die
in der NS-Zeit mindestens zeitweise in der Region Dienst taten. Zwischen 1988 und 1990 fuehrte er weitere 100 “Intensivinterviews” durch.
Die Fragebogen sind der Arbeit nicht beigegeben, ueber die statistische
Auswertung des heterogenen Datenmaterials erfaerht der Leser, dass es mit Hilfe des bei
Sozialwissenschaftlern ueblichen Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) analysiert wurde. Welche
statistischen Prozeduren aus dem SPSS-Program durchgefuert wurden und welche seiner
verschiedenen Versionen zur Anwendung kamen, laesst sich aus der Studie nicht entnehmen.
Ob die bayerische Pfarrerschaft insgesamt oder nur die nationalsozialistisch organisierten
Pfarrer als Grundgesamtheit definiert, wie Stichproben gezogen und wie die erhobenen
Daten entsprechend ihrer unterschiedlichen Aussagekraft gewichtet wurden, laesst sich nicht
oder nicht genau erkennen.
Mensing jedenfalls haelt seiner Erhebung “fuer die Nachkriegsgeneration ab
Jahrgagng 1901” fuer representativ, raeumt aber ein, dass die zeitliche Distanz und
der Gegenstand der Befragung die Erinnerung der Respondenten erheblich beeintraechtigt haben
koennte. In der Tat ist fuer alle Auskuenfte nach 1945 mit dem seinerseits
instabilen Faktoren der “sozialien Erwuenschtheit” zu rechnen. “Fuer 163 Pg-Pfarrer liessen sich
aus den Personalakten und anderen Quellen Angaben zu Motiven ihres NSDAP-Beitritts eruieren.
Allerdings stammen nur 16 dieser Angaben aus der Zeit vor 1945”. Antibolschewismus rangiert
ganz vorn, nationale und soziale Motive folgen. Bei 41 Pfarrern spielten auch
Karrieregesichtsspunkte eine Rolle.
Mensing untersucht die soziale Herkunft seiner Klientel und stellt fest,
dass deren Vaeter und Schwiegevaeter sich “fast auschlieschlich” aus dem Mittelstand
rekrutiert und der Anteil der Arbeiterschaft bei nur 3 bzw 2 Prozent liegen. Die Vaeterberufe der
juengeren Pg-Pfarrer weisen dagegen einen “starken Anstieg der Arbeitersoehne” auf. Als weitere
Stationen der Sozialisationsgeschichte werden protestantische Gymnasien und fuer die
Studienzeit die Erlanger “Stammuniversitaet” und ihre Verbindungen untersucht. Dabei konzentriert
sich die Darstellung des Autors auf bekannte Einzelpersoenlichkeiten aus seinen anonymen
subgruppen, wie z.B. auf Eduard Putz, der als Theologiestudent zur NSDAP stiess, bei der SA mittat,es
bis zum Goldenen Parteiabzeichen brachte, 1933 in den Landeskirchenrat berufen wurde und dann
zur Bekennenden Kirche fand. Der empirische Konnex von Elternhaus, Schule und Universitaet
mit dem spaeteren Pfarrberuf ist fuer den Leser kaum nachvollziehbar, da er nicht
erkennen kann, ob sich die Aussagen durchweg auf dasselbe Segment der Population beziehen.
Schon fuer die Weimarer Republik konstatiert Mensing – vor allem in
Auswertung des Korrespondenzblatts – eine gewisse Naehe der bayerischen Geistlichkiet zur
voelkischen Bewegung und ein wachsende Interesse an der NSDAP. Bei der Reichstagswahlen
vom September 1930 soll Mensings Schaetzung zufolge 20 Prozent der bayerischen
Pfarrerschaft NSDAP gewaehlt haben. Waehrend die Kirchenleitung unter Kirchenpraesident
Veit, der im April 1933 aus dem Amt gedraengt wurde, die Pfarrer mahnte, sich
offentlicher Stellungnahmen zugunsten einer Partei zu enthalten, stieg die noch kleine Gruppe
nationalsozialistisch organisierter Pfarrer (ca. 20 Prozent) “zu Meinungsfuehrern der
Pfarrerschaft” auf. 1933/34 war immerhin die Haelfte der Geistlichen in der bayerischen
Landessynode nationalsozialistisch organisiert. Zwischen Januar und November 1933 stimmte
“vier von fuenf der nationalen Revolution zu”. Veits Nachfolger, Landesbischof Meiser
uebte sich gegenueber dem NS-Staat zunaechst in strikter Loyalitaet, bis ihn die Massnahmen des
Terror-Regimes im Herbst 1934 selber trafen. Nach der “Machtergreifung” wurden kirchliche
Schluesselstellungen mit Pg. besetzt.
Ein Stimmungswechsel in der Pfarrerschaft (“Sukzessiver Distanzierungsprozess”) bahnte
sich erst an, als die Partei das vermeintlich enge Verhaeltnis von NSDAP und
Kirche aufkuendigte, christentumsfeindlichen Kraeften in der “Bewegung” immer mehr
Raum gab und schliesslich gar treue NS-Pfarrer roh aus ihren Reihen stiess. Ein treue
Pg.-Kern (Ende 1937: 10 bis 15 Prozent der Pfarrerschaft) blieb jedoch im “Hitler-Mythos” (Ian
Kershaw) gefangen oder machte nach 1945 sonstige “austrittshemmende” Einflussnahmen geltend. Bis
zum Ende des Dritten Reiches schied etwa jeder vierte Pg.-Pfarrer “mehr oder weniger
freiwilling” aus der NSDAP aus.
Ueber jene Pfarrer, die nicht Parteigenosse der NSDAP oder Mitglied im
Nationalsozialistischen Evanglischen Pfarrerbund waren, erfaehrt der Leser
nur sehr wenig. Auch nach einer historisch-theologische gewichteten Beurteilung des ingesamt
unerfreulichen Befundes sucht man in dem Materialwust vergeblich – wohl weil der Autor, ein
Pfarrer im bayerischen Kirchendienst, meint, mit dergleichen Ueberlegungen “den Rahmen
einer geschichtswissenschaftlichen Studie” zu verlassen. Zweifel im Blick auf die
Gegenstandsangemessenheit, Anwendbarkeit und Validitaet quantifizierender
Methoden scheinen ihm dagegen nicht gekommen zu sein.
Uebrigens haben Regionalstudien ueber “Pfarrer und Nationalsozialismsus”
derzeit Konjunktur. Im Unterschied zu Mensching nehmen manche Autoren Vergleiche
zwischen katholisches und evangelischen Pfarrern vor und kommen zu signifikanten
Differenzen: “Katholisches Glaubens und Kirchenverstaendnis und nationalsozialistsicher
Totalitaetsanspruch liessen sich nicht vereinbaren. Daher war es nur konsequent, dass die
wenigen Geistlichen in der Pfalz, die sich fuer den Nationalsozialismus entschieden, entweder aus dem
kirchlichen Dienst ausschieden oder sich innerhalb des Klerus als voellige Aussenseiter
erlebten. . .”: Thomas Fandel, Konfession und Nationalsozialismus.Evangelische und katholische
Pfarrer in der Pfalz 1930-1939. (See review of this book last month: Ed)
Gerhard Besier, Theological Faculty, University of Heidelberg

3c) Erwin W. Lutzer, Hitler’s Cross, Chicago: Moody Press 1995
This book does not claim to be a work of original historical scholarship,
but is really an extended sermon on the need for Christian faithfulness, using the example of
Nazi Germany as a warning against apostasy. The author is the pastor of the Moody Memorial
Church in Chicago, writing for a basically evangelical Protestant readership, and hence adopts
a didactic tone replete with biblical quotations.
His account of the German Church Struggle, though derived from others,
covers the history of those years in a lively approachable style, with appropriate
heroes and villains, and does not fail to pay tribute to those who suffered at the Nazis’ hands for
the sake of their faith. Interestingly he defends Dietrich Bonhoeffer from the kind of charges of
liberalism often put forward by evangelicals, though wishing that Bonhoeffer and his friend Karl
Barth had been more forthright in affirming the Bible’s reliability.
Essentially the purpose of the book is contained in the following
paragraph: “Parallels between Nazi Germany and America can be overdrawn, but only
those who are blind to realities around us can deny that this report from Hitler’s Germany
has ominous warnings for the United States today. The enemies of religion are not even content
with banishing religion from the state’s public activities while allowing religious freedom
privately The goal is total control – the complete submission of the church to the arbitrary moral whims
of the political establishment”.
The Nazi attempt to substitute the pagan Swastika in place of the Cross
failed: the same attempt must be similarly resisted in America.
This account can be recommended, but only for beginning evangelicals.
JSC
4) New Bonhoeffer Home Page:
Wayne Floyd, General Editor, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, Harrisburg,
Pennsylvania writes: The totally revised, upgraded and expanded Dietrich Bonhoeffer Home Page is
now available on the web at

www.cyberword.com/bonhoef

Please note that the site now more prominently features the DBW English
edition and its sponsoring organisation, the International Bonhoeffer Society, English
language section. There are also new sections devoted to “News and Events” (I’ll be glad to add
yours, just e-mail me with the information); “Research – Online” (which will feature both print
and electronic resources for Bonhoeffer research); and the “Church Struggle, the Holocaust, and the
German Resistance” (which will offer links to any sites that address supporting areas for
Bonhoeffer scholars).

The new site was developed using Microsoft FrontPage 98, which provides easy
site management now for me. I will be able to update the page regularly with your news and
suggestions for additions; so please let me know your suggestions.

In the near future look for these additional new features that will be
added: 1. The ability to find and order online from Amazon.com and Barnes and
Noble – but directly from the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Home Page – all the books by or about
Bonhoeffer which are currently in print.
2. A bibliography of recommended resources for students of Bonhoeffer,
providing an annotated list of selected sources that are available in print – or that deserve to be
known even if they are out of print and available only through libraries.
3. A page with information for editors and translators of the Dietrich
Bonhoeffer works, where up-to-date information about the DBW project can be found in full, available
for download to those working on the translation project.
4. A new Guest Book, giving visitors to the site the chance to get
information about the Bonhoeffer Society or to send comments to me or to one another about
information found on this site.

If it has been a while since you looked at the site – or if you have never
ventured there before – please check out the newly upgraded Dietrich Bonhoeffer Home Page. I know
that some of you out there will know far more about both Bonhoeffer resources and web-pages
than I do. So please don’t hesitate to give me suggestions, reactions, opinions. It was
in reaction to previous responses to earlier versions of the Page that I’ve upgraded the site at
this time. I do listen!
Thanks for your time
Wayne Floyd.
Bonhoeffer@sprynet.com

5) Conference on “Europe Divided or United”.
The 12th Biennial conference of the Australasian Association for European
History, organised by the University of Western Australia and Notre
Dame, will be held in Perth from 5-9th July 1999.
Details of the topics to be covered and the names of some of the speakers
can be found on the conference web-site:
http://www.arts.uwa.edu.au/conference/
Sent in by Mark Lindsay = lindsaym@arts.uwa.edu.au

6) One of East Germany’s leading Communist ideologues, Jurgen.Kuczynski,
made the following remarkable statement on the value of prayer at the 1987
GDR Writer’s Congress:
“Christen werden bei allem Arger, den sie am Tag haben, und allem, was
passiert, durch das Gebet morgens und abends an Gottt erinnert, das heisst
daran, dass das ganze Geschehen in der gesamten Welt einschliesslich des
Himmels und des Paradieses doch letzlich eine grossartige Sache ist. In
Islam wird man dreimal daran erinnert. Und ich suche vergeblich nach einem Ersatz fur das
Gebet, der uns bei all dem Arger, den wir taglich haben, bei all den vielen
Hindernissen, die unserem Streben taglich oder mindestens wochentlich begegnen, eine Art
Gebetserinnerung ist an das Fundamentale,Grosse, das der Sozialismus uns
gibt: keine Arbeitslosigkeit, keine Obdachlosen, nun, ich brauche nicht alles
aufzuzahlen . . . Ich habe versucht, zu den Problemen des Gebet-Ersatzes
einen Artikel zu schreiben. Es braucht gar nicht abgelehnt zu werden, weil schon alle meine Freunde,
denen ich ihn vorher zeigte, ihn ablehnten. Aber ihr als Schriftsteller habt
vielleicht eine Idee, was man tun konnte, um die Erinnerung an das Grosse – denn alles andere sind
ja sekundare Entscheidungen, die wahrlich wichtig sind, die wahrlich unsere
Leben stark beeinflussen, weil sie so alltaglich sind – um dieses Grosse ein oder
zweimal am Tag in unser Gedachtnis zu rufen”
(Sent in by Randy Bytwerk, Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Mich.)

Dear Friends,
You will be glad to hear that I have now successfully relocated to the
University of Western Ontario, where I am holding the Smallman Visiting
Professorship for the Fall Term and teaching a seminar on Nazi Germany. I
have been busy adjusting to the different technology on hand here, but hope
that the results will provide you with the same service as before.
Contents:

1) Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte meeting
2) Book reviews

a) T.Fandel, Konfession und Nazismus
b) M.G.Goerner, GDR church and state
c) ed.U.v.Hehl, Katholizismus

3) Research Enquiry – German Catholic journals
4) Book notes: N.Busch Katholische Frommigkeit und Moderne
5) Journal articles: Railton and McGreevy
6) Kirchliche Tourismus – Israel
1) The 1998 meeting of the Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte association took place
earlier this month in the idyllic setting of the Lund Diocesan Retreat
Centre in southern Sweden. The topic was ‘Images of Europe adopted by the
churches after the last war’. We began with an excellent survey of the plans
for the future put forward by churchmen resisting Nazism, who believed in
the need to re-christianize Europe, but who also recognised that the
churches’ ability to do so had been severely compromised. The call was for
intensifying the work already started before the war of building up a modern
ecumenical identity for all of Europe, leaving behind the nationalist and
confessional barriers of the past, and uniting in a spirit of
reconciliation. The newly-formed World Council of Churches, or the Lutheran
World Federation, or the later Council of European Churches were to be
models of this endeavour. But the absence of collaboration from both the
Orthodox and Roman Catholic communities meant that this effort to give
Europe back a Christian soul was a limited success. Much depended on the new
Germany. The surprising development of a stable democracy in one half of the
country owed more to Catholic statesmanship than to Protestantism, whose
forces often proved disruptive. The Nordic Protestant churches remained too
attached to their established positions to provide any new impetus for all
Europe. The overthrow of Communism ten years ago led to a revival of
nationalisms, some of them, as in Yugoslavia, misusing religious traditions
for political ends. Thus a Christian Europe has not survived or revived. And
as the final speaker remarked, the unprecedented arrival of several million
Muslims in Europe makes the necessity of accepting a pluralistic religious
future all the more pressing.

2a) Thomas Fandel, Konfession und Nationalsozialismus. Evangelische und
katholische Pfarrer in der Pfalz 1930-39. (Veroffentlichung der Kommission
fur Zeitgeschichte, Vol 76). Paderborn: F.Schoningh Verlag 1997. DM 100 –

