Download or read book The Catholic Church And Nazi Germany written by Guenter Lewy and published by Da Capo Press. This book was released on 2009-09-09 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ”The subject matter of this book is controversial,” Guenter Lewy states plainly in his preface. To show the German Catholic Church’s congeniality with some of the goals of National Socialism and its gradual entrapment in Nazi policies and programs, Lewy describes the episcopate’s support of Hitler’s expansionist policies and its failures to speak out on the persecution of the Jews. To this tragic history Lewy brings new focus and research, illuminating one of the darkest corners of our century with scholarship and intellectual honesty in a riveting, and often painful, narrative.
Download or read book Catholic Theologians in Nazi Germany written by Robert Krieg and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2004-02-27 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discusses a range of religious scholars, but focuses on five major theologians who were born during the Kulturkampf, came to maturity and international recognition during the Hitler era, and had an influence on Catholicism in the English-speaking world. While three were sympathetic to the Third Reich in varying degrees and the other two were publicly critical of the new regime, the book takes a look of each of their stances regarding the Third Reich's anti-Jewish propaganda.
Download or read book German Catholics and Hitler s Wars written by Gordon C. Zahn and published by University of Notre Dame Pess. This book was released on 1988-09-30 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Prior to the outbreak of World War II, nearly forty thousand German Catholics were involved in the German Catholic Peace League, a movement that caused many people in various countries to seriously reconsider the dimension of pacifism in their faith. During the course of the War, however, many of these same German Catholics raised no serious objection to serving in Germany's armies or swearing allegiance to Adolph Hitler. First published in 1962, German Catholics and Hitler's Wars created a furor, ultimately causing a serious reevaluation of church-state relationships and, in particular, of the morality of war. This work began as an attempt to understand the demise of the German Catholic Peace League. But because of various factors, including the destruction of vital records, Gordon C. Zahn began to consider the behavior of German Catholics in general and the evidence of their almost total conformity to the war demands of the Nazi regime. Using sociological analysis, he argues convincingly for the existence of a super-effective system of social controls, and of a selection between the competing values of Catholicism and nationalism. Although Zahn never speculates, conclusions are inescapable, chief among them that the traditional Catholic doctrine of the "just war" has ceased to be operative for Catholics in the modern world.
Download or read book The Polish Catholic Church under German Occupation written by Jonathan Huener and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2021-02-16 with total page 375 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Nazi Germany invaded Poland in 1939, it aimed to destroy Polish national consciousness. As a symbol of Polish national identity and the religious faith of approximately two-thirds of Poland's population, the Roman Catholic Church was an obvious target of the Nazi regime's policies of ethnic, racial, and cultural Germanization. Jonathan Huener reveals in The Polish Catholic Church under German Occupation that the persecution of the church was most severe in the Reichsgau Wartheland, a region of Poland annexed to Nazi Germany. Here Catholics witnessed the execution of priests, the incarceration of hundreds of clergymen and nuns in prisons and concentration camps, the closure of churches, the destruction and confiscation of church property, and countless restrictions on public expression of the Catholic faith. Huener also illustrates how some among the Nazi elite viewed this area as a testing ground for anti-church policies to be launched in the Reich after the successful completion of the war. Based on largely untapped sources from state and church archives, punctuated by vivid archival photographs, and marked by nuance and balance, The Polish Catholic Church under German Occupation exposes both the brutalities and the limitations of Nazi church policy. The first English-language investigation of German policy toward the Catholic Church in occupied Poland, this compelling story also offers insight into the varied ways in which Catholics—from Pope Pius XII, to members of the Polish episcopate, to the Polish laity at the parish level—responded to the Nazi regime's repressive measures.
Download or read book Resisting the Third Reich written by Kevin P. Spicer and published by . This book was released on 2004 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Spicer juxtaposes Catholicism and Nazism to provide a clear, balanced understanding of the challenges the clergy faced simply by celebrating the sacraments and teaching the faithful. By following individual priests in their day-to-day ministries, he documents how effectively they guarded their flock from a predatory ideology. Along the way, he highlights the leadership of Bishop Konrad von Preysing of Berlin, who enabled the diocesan clergy to speak out against Nazi violations of Catholic doctrine and practice, and Monsignor Bernhard Lichtenberg, who was sentenced to prison for publicly praying for Jews and other victims of Nazi oppression.
Download or read book Catholic Citizens in the Third Reich written by Donald J. Dietrich and published by Transaction Publishers. This book was released on 1988-01-01 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why did some German Catholics support and others oppose the police state that was the Third Reich? In this insightful analysis, Donald Dietrich explores the social-psychological dynamics behind the religious reactions of German Catholics to political and moral issues during the late Weimar and Third Reich eras. Along with many other Germans, Catholics were enmeshed in a cruel dilemma. Assenting to Nazi ideals would mean a loss of moral credibility; opposing them would result in persecution. Dietrich shows how Catholics accommodated and sometimes resisted totalitarianism and the Final Solution. Three groups of Catholics are examined: the hierarchy, the theologians, and the laity. The literature on Nazi Germany is enormous. But this is the first analysis of the dynamics shaping individual motivations and group response to Nazi ideals. This comprehensive work fuses results derived from social science research with the massive amount of historical data available. It is an interdisciplinary study relating religious values to patterns of behavior, an issue that retains its significance today.
