Catholics and the Nazis

Catholic.net ^ | DEC. 5, 2010 | Rome's Zenit News

[Alex Murphy]

ROME, DEC. 5, 2010 (Zenit.org).- The Church is often criticized for not having done enough to oppose Hitler. In his recent trip to England and Scotland, Benedict XVI took the opportunity to present the other side of the situation, reminding people of the anti-religious nature of the Nazi regime.

"I also recall the regime’s attitude to Christian pastors and religious who spoke the truth in love, opposed the Nazis and paid for that opposition with their lives," he told the Queen Elizabeth II and others at the state reception in Edinburgh, Scotland.

The Pope's depiction of the Nazis as being atheistic and wanting to eradicate God from society was not accepted by all. In a Sept. 16 press release Andrew Copson, chief executive of the British Humanist Society, denied that it was the atheism of the Nazis that led to their extreme behavior.

A book published earlier this year sheds some light on the question of religion and the Nazis. In "Catholicism and the Roots of Nazism" (Oxford University Press), Derek Hastings shows how in the early years there was indeed a strong Catholic element in the Nazi movement. He also affirms that there was a sharp discrepancy between the nature of the Nazi regime in power in the 1930s and 1940s and the early movement in Munich in the years following World War I.

"Despite the occasional maintenance of a conciliatory facade, there is little question that the Nazi party exhibited a broad antipathy toward the Catholic Church -- and, in many ways, toward Christianity more generally -- for most of the duration of the Third Reich," commented Hastings.

He noted that numerous historians have argued compellingly that after the Nazis assumed power in 1933 the party should best be viewed as a sort of political religion and as a rival form of secular devotion that strove to supplant Catholic or Christian identity.

Munich

The Nazi party was founded in 1919, in Munich. In the period from 1919 to the failed Beer Hall Putsch (overthrow) in Munich in 1923, the Nazis openly courted Catholics. Their openness to Catholicism enabled the Nazis to gain supporters and to stand out from other popular movements. In the aftermath of the 1923 failure, which saw Hitler briefly imprisoned, the Nazi movement was re-founded in 1925 in a way that left little room for its earlier Catholic orientation.

Hastings explained that this Catholic link to the Nazis during the first years was due to some local factors not typical for the rest of Germany. Support for the Bavarian People's Party (BVP) was much lower in Munich and the surrounding region of upper Bavaria than in any other Catholic area in the country. Instead they tended to support folk-based movements with a more nationalistic streak.

Another distinguishing feature among Catholics in Munich and the surrounding areas was their hostility to what they saw as an excessive ultramontanism by the BVP and the bishops of the Church. The ultramontane movement, Hastings explained, came about in the 18th and 19th centuries as Catholics in Europe increasingly looked to the Pope who resided "over the mountains" (ultra montes).

In the decade before World War I there was a Catholic Reform movement in region around Munich consisting in a push for a new form of religious identity that was loyal to the Catholic Church in a spiritual sense, but more open to a radically nationalistic political and cultural course, Hastings observed. The Nazis were able to take advantage of these local tendencies, combined with the general disillusionment following World War I, to appeal to Catholics in the initial stages of their development.

By 1923, the Nazis had obtained the support of many thousands of Catholics in and around Munich, Hastings noted. At first, the BVP ignored the new party, probably motivated by a desire not to give it greater publicity. By late 1922, seeing the growing numbers of adherents to the Nazi party, the BVP decided to embark on a campaign to make Bavarians aware of the dangerous nature of the Nazis.

This did not deter the Nazis from courting Catholics and, according to Hastings, 1923 was the high point of their efforts. That year they set off on a membership drive designed to draw Catholics into their party. Their efforts were successful, even to the point where numerous Catholic priests became involved.

In speeches at the time, Hitler openly referred to his Catholic faith and the influence it had had on his political activism. In 1923, the Nazi newspaper, the Beobachter, even started publishing Sunday Mass times and exhorted its readers to fulfill their religious obligations.

Re-foundation

This closeness between Catholics and the Nazi party came to a sudden end, however, with the the Beer Hall Putsch in November of that year. Hitler's attempt to seize control of the Bavarian state ended in rapid failure and the Nazi movement entered a period of division and decline, Hastings explained.

This coincided with an upsurge in anti-Catholicism in the other folk movements in Munich that also affected part of the Nazi party. According to Hastings, in this period many Catholics left the Nazi party, and those who remained did so by sacrificing their Catholic identity. The Catholic priests who had joined the party also left. In fact, in the fall of 1923 the Archdiocese of Munich-Freising had forbidden them from attending meetings of the Nazi party.