After a long period of relative silence we now have a massive 600 page
account of how both major denominations in the Palatinate reacted to the
Nazi attempts to infiltrate Christian theology and practice during the early
years of Hitler’s rule. The Palatinate has not been well served before,
although a self-serving biography of the Protestant bishop, Ludwig Diehl,
appeared in 1995.
Fandel has succeeded remarkably well in portraying the serious conflicts
within the Protestant church in its attempts to embrace Hitler’s national
revolution while still upholding basic Christian principles. He also makes
it abundantly clear how many Protestant clergymen, led by Diehl himself,
succumbed to the siren call of Nazi ideology by either formally joining the
Party or by showing deep sympathies for its goals. The author, himself
‘Pressereferent’ in the Roman Catholic diocese of Speyer, takes great care
to offer a balanced analysis when he turns to the relations between the
regime and the Catholics. Bishop Ludwig Sebastian, head of the Speyer
diocese during the whole Nazi period, displayed, on the one hand, a strong
wish not to run afoul of the Party, for instance supporting its goals in the
crucial Saar plebiscite of January 1936. Such support was important because
the overwhelming majority of Saarlanders were Catholic, because of the
presence of Saar priests opposed to reunification, and because this helped
the Nazi Gauleiter to claim a united front of Catholics behind the pro-union
vote. On the other hand, Sebastian staunchly defended his episcopal
privileges, especially with respect to the appointment of parish priests and
even more so in his determined opposition to the Party’s goal of ridding the
Palatinate (and Germany) of denominational schools.
It could hardly be said that Fandel uncovers any earth-shattering new
evidence, except perhaps his recounting how priests who had either alcohol
or celibacy problems would use the Party to protect them from the church
hierarchy’s attempts to discipline or expel them. Generally one senses that
Fandel treats the role of the Catholic church with rather more sympathy than
the Protestants, as his narrative and evidence tend to create the impression
that the Palatinate Catholics succumbed less to Nazi blandishments than
their Protestant counterparts.
Fandel has probably been hampered by the rather thin amount of archival
material. While he has diligently mined the holdings of the Berlin Document
Centre, the personnel files and personal reminiscences (for members of both
denominations), much remains unstated. Issues such as the attitude of the
Catholic church to antisemitism, the churches’ response to the imposition of
the ‘aryan laws’, or to the pressure on the Protestant clergy to take an
oath of loyalty to the Fuehrer are not taken up here. Surely, for example,
there were clergy whose ‘non-aryan’ origins were suspect?
Elsewhere, Fandel spends much time discussing the many areas of
accommodation between the Nazi regime and the Palatinate Protestants. The
regrettable enthusiasm shown by virtually all Protestant clergy for the
national revolution in 1933 is just the most prominent example. Fandel
provides valuable statistical charts and interpretations for the large
number of Palatinate Protestants who joined the Nazi Party either before or
after 1933, led by their Bishop. One thought-provoking observation has to do
with the role of the Protestant clergy WITHIN the Party, and its ability
from this vantage point to oppose extreme anti-Christian measures. Fandel
provides interesting examples of how Party members such as Diehl, and even
more extreme Nazis such as Pastors Hans Schmidt or Theo Kaul, occasionally
turned against the regime’s wilful practices. Otherwise, those church
opponents who could not cover themselves with the mantle of Party membership
found themselves in rather dire straits, even though Fandel rightly points
out that in no case did a Protestant clergymen under Diehl’s leadership
spend more than a very brief period in a Nazi concentration camp. None of
them, unlike several of their Catholic counterparts, paid for their
opposition with their lives. An interesting conclusion here too is the fact
that, after 1945, former Party members amongst the clergy fared better than
those who had joined extreme splinter groups, attacking the church
establishment for theological rather than political reasons. In the post-war
era, denazification was only partially applied, and theological errors were
punished more severely than political.
A striking issue raised by Fandel’s treatment is the dichotomy between the
ideological thrust of the Catholic hierarchy and the sentiments of its
parishioners. Bishop Sebastian’s attempts to enforce doctrinal uniformity on
the parishes, especially during the struggle for the denominational schools,
showed the rifts in the Catholic community. For while the local priests were
largely loyal to the bishop’s directives, parishioners deserted the church
in droves to vote for the dissolution of such schools. This challenge to
episcopal authority was a severe blow, and Fandel could have explored how
much this fact deterred the episcopate from issuing calls for a more
resolute opposition on other battlefields, such as defence of the Jews
Here is a fruitful issue that needs deeper consideration: while the Catholic
Church after 1945 prided itself on its success in protecting its liturgy and
doctrine from Nazi incursions, ultimately it fared little better than the
Protestants who had to face deep invasions into territory traditionally
under church prerogatives. While the Protestant clergy showed an all-too
eager wish to reflect the current ‘Zeit-geist’, the Catholic hierarchy
attempted equally dangerously to create an inner world immune to National
Socialism. The consequences of these rival approaches are still being felt
today.
What generally strikes every scholar of the Palatinate church scene is that
resistance to Nazism was extremely marginal, and where it did occur it did
not originate in the Palatinate.
None of the clergy or laity played any significant role on either side,
possibly because of the long-standing tradition of undogmatic pragmatism and
accommodation. A good example, unfortunately not discussed by Fandel, is the
case of Pastor George Biundo, a prominent supporter of the Nazis who
nevertheless survived to re-emerge for another worthy career after 1945. The
post-war silence about such cases may well be due to the desire, still
apparent today, to keep such skeletons safely hidden.
But Fandel has made a good start with trenchant insights which deserve to be
widely known.
Ronald Webster, York University, Toronto, Ontario
2b) Martin Georg Goerner, Die Kirche als Problem der SED. Strukturen
kommunistischer Herrschaftsausubung gegenuber der evanglischen Kirche, 1945
bis 1958 (Studien des Forschungsverbundes SED-Staat der Feien Universitat
Berlin). Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1997. P. xii,433, DM 98.
(This review appreared in German Studies Review, Vol XXI, no 1, Feb 1998)
This study by a promising young scholar represents the definitive historical
work on the church-state relationship in the GDR during the early postwar
period. Goerner brings to this topic not only extensive familiarity with the
archival sources, but also personal experience in the GDR. The study builds
upon his extensive research of the Enquete Commission on this topic,
augmented by in-depth treatment of the rapidly growing body of secondary
literature. The study was originally written as a dissertation at the
liberal Potsdam University, but was published under the auspices of the
conservative Research Group on the SED State at the Free University of
Berlin. Despite the obvious cross-pressures, Goerner has succeeded in
producing a rigorous, non-polemical treatment.
His main purpose is to analyse the shift in SED policy in 1953: after
earlier attempting to integrate the church, then to liquidate it, the SED
shifted to a strategy of inflitrating and undermining the church from
within, seeking to control the institution. The resulting policy of
differentiating among “progressive”, “reactionary”, and “wavering” forces in
the church has since become grist in the mill of numerous scholars, not to
mention the media, church officials, and former SED policymakers. Goerner to
a great extent consolidates our new-found understanding of SED policy.
He analyses the form and structures of SED political control over the
institutional church. His analysis of the SED’s development of a systematic
strategy of divide and conquer, with the corresponding bureaucratic
apparatus for its implementation, is masterful. He provides a probing
analysis of the development of the front organizations and the Inszenierung
von Offentlichkeit by the SED. He concludes that, though the regime’s
instruments of political control changed, its goal of limiting the church to
cultic functions and subordinating it to SED control remained constant.
Goerner sees the Stasi as “an integral factor in the SED’s policy toward the
churches” (p.212), but he argues that it is “one partial sphere of the
fundamentally conspiratorial policy of the SED” (p.3), thereby placing the
Stasi in its proper context.
The author breaks new ground in several respects. First, he provides new
evidence to document the directive role of the Soviets, particularly in the
shift to the New Course in 1953, while confirming the attenuation of this
influence in the late 1950s. Although much remains to be researched in
Soviet archives, Goerner convincingly argues that, as a function of their
policy on Germany, the issue represented high politics for the Soviets.
Second, the author sheds new light on divisons within the SED leadership
itself, documenting, for example, the intramural skirmishes between the SED
leader Walter Ulbricht and Central Committee Secretary Paul Wandel during
the key phase of phony destalinization in 1956-57. New evidence is offered
of the special interest that hardliner Ulbricht took in the issue and his
manipulation of the churches (and the Soviets!). Third, Goerner provides a
nuanced interpretation of the role of the CDU leader, Otto Nuschke: he
treats the CDU as largely gleichgeschaltet, but acknowledges Nuschke’s
efforts to soften state policy and prevent the final division of Germany.
Although Goerner argues for a long-term continuity in state policy, his
findings do seem consistent with more than one scenario. For example, the
front organizations whose origins he richly describes eventually failed as
mobilization organizations, a development consistent with both an
interpretation emphasizing greater state accommodation to the churches in
the 1970s, as well as one highlighting increased Stasi penetration of the
churches. This suggests that the author has succeeded in analysing the early
church-state relationship in strokes both bold enough to offer a cogent
explanation, yet nuanced enough to accommodate the complexity of the
relationship in later years.
Robert Goeckel, SUNY College, Geneseo
2c) ed. Ulrich von Hehl and H.G.Hockerts, Der Katholizismus – gesamtdeutsche
Klammer in den Jahrzehnten der Teilung? Erinnerungen und Berichte. Paderborn
1996 Pp 192, DM 28
Normally each analytical volume in the Kommission fur Zeitgeschichte series
has been published with a scholarly apparatus, but the nature of this book
explains why it is an exception. The contributors to this volume come from a
variety of associations, and they discuss how the German Democratic Republic
and the Federal Republic remained linked after World War II through the
Catholic Church. These fourteen essays describe in very personal terms how
post-1945 Germans in both zones joined with one another to co-operate in
ecclesial concerns.
These Catholics did not only co-operate on the basis of nationality, but
rather attempted to keep the Church free and strong. Reflecting the
principle of subsidiary so prominent in Catholic social theory, all of the
essays remind us that in complex dictatorial regimes a great deal of
resistance can be established through personal contacts that struggle to
sustain an identity on every level. Paradoxically, then, maintaining their
Catholic ties helped nurture both German nationalism and Catholicism, which
survived until the wall was torn down.
The essays focus on such areas as the pastoral care of youth, the Caritas
Associations, the work of German Catholics in the diaspora Church in the
GDR, diocesan information services, Catholic Student Associations, and the
role of the laity in both zones as they interacted during these decades.
Paul Arfderbeck, for example, has analysed how the Archdiocese of Paderborn
was split into two parts, but still functioned as one ecclesial entity.
Joseph Homeyer’s essay on the political and economic role of the Church in
the divided Germany of the 1950s through the 1990s is particularly welcome,
since he has outlined, although too briefly, the role of political theology
in helping to structure the responses of the Church in the GDR. Homeyer has
also pointed to a research initiative that could profitably be exploited, if
a scholar could gain access to the sensitive materials that emerged when
bishops from the Federal Republic met those from the GDR in Rome. Their
memoranda, diary entries, and summaries of discussions could really
explicate how the bishops on a personal level attempted to shape political,
economic, and cultural policies, which could help the Church interact with
the two German states.
This collection of essays serves to remind the reader of the many levels on
which Catholics operated in the postwar period, and serves again to warn
historians that any monocausal approach, when applied to historical issues
affecting the religious culture of Catholicism, will not provide an adequate
picture of life in the Church. Particularly crucial at the end of this
century is the fact that the bizonal Church came to a sensitive
understanding of diaspora and refugee experiences, which could help serve to
meet the needs of Catholics working in war-torn areas around the world
today.
Donald Dietrich, Boston College, Mass.
3) Research Enquiry: Genevieve Gunderson, U.Cal. Berkeley writes: As part of
a project on the Catholic response to the Jugendbewegung of the early
twentieth century, I am looking for copies of any of the following
periodicals in North American libraries: “Efeuranken”. “Das heilige Feuer”,
“Quickborn” and “Heliand”. I would appreciate any suggestions or leads you
can offer.
Ggunders@socrates.berkeley.edu

4) Book notes: Norbert Busch, Katholische Frommigkeit und Moderne. Die
sozial- und mentalitatsgeschichte des Herz-Jesu-Kultes in Deutschland
zwischen Kulturkampf und Ersten Weltkrieg. (Religiose Kultur und Moderne Bd
6), Gutersloh, GutersloherVerlagshaus 1997, 368 pp. DM 88
This is another welcome attempt to bridge the gap between “Profangeschichte”
and “Kirchengeschichte” – much needed in German Catholic historiography.
This work is patterned on the excellent example set by Anglo-American
authors such as Margaret Anderson, David Blackbourn, Jonathan Sperber and
Helmut Smith. It deals with the astonishing success of the cult of the Heart
of Jesus, a very typical ultramontane reaction during the Kulturkampf, as a
symbol of the sufferings of the church at that time. Even though it appeared
to others as a regressive, defensive and anti-modern sentiment, it caught on
widely amongst the persecuted Catholics. Busch’s account of the
organisation, support and effect of this piece of popular piety is much to
be commended as breaking new ground. He finds the Jesuits as principally
responsible for the successful broadcast of this cult which strengthened
personal piety while enhancing the mystical view of the whole Church. He
also shows how this sentiment could be linked with German nationalism during
the First World War to overcome accusations of lack of national solidarity
amongst Catholics. Despite or because of its proto-magical invocations, it
proved highly popular among women, and in general gives added evidence that
the so-called “inevitable” advance of secular rationalism was off-set by
such influential movements as the Herz-Jesu-Kult.
JSC
5) Journal articles:
Nicholas Railton, of the University of Ulster, Coleraine, has contributed a
useful, lengthy, if somewhat rambling article on the German Free Churches
and the Nazi Regime to the January 1998 issue of The Journal of
Ecclesiastical History. He shows how the attitudes of such figures as the
Methodist Bishop, Otto Melle, or the Baptist leader, Paul Schmidt, were
developed, and gives explicit references to their conduct at the 1937
meetings in Oxford and Edinburgh, as well as to the responses of the English
churchmen they met.
John McGreevy of Harvard has written a notable article” Thinking on one’s
own: Catholicism and the American Intellectual Imagination, 1928-1960″ to be
found in the Journal of American History, 84, June 1997. This outlines the
massive campaign launched by American liberal intellectuals, led by such
figures as John Dewey, against Catholicism and even against all religions,
which were treated as outdated and dangerous systems of belief which
hindered the development of a healthier secular rationalism. In particular
Catholicism’s anti-individualistic view of society, its subordination to
authority and paternalism, its mediaevalism and anti-democratic tendencies
were held to threaten the very identity of the United States unless forceful
measures were taken in the public arena, and such religious views limited
solely to the private sphere. McGreevy fully describes the intolerant and
indeed authoritarian character of this campaign for “liberty” and shows how
it successfully captured almost every publicly-supported university in the
country, and affected the decisions of the Supreme Court. President Kennedy’
s election in 1960 brought about an armistice. But only now is the American
intellectual climate warming towards Catholicism as a source of moral
formation and civic responsibility.
JSC
6) Kirchliche Tourismus – Israel
Israel
Move past the soldier with the gun
Open the handbag please lady:
So this is the place of the Crucifixion;
Note the crack in the rock (like any other)
But protected by glass, and
Illuminated of course;
And the open tomb so close
All enclosed in the same Church, and that
A hut compared to St Peter’s
Continually reconstructed, Byzantine
Destroyed by crusaders,
Rebuilt and destroyed, mostly by men
Sometimes accidentally by fire.
To fight for possession
Of this piece of ground
Is heresy.
Don’t miss the old olive trees
In the Garden of Gethsemane.
As you put the money in the box
The old Franciscan with the ravaged face
Hands you an olive leaf
Guaranteed genuine in five languages.
And as you descend the Mount of Olives
Do not ignore Absalom’s Pillar
Not sacred enough to destroy
Hardly worth the building of a church over
Non inflammable, but without a doubt
A silent witness of the night of indecision
The night of resolution
The night of certainty.
Here’s where your faith should begin
Not at a crack in the rock
Not at an empty tomb
Not among the tasteless ornaments
At the place of the skull.
Do not attempt to return
A hard enough coming we had of it;
A late take-off
And a slight bumpiness over Crete
But enough to spill the champagne.
The walled-up gate of the Old City
Just across from the Mount of Olives
Will open
When the Messiah comes back
And all the dead shall be raised
And the trumpet shall sound
And has He evidence of identification?
Passport? Visa?
What race did you say? Man?
I am sorry it is not precise enough.
Can you see the people He preached to?
If you are unkind
Or faithful
Or partisan
You might say they stand with black hats
Thick spectacles and long hair
Bobbing up and down at the Wailing Wall
Eyes open but minds closed.
That’s the problem – how to open the mind
But to prevent it from emptying.
Pilgrim or Tourist?
Keep all together please
And on the right, one of the most sacred. . . .
At this well in Samaria
Try and keep together please
The sixday sixday sixday
(And on the seventh day they rested)
War
Thank God we weren’t shown the
Carpenter’s shop
Look in the eyes of boy on the donkey
Ignore the jeans and sneakers
And look beyond the suspicion.
You need faith to see the expectation
You always did, you always will.
Here and at any place
Now and at any time.
At least you can’t build a church over a lake.
The sea of Galilee still refreshes the spirit
Dusty with heat; and the fish are still there
To be caught and eaten –
St Peter’s fish – all part
Of the prearranged lunch.
The man opposite puts ketchup on his
But not me – it would mask
The delicate flavour, and besides
One has to watch one’s behaviour.
Who is the old lady on the path?
The Emperor’s wife journeyed from Rome
On the same mission as you
But sixteen hundred years before,
Fixing the site of the Sermon on the Mount
And the miracle of loaves and fishes
Forever.
A clear choice at London Airport;
I walk briskly through the ‘Nothing to Declare’
Possibly something left behind but certainly
Nothing to Declare.
Who’d be concerned with an olive leaf?
David V.Bates Summer 1969
With every best wishes to you all,
John S.Conway
jconway@interchange.ubc.ca

Dear Friends,

Contents: 1) Forthcoming conferences: GSA, Salt Lake City Roosevelt Institute, Hyde Park, New York 2) Book reviews a) A.Herzig, History of Jews in Germany b) H.Schmitt, Quakers and Nazis 3) New publication plans in German church history 4) Book notes: a) Society Culture and the State b) Friedlander and Hamerow on the Catholic Church c) Remembrance, Repentance, Reconciliation 5) Bonhoeffer – a Righteous Gentile?

1) This year’s conference of the German Studies Association will be held in Salt Lake City from Oct. 8th-11th. Two sessions would appear to be of interest to our List-members. Session 5: “The transformation of Religion in the Modern Era”,and Session 27, on “Luther and Hitler?”, when Hartmut Lehmann, Bob Ericksen and Richard Steigmann-Gall will discuss this provocative issue.

The Roosevelt Institute, together with Marist College and the FDR Library,is organising a conference on “FDR, the Vatican and the Roman Catholic Church in America, 1933-1945″ in Hyde Park and Poughkeepsie, N. York from October 7th-9th. Papers examining American and Papal war-time diplomacy will be presented by George Flynn, Brian Villa, Peter Kent, Michael Phayer, Michael Marrus and myself. The contact person is David Woolner, University of Prince Edward Island = dwoolner@upei.ca

2a) Arno Herzig, Judische Geschichte in Deutschland. Von den Anfangen bis zur Gegenwart. Munich 1997, 323pp. DM 28 Arno Herzig’s Judische Geschichte in Deutschland proposes to give a representative overview of over a thousandyears of German-Jewish history, combining in less than 300 pagesa wealth of information in a concise and often compendious chronology. As professor of Modern History in Hamburg, Herzig rightly makes the point that the history of German-Jewish relations cannot solely be reconstructed in the context of the Holocaust. He stresses that such a narrow approach, which he refers to as an”Einbahnstrasse in diese Katastrophe”, can lead to a misleading,even distorted historical account. Although the Holocaust leaves modern German history with a permanent scar, Herzig refocuses his readers’ attention on the fact that since the Middle Ages, and particularly since the Enlightenment, Jews were much more than just mere onlookers or passive victims. He points out, as others have already done, that Jews in Germany increasingly interrelated with their Gentile environment and contributed extensively to society’s political. economic, scientific and cultural life. Christian-Jewish relations wove a rich and colourful fabric of cultural exchange in which both sides learned and benefited from eachother. Herzig bases his premise on the understanding that German-Jewish history is set within a framework which, on the one hand, was defined by the various degrees of flexibility and freedom given to Jews by the Church and society. On the otherhand, this framework was also determined by the extent to which Jews were able to capitalize on their liberties. The dynamics of Jewish and Christian interaction is, therefore, one of the two most important, significantly related, leitmotifs in Herzig’s study.

The second, equally prominent leitmotif is the role of both the Catholic and Protestant churches as fundamentalist institutions successively trying to marginalize and defame the Jewish community to the point of a complete “Ausgrenzung” from German society. Segregation in the German territories of the Holy Roman Empire became increasingly a factor in the 13th century, when the Church ordained the ‘servitudo Judaeorum” forcing Jews to wear specific garments. Regulations to segregate Jews were tightened even more once the Basel Council decreed in 1450 that all Jews should take up residence within the cities’ designated areas, the “Judengasse”, or the ghettoes such as in Frankfurt and Worms. The Reformation brought no improvements, contrary to the hopes of some Jews. Luther emphatically demanded that Jews needed to be converted “wo aber nicht, so sollen wir sie auch bey uns nicht dulden noch leiden”. What he insinuated by this was later spelled out in his pamphlet “Von den Juden und ihren Lugen” of 1543, when he advised burning down the synagogues and the Jewish living quarters, depriving Jews of their Talmud, and prohibiting rabbis from teaching.

By the 17th century, the antagonisms of earlier years had largely abated, but Lutheran anti-Judaism incited Christians to reject and mistrust Jews in many ways, particularly if they were economically successful. Not until 1871 were Jews finally made equal before the law. This prompted a more rapid acculturation of Jewish youth, especially among young Jewish intellectuals, both men and women, who became soon over-represented in German universities – compared to their small number in the wider society. Herzig makes the point that, despite this acculturation, German Jews remained faithful to their Jewish identities, which signified to them much more than just a religious quest. Jewishness gave them a sense of self and belonging.

Starting immediately after Hitler’s accession to power, German Jewry was incrementally deprived of all their civil rights. Herzig assesses that out of 134,000 German Jews in 1939, only about 8,000 survived the Holocaust. He sees the role of the Church, in face of this tragedy, as one of a silent eye-witness, if not accomplice. Only the Catholic Raphaelsverein, which assisted Jews to emigrate, was an exception. But while Catholics were largely reluctant to preach and propagate the Nazi racial ideology, numerous representatives of the Protestant churches became convenient mouthpieces of Nazi propaganda. It is unfortunate that Herzig devotes less than 20 pages to the fortunes of German Jewry after 1945. German ambivalence about their present situation still remains, even though the popular media, and all politicians, take a strong position against antisemitism.

Given the book’s tight format and its emphasis on portraying an overall history of Jews in Germany, it is clearly intended for the general public. However, Herzig’s narrative is not easily accessible and, in places, quite convoluted. It comes as a surprise that he makes relatively little use of primary sources and, specifically, that his coverage of Jewish women is almost non-existent. Even though he writes that, during the first pogroms in Germany in 1096, many women formed part of the resistance, choosing suicide over enforced baptism, he never elaborates on this remarkable demonstration of female solidarity. In another case, he shows that a conservative Jewish women’s liberation, under the leadership of Bertha Pappenheim, took place in the Wilhelmine period, but the information is only sketchy. And what of all those noteworthy Jewish women philosophers, writers, artists, scientists and social reformers? Should they not be included in any representative survey? Another difficulty in this book arises from Herzig’s refusal to be explicit on the extent to which social segregation hurt, or even destroyed, Jewish-Gentile relationships throughout history. Reading this book, one unfortunately feels rushed. I think it would have been more beneficial if fewer facts had been accumulated, but more background provided about how these facts came about. And lastly illustrations would have been a valuable addition. Charlotte Schallie, University of British Columbia

2b) Hans A.Schmitt, Quakers and Nazis. Inner Light in Outer Darkness. Columbia and London: University of Missouri Press 1997. 296pp (This review will appear in Shofar, Vol 18, no 1, Fall 1999) After the widespread allegations of German”eliminationist antisemitism” in the first half of this century, it is a relief to turn to the story of persons who never be accused of holding such views – the Quakers. The history of this small but significant group of German non-conformists has not previously been written either in German or English, so Professor Schmitt’s carefully-researched account is much to be welcomed, all the more since we have to wait for so long. He makes extensive useboth of the few surviving Quaker records in Germany and of the reminiscences of surviving members, as well as of the large amount of Gestapo records which portray the close surveillance devoted by the Nazi authorities to this small sect. In addition, hehas made excellent use of Quaker archives in London and Philadelphia, and convincingly establishes his case that this was a tiny but heroic handful of men and women who preferred to light a small candle rather than curse the surrounding darkness of Nazi Germany.

The Society of Friends managed to establish a small following in Europe in its early years, but emigration or rejection led to its disappearance by the mid-nineteenth century. The Quakers first returned to Germany in 1919, when the British andAmerican Friends defied the wishes of their governments and came over to Berlin and Vienna to establish a humanitarian relief programme, principally by setting up feeding stations for the starving children of those cities. The “Quakerspeisung” was so well organised that by 1921 more than one million individuals were being fed in 1640 centres, assisted by 40,000 local helpers. As the food crisis ebbed, the Quakers turned to their other principal and more spiritual concern, the cultivation of groups of spiritual seekers along the familiar pattern of silent meetings and pursuit of the “inner light”.. The first national Yearly Meeting was held in 1925, and a headquarters building was purchased in the north German spa resort of Bad Pyrmont.

