The Nazis weren't Christians.

Opinion Journal ^ | MONDAY, MARCH 25 | ROBERT L. BARTLEY

[Skooz]

Holy Week is by no means all sweetness and light. This Friday Christians mark the crucifixion, a terrible event redeemed by the resurrection three days later. The Jews gather on Thursday for Passover, celebrating the Exodus from slavery as the angel of death skipped Jewish homes during Egypt's tenth plague, the killing of the firstborn. So perhaps it's not an inappropriate time to discuss another terrible topic, the Holocaust, and in particular the divisive issue of Christian culpability in the Nazi genocide of the Jews. It is not the purpose here to dismiss the long history of anti-Semitism in Christian lands. By now most Christians agree this was a sin, and its legacy surely played an important role in laying a groundwork for the Nazis and in muting opposition to the "final solution."

[cynicom]

The Nazis did in fact consider the first reich as the Roman Empire, ending in 1806.

[cynicom]

ALL...

Anyone that cares to look might check the Simom Wiesenthal Learning Center, they leave no doubt as to the connection to the Holy Roman Empire, as do most scholars.

[Romulus]

They signed the concordat with the Catholic Church.

So what?

The Concordat of 1933 was simply an expansion of existing concordats between the Vatican and the German states of Bavaria, Baden, and Prussia. The Vatican had more than a century of concordats behind it at this point (starting with Napoleon in 1814); by the death of Pius XI in 1939 there were 41 separate concordats on the books.

A concordat is nothing more than an attempt to negotiate a legal document to ensure the Church's ability to function lawfully and unmolested with its just liberties intact. Your attempt to portray the 1933 concordat as evidence of sinister Catholic-Nazi complicity is a lie.

[cynicom]

The Vatican was very much involved at the end of WW2, in "arranging" transit of Nazis out of Germany to safe havens in South America.

[jboot]

You are correct (and I stand corrected), it that the Nazis considered the first German empire to have been the Holy Roman Empire.

This does not constitute a link between the Catholic church and nazism, but rather an attempt to link Nazism to a prior period of Germanic, as opposed to Catholic, rule. The Nazi concept of empire was a racist rather than religious notion. I am sure the Wiesenthal Center would disagree, but we can hardly consider them to be an impartial authority on this matter.

[Skooz]

If it wasn't for the dirt-dumb historical cluelessness cultivated by American public education it would scarcely be necessary to even discuss this farcical issue.

Correct on all points. But I have debated some here on FR who will not be swayed otherwise. I even once received the reply that "the Nazi leadership were mostly devout Christians." That is the ignorance of some right here at FR.

[Skooz]

The monumental ignorance of that statement is breathtaking.

The utter lack of historical knowledge in that statement is astonishing.

[mondonico]

A fair point. Clearly, he knew it was a slur and uttered it on purpose. I guess I meant that his worth was "overrated" from a normative sense: He may be smart, but we don't need his kind of smart leading the country.

[Romulus]

Anyone can throw mud. Do you have any documentation or evidence?

[VOA]

bump...

[NC_Libertarian]

I think of nazism as a humanistic philosophy.

[screed]

The Nazis may not have been Christians but the German people who empowered, supported, enabled and carried out the Nazi plans were predominantly Christian.

If you get a chance, can you give me your source for this? I am especially interested in numbers supporting the 'predominance' and evidence regarding specifically how they "carried out the Nazi plans." Thanks in advance.

[cynicom]

Romulus...I try to be civil and correct, what mud did you have reference to????

[Romulus]

Your post #44. Can we see some evidence, please?

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

Didn't...uh...the Nazis sign an agreement with Britain as well? The so-called "Peace in our time" paper waved by the appeasing PM? Does that...uh...make the Brits pro-Nazi? Then there was the Stalin-Hitler pact. Not to mention the financial backing of the Nazis by American financiers and bankers. Seems like the Nazis were cutting deals with EVERYBODY? Shall we include the whole world as responsible for the holocaust?

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

Ever heard of "Project Paperclip" or Allen Dulles?

[cynicom]

Romulus...

The Vatican and OSS were working together to move Nazis from Germany to Italy and thence to South American countries. This has been written about many times in books and news reports. I am surprised anyone could have missed it.

[Seydlitz]

Do you actually have a citation? Or, do you prefer to stick with mysterious, unnamed sources? See Trevalyn's "Rome 1944" on events inside the Vatican (far from helping the Nazis, the Vatican was almost seized by the SS, until SS General Karl Wolff decided against a take-over).

The allegations about the OSS are particularly lame. They are based on the OSS's later use of remaining Abwehr assets behind the Iron Curtain. There were no Nazis smuggled into South America for this purpose. For details, see Otto Skorzeny's "My Commando Operations".

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

"The Vatican made me do it" theory of National Socialism is essentially the single-bullet theory for World War II. There were multiple factors of causation leading to the events of 1933-1945. There was in fact a Catholic candidate who ran against Hitler for election. The Soviet Communists ordered Communist Party members in Germany to throw their support behind Hitler because they thought this would hasten the coming of a Communist Revolution in Germany. Hitler had supporters in England and America. Just like the burning of the Reichstag and the peace negotiations with Britain, the "Concordat" with the Vatican was yet another of Hitler's forked-tongue diplomatic smokescreens. If there is any one or group who deserves a lot of blame for setting up the power vacuum which led to the Nazi insanity, it was President Wilson and his wacko liberal advisers who created the idiotic Versailles Treaty toppling Austria-Hungary and the Kaiser. This was the opinion of Winston Churchill. Check out Churchill'sThe Gathering Storm for more on the ludicrously insane diplomacy which created the Weimar Republic and its power vacuum which opened the door for the Nazis. Read about the Stalin-Hitler pact in Kennan's memoirs for how the Communists WANTED the Nazis to gain power, etc., etc.

[cynicom]

Howl....

Yes I have, that is how we got Von Braun and his crew.