Once re-founded, the previous Catholic orientation was reversed and in large part replaced Christianity with its own set of martyr figures drawn from the failed putsch. From that time too Hitler no longer portrayed himself as a believing Catholic or even as an advocate of Christianity, Hastings affirmed.

With time the Nazi movement became more and more overtly anti-Catholic to the point where the Nazis strongly opposed the establishment of a concordat between Bavaria and the Vatican. They were also openly critical of the papal nuncio Archbishop Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII. The German bishops were frequently attacked in Nazi publications, particularly Cardinal Michael von Faulhaber, who just prior to the 1923 putsch had spoken out in defense of the Jews.

On the issue of Nazi anti-Semitism and the influence of Catholics, Hastings noted that in the early years the Nazi movement drew on New Testament imagery -- such as Christ's driving the money-changers out of the Temple -- in their propaganda. At this stage, however, the Nazi ideology was still not fully defined, and as it took more definitive shape in later years it became a much purer and overtly secular form of anti-Semitism.

By the early 1930s, especially after the official ecclesiastical condemnations, Hastings argued that the mutual exclusivity of the Catholic and Nazi worldviews came into clearer focus.

In conclusion, Hastings said that while it is necessary to recognize the very real role played by Catholic clergy and laypeople in the early Nazi movement, at the same time there are not grounds for an indictment of Catholicism as an institution or set of ideas.

Moreover, the cohabitation between Nazi and Catholic identities disappeared in what Hastings termed, "the flood of anti-Catholic invective that washed over the fractured movement in the wake of the failed putsch."

This cohabitation became an early victim of Hitler's increasingly messianic political ambition, Hastings related. What does become clear, both from Hastings and other accounts, is that the horrible excesses of the Nazi regime were in spite of, and not because of, any Catholic influence.

[Alex Murphy]

....A book published earlier this year sheds some light on the question of religion and the Nazis. In "Catholicism and the Roots of Nazism" (Oxford University Press), Derek Hastings shows how in the early years there was indeed a strong Catholic element in the Nazi movement. He also affirms that there was a sharp discrepancy between the nature of the Nazi regime in power in the 1930s and 1940s and the early movement in Munich in the years following World War I....

....The Nazi party was founded in 1919, in Munich. In the period from 1919 to the failed Beer Hall Putsch (overthrow) in Munich in 1923, the Nazis openly courted Catholics. Their openness to Catholicism enabled the Nazis to gain supporters and to stand out from other popular movements. In the aftermath of the 1923 failure, which saw Hitler briefly imprisoned, the Nazi movement was re-founded in 1925 in a way that left little room for its earlier Catholic orientation....

....[a] distinguishing feature among Catholics in Munich and the surrounding areas was their hostility to what they saw as an excessive ultramontanism by the BVP [Bavarian People's Party] and the bishops of the Church. The ultramontane movement, Hastings explained, came about in the 18th and 19th centuries as Catholics in Europe increasingly looked to the Pope who resided "over the mountains" (ultra montes). In the decade before World War I there was a Catholic Reform movement in region around Munich consisting in a push for a new form of religious identity that was loyal to the Catholic Church in a spiritual sense, but more open to a radically nationalistic political and cultural course, Hastings observed. The Nazis were able to take advantage of these local tendencies, combined with the general disillusionment following World War I, to appeal to Catholics in the initial stages of their development. By 1923, the Nazis had obtained the support of many thousands of Catholics in and around Munich....

....1923 was the high point of their efforts. That year they set off on a membership drive designed to draw Catholics into their party. Their efforts were successful, even to the point where numerous Catholic priests became involved. In speeches at the time, Hitler openly referred to his Catholic faith and the influence it had had on his political activism. In 1923, the Nazi newspaper, the Beobachter, even started publishing Sunday Mass times and exhorted its readers to fulfill their religious obligations. This closeness between Catholics and the Nazi party came to a sudden end, however, with the the Beer Hall Putsch in November of that year.

Releated threads:
Was Hitler a Christian?
The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany: an exhaustive survey of John Toland's biography of Hitler
Pope would have quit if captured by Nazis
Report Details Catholic Role in Nazi Abuses
Hitler's Pope? (Book review of The Myth of Hitler's Pope)

[GeronL]

Freeper Homer J Simpson has been posting day by day newspaper reports of the second world war. The NAZI’s seized a lot of Catholic properties and even replaced Catholic nuns at hospitals with ‘Nazi sisters’.

They were most definitely not friendly to the Catholic Church.

[OpusatFR]

Merry Christmas and Peace on Earth to you, Alex.