But the Quaker faith is highly demanding of commitment, conscience and conviction. It requires a readiness to suffer and a courageous witness. As a result no large-scale membership drive was attempted. By 1933 only some 150 members were declared Friends, though probably twice as many were interested observers. With the rise of Hitler, Quakers, as pacifists, were immediately suspect, and the evidence shows that from early on the Gestapo continually scrutinized their activities. The Friends were, however, to demonstrate that, even in this difficult and isolated setting, they were prepared to carry out their commitment to reconciliation and relief of suffering. Very quickly they became involved in trying to assist the Nazis’ chief victims, the Jews. In particular, the Quaker help was directed to those “non-aryans”who no longer had connections to any Jewish or Christian organisations. (A particularly poignant case is described in Yad Washem Studies, Vol XI, pp.91-130). This work was principally undertaken by the team of British Friends in Berlin under Corder Catchpool. He fully shared the Quaker commitment to the need to relieve suffering, but at the same time was convinced that his duty called him to attemptreconciliation, even with Nazis. He also shared a common Quaker view that if only he could meet with the top Nazi leadership, hecould convince them of the need for peace and toleration. But by1938 such naive illusions had to be abandoned. Frantic attempts were made to raise funds in Britain for daily sustenance of theNazis’ victims, or to gain sponsorship affidavits for emigration to the USA.

The results were limited in scope, but German Friends did what they could to alleviate distress. Being so few they increasingly were to feel their loneliness and vulnerability. When war broke out they were additionally weighed down by their burdened consciences and a deep sense of individual and collective inadequacy. They sustained their spiritual community by publishing small booklets of inspiring writings, and by constant dedication to helping the needy. They felt a particularly keen sense of shame and responsibility as Germans for what was being done in Poland and for the continually renewed pressure on the Jews. In fact, however, unlike the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Quakers were not imprisoned or executed for their beliefs. Schmitt wonders whether this was due to their small numbers, to the need to avoid bad publicity abroad, to their obviously sincere beliefs, or to the memory of the help they had earlier provided.

Schmitt’s account also gives valuable descriptions of other Quaker involvements, such as the school established in Holland for German refugees, which somehow survived even during the war. In Vienna, a remarkable American Friend, Emma Cadbury, extended help to the persecuted Jews and Social Democrats, trying to cope with an uncontrollable flood of petitioners, until finally forced to close her doors. More problematic was the good-natured earnestness of those British Friends who sought to prevent war by appeasing the Nazi regime. Their sense of guilt over past British policies, especially the much decried Treaty of Versailles, led them to hope they could usher in a new age of peace and international understanding. But in the end they had to realise that they had largely been duped by Nazi propagandists. In Schmitt’s view these peacemakers failed, but they did what they should have done. Their hopeless quest did not transform the world and their cause remains as lost as ever. But their moral example and the”Inner Light” which radiated provided an impressive witness to the power of love. The abiding lesson of the Quaker encounter with Nazism was that evil and violence persist, but Quakers must not and will not abet such destructive forces. JSC

3) New publication plans in German Church history. Both the Protestant and the Catholic Church Commissionsfor Contemporary History are making ambitious new plans for large-scale publishing ventures. In the EKiD, instead of undertaking what might turn out to be a contentious post-mortem investigation of the Church’s role in the former GDR, the proposal now is to enlarge the scope and to engage in a vast survey with the title “The role of the Evangelical Church in the divided Germany” to cover both the west and east, and thereby facilitate a comparative approach. This is to begin with an early study on “Die Klammerfunktion der Evangelischen Kirche” and a scholarly conference to work out the future dimensions of the project is to be held in Potsdam in November 1998. An even more ambitious proposal is being undertaken by a joint working group of both churches, to be financed by the Volkswagen Foundation. This seeks to evaluate, and eventually publish, those records of the Nazi Security Service, consisting of some 137 running metres of documents, which were carried off by the Red Army in 1945, and later returned to the headquarters of the Stasi in East Germany, presumably for more current use there. They are now housed in the Bundesarchiv’s Zwischen-Archiv in Dahlwitz-Hoppegarten, Berlin. These newly-discovered documents can be expected to give a much more complete picture of the ideology and practice of the Nazi repression and persecution of the churches than we have had before. Supervision of the archival project lies in the very capable hands of Dr Heinz Boberach, a former archivist of the Bundesarchiv, and himself a member of the Evang. Kommission. The results will be computerized, and eventually the documents themselves will be (re)-incorporated with the existing enormous records of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt (R 58) in the Bundesarchiv. Along with computerized indices, this projectshould provide a much easier access to the Nazi records dealingwith the churches. A full description of this new project can be found in the latest issue of the Mitteilungen der Evangelische Arbeitsgemeinschaft fur kirchlicher Zeitgeschichte, Folge 17, April1998, pp 68ff, written (presumably) by the young scholar engaged on this work, Wolfgang Dierker, which is available from the Geschaftsstelle, Schellingstrasse 3 VG, 80799 Munich

4) Book notes: a) Society, Culture and the State, 1870-1930, ed.Geoff Eley, Ann Arbor: U of Michigan Press, 1996 Yet another volume of conference papers, this one reflecting the impact of gender and cultural studies in recent German historiography. However cogent the articles may be, they will get lost unless one has either an encyclopaedic memory or a well-tuned computerized indexing system. But for our purposes, two deserve mention. David Blackbourn summarizes the findings of his wonderful book, Marpingen (Oxford 1993) in his treatment of “Apparitions of the Virgin Mary in Bismarckian Grmany”, whichseeks to explore the interface between piety and politics,particularly during the Kulturkampf and its aftermath. Wilfried Spohn casts his net wider in examining “Religion and working-class formation in Imperial Germany, 1871-1914”. He seeks to remedy the omission of religion in most of the (proto-Marxist or socialist) writings about the emergence of working class political structures. Whereas most of the Protestant workers became secularized and transferred their loyalties and practices to an alternative socialist culture, the Catholic traditions proved more durable and retained their hold over this minority segment of the working population. The consequent mutual rivalries only hindered any effective challenge to the Kaiserreich’s authoritarian structures and policies. JSC

b) Two recent books, Saul Friedlander’s “Nazi Germany and theJews”, Vol. I, and Theodor Hamerow’s “On the Road to the Wolf’s Lair. German Resistance to Hitler”, deal in part with the churches and the Jews during the Holocaust. It appears to me that Hamerow reached a much more balanced and nuanced interpretation. To takejust one example – nevertheless an important one – consider how the two authors deal with Cardinal Michael Faulhaber. Friedlander depicts him as agreeing with Hitler’s antisemitic and racist ideas (pp183-4). In so doing, the author unfortunately follows the tendentious German publicist, Ernst Klee, whose book “Die SA Jesu Christi” pinned the racist label on Faulhaber. In arriving at this conclusion, Klee eliminated a key passage from Faulhaber’s notes on his three hour meeting with Hitler at the Obersalzberg in November 1936, in which he noted that the Pope (Pius XI) gave an address on the same day as Hitler’s Nuremberg speech, declaring that atheism and godlessness, rather than the Jews, were responsible for Bolshevism. (See Ludwig Volk’s “Akten Kardinal Michael von Faulhaber, 1917-1945”, p 184). My reading of Friedlander leads me to conclude that the author looked for negative points about the cardinal (and others) and overlooked the positive. He does not, for example, mention the positive relationship which Faulhaber had with Munich’s rabbi, LeoBaerwald (both before and after the Holocaust), nor does he mention Faulhaber’s letter to Cardinal Bertram in which he likened the forced emigration of Jews to the slave trade of previous centuries. Theodor Hamerow, on the other hand, gives a specifically non-racist view of Cardinal Faulhaber, basing his interpretation on, among other things, the private correspondence of the Bavarian church leader. Hamerow found that Faullhaber “disapproved of the regime’s racial policy” and not just when it concerned “converted Jews” but also Mosaic Jews (p.140-42). There is much to be said for Friedlander’s new book. Although he paints, like Goldhagen, a mostly negative picture of the churches, it is by no means as pitifully under-researched as is”Hitler’s Willing Executioners” on their role during the Nazi era. But I would be interested to know if others found a lack of balance in Friedlander regarding the Protestant Church as I have regarding the Catholics.Michael Phayer, Marquette University. (Anyone wishing to reply can write here, or direct to M.Phayer =PhayerM@vms.csd.mu.edu )

c) ed D.Tobler, Remembrance, Repentance, Reconciliation. The 25th Anniversary Volume of the Annual Scholars’ Conference on the Holocaust and the Churches, (Studies in the Shoah, Vol XXI),University Press of America, Lanham, New York, London 1998 This collection of papers from the 25th conference held in Provo, Utah, in 1995, besides a number of valuable articles on Holocaust topics, also includes Doris Bergen’s preliminary account of Overseas Missions and the German Christian View of Race, a sad commentary on how far racist views penetrated even the German missionaries abroad, though most of them turned away from such heresies when they realized the full implications. It also has my own tribute to the founders of these conferences, Franklin Littell and Hubert Locke.

5) Bonhoeffer – a Righteous Gentile? Considerable controversy has arisen over the attempt to have Dietrich Bonhoeffer commemorated in the Avenue of the Righteous Gentiles in the Yad Washem Martyrs’ Memorial gardens on the outskirts of Jerusalem, as reported in the latest issue of the International Bonhoeffer Society’s Newsletter. Led by a Connecticut lawyer, the grandson of the noted American Jewish leader at the time of the Holocaust, Stephen Wise, pressure is being mobilized to have Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s name added to the list of some 16,000 people recognised by the Israeli museum authorities, on the grounds that he participated in the rescue attempts which resulted in 13 Jews escaping to Switzerland in 1942. In reply, the director of Yad Washem Department for the Righteous among the Nations stated that Bonhoeffer “deserves our admiration for his courageous anti-Nazi stand, which eventually doomed him – he is a martyr in the struggle against Nazism” But the purpose of the programme is to “honour non-Jews who specifically addressed themselves to the Jewish issue, and risked their lives in the attempt to aid Jews”. There can be no doubt that Bonhoeffer’s attitude towards the Jews developed incrementally from 1933 onwards, theologically as well as personally. Not only were his sister and her husband, Gerhard Leibholz, obliged to flee Germany because of his “non-aryan” status, but another brother-in-law, Hans Dohnanyi, became the leading figure in the resistance movement, and was described by the Gestapo as “the intellectual head of the movement to remove the Fuhrer”. It was Dohnanyi who organised the flight of the 13 Jews, which has been exhaustively described in Winfried Meyer’sbook, “Unternehmung 7”. (Frankfurt/Main 1993) Meyer relates how Bonhoeffer was asked for his advice on the desirability of including Charlotte Friedenthal, a Jewish convert to Christianity, in the group,which he readily gave. But how much more he knew about, or assisted, in this venture was, needless to say, never recorded. But on the strength of his connection with this affair, both he and Dohnanyi were arrested in the following April, and, as we know, both were hanged in 1945.

Does this constitute enough to warrant inclusion among the Righteous Gentiles? In the view of those disappointed by Yad Washem’s response so far, there seems to be a built-in reluctance in Jerusalem to honour the members of the German resistance, even when they were clearly opposed to Hitler’s crimes, including the murder of the Jews, for the noblest of moral reasons, as Bonhoeffer undoubtedly was. Clearly, not all those who were executed by the Nazis for whatever reasons can be included. And, in Yad Washem’s eyes, Bonhoeffer is principally to be honoured for his defiant stance against the Nazis’ persecution of the church, and for his challenge to the entrenched anti-Judaism of so many of his Lutheran brethren. But, they claim, “no direct evidence has surfaced on his personal involvement in sheltering or extending other forms of aid to persecuted Jews (to persons still adhering to the Jewish faith)”. Such casuistry has been much criticized by Bonhoeffer’s supporters. In a “Christian Century” article, they questioned this exclusion of the Christian-Jewish converts, since the danger of being sent to Auschwitz was equally imminent for all Jews. And Bonhoeffer’s sympathies were by no means limited only to the Christian Jews, even if he had no immediate opportunity to undertake rescue efforts for others. This is clearly a border-line case. But in the interests of a warmer fellowship between Christians and Jews, such a recognition of the role which Bonhoeffer played in reversing the tradition of Christian anti-Judaism, and in pleading for support for the persecuted and oppressed, would seem to deserve a magnanimous gesture.on the part of Yad Washem, and would by no means detract from the honour which those Righteous Gentiles have been fittingly accorded in the splendidly laid-out row of trees which graces the entrance to the Holocaust Martyrs’ and Remembrance Memorial. It would be interesting to hear from any of you about this controversy. JSC

With best wishes

John S.Conway

jconway@interchange.ubc.ca

Contents: 1) Congratulations again 2) Forthcoming conference KZG and Lund University, 27th August-1st Sept. 3) Book reviews a) Davies/Nefsky, How silent were the churches? b) R.Hering, Theologinnen, Lauterer, Liebestatigkeit 4) Thesis review: B. Hall, Mormons in the G.D.R. 5) Journal article: W. Ribegge, Joseph Mausbach 6)Book note: H-J Ramm, Resistance and morality

1) Congratulations, first to Susannah Heschel, who has been appointed the Eli Black Professor of Jewish Studies, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, and has just published a new book:”Abraham Geiger and the Jewish Jesus” (U. of Chicago Press), which concerns debates over the relationship between Judaism and Jesus amongst Jewish and Protestant theologians in the 19th century in Germany. Congratulations also on the forthcoming arrival of herfirst-born in January! Congratulations are also due to Bruce Hall, Brigham Young University, for completing his M.A. thesis on “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in East Germany 1949-1989. (Ed Note: It is not our practice to review MA theses, but in view of the singularity of this topic, an exception is being made. See below.)

2) Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte will hold its 1998 meeting together with the Dept of Theology and Religious Studies, Lund University, in Lund, Sweden later this month, on the topic “Europabilder der Kirchen in der Nachkriegszeit”. A good turnout of Scandinavians is expected, and a short report will be included in our October issue

3a) Alan Davies and Marilyn F.Nefsky, How silent were theChurches? Canadian Protestantism and the Jewish Plight during the Nazi Era. Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press,1997 xvi + 179pp Cloth $39.95. (This review appeared in National History (Toronto) Vol 1, no 3 1997) It is not often that one wishes a book was twice as long as itis. But Davies and Nefsky’s treatment of Canadian Protestant attitudes towards the Nazi persecution of the Jews is so engrossing and insightful that one could wish for more. The collaboration of two scholars, one Jewish and one Christian, ensures that their evaluations are balanced and the results excellently summarised.

As the title of the book indicates, the authors seek to grapple with the accusation made in an earlier work “None is too many,” criticizing the lack of significant steps to permit Jewish immigration to Canada during the 1930s and 1940s, and attributing this regrettable inactivity to the prevalence of antisemitism in Canada. In the meanwhile, however,the valid point has been made that the rigid immigration barriers were maintained not because of antisemitism, but because of a much wider anti-alienism. And while racial prejudice undoubtedly existed in Canada, its target was much more often directed against orientals than against Jews, as could be seen by the fate of the Japanese-Canadians in 1942. Davies and Nefsky are certainly aware of both this widespread Canadian anti-alien nativism, and the equally prevalent belief that further immigration would only add to economic and social difficulties, and would appear to agree that the reluctance to accept refugees from whatever source was primarily economically-based rather than founded only on antisemitism. At the same time, as the authors demonstrate, many church members were appalled by the growing evidence of the persecution being suffered by the Jews in far-off Europe. As a result they developed a genuine dislike for antisemitism and antisemites and were increasingly alarmed by reports of the Nazis’ infamous policies. Several clergymen gave a lead in claiming that Canadians had, or should have, an obligation to seek to remedy such conditions.

Davies and Nefsky devote separate chapters to each of the Protestant denominations, based on the use of church records religious publications and even some sermons. Despite their significant differences of doctrine and ecclesiastical style, almost all these church bodies still held lingering traces of traditional anti-Judaism, often coupled with an ardent desire to evangelise the Jews in their hour of need. Nevertheless, apart from a handful of naive enthusiasts who at first idealized Hitler, the churches’ chorus of condemnation of Nazi policy grew with each successive outrage. Even if, for some, the predicament of the Jews was overshadowed by the events of the German Church Struggle, the Nazis’ attacks on both the Christians and the Jews came to be seen as companion evils. Prominent clergymen, such as Claris Silcox, generalsecretary of the Christian Social Council of Canada and a highly respected figure in the United Church, the Anglican bishops of Fredericton and Montreal, and the pastor of Toronto’s largest Presbyterian church, united in raising their voices in protest. Church periodicals from 1933 onwards vigorously denounced the Nazi state and its ideology. And while it is difficult to quantify the results among the churches’ rank-and-file, the evidence is clear that the church elites were not silent at all. Furthermore, they demanded action. They repeatedly called on the Canadian government to open the doors to the Nazis’ victims, and in so doing attacked the lethargy, xenophobia and insensitivity of the Canadian public. And they quickly sounded the alarm bells as soon as they received reliable information about the mass murders of Jews in eastern Europe after 1942.

Critics of the Christians’ alleged silence have too often believed that the churches were far more influential than was the case. They assume that, had the churches spoken out more forcefully, the government would have followed their wishes. But the reality was very different. The Canadian government adamantly refused to change its immigration policy, even if Prime Minister Mackenzie King was a loyal Presbyterian. In fact, the Christian conscience was aroused and, quite remarkably, was ready to see the Jewish victims of Nazism as belonging within the churches’ circle of obligation. Their leaders do not therefore deserve all the censure which later post-mortems have expressed. To be sure, their humanitarian pleas were consistently turned down in Ottawa. But this sad fact should not be allowed to blur the evidence of their advocacy on behalf of the Jews, even if their sympathies were not expressed with all the sensitivity we should now expect in today’s more religiously-correct climate. Davies and Nefsky are to be commended for setting the record straight. It is only a pity this account did not appear forty years ago. JSC

3b) Rainer Hering, Die Theologinnen: Sophie Kunert, Margarete Braun, Margarete Schuster, Hamburg 1997 125 pp Heide-Marie Lauterer, Liebestatigkeit fur dieVolksgemeinschaft: Der Kaiserwerther Verband deutscher Diakonissenmutterhauser in den ersten Jahren des NS-Regimes, (Arbeiten zur kirchlichen Zeitgeschichte, Reihe B: Darstellungen,22), Gottingen 1994 224 pp. ‘Opfer, Dienst, Liebe’ – these words play a key role in both Rainer Hering’s and Heide-Marie Lauterer’s recent contributions to the history of the Protestant church and of Protestant church womeni n Germany. But both authors go beyond an official, sentimental version of events to take a hard look at how those “womanly virtues” were promoted, used, and sometimes abused by the church as an institution and its more powerful spokesmen.

Hering’s biographical studies of three women theologians in Hamburg and Lauterer’s investigation of the association of Kaiserwerther Diakonissen in 1933 and 1934 do more than fill gaps in the existing narrative. Indeed, in the hands of Hering and Lauterer, what appear to be narrow topics of limited interest become windows on to much broader issues. These books illustrate processes of secularization, professionalization, and gender inequality in modern Germany; they depict aspects of the “Kirchenkampf” and address resistance and complicity in Christian antisemitism and the so-called Euthanasia programme – the murder of people deemed handicapped. At the same time, both works demonstrate the achievements, failings, and ironies of the church’s past in a way that is only possible when one turns one’s gaze from the macro to the micro level. Their carefully researched, skilfully presented studies merit wide readership.

Rainer Hering’s book is straightforward and even old-fashioned in approach and style. It includes brief biographical sketches of Sophie Kunert, Margarete Braun, and Margarete Schuster, three academically trained theologians who served the church in Hamburg before women could be ordained as pastors. The chronological focus extends from 1927, when a new regulation extended possibilities for such women, to 1959 when Braun as the last of the three women he discusses retired. There is a brief introduction, no general conclusion, and no explicit, overarching analysis. Numerous, often personal, photographs and the use of high-gloss paper add to the impression that here is a traditional, attractive, accessible book, a suitable present for a devout mother or grandmother. Hering’s book is indeed all of these things, but its pious appearance harbours a message that is more disruptive than congratulatory. Always present in his respectful discussion of these women is an awareness of the profound difficulty and loneliness they faced, and a keen sense of the injustice that surrounded them. These pioneering theologians deserve our admiration, Hering shows, but their experiences also challenge us “not to content ourselves with the legal equality of women, but to anchor that equality firmly in reality” (p.9)

All three of Hering’s subjects were born in the 1890s. Only Schuster lived to see the”Pastorinnengesetz” of January 1969 that acknowledged women’s right to ordination in the Evangelisch-lutherischen church of Hamburg.. Two months later, Schuster received the official title”Pastorin i.R.”, as well as the right to preach in public and administer the sacraments, but never did so (p 118-9). On this note the book ends. The theme of too little, too late permeates Hering’s discussion. A recurring image is that of a church lagging behind a society itself reluctant to recognise the fundamental equality of women and men. Hering’s admonitions are subtle but are barbs all the same. Who cannot deplore the double standard that encouraged the pastors to marry while insisting that those women who served as Pfarramtshelferinnen and Gemeindehelferinnen remain single (and celibate) (p.8)? Who could not share Hering’s outrage, muted though it may be, at a church that refused to grant its faithful female servants the titles, authority, and salaries due them, and then even charged Margarete Braun interest on a loan to buy a car she needed to fulfil her duties (p.93-4)? Who could fail to be touched by the selfless devotion with which these women served some of the most neglected, needy and demanding groups within the church: Kunert’s women in prison (p. 41); sick and institutionalized women and young people in Braun’s case (p.91); for Schuster, couples who had refused church marriage or baptism for their children (p.108)?

