Posted on 11/17/2009 8:13:49 AM PST by Tribune7
The Nazis hated Christianity and Christmas posed a problem to them since it was Germany's most popular holiday. Rather than ban it, they tried to replace it as described in this story at the TimesOnline, the website for the paper most of us in the U.S. know as The Times of London albeit in the U.K. it is simply the Times.
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.billlawrenceonline.com ...
Just in case you ever get in a debate with someone who insists the Nazis were Christians.
Christmas will live forever! bump
Well...in the first place, the Winter Solstice had been a Pagan holiday in Germanic lands for thousands of years. So you can properly say that the Church appropriated the holiday first. This is historical fact. There was a winter celebration long before the first missionary set foot in any Germanic land.
Secondly, every Wermacht soldier had the phrase “Gott Mit Uns” on his belt buckle. It means “God with us,” which is a Christian saying. These belt buckles were designed and produced by Nazis, they weren’t leftovers from WWI.
So either the Nazi leaders were very confused when they designed, ordered and distributed the Christian belt buckles, or they at least considered themselves Christians.
The fact that the phrase was purposely placed on every soldier in the Wermacht doesn’t leave much room for debate, I’m afraid.
I’m pro-Christian and anti-Nazi. That doesn’t mean that the truth isn’t the truth, and the truth is, Nazis went to war with Christian slogans on their uniforms. I don’t see how this reflects poorly on Christians in general, you don’t control what others “do in God’s name.” Put in quotes because obviously they weren’t doing God’s work.
“Just in case you ever get in a debate with someone who insists
the Nazis were Christians.”
The article below is also useful for that discussion.
(If interested in the text, you might want to copy/past and save
a copy of it. It appears that National Review Online may have deleted
it and I could only find this Google-cached copy)
#################################################
You Mean Hitler Wasn’t A Priest?
The truth is, in fact, out there.
Dave Shiflett is coauthor of Christianity on Trial.
Re-reading my post, I want to make it absolutely clear that I am not attacking Christians or defending Nazis. I’m just laying out historical fact which must be taken into account, unless you wish to labor under a misconception.
I’m not religious, for personal reasons, but I consider Christians to be “my people.” Stretching back into antiquity, my ancestors have been Christian. I believe Christians, out of any group in the World, have done by far the most good. So I sincerely hope that no one takes my words as an attack on the hundreds of millions of good Christian people the World over.
Welcome to Free Republic. You're off to a very inauspicious beginning, claiming that Nazis were Christian.
Nazis attempted to infiltrate and co-opt Christian institutions, so of course a popular phrase associated with Christianity would be used for a belt buckle.
It's sort of like Clintigula carrying a Bible. Or, Obama claiming to be Christian when he attended a Muslim-oriented Liberation Theology "church."
You know, that sort of thing. Democrats do it all the time.
bm
The Obama’s to send out Happy Winter Solstice cards media coo’s.
The answer is neither. The pagan Nazi leaders where content to use (exploit) whatever they thought would be emboldening to the average soldaten. This use of Gott mit uns predates Nazism by centuries, by the way and although the Wehrmacht was controlled by Hitler and every member took a personal oath to him, not everyone in the Wehrmacht was a Nazi (not even close).
Stalin did the same when the going got tough, relaxing restrictions on Christian worship and so forth.
The Wermacht and the Nazis weren’t exactly the same thing.
So because the Nazis wanted to bring back pagan holidays you're saying that makes them Christians?
It means “God with us,” which is a Christian saying.
Way to go, Einstein! You're saying the Nazis were Jews!
So because the Nazis wanted to bring back pagan holidays you're saying that makes them Christians?
It means “God with us,” which is a Christian saying.
Way to go, Einstein! You're saying the Nazis were Jews!
So because the Nazis wanted to bring back pagan holidays you're saying that makes them Christians?
It means “God with us,” which is a Christian saying.
Way to go, Einstein! You're saying the Nazis were Jews!
So because the Nazis wanted to bring back pagan holidays you're saying that makes them Christians?
It means “God with us,” which is a Christian saying.
Way to go, Einstein! You're saying the Nazis were Jews!
Thank you. Good article.
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