Nothing like flogging the usual Catholic/Nazi posts or the ever popular devisiveness of the IC of the BVM.

[pgyanke]

You can also look at the long list of faithful Catholics murdered in the concentration camps for more evidence of Nazi hostility. Like the modern liberal Democrat view... you can “seem” to support a religion... but don’t dare be faithful!

God uses the good ones... the bad ones use God.

[Carpe Cerevisi]

You can also look at the long list of faithful Catholics murdered in the concentration camps for more evidence of Nazi hostility.

Correct...take St. Maximilian Kolbe for one.

[D-fendr]

Good article. The unsaid point is that Hitler was elected by his large Protestant voter support.

[Alex Murphy]

Good article. The unsaid point is that Hitler was elected by his large Protestant voter support.

Did you mean to say Protestant-In-Name-Only support?

[Skepolitic]

So Hitler was born and baptized as a Roman Catholic, and self-identified as one when it was to his advantage. So what? Politicians do this all the time. Recall Bill Clinton’s penchant for carrying a huge Bible to and fro Sunday services. Later on at least one of these occasions, he would be serviced by Monica on her presidential kneepads. Or Bush’s and Obama’s penchant for praising Islam as a religion of peace. Or, virtually every politician’s call for “God bless America.” These invocations of the diety and praise for religion serve political rather than spiritual ends.

To argue against the Catholic Church and Christianity in general by proclaiming “Hitler was a Christian” and “Hitler was a Catholic” is nonsense. It’s a waste of time to argue against it because its adherents are too stupid and ignorant to grasp sound reasoning. They don’t understand logic. They don’t know history. And they are utterly ignorant about Christianity. It’s just phony sophistry to slander Christianity and the Catholic Church.

There are, unfortunately, plenty of valid and very serious criticisms of the conduct of the Catholic Church and Christendom generally. The fact that Hitler occasionally self-identified as a Catholic to deceive the German faithful simply isn’t one of them.

[FreedomPoster]

>>He noted that numerous historians have argued compellingly that after the Nazis assumed power in 1933 the party should best be viewed as a sort of political religion and as a rival form of secular devotion that strove to supplant Catholic or Christian identity.

Much like communism/Leftism/socialism does today. They can be seen as a secular religion that demands obedience in a way Christianity does not.

[SuziQ]

In "Catholicism and the Roots of Nazism" (Oxford University Press), Derek Hastings shows how in the early years there was indeed a strong Catholic element in the Nazi movement. He also affirms that there was a sharp discrepancy between the nature of the Nazi regime in power in the 1930s and 1940s and the early movement in Munich in the years following World War I.

A strong Catholic element could simply mean that there were individual Catholics in the Nazi Party, which wouldn't surprise me in the least. At first, the people of Germany saw the Nazis as simply a Nationalist movement, and many who had felt emasculated by the Versailles decisions would have felt drawn to it.

But even with that, there is absolutely NO EVIDENCE that the Church herself had any connection to the Nazis. IIRC, the man who would become Pope Pius XII spoke out strongly against what the Nazis were becoming even before Kristallnacht, when the intentions of the Party became clear.

[ichabod1]

That’s an oversimplification, and I think you know it. 1) Hitler never won a majority of anything, 2) Those that voted for him were interested in anti-communism and nationalism, not religion, 3) I’ve seen no documentation on how the catholic/prot vote shook out but being Germany, you gotta figure there were a LOT of Lutherans.

[D-fendr]

Did you mean to say Protestant-In-Name-Only support?

I think we can safely say that Nazism is inconsistent with Christ's teaching. But as the article explains, Hitler's support, when broken down that way, was more among Protestants than Catholics.

[D-fendr]

That’s an oversimplification, and I think you know it.

In a way, yes. I've seen too much of the "Nazi Pope" garbage and "Hitler was a Catholic" posts.

I reacted this way on this thread because I saw a chance that was the way it was directed.

1) Hitler never won a majority of anything, 2) Those that voted for him were interested in anti-communism and nationalism, not religion.

True on the majority, not so true on the religion aspect. Hitler used Luther (his "Against the Jews" in particular) as support for his policies. (Not that there was a lack of anti-semitism to draw from.)

I’ve seen no documentation on how the catholic/prot vote shook out but being Germany, you gotta figure there were a LOT of Lutherans.

I've seen the breakout, it's been posted on several of the threads I alluded to earlier. By region, it's a much higher percentage of Prot vs. Catholic support.

In the main I agree with you, any religious appeal by Hitler was an evil perversion. To attribute guilt for Hitler on Christianity is a perversion of it as well. However, on this topic it is usually the Catholic Church that gets attention and the blame.