Hering reveals something of the toll that this often thankless work and the lack of adequate support from the church took on these women. Kunert’s pain, he tells us, showed in her face in the photographs of her 1934 wedding (p. 54). Schuster suffered physical and emotional collapse in 1928, as she prepared for the second theological examination (p.111), and again twenty years later (p.117). The second time it became impossible for her to continue her work. None of Hering’s Theologinnen, with the possible exception of Kunert, considered herself a feminist. Still their work helped to open doors for women behind them. But those advances came at a high personal cost. Hering’s discussion of Kunert is by far the longest of the three. Presumably that imbalance reflects the availability of sources. In each case, Hering has drawn on archival records, the women’s writings, and conversations with friends and relatives. Each of the sketches has its own surprises, many of them involving the Nazi era. For example, the swastika displayed by Sophie Kunert’s new stepson on her wedding photograph comes as somewhat of a shock (p. 51) More appalling is the viciousness directed at her husband, Pastor Bruno Benfey, who came from a family of converts from Judaism (p.50-57). Rejected by most of Kunert’s family, reviled by the public, including members of his own church council, arrested, incarcerated in Buchenwald in 1938, and forced out of Germany, Benfey described his “bitter pain” at the behaviour of the official church in Hanover (p.58) Under Bishop Marahrens, it did everything it could to distance itself from him. To the extent possible, Sophie Kunert shared her husband’s hardships.

Margarete Braun’s experiences were very different. Demoted by the German Christian bishop Franz Tugel in 1934(p.87), she nevertheless joined the Nazi party three years later (p. 89) It is difficult to say what this decision meant to this competent, stoic woman. Schuster was briefly a member of the German Christian movement (p.113) but we learn little else about her relationship to the Nazi revolution. All three biographies are engaging and eminently readable.

Heide-Marie Lauterer’s book stands in contrast to Hering’s in some obvious ways. If his is characterized by its simplicity, hers is marked by complexity. She assembles her “thick description” (p.18) of the Kaiserwerther Verband deutscher Diakonissenmutterhauserin 1933-34 using a variety of methodologies: standard organizational history, linguistic, textual, and feminist analysis, oral interviews, and biographical studies. She critically engages otherkey works in the field, most notably those by Jochen-Christian Kaiser and Kurt Nowak (p.139), and her study shows the influence of a wide, diverse set of scholars, from Heinz Eduard Todt to Saul Friedlander, Ernst Klee, Gisela Bock, and even Klaus Theweleit.

Unlike Hering, Lauterer is explicitly analytical. A key concept hereis Martin Broszat’s notion of “Resistenz”, which she uses to assessthe extent to which the Kaiserwerther Verband, one of the largest Protestant women’s service associations with over 27,000 Diakonissen (p.59) can be said to have defied National Socialism. Lauterer’s findings are deeply unsettling. The Kaiserwerher organisation, she concludes, cannot be characterized as resistant. In particular its leadership, the Verbandsvorstand, proved eager to comply with and even anticipate the wishes of the National Socialist state (p.199) Rather than preserving a space independent of Nazi ideology.and limiting the impact of Nazi rule, the Diakonissenschaft as a whole was a stabilising factor (p.77). But, Lauterer shows, at least some of the individuals involved – the “Oberinnen, Vorstehern und Diakonissen” – do merit the”Resistenz” label. They continued to work for the suffering and needy without regard to Nazi racial laws; they sought ‘to obey God more than man’ (p.200). That gap between the institutional – the layers of leadership and organizational structures that built up around the Diakonissenmutterhauser – and the individual – the Diakonissen with their call to service, sacrifice, and love – pervades Lauterer’s study. It reflects a tension that in turn provides space for the range of responses her study evokes, from anger and disappointment to empathy and admiration. In this regard, Lauterer is not so different from Hering after all.

Her book is based on an impressive, indeed formidable amount of research in public and private archives. In addition, between 1984 and 1989, she visited twelve of the Diakonissenmutterhauser and interviewed around fifty of the women about their experiences under National Socialism (p.14). Her book has three parts. The first provides background on the Kaiserwerther Mutterhausdiakonie from 1833 to 1932; the second focuses on the Kaiserwerther Verband in 1933, with a look both at its relationship to the Nazi state and its interactions with the official Protestant church. Part Three, entitled “Kooperation und Resistenz” zeroes in on issues surrounding forced sterilization and so-called euthanasia from 1933 to 1945. In places excessive organizational detail detracts somewhat from the force of her arguments, but on the whole, Lauterer’s book is a thoroughly convincing presentation of how a purportedly Christian organization failed to counter the Nazi assault. It was not ultimately the agreement with Nazi racial, biological thinking that hindered resistance, Lauterer indicates.

Nor was it that Verband’s financial problems. Rather it was above all”the absence of a fundamental ethical stance” at the level of theleadership that made it impossible for the organization to recognise and oppose the abuses of the Nazi state (p.147) In particular with regard to forced sterilization and murder of people deemed handicapped, misgivings expressed too little, too late had terrible repercussions. One statistic serves to illustrate. In 1940, Lauterershows, of the 1,758 patients at the Kaiserwerther Verband’s Neuendettelsauer institutions, 1,100 were murdered.(p.142). The most intriguing parts of Lauterer’s study are those which draw directly on her conversations with Diakonissen. For example, the individual responses to involvement in the sterilization programare devastating (p.120-2). At the other extreme, personal memories of Oberin Elly Schwetdke in Frankfurt/Main are an inspirational tribute to the clear-sightedness and courage of that steadfast anti-Nazi (p.190-93).

However, for long stretches in this account, the women involved tend to disappear, a regrettable and sadly accurate reflection of the power relations within the Kaiserwerther Verband. Men not only dominated positions of leadership above the Oberinnen (p. 28); they were the primary publicists, representatives, and arguably beneficiaries of an organization that was based on women’s unpaid labour. Thus we learn a great deal about those men whose photographs grace Lauterer’s book: Hans Lauerer, Siegfried Graf von Luttichau,a nd Theodor Hickel (p.19). The one high-ranking, female, professional administrator – August Mohrmann -also receives a photograph and considerable attention (p.64-6). But the individual Diakonissen remain somewhat elusive. Lautererr ecognizes the limited options for women and the pervasive influence of the patriarchal family model in early twentieth-century Germany (p. 25). Inequality and double standards are part of her story as much as they are of Hering’s. Indeed, she suggests, the male leadership’s culpability may be all the greater given their female subordinates’ lack of political orientation and conditioning for obedience. Still Lauterer is no apologist, and the Diakonissen as she depicts them varied in their responses to Nazism from ardent enthusiasm to confirmed opponents. Like Hering, Lauterer is always sensitive and empathises with the humanity of her subjects. Both authors’ works are themselves labours of love that give at least some quiet voice to women whose service and sacrifice for the church were often not only underappreciated but misused. Doris Bergen, University of Notre Dame

4) Thesis review: Bruce Hall, Gemeindegeschichte als vergleichende Geschichte. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in East Germany 1949-1989. Bruce Hall’s impressive study of the Church of Latter-day Saints (LDS or Mormons) in the German Democratic Republic is based primarily on the story of the Leipzig branch of this sect, as well as official GDR records, including the voluminous files of the Stasi, all of which he has exploited most successfully to throw light on how this minority religious community attempted to live a devout religious life in an unfriendly Communist society.

As an American-based church, the Mormons were particularly suspect in the initial years of the GDR as a front for military and political espionage, and hence subject to constant Stasi surveillance – a situation not helped by the inflammatory anti-Communist speeches of their leaders in far-away Utah. The total membership constituted less than 0.3% of the GDR population, lacked influence of any kind, had no prominent leadership, nor any political agenda. Survival and upholding their moral and spiritual character was their sole goal. However, unlike the Salvation Army or the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the LDS was not outlawed.

How the Mormons maintained their religious witness while adopting a conformist stance politically and socially is at the heart of this thesis. For the general background, Hall relies heavily on the finebook by our list-member Robert Goeckel, which could have been supplemented by the newer insightful account by another list-member, Gregory Baum: “The Church for Others”. After 1961, when the doors were closed to outside support and influence, the LDS church stagnated as a rather isolated and closed community, striving to avoid confrontation, despite bureaucratic provocation and harassment by government officials. Hall’s chapter on the Stasi and the LDS admits that some Mormons were recruited to act as informants for many years, and even paid for their services in cash or in kind. By such means the minutes of leadership meetings, reports of church leadership changes, and personal profiles of these leaders came into the Stasi’s possession. What they knew about the LDS church was often more than what most members knew. Out of filial piety, Hall does not reveal these informers’ real names.

Paradoxically, however, Hall shows that the intense attention given by the Stasi to the LDS in the end turned out to be an advantage. Their reports concluded that the Mormons were no political threat to the regime, and could be regarded as model, if passive, citizens. In 1979, the dictator Honecker took theunprecedented decision to allow the Mormons to build their own temple in the GDR and to permit full-time American proselytizing missionaries to operate within the country. Hall believes this was part of a wider strategy to tame the churches and to integrate them more fully into the East German society, while exploiting their foreign contacts to help gain diplomatic recognition for the GDR. Certainly, the authorities proved remarkably co-operative in getting the Mormon temple built – with American money, at a cost of 32 million marks. 90,000 people came to view the edifice when construction was complete. As owners of the newest church buildings in all of the GDR, the Mormons were jubilant. But the Communist-led secularization process took its toll. Like the other churches, the LDS is not likely to recover from four decades of trial and hardship, and systematic atheist indoctrination,in the foreseeable future. Bitterness over the co-operation of some of their own members with the hated Stasi still lingers. In this situation, the Mormons were and are not alone. This is one valid point of comparison. On the other hand, in contrast to other churches, the stalwart loyalty to their own doctrinal positions meant that the LDS never challenged the GDR regime, nor indeed contributed to the protest movements which led to its overthrow. They could remain faithful within their somewhat limited horizons.This survival to live another day is a remarkable feat and Hall rightly celebrates it. JSC

5) Journal article: Prof. Wilhelm Ribegge, Munster, hascontributed a useful article on the Catholic moral theologian “Joseph Mausbach and his role in public life” at the beginning of this century to “Catholic Historical Review”, Vol LXXIV, no 1, January 1998.

6) Book note: Hans-Joachim Ramm “. . .stets einem hoherenVerantwortlichkeit. Christliche Grunduberzeugungen in innermilitarischen Widerstand gegen Hitler”, Stuttgart, Hansler1996, 370pp. Ramm seeks to defend the military officers who participated in the 20 July 1944 attempt to overthrow Hitler against charges that they were solely motivated by the fear of military defeat or by political opportunism. Rather he wants to demonstrate that they were primarily impelled by moral factors, because of their perception that Nazi rule was contrary to the Christian-ethical foundation of society. His account provides brief biographies of several of these officer-conspirators. most of whom lost their lives as a result of their convictions. Ramm, like Peter Hoffmann before him, shows that these were courageous individuals, smitten by conscientious scruples, directly challenging the long history of obedience to the state, and often, at first, misjudging the true nature of Nazism. He also shows that the attitude of the major church leaders was never supportive of any such acts of political high treason, even after the war, and points out how these conspirators’ reputations have suffered as a result. This is not a new thesis, and the book brings little new to the discussion, But it recapitulates the “moral”motivations of these military officers in a convenient form for quick reference, has a good bibliography but no index. JSC

I trust that all of you in the northern hemisphere have been able to enjoy the summer holidays. If you have been anywhere of church-historical interest, we would love to hear from you.

All the best

John S.Conway

Dear Friends

Contents: 1) Congratulations 2) Book reviews a) Graham and Alvarez, Nothing Sacred b) Evangelische Pfarrer 3) Journal article: Webster, Non-aryan clergymen in exile 4) Kirchliche Tourismus: South Tyrol

1) Congratulations are due to our list members, Mark Lindsay, whohas successfully completed his doctoral studies with distinction at the University of Western Australia. His thesis was on “Covenanted Solidarity: The theological bases for Karl Barth’s opposition to Nazi antisemitism and the Holocaust”; (another list member, Professor John Moses, being one of his examiners); and to Rob Levy, for completing his MA thesis on “Screening the Past:Scholarly histories and popular memories” for Washington StateUniversity.

2a) David Alvarez and Robert A. Graham, SJ. _Nothing Sacred. Nazi Espionage against the Vatican, 1939-1945_. London and Portland, Oregon: Frank Cass Publishers, 1997. Pp 190. Cloth$42.50. ISBN 0-7146-4744-6 Paper ISBN 0-7146-4302-5 (This review appeared on H-German on June 5th) Fr.Robert Graham, who sadly died last year, was a notable journalist and Jesuit, who wrote several books on the history of the Papacy and the wartime policies of Pope Pius XII. In the course of these studies, Graham uncovered a large amount of material relating to the espionage and surveillance efforts by foreign governments or emissaries directed against the Vatican. With the assistance of a younger colleague from California, David Alvarez, his bulky findings have now been reduced to a compact and readable 183 pages, concentrating on the Nazi attempts to spy on the Vatican during these turbulent years.

The Vatican was, and is, a strictly hierarchical entity, whose policies are not subject to public scrutiny. Its diplomacy, similarly, is enveloped in secrecy, a characteristic which became even more tightly controlled once the European war broke out in 1939. The result was that all sorts of groundless rumours, imagined scenarios and even calculated falsehoods were rife about what the Pope would do or say, purveyed by “informants” who were only too ready to satisfy the world’s curiosity, often for personal gain. Since this “information” was never authorized, but equally rarely officially denied, fanciful speculations abounded, some of whichwere later repeated in post-war journalistic books. The Holy See was widely assumed to have considerable spiritual power which could affect the Catholic citizens of many nations. Such influence was worth cultivating. For this reason, during the war, “all of the major belligerents (with the exception of the Soviet Union) maintained diplomatic missions at the Vatican to press the righteousness of their cause and to solicit the support of the Pope and his advisers. At the same time all of the major belligerents (including the Soviet Union) sought to determine the sympathies of the papacy, and to uncover and frustrate the intrigues of their opponents by maintaining intelligence coverage of the Vatican” (ix).

Prominent among these players was Nazi Germany. Hitler and his associates always had a hostile and suspicious attitude towards Catholicism. The Papacy, they believed, employed a world-wide network of clerical agents supplying potentially dangerous information to Rome. In consequence their deliberate aim was to curtail and curb such activities, not only by a ruthless persecution of “political Catholicism” in Germany and its occupied territories, but also by establishing their own networks of agents in the Vatican environment itself. A principal locale was the German Embassy to the Holy See. The Ambassador, Diego von Bergen, however, was a diplomat of the old school, rightly sceptical of much of the supposed “insider information” fed to him by various dubious contacts, and even by some pro-Nazi clerics. But Bergen was nearretirement and no longer enjoyed much support in Berlin. Much more significant were the intrigues of Reinhard Heydrich, head of the Reich Main Security Office (RSHA), whose pathological hatred of the church made him lose all sense of logic or proportion. He built a large staff in Munich and Berlin and in1941 declared that “our ultimate goal is the extirpation of all Christianity” (59). In the meanwhile intelligence operations against such a dangerous foe should be intensified. The Vatican, as the centre of this anti-Nazi activity, was particularly suspect. Already in March 1939 an agent had been sent to Rome to report on the papal election, though his speculations proved entirely erroneous. This debacle showed that spying on the Holy See required better staffing, despite strong opposition from the regular diplomats. The RSHA was successful in penetrating not only the Nunciatures in Berlin and Slovakia, but also the central office of the German Catholic bishops. Various agents with contacts to high ecclesiastics were paid large sums to send in information.

These machinations, on the other side, aroused alarm in theVatican, leading to the belief that the Nazis were about to invade Vatican territory or even kidnap the Pope. In August 1943, this threat seemed so imminent that sensitive diplomatic documents and the Pope’s personal files were hidden under the marble floors of the papal palace. Despite the authors’ diligent researches, they have been unable to find any hard evidence that such a plot was instigated, but the fears were genuine, even if “inspired” by western agents. The closest the RSHA got to penetrating the Vatican itself was by bribing some exiles from Georgia with funds to buy a convent in which they tried to install a secret radio transmitter. But this failed when the Allies reached Rome first. They did manage to”turn” a young Soviet agent from Estonia, who did translations for the Congregation for the Eastern Churches, but he promptly reverted when the Germans left and was last seen in a Siberian ‘gulag’. The harvest was very meagre. The only real success came from eavesdropping on the Vatican’s signals communications and deciphering the Vatican’s diplomatic codes. Despite being the first in history to use cryptography, by the 1940s the Vatican’s methods were primitively out of date. Both Germany and Italy had no difficulty in reading most of the papal traffic, or in tapping the various nuncios’ telephones. In fact, the Vatican officials knew their systems were insecure, and hence were obliged to be even more discreet than ever. It was a severe restraint, and probably the greatest weakness of papal wartime diplomacy.

The authors conclude that the results were mixed. No high-level Nazi agent was placed in the Papal entourage, and none of the very small number of individuals in the Vatican responsible for policy decisions was disloyal. This lack of success was partly due to the duplication of efforts by rival Nazi agencies, but also to the total misapprehension of the Vatican’s stature in the world, which was nothing like as powerful (or sinister) as the Nazis imagined. Nazi espionage was only one of the reasons why theVatican’s influence and prestige suffered disastrously during the second world war. Essentially much more significant was the growing gap between its ideals of peace and justice and the meagre achievements of its diplomacy, for example in its efforts to mitigate the Holocaust. But the authors succeed very well indepicting vividly the turgid, claustrophobic and conspiratorial atmosphere which prevailed during those fateful years. JSC

2b) “Evangelische Pfarrer: Zur sozialen und politischen Rolle einerburgerlichen Gruppe in der deutschen Gesellschaft des 18 bis 20 Jahrhunderts”, edited by Luise Schorn-Schutte and Walter Sparn. (Konfession und Gesellschaft. Beitrage zur Zeitgeschichte, 12) Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1997. ISBN 4-17-014404-9. 217pp. “Evangelische Pfarrer” is a collection of ten essays edited by an historian, Luise Schorn-Schutte, and a theologian, Walter Sparn.Like half of the contributors to their volume, both were born in the1940s. Eberhard Winkler and Johannes Wahl are the only two theologians represented; Reinhart Siegert was trained in Germanistik, and the others all appear to be historians, Given their professional profile, it is no wonder that the collection is heavily influenced by the methodological and thematic approaches to history which emerged in Germany in the 1970s and early 1980s. Indeed, a quick survey of the contents reminds us just how productive those years were in developing new ways to explore the German past. Schorn-Schutte’s piece on “Evangelische Geistlichkeit im Alten Reich und in der schweizerischen Eidgenossenschaft im 18 Jahrhundert” echoes attempts at cross-national comparisons that grew out of the French Annales school and its interest in the”longue duree”.

Wahl’s “Lebenslaufe und Geschlechterraume im Pfarrhaus des 17 und 18 Jahrhunderts” builds on alternative traditions of Alltagsgeschichte. Hartmut Titze’s use of quantification, in “Uberfullung und Mangel im evangelische Pfarramt seit dem ausgehenden 18 Jahrhundert” is reminiscent of older works by Konrad Jarausch, who used quantified date to explore issues of professionalization. Titze’s assumption that social structures underlie cultural and material phenomena brings to mind the structuralism of Hans Mommsen and others. In his study of the Protestant pastors in the Vormarz in Kurhessen, Robert von Friedeburg echoes the so-called Bielefeld school of social history around Hans-Ulrich Wehler and its efforts to link the social and the political. The marks of Bielefeld are also evident in Frank-Michael Kuhlemann’s essay on “Die evangelischen Pfarrer und ihre Mentalitat in Baden 1860-1914″ with its sociological concerns, debt to Max Weber, and incorporation of the Annalistes’ attention to”mentalite”.

