The Nazi rise to power in Germany was greeted by most Christians in Germany with optimism. They welcomed the new regime and particularly embraced its nationalism, and both the Catholic and Protestant churches there pursued a course of compromise and accommodation with the regime, particularly when conflicts arose over Nazi state interference with church programs. Among European ecumenical leaders, there were worries about the possible anti-Christian repercussions of a fascist ideology and fears of renewed German militarism under Nazism. In 1933 most European and US Christian leaders, however, took a "wait and see" attitude.
Throughout the Christian world, there was little condemnation of the most striking and ominous element of Nazi ideology: its virulent antisemitism and its threat to remove Jews from all aspects of German society. Indeed, many Christian leaders before and throughout the Nazi era cited Christian teachings as a justification for anti-Jewish rhetoric and policies.
Some church leaders, however, did protest against the Nazi treatment of the Jews and attempted to help refugees fleeing Nazism. In the United States, many of these leaders had been involved in Jewish-Christian dialogue and interfaith work before 1933.
This interreligious cooperation arose from the common ground of religious concern on social justice issues, particularly labor issues and civil rights. This engagement, which often began locally, sparked national institutional commitments to interreligious understanding. In 1923 the Federal Council of Churches (the FCC, precursor of today’s National Council of Churches) established a sub-committee, the Commission on International Justice and Goodwill, to reduce anti-Jewish, anti-Catholic, and racial prejudice. This Commission worked throughout the 1920s to promote increased local contacts among the three major faiths. This led to the founding of the National Conference of Christians and Jews (NCCJ) in 1928. The NCCJ promoted a number of initiatives to foster interreligious understanding, ranging from pulpit exchanges to discussion groups where Catholics, Protestants, and Jews explained points of doctrine to one another. Early Christian and Jewish leaders who were involved included FCC president Rev. Samuel Cavert, NCCJ president Rev. Everett Clinchy, Rabbi Stephen Wise, Jonah Wise, and Felix Warburg.
In Europe, those who spoke out included ecumenical Protestant leaders, who helped create a network of small resistance and rescue movements throughout Europe.
Bishop William T. Manning and Rabbi Stephen Wise attend a mass rally. Bishop William T. Manning (lower left) and Rabbi Stephen Wise (center) attend a mass rally at Madison Square Garden. US Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College Park
By the beginning of April 1933, when 3,000 Jewish refugees had arrived in Switzerland, Swiss Protestant church president Henry Henriod sent a message to the German churches asking for a clear position of protest against Nazi measures. That same month, French Protestant leader Wilfred Monod published an open letter welcoming the Jews coming from Germany to France. In May 1933, British Bishop George Bell wrote Hermann Kapler, president of the German Church Federation, of his concern about actions against the Jews. At the ecumenical World Alliance conference in Sofia, Bularia, in September 1933, the delegates passed a resolution condemning the Nazi actions against the Jews: “We especially deplore the fact that the state measures against the Jews in Germany have had such an effect on public opinion that in some circles the Jewish race is considered a race of inferior status.” These Christian leaders eventually became part of a network, coordinated primarily from the Protestant ecumenical offices in Geneva, that aided Jews throughout Europe.
Thus, there were significant but isolated voices of protest. Many of these statements drew on church teachings about compassion and social justice, as well as church commitments to civil liberties. Yet, they appear to have found little resonance within the broader community of lay Christians at the time. And, although they did lay a foundation for Christians after 1945 to wrestle theologically with the reality of what had happened during the Holocaust, most of them did not yet confront the theological reality revealed in the Holocaust: that centuries of anti-Jewish teachings by the Christian churches had helped to create a culture in which the genocide of millions of Jewish men, women, and children was possible. Only after 1945 would the Christian churches throughout the world begin to confront the deeper theological challenges of the Holocaust for Christian faith and teaching.