[Alex Murphy]

....as the article explains, Hitler's support, when broken down that way, was more among Protestants than Catholics.

There's no way that the "article explains" that or any such thing. The article never mentions Protestants or any other religious group, or even the percentage of Catholics backing the National Socialist Party prior to 1925. Catholic support was in decline by 1923, because the Nazis turned their propaganda focus elsewhere:

This coincided with an upsurge in anti-Catholicism in the other folk movements in Munich that also affected part of the Nazi party. According to Hastings, in this period many Catholics left the Nazi party, and those who remained did so by sacrificing their Catholic identity. The Catholic priests who had joined the party also left. In fact, in the fall of 1923 the Archdiocese of Munich-Freising had forbidden them from attending meetings of the Nazi party.

Once re-founded, the previous Catholic orientation was reversed and in large part replaced Christianity with its own set of martyr figures drawn from the failed putsch. From that time too Hitler no longer portrayed himself as a believing Catholic or even as an advocate of Christianity, Hastings affirmed.

With time the Nazi movement became more and more overtly anti-Catholic to the point where the Nazis strongly opposed the establishment of a concordat between Bavaria and the Vatican. They were also openly critical of the papal nuncio Archbishop Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII. The German bishops were frequently attacked in Nazi publications, particularly Cardinal Michael von Faulhaber, who just prior to the 1923 putsch had spoken out in defense of the Jews.

[D-fendr]

I guess I did go an assumption too far as regards the article, though other data support the conclusion.

My logic was: if Catholic support was in decline while Nazi support was increasing, their support would necessarily be increasing among non-Catholics, i.e. Protestants.

My previous response to ichabod1 explains my position more fully.

[Alex Murphy]

My logic was: if Catholic support was in decline while Nazi support was increasing, their support would necessarily be increasing among non-Catholics, i.e. Protestants.

Everything not Catholic must be Protestant, eh?

[D-fendr]

Everything not Catholic must be Protestant, eh?

Not everything (everyone), but in Germany at the time, it would be a reasonable assumption I believe.

[D-fendr]

Here's a graphic comparison. Again, my former comments on this subject in general should be kept in mind.

"This map shows the influence of religious conviction on the Nazi vote for the Reichstag election 7/32. Elevation represents the share of Catholics / protestants (the higher, the more Catholics live in a Kreis) in relation to total population. The Nazi vote share is represented by different color shadings (dark red: highest NSDAP share; light green: lowest NSDAP share). The map reveals that the NSDAP strongholds are clearly restricted to protestant areas. This becomes very clear e.g. in East Prussia, where in a small catholic enclave the NSDAP performed very poorly in comparison to the surrounding Kreise dominated by protestants.

"It is also inportant to note that of the 21 Nazi Germans tried as war criminals at Nuremberg 16 indicated they were "Protestant."
Source.

And, FWIW, a portion of the Wikipedia article on Religion in Nazi Germany[Cites at the source.]:

Yet Lutherans voted for Hitler in greater numbers than Catholics. Different German states possessed regional social variations as to class densities and religious denomination;[38] Richard Steigmann-Gall alleges a linkage between several Protestant churches and Nazism,[39] the main aspect being Hitler's citing anti-Semitic pamphlets by Martin Luther and accusations that the Lutheran establishment supported Hitler. The small Methodist population at times was deemed foreign; this stemmed from the fact that Methodism began in England, while it did not develop in Germany until the nineteenth century with Christoph Gottlob Müller and Louis Jacoby. Because of this history they felt the urge to be "more German than the Germans" to avoid suspicion. Methodist Bishop John L. Nelsen toured the U.S. on Hitler's behalf to protect his church, but in private letters indicated that he feared or hated Nazism, and so retired to Switzerland. Methodist Bishop F. H. Otto Melle took a far more collaborationist position that included apparently sincere support for Nazism. He felt that serving the Reich was both a patriotic duty and a means of advancement. To show his gratitude, Hitler made a gift of 10,000 marks in 1939 to a Methodist congregation to purchase an organ.[40] Outside of Germany, Melle's views were overwhelmingly rejected by most Methodists. The leader of pro-Nazi segment of Baptists was Paul Schmidt. Hitler also led to the unification of Pro-Nazi Protestants in the Protestant Reich Church which was led by Ludwig Müller. The idea of such a "national church" was possible in the history of mainstream German Protestantism, but National Churches devoted primarily to the state were generally forbidden among the Anabaptists, Jehovah's Witnesses, and in Catholicism.

[Pelham]

Start on page 235:

http://tinyurl.com/27szuwm

[narses]

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