Oliver Janz, in “Kirche, Staat und Burgertum in Preussen”, focusses on another preoccupation of the Bielefelders:the educated middle class, or “Bildungsburgertum”. Questions of change and continuity, so crucial to reassessments of World Wars I and II in earlier works by Fritz Fischer, and at the heart of the debate over Germany’s alleged “Sonderweg”, reappear in productive ways in Kurt Nowak’s fascinating “Politische Pastoren: Der evangelische Geistliche als Sonderfall des Staatsburgers (1862-1932)”. Of course the past twenty years have also changed historical methodology, and most of the essays reflect at least some of these developments. Schorn-Schutte and Wahl pay attention to women and gender, a part of the population and a category of analysis noticeably absent from mainstream German scholarship of the1970s. Kuhlemann’s interest in culture represents another innovation, evident also in Christoph Klessmann’s intriguing”Evangelische Pfarrer im Sozialismus – soziale Stellung und politische Bedeutung in der DDR”, with its exploration of “milieu”. The one piece by a Germanisten, Siegert’s :”Pfarrer und Literatur im 19 Jahrhundert”, might not have been possible without scholarship on reading and production of books over the past decades, some of the best of it by the cultural historian Robert Darnton. So although there are times at which the essays in “Evangelische Pfarrer” give one the impression of being in a time warp, in fact the book in rather subtle ways shows signs of the 1990s as well.

As the book proves, application of older approaches, many of them drawn from Wehler’s “Gesellschaftsgeschichte” – a particularly German variety of social history – to the study of Protestant clergy in modern Germany, can be very fruitful. For example, the emphasis on the political contexts in which pastors existed helps complicate old cliches about relations between church and state. Here we see not simply the oft-invoked union of “Thron und Adler”, but a multi-faceted, dynamic, regionally-varied relationship between pastors – some of whom were liberals, some of whom sought more independence for their churches – and states that followed their own agendas. Attention to issues of class reveals complex connections between the clergy and the bourgeoisie: sometimes they overlapped to the point of coalescence; sometimesthey moved in opposite directions with regard to prestige and power. In general, studying the social and material realities of pastors’ lives puts into perspective the changing conditions in which clergy and their families operated over time. Surprisingly, one ofthe most interesting and useful pieces in the book is what might seem at first glance the driest: Titze’s quantitative analysis of the six phases in the market for Protestant clergy from the end of the eighteenth century to the present.

But there are downsides to the reliance on methodologies from the1970s as well. For one thing, those by now somewhat old-fashioned approaches lend an unnecessary provincialism to much of the book. The essays here, rooted in a German historical tradition, miss much of the enrichment that drawing on works from outside might have produced. In vain I searched the footnotes for reference to the burgeoning English-language literature on religion in Germany, much of it written by subscribers to this list: people like David Diephouse, Helmut Smith, and Dagmar Herzog. Although such works are in many cases directly relevant to the topics being explored, they might as well not have been written for all the impact they appear to have had on these scholars. Not surprisingly, the few exceptions – references to Steven Ozment and David Sabean or to Robert Ericksen (pp. 37, 48 and 72) – appear in what are, in my view, some of the livelier essays here: the contributionsby Wahl and Titze.

The book’s chronological coverage also reflects both the strengths and the weaknesses of the 1970s historiography. One of the great contributions of that decade was its recovery of the Kaiserreich as aperiod of interest. To a significant extent that concentration grew out of efforts to identify the roots of National Socialism, but the works stood on their own merits. “Evangelische Pfarrer” partakes in that scholarly legacy; moreover, it also reflects the significant emphasis these days on the post-World War II Germanies. Klessmann’s contribution on the German Democratic Republic is an excellent example of how much can be learned by taking into consideration the most recent German past. Entirely absent from the volume, however, is any examination of Protestant pastors in the Nazi era. The editors decry this gap in their introduction (xxiii), but it sticks out like the famous blue elephant in the middle of the room which no one mentions and all the guests politely avoid, but which nevertheless remains an all-too-embarrassing presence in every conversation. How can one speak of the development of German Protestant clergy over time without even addressing the years that constituted the greatest challenge to these men and their congregations? Given the many outstanding German scholars working in the area, the editors could certainly have done more to include some discussion of the Nazi years.

Finally, a sociological approach that lends itself well to exploring processes like secularization in many cases also produces bloodless analyses that can become tedious for readers. The worst culprit in this regard is Friedeburg. I found myself scouring his essay for signs of human life – anecdotes, even names – as relief from the impersonal discussion. In contrast, Eberhard Winkler’s piece on “Evangelische Pfarrer und Pfarrerinnen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (1949-1989)”, the least historically and methodologically informed of all the contributions, was a refreshing reminder that history can be about people. Perhaps Winkler could be faulted for his anecdotal approach, but I for one benefitted from his personal, engaged assessment of the challenges facing the Protestant clergy in West Germany before unification – and after. It is Winkler too whose concluding question provies a fitting close to the book: “Wie werden Menschen dazu bewegt, ihre geistigen und materiellen Gaben gemass (1 Peter: 4:10) als gute Haushalter der vielfaltigen Gnade Gottes in den Dienst zu stellen?” (p. 211) The reference to the New Testament and the content of 1 Peter 4:10 itself “As every man has received the gift, even so minister the same to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God”.remind us that, after all, a discussion of pastors is still a conversation about religion. By invoking scripture, Winkler highlights what is perhaps the most serious weakness of a purely social-historical approach to the study of Protestant pastors: that is, the way it excludes precisely the most absorbing and even urgent questions about religion. Economics,social class, relations with state authorities, education, professionalization, and religious institutions are only part of the story. What about belief, ritual, tradition, community, faith and spirituality? To address these components of the history of Christianity in Germany, one needs tools that allow access to their rational, the emotional, and even the physical – tools that are more likely to come from anthropology, cultural history and gender studies than from sociology and social history.

“Evangelische Pfarrer” wuld have benefited from more careful editing. Some problems with breaks in words produced many cases of inappropriate hyphenation in the middle of lines. In addition to being distracting, non-words like “kon-ne”, “Bekennt-nisse” and”ba-dischen” (pp 89,93 and 121) create a postmodern or even Heideggerian effect that stands at odds with the book’s content. There is no index, and Janz’s essay is severely under-footnoted. Such quibbles aside, Schorn-Schutte and Sparn have put together a collection that will be useful to everyone concerned with Protestant clergy in the Kaiserreich, the Weimar Republic, or the post-WorldWar II Germanies. Doris Bergen, University of Notre Dame (with apologies for the unavoidable omission of umlauts)

3) Journal Article: Ronald Webster, German “non-aryan” clergymen and the anguish of exile after 1933. in Journal of Religious History, (Sydney,Australia), Vol 22, no 1, Feb. 1998, pp 83-103.This article, based on oral and archival sources, comments on the lives in exile of a group of “non-aryan” pastors forced to flee to theU.K., Canada and USA to escape Nazi anti-Jewish persecution. It pays homage to the work of those who assisted the refugees, and explores the ways these testimonies open new ground for the the ongoing dialogue between Judaism and Christianity.

4) Whitsun in the South Tyrol. The village of Klobenstein sits halfway up the mountainside, high above the gorge of the River Etsch which hurtles down from theBrenner Pass, past Bozen, Trent and Verona to the Italian plains. Nestled amongst surrounding meadows, in its midst is the village church – hardly larger than a chapel – where my wife and I went to celebrate the Coming of the Holy Spirit on Whitsunday. Like most of these ancient churches, it must have been a simple Gothic structure, but was later rebuilt during the baroque period, and now is surmounted by a onion-shaped steeple, whence two discordant bells unharmoniously summoned us to the Mass.

Inside the apse was decorated with three large pictures under classical porticos, and the altar was moved forward, so that there wasn’t enough room for all the parishioners, especially on a major Festival like Pentecost. Many of them were obliged to stand throughout in the aisle, the narthex or even outside the west door. Luckily the sermon was short and simple, while in the gallery a wind and brass ensemble accompanied the Introit, Gloria and Creed with a tuneful folkloric setting. A lady parishioner read the Prayers of the People, invoking God’s aid for the tense political situation in Indonesia, which sounded very far from this peaceful Alpine village.We sang a hymn, which, since there were no hymn books, must have been well known to the villagers. But I did notice the young priest glowering at the congregation for not singing more enthusiastically.

Afterwards everyone spilled out to the nearby coffee shop and Gasthaus to enjoy the bright sunlight.We walked back through the copses and fields, glowingly burstingwith yellow buttercups, kingcups, campion and blue violets. We crossed over the picturesque little tram line which loops and turns through the meadows. Every hour a tiny South Tyrolean “sky-train”trundles slowly between the farms and hamlets, as it has done ever since it was built in 1907. At the other end of the line is the settlement of Mary Ascension, where the wealthy merchants of Bozen have for centuries built their summer homes to escape from the heat below. The only sounds were the calling of the cuckoos and the clanging of cow-bells.

It was an idyllic rustic paradise.But it was not always so. Whenever the Etsch gorge was blockedby rock slides, floods or high waters, the only route open from north of the Alps necessitated ascending the hillsides to Klobenstein and then zig-zagging down the steep descent to Bozen far below. From Roman times onwards, thousands of merchants, soldiers, pilgrims and caravans trod the same paths we took on our way to church. Plundering armies invaded from north and south, looting the peasants’ cattle, and forcing them higher up into the mountains.Even in modern times, political turmoil has engulfed the area. Originally the South Tyrol was part of the Austrian Hapsburg Empire. But in 1919 it was awarded to Italy, in flagrant contradiction to President Wilson’s principle of self-determination. Under Mussolini, a vicious policy of “italianization” was launched -democratic rights were expunged, the German-speaking school system abolished, and place names forcibly changed. In 1939 Hitler and Mussolini signed a notorious agreement, giving the South Tyrolese the option, either of moving back to the German Reich to be rewarded with new lands conquered by the Nazi armies, or of compulsorily becoming Italian citizens, and even, it was said, of being evicted to Sicily if they disobeyed. This choice split the community apart, and the wounds still show.

With Mussolini’s overthrow in 1943, the South Tyrol was seized by the Nazis, and hopes for a German future arose again, only to be dashed as the American and British armies “liberated” the territory in 1945. Demonstrations and sporadic violence against Italy’s rule continued until finally, some thirty years ago, the Italian government recognised the virtue of multiculturalism and restored most the German-speaking rights. The casualties in this long drawn-out struggle were high. On our way back to the hotel, we passed a memorial chapel dedicated to ayoung priest, Fr Peter Nuss Mayer, executed by the Nazis for refusing to take an oath of allegiance to the SS in 1945. Only a third of those who “opted” to go to Germany returned to their homes after the war. Despite the lushness of the meadows, economic realities make for difficult survival on these mountain slopes. Only embedded tradition and loyalty keeps this German-speaking minority attached to their homesteads.Across the valley looms the massive cliff face of the Schlern, rising a thousand feet precipitously from the valley floor. In the summer evenings, when the sun’s angle is right, the whole rock face turns a brilliant crimson – much to the delight of the tourists dining on the hotel terraces. Then the light fades, darkness falls, a night-bird calls, and the whole valley is silent, wrapped in the peace and grace of God. JSC

With every best wish for the summer holidays to you all,

John S.Conway

Newsletter – Vol IV, no 6 – June 1998

Dear Friends,

Please forgive the delay in sending you this Newsletter, due to my absencein Europe forthe past month.

Contents: 1) Historisches Kolleg Colloquium, Munich,May 17-20th (Report submitted by Greg Munro) 2) Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte 1997/2 3) Book reviews a) G.Beck, Bistumspresse in Hesse b) V.Synan, Pentecostalism 4) Journal articles: Ustorf, German Missions Greschat, Euopean Unity

1)A Colloquium held in Munich last month, organised byProfessor Gerhard Besier, was designed to widen the scope ofinvestigations on the theme of “Nationaler Revolution andmilitarischer Aggression. Transformationen in Kirche und Gesellschaft unter der konsolidierten NS-Gewaltherrschaft 1934-39”. We began with a provocative paper by Hans Mommsen, outlining the significance to the Nazi leaders, especially Hitler, of the ideological/religious struggle. This was followed by a sound examination by Gerhard Ringshausien of the various resistance movements, and the differing interpretations of their activities and motives in the writings of both their contemporaries and of subsequent generations of historians. If the early analyses were dominated by the accounts of the National Conservative resistance members, especially the German officer corps, (Fabian Schlabrendorff, Offiziere gegen Hitler, 1946), and by the eschatological interpretation of Nazism (J.Neuhausler, Kreuz und Hakenkreuz, 1946), these were followed in the 1950s by the more differentiated picture drawn by Gerhard Ritter in his biography of Carl Goerdeler, who was certainly motivated by the need to defend an ethical system derived from the Christian faith, but also by his loathing of tyranny. In the 1970s and 1980s, with the ascendancy of the social sciences, there was a far greater stress on a sociological analysis of the resistance movement. But this in turn attracted considerable criticism from such historians as Klemens v.Klemperer and Peter Hoffmann, who insist of the importance of the religious and moral motivations of those individuals who took up arms against the Nazi regime. Klaus Mallmann (Universitat Essen) delivered an interesting paper on the Gestapo and the Churches. The evidence contained in the regularly compiled Berichte uber die weltanschauliche Lage im Reich, shows that already from 1934, the Gestapo regarded the churches as one of the most serious opponents of the Nazi state. Their powers were thus used to undertake an escalating persecution of all the churches, restrained only by various tactical considerations, as during the war-time period. But as Robert Gellately has shown, they skilfully made use of the information relayed by informants or through denunciations, and successfully infiltrated a substantial number of church assemblies, including the Fulda Bishops’ Conference, as well as exploiting numerousVertrauensmanner, quite often retired priests.Julius Schoeps’ paper on “Nationalsozialismus als politische Religion” traced the arguments in his book with this title (PhiloVerlag), and caused a lively discussion. He argued that Nazism could only really be properly understood if one acknowledged its religious dimensions, derived from the volkisch roots of Nazism combined with the exaltation of the nation. Hans Mommsen was critical of the application of the word “religion” to describe Nazism and suggested that the movement was better understood as an ideological cult. But what constitutes “religion”? One key aspect not addressed here were the various schools of German theology which certainly played a significant role in the churches’understanding and response to Nazism. The conference gained from the broader perspective provided by analyses of church responses outside Germany. Karl Schwarz (U of Vienna) described the tensions between the highly articulate Protestant minority in Austria and the Roman Catholic majority. While Austrian Catholics generally supported the Standesstaat ideology of the Austrian Republic, Austrian Protestants were frequently enthusiastic proponents of the Nazi regime after 1933.Clearly both groups supported the Anschluss in 1938. However,the idea of a Grossdeutschland under Nazi leadership appeared to elicit more enthusiasm from the Protestants. Referring to HansMommsen’s thesis of a radicalization of the Nazi movement from1938, Schwarz noted that Austria was an important laboratory, where the deconfessionalization of public life was carried out with even greater rigour when compared to the anti-clerical measures enacted before 1938 in Germany. And this pattern was to be continued in occupied Poland in 1939. Andrew Chandler (George Bell Institute, Birmingham, UK) read a fine paper on “The Attitude of the British Churches towards the political and church situation in Germany”, making clear that theBritish churches became ever more critical of the Nazi regime from 1933 onwards. They quickly identified the dangers of totalitarianism and atheism, and totally rejected the ethos of violence and racism. On the other hand, the British church leaders were reluctant to interfere in another church’s affairs, and were also subject to the mood of appeasement widespread at the time. During the Sudeten crisis of September 1938, most churches held special services with prayers for divine guidance. Neville Chamberlain’s apparent success in securing an agreement with Hitler seemed to justify such hopes. However, the pogrom of November 1938 and the German occupation of Bohemia and Moravia in March 1939 led to a complete disillusionment with the Nazi state.A similar response was to be seen in the North American churches, as reported by John Conway. Here too the churches were strongly inclined to a pacifist stance which went hand in hand with American isolationism. In the initial years of the Nazi dictatorship the Lutheran church press in America was sympathetic towards the Nazi regime, and there was even a tendency to accept the apologies of the Nazi propagandists who presented the Nazi regime as a bastion of Christian anti-Communist morality. But from 1934, opposition to the Nazi regime grew considerably,especially notably over the imprisonment of Martin Niemoller in1937. Prominent journals such as the Christian Century rightly noted that the Nazi attacks on Christians and Jews were companion evils. The church was therefore called to a simultaneous (and unprecedented) support of the persecuted Jews, as well as of their own members. However the call for a militant stand against Nazism was weakened by a tendency to believe that Nazi actions were not due to Hitler but to the radical wing of the party. Many North Americans also supported the appeasement policies of the British and French governments until the pogrom of November 1938. Thereafter their moral outrage at such events outweighed the lingering desire to uphold a pacifist stance, and hence these churches were ready to take up arms again in 1939-41in defence of both democracy and God. In his introductory remarks, Gerhard Besier had stressed the needt o take more seriously the theological aspects of the Church Struggle. However, it was disappointing that more of these did not emerge during the proceedings. I would have liked to see more attention given to the Roman Catholic Church’s part in the Church Struggle. As the devil’s advocate, Doris Bergen raised the questionas to why the Church Struggle is studied with such care when the Church seemed to be relatively powerless to affect the course of events. This occasioned considerable discussion about the role of the historian in making moral judgements. It was argued that,s ince the Church had played such a formative role in European history, the reasons for its eclipse and decline in power were especially worthy of study. Moreover, as a central component of the European intellectual tradition, the fate of the Christian faithmust remain a central concern of historians.

Greg Munro, Catholic University, Brisbane, Australia

2) The latest issue of Kirchliche Zeitgechichte 1997/2 has anumber of articles relating to our field of interest, which will repay close scrutiny. It also contains the texts of papers given in English by two of Gerhard Besier’s younger colleagues, Gerhard Lindemann and Christian Binder at last year’s meeting of the German Studies Association on Christians of Jewish Descent in the Nazi Period, and their regrettable treatment by the local church authorities. Bob Ericksen contributes a thoughtful commentary.

3a) Gottfried Beck, Die Bistumspresse in Hessen und der Nationalsozialismus 1930-1941,(Vervffentlichungen der Kommission für Zeitgeschichte, Reihe B:Forschungen, Bd 72)Paderborn: Ferdinand Schvningh 1996. 478 pp DM (This review appeared in the Catholic Historical Review, Vol LXXXIV, no1, January 1998, 139-41.) The German Catholic Commission for Contemporary History is continuing its well-established custom of publishing dissertations by young Catholic scholars, whose work is thereby given the extra prestige of appearing in this excellently-edited and finely-produced series of research studies. But, as before, readers should be aware that the overall theme is to provide an apologetic defence of Catholic policies during the Nazi era. Gottfried Beck has examined in depth the weekly Catholic press published in the region of Hesse, covering the three dioceses of Limburg, Fulda and Mainz. He thereby supplements the various studies of a similar character for other areas of Germany, and provides another mosaic stone to the picture already built up. His stance is basically to reject both the hagiographical approach adopted in the immediate post-war years, and the highly critical attacks of foreigners who saw the Catholic press as no more than a willing instrument for the propagation of pro-Nazi ideas. Instead he begins his account in 1930 in order to show the ambivalence ofthe Catholic editors during the downfall of the Weimar Republic. Despite a clear repudiation of Nazi ideological and political radicalism – most firmly expressed by the Bishop of Mainz, Ludwig Hugo – nevertheless there was an awareness that democratic republicanism was unable to provide strong government, and hence a certain sympathy for the Nazi goal of authoritarian leadership. In 1933 these editors shared most of the illusions about the nature of the new regime, and about the Concordat signed in July. The bishops’ reversal in late March on the question of Catholics joining the Nazi Party only added to the confusion. Previous reservations about the Nazis’ extreme nationalism and totalitarian ambitions were abandoned in view of the general euphoria, The shock and dismay at the rapidly implemented regulations issued by Goebbels’ new Ministry of Propaganda were therefore all the more devastating. The Catholic press now found itself “gleichgeschaltet” and subject to arbitrary interventions or prohibitions. Beck rightly notes that the Catholic reaction was one of bewilderment and lack of purposeful planning. The editors’ determination to combat Rosenberg’s campaign for the “new heathendom” was matched by their desire not to be branded as traitors to the new vision of national renewal. Unwilling to admit that the wishful thinking of the Concordat had been a mistake, the church leaders were unable torally their followers to the kind of outright opposition expressed towards the governments of the Soviet Union, Spain or Mexico. On the other hand, a conformist approach seemed to offer the best hope of preventing increased regulation or interference. Beck provides a plethora of examples of how these editors steered a careful line, and increasingly how they (and their readers) were obliged to “read between the lines”. But such compromises availed them little, and on fact only revealed the Catholics ‘dilemma more clearly. Reticence and abstention became the tone for their utterances on the Nazis’ most radical measures, such as the discrimination against and persecution of the Jews. The bishops’ hesitant lead, even in defending Catholic rights, such as in the field of education, was faithfully followed by the church press. The whole sad story is meticulously laid out from the examples here provided. To be sure, some editors sought to adopt a defensive position, rather than give away hostages to fortune, But their influence was progressively diminished, and their continued readiness to uphold their belief in the state and its powers, including their support of the war effort after 1939, only furtherc ompromised their stance. Beck does not claim that his study of Hesse breaks new ground. This regional press in fact differed little from that of other areas. But his thorough analysis of the editorial utterances is a useful addition to our general knowledge. His conclusion, with hindsight, that the failure to confront the evils of Nazism more forcibly owed much to the continuity of Catholic attitudes from the1920s with its disapproval of democratic liberalism is certainly correct but only reinforces the view that German Catholics were caught up in an ambivalent and ultimately morally disastrous conflict of loyalties. His claim that the church press should be recognised as having played a significant role in resisting Naziideological pretensions is in line with the view adopted by other authors in this series of volumes. But even so, the general failure of German Catholics to take a stand against this nefarious government and its atrocities cannot be denied. The record is a sobering example of the weakness of religious convictions when confronted by the criminal acts of a totalitarian regime. JSC

3b) Vinson Synan, The Holiness-Pentecostal Tradition. Charismatic Movements in the Twentieth Century. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans 1997 340pp $25. US Dean Vinson Synan has recently issued an updated revision of his scholarly treatment of the Pentecostalist movement, which first appeared in 1971. In view of the enormous and rapid spread of this form of Christian witness during the last three decades, this new account is most welcome. In Synan’s view, Pentecostalism has now grown out of its impulsive beginnings to become a firmly established tradition, which deserves to be taken more seriously as it moves along the spectrum discerned by Troeltsch from an irrelevant sect to a major church. Synan seeks to anchor the Pentecostalists firmly in the earlier experience of the “baptism in the Holy Spirit” which indeed was part of the public liturgy for at least eight centuries after the Day of Pentecost. It also owes much to both Catholic and Anglican mystical traditions. But, above all, Synan shows that its formative influence derives from John Wesley and the kind of holiness spirituality practised by his Methodist followers, including the famous Keswick Connection. He describes the developments in the United States during the 19th century, where an increasing populist discontent with the dominant eastern political establishment, along with a backlash among the lower classes against the liberal intellectual leadership of the churches, led to numerous attempts to return to a spontaneity of religious fervour. This historical emphasis is a useful correction for those who have regarded Pentecostalism with disdain, or as the product of an over-enthusiastic Californian extravaganza. To be sure, the scenes in the run-down shack on Azuza Street, Los Angeles in April 1906 were extraordinary enough to shock both respectable church-goers and non-believers alike. Theaccent on the “gift of tongues” and the accompanying frenzy of religious devotion were extreme even for Los Angeles, with its numberless varieties of creeds and sects. Leadership at Azuza Street was taken by a coloured preacher, W.J. Seymour, whose gifts to arouse religious enthusiasm with a stress on “speaking in tongues”would today rightly be called charismatic. By the summer’s end people of all races and nationalities were caught up in the revival, which notably ignored the colour-bar prevalent in so many other United States churches. The power and attractiveness of its enthusiasms quickly spread abroad, and led to literally thousands of similar “Spirit-filled” sects springing up around the globe. It clearly filled a need not catered to by more structured churches. The reason, Synan suggests, was that Pentecostalism was truly the child of the holiness movement which itself was the child of Methodism, all of them stressing the Wesleyan view of sanctification and Christian perfection. Synan ably traces the stages by which the Pentecostal movement managed, despite intense divisions, to become a coherent and attractive denomination. The early hostility against the “holy rollers” eventually subsided when it became apparent that Pentecostalism constituted no threat to either the political or ecclesiastical hierarchies. And within the sect, fears that any structured authority would quench the spontaneous outpouring of the Spirit gave way to a recognition of the advantages of national and even international organization. Despite the histrionics of such figures as Aimee Semple MacPherson, more moderate pastors steered the worshippers’ fervent ecstasy into worthier channels of devotion. At the same time, the warmth and sincerity of their worship services continued to attract large followings even when the first wave of preachers passed from the scene. In his final section, describing the new developments within Pentecostalism since his first edition came out, Synan outlines the various factors evident in the most recent years: first, Pentecostalism’s impact on the more established churches, including the Roman Catholic Church, through the charismatic movement, clearly resulting in a deepening of loyalty and faithfulness; second, its acceptance into middle-class educated circles, as seen in the Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship, where testimonies to the rewardsfor spirit-filled persons could be combined with upholding the American capitalist ethos; third, the widening of horizons to include fellowship with such liberal bodies as the World Council of Churches, with leadership given by David Du Plessis. In the last two decades, the astonishing and rapid spread of Pentecostal communities, first in Latin America and more latterly in the former Communist eastern Europe, produced a “third wave” of remarkable vitality. Trying to hold all these differing and sometimes divergent congregations has so far proved difficult, all the more since no clear doctrine of church discipline or authority has been agreed to. A key factor in the expansion of Pentecostalism was the appearance of unexpected waves of revival, constituting sources of both tension and growth. A recent example can be seen in the astounding phenomenon of Toronto Airport’s Vineyard Church with its “Toronto blessing”. How to maintain the revolutionary fervour of the “latter rain” movement, while at the same time making its adherents more aware of their social and political obligations, is now the prime task of Pentecostalist leaders. Even though he is certainly well aware of the dangers of fissiparous and individualistic trends within the Pentecostalist tradition, Synan optimistically concludes with the belief that “Christian affairs of the twenty-first century may be largely in the hands of surging Pentecostalist churches in the Third World and a Roman Catholicism inspired and revivified by the charismatic renewal”. JSC.

4a) Werner Ustorf, in the Journal of Religion in Africa, XXVIII, 1(1998), describes the regrettable stance taken by the leading German missiologists during the Nazi period towards the planned reversion of former German colonies and the impact on the missions there. He analyses the overlapping areas of contiguity between the missions and the Nazi racial attitudes, giving examples of the behaviour of Walter Freytag and other leading figures.

4b) Martin Greschat, in Pastoraltheologie Vol 87 (1998) outlines the contribution of Protestantism to the development of European Unity after 1945, concentrating on the German, Dutch, French and Scandinavian churches, as well as the ecumenical bodies such as the Conference of European Churches and the World Council. He describes the dilemma for the churches as to how to be both relevant and credible in these new pan-European structures without being captivated by any of the prevailing political ideological campaigns.

With every best wish

John S.Conway

Dear Friends,
I am pleased to let you know that I have been appointed the J.B. Smallman
Distinguished Visiting Professor in the Department of History at the
University of Western Ontario for the first half of the next academic year.
So Ann and I will be leaving for London, Ontario at the end of August until
Christmas. Just what the implications for this Newsletter are as yet unclear.
I shall hope to establish an E-mail connection through the University of
Western Ontario, and will also try to arrange to have messages forwarded from
here. But there may be some unavoidable interruptions or delays, for which I
apologise in advance. But perhaps, in return, there may be a chance to see
some of you in Ontario or nearby while I am there. That would be a
welcome opportunity for me. It would also help if I could prepare Newsletter
material in advance. I therefore repeat my invitation to you all to send in
comments or contributions. I would also like to ask those who have books out
for review (Fraser, Bergen, Ericksen, Friedrichs) to let me have your copy as
soon as possible. In the meanwhile the June issue will come to you a week
late as I have to be in Munich for a conference on the German Church Struggle,
on which I will report later. By contrast, I will try and get the September
issue off to you before I leave Vancouver. JSC
Contents: 1) Pius XII and the Jews 2) The Hidden Encyclical 3) Conference
proceedings: Amer. Cath.Hist. Ass. 4) Conference announcement – Holocaust and
Reconciliation 5) Book reviews – Raabe, SED Staat und katholische Kirche –
Sugate, Japanese Christians
1) Pius XII and the Jews: Considerable comment, with a wide range of opinion,
not much of it historical, has reached me about the recent Vatican
statement which was reviewed here last month. On the one side, several Jewish
commentators treated the document sceptically, showing an unwillingness to
believe that the Catholic Church, after so many centuries, could really be
changing its doctrinal stance. Others expressed disappointment that
the statement did not go far enough. But Rabbi Mark Shook of St Louis,
Missouri is surely right to say that “our expectations must be focussed on
the possible, not the impossible. No Pope will allow for open and frank
criticism of a predecessor. There is too much theology and church history
concerning the role of the pope to allow for critical review of one pope by
another.. . .This is not the end of the process. We need to give the church
time and space to allow reflection to continue. In a mere generation, the
Catholic Church has swept away the shadow of prejudice and ignorance from its
official pronouncements on Jews and Judaism. How long will it take before the
sweeping reaches down to the pew?” On the Christian side, opinion was also
mixed. The leadingU.S. Catholic journal, America, commented that “the
document reflected two concerns – to defend the Church against calumny and to
express repentance. The defensive motif predominates. . . .The horrors of the
Holocaust are attributed not to religious anti-Judaism but to nationalism and
racism hostile to both Christianity andJudaism alike. This leaves unsettled
how far religious prejudice nourished secular antisemitism. “John Paul II has
frequently deplored the Holocaust but has been reticent in speaking of
the church’s responsibility.” We shall have to wait for a further
personal pronouncement expected during the coming jubilee year. Kenneth
Woodward, writing in Newsweek on this topic “in defence of Pius XII” claimed
that “No one person, Hitler excepted, was responsible for the Holocaust. And
no one person, Pius XII included, could have prevented it. It’s time to lay
off this pope.” In Britain, the leading church historian Sir Owen
Chadwick,who has written extensively about the Papacy, believed the document
was inadequate, since “No one can be convincingly repentant about someone
else’s crimes – or in this case someone else’s failure to resist crime as
bravely as they should. If they cannot be convincing by the nature of the
exercise, the words will sound hollow, and hollow words are better not
spoken. . . . Nothing that anyone could ever say in the way of apology or
sorrow in repentance can ever be adequate; anything that is said is bound
to be resented. If you wish to avoid resentment (which is a good thing to
avoid), say nothing. . . History is much too complex to be painted with a
brush that daubs a few crude red or purple lines. The legends are a daub,
you cannot refute them with a different daub, they cannot be covered up by
shovelling on whitewash. The only thing that corrects them is more history
and that takes time.” Whatever the merits or otherwise of such declarations
of repentance – which are surely more appropriate than the
former triumphalism – they are no substitute for historical research.
But Chadwick is right, that takes time. How many scholars have in factfully
absorbed the 11 volumes of the Actes et documents relatifs ala seconde
guerre mondiale? These are an indispensable place to start for historians of
Pius XII and his diplomacy, even if sometimes, as recently in the Tablet, a
lady journalist used these in a highly apologetic manner only.. But see also
H.Favre’s highly critical analysis of these documents, L’eglise catholique
face aufascisme et au nazisme – reviewed here in Newsletter no 7,
August1995.JSC

2) Frank Coppa has contributed, in The Catholic Historical Review, January
1998, vol LXXXIV, no 1, pp 63-72,. a valuable guide to the “reception” of the
“Hidden Encyclical” of1939 in analysing the various books and articles which
have recently appeared on this topic.

3) The American Catholic Historical Association held its spring meeting at
Marian College, Indianapolis on March 27-28th. Of particular relevance to
members of this list were three panels. The first examined “Priests and
Pastors in the Third Reich” and included a paper by Doris Bergen, who asked
whether theWehrmacht chaplains were Christian soldiers or Nazi priests. Using
two examples, one Protestant and one Catholic, Bergen demonstrated that
German military chaplains responded to the demands of their tasks in various
ways, from adopting soldierly ways to identify with their comrades at the
front to appealing (ultimately in vain) to army officers to prevent the
killing of Jewish children. Bergen exploited the records of the Reich Ministry
of Church Affairs to argue that the complex selection process produced
military chaplains who were generally older, more nationalist clergymen.
Members of the Confessing Church, other independent-minded clergy and
aggressive “German Christians” were all screened out. Bergen concluded that
“the moderate nature of many chaplains” made the service “an effective vehicle
for legitimization of the Nazi regime”. John Delaney contributed a paper which
examined the role of Catholic priests in “opposing Nazi anti-Polish racial
policy measures directed at Bavarian peasants”. By inviting Poles,
mainly forced labour recruits on Bavarian farms, to Mass, including them in
the local spiritual community, giving them small gifts and instructing
parishioners “to treat Polish fellow-Catholics as co-religionists, not
‘sub-human racial threats'”, parish priests demonstrated a high level of
leadership (in the absence of support from the ecclesiastical
leadership). Kyle Jantzen gave a paper on the politics of pastoral
appointments in the German Church Struggle. Arguing that local church
history often fails to correspond with the high church politics of the
Naziera, Jantzen used the example of pastoral appointments in
Nauen (Brandenburg) to illustrate how parish patrons, local
political authorities, parish clergy, lay leaders, district synods and
Land church authorities combined to appoint pastors. As they engaged in this
process, local clergy and laity enjoyed ” a significant range of freedom in
which to act” and displayed the willingness to articulate practical and
ideological grievances against potential pastors.The second panel of note
dealt with the Catholic responses to war, and included a paper by Frank
Buscher of the Christian Brothers University (and Canadian Department of
Justice, Crimes against Humanity and War Crimes Section). Buscher detailed
the work of Cardinal Josef Frings in dealing with the German refugees
from 1945-1955, demonstrating the dilemma Frings and others faced between many
refugees’ desire to return to their former homes, their frustration with a
prolonged existence in temporary camps, and the difficulties of integrating
them into post-war Germany. A third panel had an interesting contribution by
Jose M. Sanchez on Pius XII, which took a different approach to the question
of that pope’s response to Nazism and the Holocaust. Rather than an austere
monarch of the church, Sanchez argued that Pius was infact a shy but warm
personality, a lonely man in a lonely job, who simply wasn’t prepared for the
crises he faced. Hampered by his diplomatic background and his habit of
looking at both sides of every problem, Pius did not have the confidence or
experience to be the pastor that the Roman Catholic Church needed in World War
Two. (Ed.note: This last sentence should surely be questioned. Pius had every
confidence, as well as the experience, in his own abilities as a diplomat.
Whether these were the right qualities at that juncture is still a matter of
debate.) (Contributed by Kyle Jantzen, Saskatoon)

4) The 5th Biennial Conference on Christianity and the Holocaust will be held
from October 18-19th at the Princeton Marriott Forrestal Village, at which
such leading figures as Cardinal Cassidy, Professor Martin Stoehr, President
of the InternationalCouncil of Christians and Jews, Rabbi Leon Kienecki, and
Dr John Gager, Princeton, will be the principal speakers. Contact:
Dr H.Kornberg, Rider University, Lawrenceville, New Jersey =HOLCTR@Rider.edu

5a) Thomas Raabe, SED-Staat und katholische Kirche. Politische Beziehungen
1949-1961. Paderborn: Schoeningh. 294 pp. DM 64.(This review appeared in
German History, Vol 16, no1, 1998,138-9) Historians of the churches in the
former German Democratic Republic have usually ignored the fate of the
Catholics for two reasons: they were only a minority in the predominantly
(at least nominally) Protestant land of Luther, and they kept a carefully low
profile, adopting a reticence without taking a stance for or against the
Communist government. Their history seemed therefore uninteresting. Thomas
Raabe’s dissertation makes use of the newly-available documents of the
unlamented regime to clarify its policies towards the Catholics during its
first twelve years, when its ideological class warriors attacked the
“reactionary” remnant of this “mediaeval survival” as part of its campaign to
overthrow all traces of the past and all institutional links with the Vatican
or the outer world. At the same time he seeks to outline what was the Catholic
Church’s response to this virulent onslaught. His findings are elegantly and
scholarly presented, and have therefore been included in the prestigious
series of research studies produced by the Catholic Commission for
Contemporary History, of which this is now the sixtieth to appear. The book
is well edited, has full footnotes and bibliography and has been kept to a
readable length. Raabe’s study is essentially one of an embattled
church, which had already undergone severe institutional repression at
the hands of the Nazis. In fact, German Catholics, ever since Bismarck’s days,
have seen themselves as a threatened minority trying to uphold the integrity
of their faith and witness when confronted with the challenge of state power,
whether in the Protestant-led imperial period, the racist-dominated Nazi era,
or now in the explicitly atheistic-materialist communist G.D.R. The Catholic
strategy had been to concentrate on the pastoral life of its parishes, to
strengthen the spiritual resources of its own following against all heretical
deviations, and to circumvent political confrontations where possible. This
strategy seemed to have worked well under the Nazis, enabling the church
leaders after1945 to claim that they had been victimised by the regime,
and hence to avoid direct responsibility for any Catholic collaboration. It
was only natural that a similar strategy should be advocated in the no less
turbulent early years of the G.D.R. Raabe succinctly describes how, in the
immediate post-war period, the Soviet military authorities adopted a
benevolent attitude towards all the churches, and their communist
lackeys similarly declared their support for all “anti-fascist
democratic forces”. But, even though the new G.D.R.’s constitution in
1949 enunciated high-sounding principles of religious freedom, the practice
was very different. In the 1950s the governing party, theSED, refused to
recognise the legitimacy of the 1933 Concordat, and disallowed any legal
appeals against its regulations. Catholic social, educational and welfare
institutions were in great part suppressed, and the regime launched an
intensive campaign to propagate the “inevitable” victory of Socialism. All
this is already well known, though Raabe is able to add a particular
Catholic perspective on these campaigns. The novel part of this book consists
of six case studies of how various Catholic institutions sought to protect
their autonomy during this repressive period. Raabe make good and
informative use of the surviving party and church records to show the
regime’s intransigent and belligerent intentions. However, already by
1953, and largely because of Soviet pressure, this headlong onslaught was
recognised as counter-productive. More time would be needed to root out all
ties to the Catholic church, so a more pragmatic tactical approach was to be
preferred. After 1961, increased efforts were made by the Stasi to infiltrate
the church’s activities, not without some success. But, in the earlier
period, the atmosphere was one of provocative confrontation, with numerous but
largely unsuccessful remonstrances by the church authorities. Because these
aggressive policies were formulated by the highly-centralized state
apparatus, and responded to by the Catholic bishops acting together and
forbidding any local initiatives by their priests, Raabe’s account rightly
describes events from the top downwards. We still need additional accounts of
how matters turned out on the local level. As a coherent strategy,
the Catholic response ensured survival, though with drastically reduced impact
outside the church’s immediate surroundings. Its doctrinal position was not
undermined by “fellow-travellers” in its own ranks, except for one lone
maverick priest. The price was however high. The church lost the battle over
the so-called “Youth Dedication”, an increasing proportion of the population
was alienated, and the church’s ranks were steadily reduced. Raabe’s
competent study gives a good picture of the SED’s convoluted policies, which
have already been documented in numerous works on the fate of the Protestant
churches. He rightly notes that the Catholic bishops were always more
sceptical and reticent than some of their Protestant counterparts. As
one dignitary trenchantly noted: “We live in a house whose foundations we did
not build, and whose structures we can only regard as false”. This insight
was however not enough to outweigh the persecution and pressures of the
totalitarian regime. By the 1980s only a remnant remained. But in the end the
Catholic church survived to live another day. JSC

5b) Alan Sugate. (with the assistance of Yamano Shigeko), Japanese Christians
and Society, Bern, New York: Peter Lang,1996 285pp ISBN 3-906755-84-3 This
work represents a break-through in English language book-length studies of
Japanese Christianity. Apart from a few articles, most works have dealt with
what be called the official side of Japanese Christianity, the “political” or
“ideological” record of the movement as seen from the outside. Here, through
a collaboration between an English and a Japanese scholar, we are able to
delve more deeply into the record and to see it from the inside. Thus the
writers are able to identify an element that they admit is a minority,
marginal to the movement as a whole, even looked on with “hostility . . .in
their struggle for the quality of social life in Japan”. Yet this is a
significant minority which has made a surprising impact on the society as a
whole, whether by themselves or “in concert with . . non-Christian
compatriots whenever common ground was possible” (13) Japanese Christianity is
itself a minority – never increasing to more than about one percent of the
total population – but it is the minority described by Sugate and Yamano that
gives the overall movement its cutting edge. Following an introductory
chapter which offers an interpretation of Japanese society as a whole, the
book proceeds to define and describe the important ideological nature of the
Tenno system. When Japan opened itself to the West in the mid-19th century, it
developed a constitution centred around the person of its ruler, a figure who
was seen as both a monarch and a priest. Not only did this monarch rule by
divine right, as in pre-civil war England, but he was himself in some sense
divine, the ultimate source of authority and power in the nation. This divine
nature was expressed in the ruler’s title. Tenno, usually translated
as ‘Emperor’ but used untranslated here because “the term ‘Tenno’ implies
religious headship, whereas ‘Emperor’ implies primarily a political headship”
(8) The various elites which dominated society- bureaucrats, both civil and
military, industrial and financial concerns and politicians – drew their
authority from the supremehead, and therefore considered that their power
could not be challenged. This constitution was abolished after Japan’s defeat
in 1945 and a new constitution established in which the emperor was seen as
the “symbol” of the people’s power. Nevertheless, the powerful elites, which
continued even after defeat (and whose power has been increased
astronomically by Japan’s ‘economic miracle’) havebeen pushing steadily and
with some success to restore the pre-war status of the Tenno and with it,
their own power to run the nation. This book describes the ‘machinations’ of
these ‘elephants’ (13) and the way in which the ‘ants’ (i.e. the Christian
minority and their allies in secular society) have struggled to maintain and
promote a juster and more democratic and humane society. In nine chapters the
authors describe with detailed documentation the revival of State Shinto (the
religious foundation of the Tenno system), the oppression of the
workforce, environmental pollution, discrimination against minorities and
the struggle for peace, all problems exacerbated by the revival of the Tenno
system. The book ends with a chapter of reflections. The authors have written
this study, not just to educate but to challenge Christians in the West.
According to the writers, the latter need to do two things. “First they
should listen to those Christian voices [which are raising the challenges in
Japan] and give them understanding and support. . . Secondly, they should
consider to what extent they are prepared to ask themselves critical
questions about their own societies, and act accordingly.” (250) We in
the West need to reflect on our own record when it comes to questions like
discrimination and imperialism (particularly as it takes its contemporary
trans-national form). Confronting social problems has led Japanese
Christians to review critically their traditional theology of “the life,
death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and therefore the very nature of
God” (256). In confronting the “immanental” nature of the Tenno system, they
have been led to emphasise the transcendence of God,underlining the crucial
distinction between God’s sovereignty and human power. The suffering of
oppressed minorities like the Koreans and the outcast communities has given
them a fuller understanding of the Cross: the suffering and self-emptying
of Christ. Thus they strive to go beyond a liberal social-gospel type of
activism to develop a living theology which will serve to enlighten the whole
Christian movement, not only in Japan but throughout the world. A book well
worth reading. Cyril Powles, Vancouver.

With best wishes
John S.Conway

Dear Friends,

On the occasion of this, the 40th, issue of this Newsletter, I amglad to report to you that, as of today, we now have 200 subscribers world-wide, from Western Australia to PolandI have been much gratified by the expressions of appreciation made by several of you whom I have met in recent weeks, and only hope there will be some future opportunity for more of us to meet each other personally. Since this Newsletter was conceived originally as a post-retirement project, I am not sure how long I can continue, but your enthusiastic support has been a great encouragement. In the meantime, let me repeat my invitation to send in contributions which may be of interest to other members. These will be most welcome.

Congratulations are due to our list-member, Jonathan Vance, who has been awarded the $5000 Dafoe Book Prize for his book “Death So Noble”, published by UBC Press, and reviewed here lastSeptember, Vol III, no 9. Contents: 1) Editorial: Vatican Document on the Shoah and Letter to the Editor 2) Scholars’ Conference, Seattle, Feb-March 1998 3) Holocaust Conference, Notre Dame, April 1998 4) Book reviews: Religion in Russia J Burgess, East German Church 5) Journal article: Confessional Cultures 1945 6) Bonhoeffer Society publication

1) Editorial: On March 16th, the Vatican issued an important Statement: “We Remember: A theological reflection on the Shoah”, which is designed to “heal the wounds of p ast misunderstandings and injustices” between Christians and Jews. This document, as printed in the New York Times, is clearly not a historical treatise, still less an attempt at Vergangenheitsbewaltigung, but a call for “serious reflection on the events of the Shoah”.. I can forward the full text to anyone who writes to ask for it. The first section expresses sympathy for the unspeakable tragedy which befell the Jewish people, to which “the Church cannot remain indifferent”. The third section acknowledges that “in the Christian world, erroneous and unjust interpretations of the New Testament regarding the Jewish people have circulated for far too long”, but points to their total and definitive rejection by the Second Vatican Council. At the same time, the rise of secular racism, as exploited by the Nazis, and condemned by the Church, showed a “definite hatreddirected at God himself”. “The Shoah was thus the work of a thoroughly neo-pagan regime”. But, on the other hand, was the Nazi persecution of the Jews “made easier by the anti-Judaic prejudices imbedded in some Christian minds and hearts?” “Any response to this question must take into account that we are dealing with the history of people’s attitudes . . . Did Christians give every possible assistance to those being persecuted, and in particular the persecuted Jews? Many did, but others did not. During and after the war, Jewish communities and Jewish leaders expressed their thanks for all that had been done for them, including what Pope Pius XII did personally or through his representatives to save hundreds of thousands of Jewish lives . . . Unfortunately the governments of some western nations of Christian tradition, including some in North and South America, were more than hesitant to open their borders to the persecuted Jews. . . Nevertheless . . . the spiritual resistance and concrete actions of other Christians was not that which might have been expected from Christ’s followers. We deeply regret the errors and failings of these sons and daughters of the Church. . . This is an act of repentance (‘Teshuva’) . . . the Church approaches with deep respect and great compassion the experience of extermination, the Shoah, suffered by the Jewish people during World War II . . . . We wish to turn awareness of past sins into a firm resolve to build a new future in which there will be no more anti- Judaism among Christians or anti-Christian sentiment among Jews”. Such laudable feelings summarize, in fact, what Pope JohnPaul II has been saying for several years. His condemnation of racist antisemitism, his repudiation of Christian anti-Judaism, his deep sorrow for the sufferings of the Shoah, and his desire to promote the Church’s “very close bonds of spiritual kinship with the Jewish people” are here repeated with added force. The initial reactions, however, from the Jewish side, according to press reports, remain sceptical. In particular, theabsence of any more extended treatment of the actual policies of the Vatican during the time of the Shoah, let alone any hintthat Pope Pius XII might have got his priorities wrong – pursuingpeace through diplomacy, rather than protest against persecution -(see below) will still leave many observers, and not only Jews, unsatisfied. The claim that Pius and his representatives rescued”hundred of thousands” is questionable. Hundreds were undoubtedly assisted to take refuge, and Papal interventions may have delayed, rather than prevented, the Jewish tragedy in such countries as Roumania or Hungary. But the document does not provide the evidence for such large figures. On the other hand, the kind of wishful thinking, which still believes that the Pope, had he protested loudly enough, would have been able to prevent the Holocaust entirely, as was voiced in the debate about the so-called”lost” Encyclical of 1939, is still with us and is surely wrong-headed. So too the complete absence in the Statement of any reference to the Land of Israel, or acknowledgement of the Jewish view of the indissolubility of the bond between Land and People, will leave others unsatisfied. But it is to be hoped that this evidence of a sincere desire for repentance and improved relations between Christians and Jews will serve to dispel some lingering prejudices and induce all Christians to reflect more deeply on the “ungekundigte Bund” which links both communities together, not least in a common resolve never to allow such events as the Shoah to happen again. JSC

Letter to the Editor:

Dear John, At the June 1975 International Conference on theHolocaust in Hamburg, Pinchas Lapide [author of The Last Three Popes and the Jews (London 1967)] (who recently died) told me that his estimate of 860,000 Jews saved through secret Vatican diplomacy during the Second World War was based on six month’s research in the Yad Vashem Holocaust archive in Jerusalem. In the interest of fairness, and since it is too little known, Pius XII’s own account of his actions and motives is to be found in his 30 April 1943 letter to Bishop Preysing of Berlin, which is printed int he Actes et Documents du Saint Siege, Vol 2, and in German translation in Die Briefe Pius XII an die deutsche Bischoefe 1939-1946, document no 105, German ed. p.235-242. It is unfair to judge any man without considering his own account of his actions, if one is available. Also deserving of mention, because of historical significance, is the fact that 80% of Italy’s Jews survived the Holocaust. In the face of six million dead, no one can claim that enough was done. To claim, however, that nothing was done – or that the failure to do more was the result of indifference, cynicism, or cowardice – is a grave falsification of history. Sincerely, John J. Hughes, St Loius, Missouri..

2) It was a particular pleasure to attend the 28th Scholars’ Conference on the Holocaust and the Churches at the University of Washington at the beginning of March. This annual event, which has been under the genial guidance of Professor Franklin Littell and his wife Marcie since its beginnings in 1970, brings together both Jewish and Christian scholars to discuss the implications oft he Holocaust for both religious communities. So it was great to meet so many old friends there, and to see how many of them are also subscribers to this Newsletter. This year, special sessions were devoted to the churches during the Nazi era. An excellent plenary session was given over to the policies of Pope Pius XII. John Pawlikowski explored Pius ‘development of Catholic social teachings, which sought to overcome the long tradition of opposition to democracy and liberalism, and posed the question as to how far this influenced his attitude towards the Jewish victims of Nazism. He also repeated his call for more opening of archives, which would surely give us a broader picture of the Vatican’s stance during these turbulent years. Jacques Kornberg, Toronto, outlined clearly the Holy See’s reactions to the earlier genocides of the Armenians, the Ethiopians, and the Catholic Poles after the Nazi onslaught began in 1939. In each case, the Popes were outraged, but their interpretation of Catholic interests led to them to keep silence, lest their authority should be challenged, and possibly weakened. The Vatican’s response to the Holocaust followed a similar path. It was only afterwards that expectations were heightened about how Pius XII should have acted, though the advocates of this view have rarely thought through the implications of their desire for a more forceful Papal intervention in political affairs. I was asked to speak on the Pope’s political priorities, and sought to outline his overwhelming concern for peace, his preservation of a strict impartiality, and his desire to play the role of mediator to bring the murderous hostilities to an end. To be sure, this policy which had been established already in the first world war under Benedict XV, Pius’ mentor, was not successful, and can be criticised for its illusions about the effectiveness of the Holy See’s influence. But it was a noble and worthy ideal, even if it was doomed to be thwarted by the power politics of all the combatants. So too, the Vatican’s heartfelt efforts to assist the victims of the war were to prove too limited, but should not be dismissed as totally insignificant. Later, we had a splendid session devoted to church policies, when we heard six papers on a variety of topics. Outstanding was the presentation by Jolene Chu, a member of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, on their fate in Ravensbruck concentration camp, as also a paper by Victoria Barnett on the ecumenical movement’s efforts to find aconsensus on opposing Nazism. Haim Genizi, Israel, read a mosti nteresting paper on a leading figure in the Canadian United Church, describing both his efforts to help Jewish refugees, as well as his subsequent opposition to Zionism after 1945. These were useful contributions to show the variety of Christian responses to the unprecedented challenge of totalitarian ferocity as exhibited during the Nazi era

.3) A major conference on The Impact of the Holocaust, with a distinguished and international cast of speakers, will be held at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana on 26-28th April. More information can be obtained from Center for Continuing Education, Box 1008, Notre Dame, Indiana 46556

4) Book reviews:

a) John Anderson. Religion, state and politics in the Soviet Unionand successor states. Cambridge: University Press, 1994. xi,236 pp. $54.95 hardback, $18.95 paper. ed. Michael Bourdeaux. The Politics of Religion in Russia and the new states of Eurasia. (The International Politics of Eurasia,Volume 3) Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe Inc., 1995. xiii, 321pp. $49.95 hardback, $19.95 paper. (This review appeared in Canadian-American Slavic Studies, Vol 30, no.2-4, 1996) Keston College, formerly in Kent, now in Oxford, has long been the most significant centre in the west for research into religion in communist lands. The authors of these books have made extensive use of its resources, and supplemented these in more recent years by at least partial access to archives in Russia itself, such as those of the Council for Religious Affairs and the Communist Party’s Central Committee. Anderson’s brisk and workman-like study deals with the making of religious policy in the Soviet Union from the death of Stalin to the overthrow of the regime. Much of the story lies hidden behind the complex and often competing strata of the Soviet bureaucracy, whose policy-making was exceedingly opaque and secretive. Nevertheless he rightly detects an on-going conflict between “fundamentalists” and “pragmatists”, with the former concentrating on the ideological necessity of rooting out religious superstitions and prejudice in order to create the new Communist society, while the latter adopted a more flexible but often severeline. Khrushchev was a strong champion of the hard-liners. His attack of the late 1950s upon the churches did much damage. Church leaders were cowed into submission and administrative restrictions imposed strict limits on church life. Following Khrushchev’s fall, a reassessment under Brezhnev drew attention to the counterproductive implications of these repressive measures, and placed greater emphasis on Russia’s national heritage, including the preservation of historic church buildings. A more nuanced ideological approach attacked the simplistic notions of earlier propagandists. Complaints from believers, appealing for their rights, were at least listened to, even though the sectarian activities of illegal and unregistered church bodies, such as the “underground”Baptists, continued to be repressed. The disappearance of religion came to be regarded as a distant prospect, and the anti-religious struggle lost its priority. At the end of the 1970s, the arrival of the human rights issue on the international scene, the perceived revival of Islamic self-confidence, and the election of a Polish Pope, posed new policy questions to the Soviet leadership, which was increasingly incapable of coming up with new answers. This situation paved the way for Gorbachev’s more radical rethinking in the 1980s. Particular difficulties arose from the strength of religious attachments in such areas as Lithuania and Central Asia. Concern that religious revitalization might lead to nascent nationalist strivings was widely expressed, but little was achieved to head off such dangers. The attempts by Andropov, a former head of the KGB, in the early ’80s to clamp down on nationalism, religion and dissent, in fact, only demonstrated the regime’s limitations. Not only the desire to polish up the patriotic image of the Soviet state, but the need to impress foreign churchmen, led to ambivalent policies, and did little to satisfy either foreign critics abroad or religious communities at home, despite intrusive and extensive moves to suborn the clergy to the regime’s wishes. It remained for Gorbachev to realise that repression of all non-conformity was unacceptable and inefficient. His motives, and those of the bureaucracy which backed him, were clearly designed to harness the energy and powers of religious communities behind the state’s secular purposes of economic and political reform. At such a time “opium” had its uses. As could be seen during the 1988 celebrations of the millenium of the adoption of Christianity, the regime tried to mobilize religious and nationalist sentiments for its own ends. But, in essence, perestroika was unstoppable. By the end of 1990, the Soviet anti-religious onslaught had been abandoned. Seventy years of persecution and repression had failed in its purpose, even though it left a difficult legacy of antagonism, suspicion and intrigue – problems which still remain to be dealt with. Relations between the new Russian state and its religious communities are still tangled, when the memories and recriminations of the past era overlap with the Orthodox Church’s view of itself as the upholder of Russia’s national traditions. Anderson’s well-informed survey of the Soviet regime’s policies is both competent and well-organized. His findings will surely gain wide acceptance. But his concentration on the state’s systemic political approach needs to be supplemented by considering the impact on the believers themselves. In the collection of essays edited by Michael Bourdeaux, we are given useful glimpses of how individual churchmen are trying to cope with the trauma of the turbulent events since the fall of the Soviet empire in both Russia and its neighbouring countries. Most of the contributors are academic observers sympathetic to the often ambiguous stages of church revival. Several Americans, such as John Dunlop, are critical of the Russia Orthodox hierarchy for its former subservience to the Communist rulers, while Fr. Chaplinoutlines the present views of the renewed Patriarchate, with useful quotations from its more recent pronouncements on political matters. Some observers like Michael Bourdeaux are confident that religion will play a positive role in rebuilding morale. But it is clear that old habits die hard, as for instance in the Russian Orthodox Church’s demand that the state should still control the influx of foreign missionaries from various sectarian, or at least non-Orthodox, bodies. Most valuable, because less well-known, are the chapters on the churches in the newly-independent states around the edges of the former Soviet empire. Robert Goeckel gives an excellentoverview of the intertwining of nationalist and ecclesiastical factors in the Baltic churches. Relations between the national churches and those linked more closely to outside church establishments, such as the Vatican, the Moscow Patriarchate or the Lutheran World Federation, pose a potential minefield for the democratization and renewal process. It is good to have Goeckel’s most competent guidance through these complexities. Professor Bociurkiw’s account of the intra-church and intra-tribal rivalries in the Ukraine is a brave attempt to introduce western readers to this morass, whose record of violence, murder and internecine in-fighting, has long defied any coherent or meaningful analysis. The final two chapters on Islam in the regions of Central Asia seek to show that the long years of Communist-inspired fear and intimidation have left an appalling legacy of total mistrust and unreliability. It is difficult to see many signs of religious renewal here, especially when political opponents consistently evoke the spectre of Islamic “fundamentalism”. Similarly in the Caucasus, the continuing nationalist and irredentist violence precludes the emergence of any climate in which the beneficial impact of religious forces might be effective. Religious pluralism may be now legally established, but any signs of a tolerant ecumenical willingness to live together in peace and harmony still seem a long way off. “This book”, says the editor, “is the product of an interim period during which many questions are being asked but few answers have been found. Religion, at this time, faces the challenge of either contributing to the process of destabilization or of fulfilling its potential as an agent of reconciliation”. Judging by the evidence, the outcome is still highly problematical. J SC.

4b) John P.Burgess, The East German Church and the End of Communism, Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press 1997,185 pp US $39.95 Congratulations to our list member John Burgess on the appearance of his short but valuable study of the East German Protestant Church’s theological developments, particularly in the1980s. It is a more theoretical, and possibly less vibrant, account of this beleaguered church’s fortunes than was contained in Gregory Baum’s highly sympathetic analysis, The Church for Others, (reviewed in this Newsletter Vol III, no 9, September 1997), but the two together provide the English-speaking audience with an excellent picture of the significant theological issues faced by the East German Protestants.. John Burgess is on the staff of the national Presbyterian Church of the USA. He spent several extended periods in the former East Germany for theological study, and wrote up his impressions in articles in various religious publications. He has now revised and updated these and turned them into a useful study of the fate of the church up to the collapse of the Communist regime. In 1989, the role of the churches in helping to bring about the fall of Communism was widely praised. Yet, shortly afterwards, shocking revelations of the extent to which its leadership had collaborated with the notorious secret police, the Stasi, led to a rapid change. Baum by-passed this issue as theologically irrelevant, but Burgess gives a fair and balanced outline of the implications of the seaccusations, and recognises how much they undermined the church’s trustworthiness as a public institution. The mixture of moral, political and ecclesiastical factors involved in coming to terms with such a past are here succinctly and frankly discussed. But Burgess is really more interested in the ways in which the churches sought to serve God in a Marxist land. They had to deal with the inconsistencies in the Communist ranks as to whether the churches should be seen as ideological opponents or as potential partners in building a socialist society. The churches also suffered from similar ambivalences. Some “progressive” churchmen sought to build a new form of Christian socialism; others aspired only to the freedoms enjoyed by their brethren in the west. Pragmatically the church leaders sought to enlarge the free space allegedly guarantied by the constitution; but they also saw the need to repudiate the long Lutheran tradition of subordination to the state, of nationalism and of authoritarianism. Burgess rightly points out the paradox that, while in its own religious sphere the church lost membership and support, it gained more and more adherents as the only ideological and political alternative to the regime. By seeking to define itself as being not beside, not against, but within socialism, the church tried to adopt a position of “critical solidarity” towards the Communist society. This was a risky venture, and western critics both before and after 1989 were ready to call it a sell-out. Nevertheless Burgess makes a convincing case that the ability of the church to uphold a theology with democratic political impulses, and to provide powerful symbols for the oppositional groups, gave it a pivotal role in the 1989 end of Communism. These essays are not a systematic history, but more of a thoughtful commentary on the church’s life in a communist-controlled setting. They presume a considerable knowledge of events. The personalities of the individuals involved could have been more fully explored. But Burgess’ discussion of the theoretical issues, especially in the field of Christian social and political ethics, will undoubtedly be helpful. JSC

5) Journal Article: In the latest issue of Occasional Papers fromthe German Historical Institute, Washington, No 20, edited by Geoffrey Giles, “Stunde Null: The End and the Beginning. Fifty Years ago”, Maria Mitchell contributes an insightful and excellently researched article on “Confessional Culture, Realpolitik and the organisation of Christian Democracy”. She examines the reasons why leading Catholics abandoned their pre-war stance of defending the Catholic Teilkultur through the Centre Party, and instead opted for a new alliance with Protestants in the new C.D.U. She traces the previous history of such interdenominationalism, and the drawbacks to any revival of the old Centre Party, basically because of the need for Catholics to find new partners in the struggle against both Socialists and Marxism. Adenauer’s leadership was certainly the most significant factor, but so too was the recognition that Catholic interests could only be defended if a new and more realistic assessment of political forces was acknowledged. The CDU still upheld many of the Centre’s traditions, so the breach was not complete, but the spectre of Communism, and the need for a common policy for restoration of the German economy and culture, along democratic and pragmatic lines, successfully overcame Protestant hesitations, and led to the success of Adenauer’s reign. JSC

6) The English Language Section of the International Bonhoeffer Society has produced a translation of Ernst Feil’s “Bonhoeffer Studies in Germany: a survey of recent literature”, which first appeared in German in 1992. This is a thoughtful and comprehensive history of the various trends in the study of Bonhoeffer’s theology, but is confined solely to the work of German authors, and hardly touches on historical events. It can be obtained from the I.B.S. – English Section, Box 235,Afton, Minnesota 55001, USA (price for non-members $6, and $2postage).The Bonhoeffer Website is http://www.cyberword.com/bonhoef

With best wishes

John S.Conway

jconway@unixg.ubc.ca

Contents:

1) The Hidden Encyclical

2) Book reviews : Latour, Papacy in World War I; Bacque, Crimes and Mercies

3) Kirchliche Tourismus or Postcards from Sacred Spots

1)”The Hidden Encyclical”: In the summer of 1938, Pope Pius XI was deeply troubled by the Nazis’ vicious antisemitic campaigns against the Jews, and by the likelihood that Mussolini would pass equivalent legislation affecting Italy’s Jews. He therefore resolved to commission an Encyclical which would make clear the Catholic Church’s opposition to such pernicious developments. To this end he requested a prominent American Jesuit, Fr. John LaFarge, well-known as an expert on race relations, and also as a leading contributor to the respected Jesuit periodical ‘America’, to prepare a suitable text. For three months, LaFarge, together with a German and a French Jesuit, laboured to summarise Catholic teachings on racism. He then submitted the results to the head ofthe Jesuit order in Rome for onward transmission to the Pope. For as yet unclear reasons, the document only reached the Pope’s desk in early 1939, but he died before it could be promulgated. His successor, Pius XII, chose not to make any statement on this highly controversial and politically explosive subject, and the Encyclical was in fact suppressed. Only in 1995 did a book in French, with the title “The Hidden Encyclical” appear, written jointly by two scholars, one Catholic and one Jewish, G.Passelecq and B Suchecky, as noted in our Newsletter no 21 (September1996), p.4-5. Their findings have helped to shed light on the origins, the contents, and the disposition of this document.

But debate continues. Recently, in the latest issue of ‘Holocaustand Genocide Studies’, Vol 11, no 2 (Winter 1997), Professor Michael Marrus published an excellently authoritative article on this “hidden encyclical”, which was followed last month by a public debate at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum inWashington, D.C., in which Professor Michael Phayer, Professor Tom Breslin and Fr. John Morley took part. In its usual secretive way, the Vatican long denied even the existence of this proto-encyclical. But Tom Breslin found the text in 1972 amongst John LaFarge’s Nachlass. Passelecq and Suchecky have now published the full text, and Marrus’ article makes its main points available in English. For several years, some critical observers, such as Connor Cruise O’Brien, have argued that here was “one of the greatest and most tragically missed opportunities of history”. Had the Vatican issued the Encyclical, it is claimed, its effect would have been enough to “save the Jews” from Hitler’s racial fanaticism.

It is one of the most significant “might-have-beens” of contemporary church history, a point of view not surprisingly shared by many observers of the Holocaust, whether Jewish or Catholic. More cautious scholars, such as Marrus and myself, discount such exaggerations. What possible results the Encyclical might have had were fully explored at the Washington meeting, but can only really be a matter of speculation. To be sure, LaFarge’s extensive text was suitably condemnatory of racism in general, and of Nazi antisemitism and American anti-negro attitudes in particular. But it would be wishful thinking to believe that significant sections of opinion in Germany, let alone in Poland, even among Catholics, would have changed their minds about the treatment of the Jews. In fact, LaFarge’s draft largely restated the classic Catholic position on Judaism, though he was also emphatic that the Jews are the Chosen People of God and that their Covenant has not been revoked. The Church should nevertheless ardently seek their conversion. But antisemitism was directly counter-productive to such a goal, and persecution only made matters worse. Justice and charity should be the hall-marks of the Christians’ attitude. Such general statements – as is usual in Papal Encyclicals – were not accompanied by any specific denunciations of either Hitler’s or Mussolini’s policies, and, as Marrus correctly states, this was more like a repetition of conventional wisdom of the Church on antisemitism rather than a call to arms against antisemitic forces in Germany or Italy. “Under these circumstances, it is hard to imagine that the issuing of the encyclical on the eve of the Second World War would have made a great deal of difference – let alone that it might have ‘averted the Holocaust'”. It is only too probable that its publication would have been as non-effective as was the1937 Encyclical ‘Mit Brennender Sorge’.

But speculations continue, as they do about the reasons why this hidden document never saw the light of day. Conspiracy theories, such as the view that Pius XI was deliberately murdered to prevent its appearance, or that the Jesuit leaders were ready to appease Hitler because of their violent anti-communism, or that the diplomatic Pius XII would not have been elected had a stronger anti-fascist course been set earlier, were aired at the Washington meeting. But whether or not such a pronouncement would have significantly altered the Church’s stance, or the fate of the Jews, still seems very debatable. All speakers were at least in agreement that access to the Vatican and Jesuit archives would be highly desirable in order to obtain a more complete account of this draft and its subsequent history. JSC (with thanks to Peggy Obrecht).

2a) Francis Latour, La Papaute et les problemes de la paix pendantla premiere guerre mondiale, Paris/Montreal: L’Harmattan 1996 ISBN 2-7384-4600-0 350pp. For the past thirty years considerable controversy has erupted about the policies of the Vatican, and of Pope Pius XII, during the Second World War. By contrast, the equivalent stances of the Vatican during the First World War have been largely passed by. Francis Latour, who teaches at the Catholic Institute in Paris, has recently produced a serviceable account of this earlier period, using the now available records for the pontificate of Pope Benedict XV (1914-1922). He shows that, in fact, both the principles and practices followed by the papacy in both conflicts were remarkably similar,to the point where one can conclude that Pius XII’s policies clearly owed much to the example of his predecessor. So too thepredicaments and the opposition faced by the papacy were similarin tone, often sparked by the same kind of resentments and disappointments. Benedict XV’s principles, enunciated immediately following his election, which took place a month after the outbreak of hostilities, were, firstly, to uphold resolutely the ideal of peace and to refuse to succumb to the war fever which engulfed all the combatantnations. Secondly, he deliberately decided to adopt a stance of strict impartiality, refusing to support or to blame either side.Thirdly, he sought to use the Vatican’s influence to promote the cause of a negotiated settlement, and to prevent any escalation of the conflict. These were honourable motives, but subject to incessant misrepresentation. His frequent appeals for a cessation of hostilities were politely and firmly rejected, his impartiality continually impugned, and his attempts at negotiation spurned by one or other side, for as long as the hope of military victory remained uppermost.Latour demonstrates that the Papacy’s horror at the calamities of modern warfare was genuine, based on the recognition that the whole edifice of Christian civilisation was being undermined. But equally, the Vatican was obliged to face the unwelcome fact that its power was insufficient to bring about a reversal or to re-establish a rational peaceful international order. And while its political influence was held to be an asset which both sides sought to obtain for their own ends, it was inadequate to challenge the massive nationalist enthusiasms mobilised for the propagation of ever-increasing mutual hatreds.

Each of the combatants criticised the Papacy’s refusal to take sides, or attacked the Pope for failing to protest the alleged atrocities of their opponents. Each side condemned the Vatican’s stance as “too weak”, and only a handful of commentators were prepared to recognise the difficulties and dilemmas faced by the Pope and his advisers. To be sure, in 1914, the papacy’s situation was not propitious. Ever since the unification of Italy in 1870, its position in Rome has rested solely on the good will, or otherwise, of the Italian government. With the separation of church and state in France in1905, the open hostility of such Protestant nations as Germany and Britain, the apparent disinterest of the United States, and the clear suspicion of the Russian Czarist Empire, the Vatican’s only reliable supporter was Austria-Hungary. But the Austrians’ determination to plunge the continent into war over the misdeeds of Serbia was a sad blow. So too was the readiness of Italy to join the Allied side in May 1915, despite Benedict XV’s strenuous efforts to prevent this development, prompted in part by considerable fears that an Italian defeat might lead to revolution in the streets of Rome and endanger the Vatican’s very existence.

Above all, the evident inability of the Vatican to assert its ideals was a source of constant grief. The Pope’s fervent pronouncements in favour of peace were ignored or disdained, and his motives continually misinterpreted. Yet his silences were equally criticised as an abdication of his pastoral responsibilities. But Benedict XV clung on to the belief, as Pius XII was to do twenty-five years later, that sooner or later the warring parties would see the folly of their war-like ways and require the help of a moderator to bring hostilities to an end. As Latour shows, this was a worthy but utopian illusion. Only in 1917, with the stalemate on the western front, and the overthrow of the Czarist regime, did a Papal initiative in favour of peace appear to have some chance of success.

This diplomatic endeavour has been fully documented in the large-scale volume, Das Friedensappell Papst Benedicts XV, beautifully edited by W. Steglich, which appeared in 1970. Incredibly, this volume is not mentioned at all by Latour. Nor is a convincing article on this topic in Stimmen der Zeit by a later papal adviser, Fr Robert Leiber. Even though Latour has had access to the papal records, he does not produce any new analysis to account for the failure of this significant undertaking.With the advantage of hindsight, it is clear that at no point did the prerequisites for a successful peace initiative by the Papacy or anyone else prevail. At no point were all the powers, simultaneously, prepared to recognise that neither side could obtain victory, to withdraw their ambitious dreams of national aggrandisement, or to abandon the hope of revenge for all the terrible losses suffered. Such a moment never came, and the papacy’s influence was palpably too weak to induce such changes in the belligerents’ attitudes.

On the other hand, the fact that all the combatants used moral terms in the attempt to justify their actions, and to demonise those of their opponents, appealing thereby to their public opinions, meant that the Vatican’s idealistic stance could not be rejected outright. Noble ideals were useful for propaganda purposes, even though they served only to foster illusionary prospects. In the event, Realpolitik and force majeure were the true proponents of each state’s policies,including those of the United States, despite President Wilson’s highly moralistic rhetoric. Wilson’s refusal to give any support to the papacy’s efforts was, in fact, deeply disillusioning, as was his capitulation to the anti-clerical forces, especially in Italy, which refused to allow the Vatican to be invited to the eventual Paris Peace Conference, or to become a member of the League of Nations. These rebuffs hurt, and were taken as a poor reward for Benedict’s high-minded and persistent pursuit of peace throughout the conflict. They were attributed therefore to the petty jealousies of anti-clericals, unable to grasp the nobility of the Pope’s ideals.

But, as Latour admits, no one at the Vatican was prepared to accept how much its own anti-democratic, authoritarian and distinctly un-ecumenical political style, dreaming of reconstituting a kind of mediaeval world order with the Pope as its spiritual guardian, was bound to arouse opposition and suspicions. The first great war was, in fact, a striking reminder that the Vatican’s position in the world was far less influential than its dignitaries desired. It was the beginning of an irreversible process. But the dilemma of how to uphold the vision of Christian idealism in the midst of the realities and disasters of power politics remains. Latour has provided a useful description of how this predicament was faced during the short reign of Benedict XV. JSC.

2b) James Bacque, Crimes and Mercies. The fate of German civilians under Allied Occupation 1944-1950, Toronto:Little, Brown and Co., 1997 288 pp. James Bacque is, according to the book jacket, a novelist living in Toronto. He is also, clearly, as man of extensive compassion, particularly for Germans. His earlier book, Other Losses, sought to describe the fate of “about 1 million” Germans captured at the end of the war in 1945, imprisoned on the banks of the Rhine and left to starve to death by the deliberate neglect of the American zonal authorities directed by General Eisenhower. This provocative accusation was supported by some highly original manipulation of demographic statistics seeking to account for the”disappearance” of so many suffering Germans, but earned only justified criticism from such historians as Eisenhower’s biographer.

Bacque has now produced a sequel which equallyconcentrates of the plight of the Germans in the post-1945 period,particularly those who endured “ethnic cleansing” by being expelled from eastern Europe, or as prisoners-of-war in the Soviet Union. Altogether, Bacque calculates, at least 9.3 million Germans died needlessly after the war because of the conditions imposed by the four major victors. “This is many more Germans than died in battle, air raids and concentration camps during the war” (p.131). Bacque believes these deaths have never been fully reported, largely because of a high-level cover-up by the Allied governments and their compliant historians. His aim now is to reverse this omission by exposing the lies and hypocrisy which enabled so-called democratic governments to ignore the mistreatment and plight of these helpless Germans. His final chapter entitled “History and Forgetting” describes what he calls “the great institutions of public opinion feverishly denying the Western Allied atrocities of the post-war period against Germany” (p.191), and points to the unfortunate reception given to those brave enough to bare the truth.

To support his case. Bacque tried to see the records of the Red Cross in Geneva, but was denied access. He did however visit the KGB archive in Russia, despite having no fluency in this language. Documents he obtained in Moscow, he claims, accurately gave the figure of 500,000 German deaths in Soviet captivity. Therefore, another missing million must have died in western-held camps. The silence about their fate, he asserts, amounts to a vast international falsification maintained for fifty years. “Sometimes the Allies have lied in co-operation with the Soviets, sometimes they have lied to foment hatred against them,s ometimes they have lied to cover up their own crimes. They are still at it” (p.88). The contrast between the well-publicised atrocities of the Nazis and the cover-up of post-war Allied crimes, forcing the Germans into starvation and death, is therefore glaring.

But his own examination of the surviving statistics and thed iscrepancies in reported death rates in Germany for 1946-1950, when he reaches the conclusion that 5.7 million persons”disappeared”, is largely speculative and so remains unconvincing. Bacque produces a similar indictment of the dreadful expulsions of Germans in 1945-6 from Poland, Czechoslovakia and other eastern European countries, despite the Potsdam Conference’s assurance that such population transfers would be orderly and humane. Enormous suffering also resulted form the Allies’ vindictive policy of dismantling industrial production in the name of reparations, when, Bacque claims, the Americans took from Germany at least twenty times the amount later returned under the Marshall Plan. It was all part of the Allies’ horrendous animus against the Germans. Leading figures in this conspiracy were such men as Henry Morgenthau, Churchill, De Gaulle and Eisenhower, the authors of the infamous policy of unconditional surrender. On the other hand, there were also the “good guys” such as Herbert Hoover, Victor Gollancz, Senators Langer and Wherry, journalists such as Dorothy Thompson, countless aid workers and a very few honest reporters. These were the merciful saviours whose compassion was in the end successful. Thanks to their efforts, Bacque believes, the ban on private aid to Germans was relaxed. And the horrendous German death rates in 1946-7, twice those of pre-war years, finally forced the Allied authorities to abandon their starvation policies.

As a historical work, this book suffers from both imbalance and imprecision. Contrary to Bacque’s assertions, much of the inhumanity inflicted on the German population has been well and more fully described before. His graphic recapitulation of eye-witness reports only adds graphic details to this regrettable story. On the other hand, his attribution of infamous motives to the main agents of Allied occupation policy ignores the complexities, even the contradictions, which dominated the political scene at the time. Portraying the Germans as helpless victims of Allied vindictiveness totally overlooks the fact that only a handful were prepared to acknowledge, let alone show remorse for, the manifold crimes committed in Germany’s name during the Nazi years. All observers at the time were appalled by the Germans’ complete pre-occupation with their own sufferings, and their total amnesia about what they had done to others. His indulgence in a conspiratorial view of history may in fact be due to his belief – as explained in an appendix – that, as a result of his earlier work, he was (is) under surveillance by such agencies as the CIA, his post censored and his telephone calls intercepted and recorded. Deplorable as this may be, his moralistic approach to history, seeing it as a continual struggle between the criminals and the merciful, leaves much to be desired. By upholding the democratic ideals of truth and justice, and by denouncing some of the lies and distortions of yester-year, Bacque is in the good company of other “expose” journalists. But his own partiality is so strident and one-sided that only the converted are likely to find much of value in this extended diatribe. JSC

3) Kirchliche Tourismus or Postcards from Sacred Spots (This column, which will appear from time to time, invites contributions from anywhere, recalling any aspect of church history which may be of general interest to our readers).

Shaking the Heavens. One of the lesser-known but still notable pilgrimage sites in North America is situated at Niskeyuna, near the banks of the Mohawk River, in upper New York State. When Ann and I visited there last month, we found it almost engulfed by Albany’s noisy airport. But two hundred years ago, this was where, in 1774, the first settlement of the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing was established under the charismatic guidance of their leader “Mother” Ann Lee. Because of the fervour of their religious ecstasy, especially in dancing, their opponents labelled this sect as the Shakers, and the name has stuck ever since.

Ann Lee was born in 1736 in the squalid slums of Manchester, at atime when the Lancashire cotton mill owners ruthlessly exploited child labour. She never attended school, nor indeed ever learned toread or write. Nevertheless as she grew up, she developed aremarkable spiritual presence which was to have a profound effecton thousands of lives. Having been mightily impressed by the preaching of George Whitefield, she joined a break-away group of Quakers who warmly encouraged the gifts of women, including preaching and prophesy. Their intense religious search led them to believe in the imminent return of Christ, and in Ann’s case to the conviction that this would happen in the form of a woman. But first, sin must be overcome, and, in particular, Ann believed, the sin of sexual lust. It is probable that she came to this view after her own early marriage and the loss of four children in rapid succession to early deaths. She therefore persuaded her followers that henceforth they must follow a life of strict celibacy, when men and women would live together in community but on separate lines.

Persecuted and harassed by the authorities in England, she resolved to seek the remoteness of America where she hoped their special witness would be allowed free expression. Somehow orother she and eight others, including her husband and brother, set sail for New York, and after a year of hardship and deprivation, finally realised their goal of setting up a small agricultural colony where they could practise their worship and evangelisation.In the 1770s the British American colonies were in a state of political and religious turmoil. Possibly for this reason, Ann Lee found an increasing number of men and women willing to renounce all worldly possessions and sex and to join the Shakers’ idealistic vision of new birth, despite the rigid discipline demanded.

By the turn of the century numerous Shaker farm settlements hadbeen established in New England, and by the mid-nineteenth century had spread as far away as Ohio and Kentucky after the remarkable religious revivals which swept these states. But in the following decades, the Shakers began to decline in numbers.Without children to carry forward their beliefs, they relied solely on sporadic conversions which grew less frequent. The last colony finally ceased in 1970, when their assets were turned over to a Heritage Society.

To get a clearer view of the Shakers’ life, we went over to Hancockin Massachusetts, about forty miles from Niskeyuna, which wasfirst settled in 1790 and still maintains most of the Shaker buildings in good repair. Here we found an impressive brickhouse, the dwelling of some 100 Shakers, symmetrically built with separate doors and staircases for men and women, and still furnished with fine examples of the simple pure Shaker furniture. The meeting house is beautifully proportioned with a large open area where the community practised their dancing rituals and gave their testimonies to God’s blessing. Here too were the workshops where the Shaker furniture, which has since gained a world-wide reputation and is much sought after, is still being made, and the weaving rooms where chair seats, pads and baskets are produced, and dried herbs and seeds harvested and packaged for sale. The commitment to hard work of this community is readily apparent in what was to become one of the most successful attempts in community living ever seen, where work and worship went hand in hand..

Their success and ingenuity in developing newinventions to improve their farming techniques were such that, int heir day, these settlements became models of a thriving agricultural way of life. But primary was the devotion to God in simplicity and humility, following the precepts of their foundress Ann Lee.In Niskeyuna, all that remains now of this inspiring experiment is part of the old orchard and a historic cemetery where Mother Ann Lee lies buried, surrounded by the ranks of her followers withs imple gravestones under the maple trees glowing in the autumnal sunshine. Here they rest, as witnesses to St Paul’s words: “All that believed were together and had all things common, being of one heart and of one soul” in an island of peace set over against the worldliness against which they witnessed so fervently, transformed, as they were convinced, by the perfect will of God. JSC

Our website, containing the index to all previous issues, can befound at: http://omni.cc.purdue.edu/~gmork/akz/index/html

With all best wishes,

John Conway

jconway@unixg.ubc.ca