Download or read book Catholics Confronting Hitler written by Peter Bartley and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2016-09-21 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written with economy and in chronological order, this book offers a comprehensive account of the response to the Nazi tyranny by Pope Pius XII, his envoys, and various representatives of the Catholic Church in every country where Nazism existed before and during WWII. Peter Bartley makes extensive use of primary sources letters, diaries, memoirs, official government reports, German and British. He manifestly quotes the works of several prominent Nazis, of churchmen, diplomats, members of the Resistance, and ordinary Jews and gentiles who left eye-witness accounts of life under the Nazis, in addition to the wartime correspondence between Pius XII and President Roosevelt. This book reveals how resistance to Hitler and rescue work engaged many churchmen and laypeople at all levels, and was often undertaken in collaboration with Protestants and Jews. The Church paid a high price in many countries for its resistance, with hundreds of churches closed down, bishops exiled or martyred, and many priests shot or sent to Nazi death camps. Bartley also explores the supposed inaction of the German bishops over Hitler's oppression of the Jews, showing that the Reich Concordat did not deter the hierarchy and clergy from protesting the regime's iniquities or from rescuing its victims. While giving clear evidence for Papal condemnation of the Jewish persecution, he also explains why Pius XII could not completely set aside the language of diplomacy and be more openly vocal in his rebuke of the Nazis.
Download or read book Catholicism and the Roots of Nazism written by Derek Hastings and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Derek Hastings illuminates an important and largely overlooked aspect of Nazi history, revealing National Socialism's close, early ties with Catholicism in the years immediately after World War I, when the movement first emerged."--Jacket.
Download or read book Hitler s Religion written by Richard Weikart and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-11-22 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A book to challenge the status quo, spark a debate, and get people talking about the issues and questions we face as a country!
Download or read book Hitler s Priests written by Kevin Spicer and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2008-04-14 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Shaken by military defeat and economic depression after War World I, Germans sought to restore their nation's dignity and power. In this context the National Socialist Party, with its promise of a revivified Germany, drew supporters. Among the most zealous were a number of Catholic clergymen known as "brown priests" who volunteered as Nazi propagandists. In this insightful study, Spicer unearths a dark subchapter in Roman Catholic history, introduces the principal clergymen who participated in the Nazi movement, examines their motives, details their advocacy of National Socialism, and explores the consequences of their political activism. Some brown priests, particularly war veterans, advocated National Socialism because it appealed to their patriotic ardor. Others had less laudatory motives: disaffection with clerical life, conflicts with Church superiors, or ambition for personal power and fame. Whatever their individual motives, they employed their skills as orators, writers, and teachers to proclaim the message of Nazism. Especially during the early 1930s, when the Church forbade membership in the party, these clergymen strove to prove that Catholicism was compatible with National Socialism, thereby justifying their support of Nazi ideology. Father Dr. Philipp Haeuser, a scholar and pastor, went so far as to promote antisemitism while deifying Adolf Hitler. The Führer's antisemitism, Spicer argues, did not deter clergymen such as Haeuser because, although the Church officially rejected the Nazis' extreme racism, Catholic teachings tolerated hostility toward Jews by blaming them for Christ's crucifixion. While a handful of brown priests enjoyed the forbearance of their bishops, others endured reprimand or even dismissal; a few found new vocations with the Third Reich. After the fall of the Reich, the most visible brown priests faced trial for their part in the crimes of National Socialism, a movement they had once so earnestly supported. In addition to this intriguing history about clergymen trying to reconcile faith and politics, Spicer provides a master list—verified by extensive research in Church and government archives—of Catholic clergy who publicly supported National Socialism.
Download or read book Hitler s Pope written by John Cornwell and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2000-10-01 with total page 452 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The “explosive” (The New York Times) bestseller that “redefined the history of the twentieth century” (The Washington Post ) This shocking book was the first account to tell the whole truth about Pope Pius XII's actions during World War II, and it remains the definitive account of that era. It sparked a firestorm of controversy both inside and outside the Catholic Church. Award-winning journalist John Cornwell has also included in this seminal work of history an introduction that both answers his critics and reaffirms his overall thesis that Pius XII fatally weakened the Catholic Church with his endorsement of Hitler—and sealed the fate of the Jews in Europe.
Download or read book History vs Apologetics written by David Cymet and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2012-07-10 with total page 510 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Set within the context of the political and ideological developments of the time, History vs. Apologetics examines the role played by the Catholic Church in the rise and consolidation of the Third Reich and in particular with regard to the Nazi persecution of the Jews. Distanced in the beginning, the Catholic Church and the Nazi party drew closer as Hitler's popularity increased. At the ratification of the Concordat in Rome, a commitment not to interfere with the Nazis' 'Final Solution' to the 'Jewish Question' was traded for a verbal promise from Berlin to exclude the baptized converts. While the Nazi government violated the Concordat at every turn, the Church kept zealously its promise. Pope Pius XII never mentioned the persecuted Jews by name and denied any knowledge of the annihilation of the Jews. Even after the war, Pius XII refused to condemn anti-Semitism and Germany's role in the Holocaust. Instead, the Vatican engaged in the protection of genocide perpetrators and assisted in their mass escape. David Cymet's comprehensive critical analysis of the polemical literature on the topic makes it possible to separate legitimate history from apologetic allegations and misrepresentations, bringing to light key elements of Church policy that is intentionally misinterpreted by apologists. By surveying the Church's policy from just before the rise of Nazism to the present, Cymet demonstrates how the Nazis were able to turn the Catholic Church into their ally in their war against the Jews.
Download or read book Wehrmacht Priests written by Lauren Faulkner Rossi and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2015-04-06 with total page 349 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Between 1939 and 1945 more than 17,000 Catholic German priests and seminarians were conscripted into Hitler’s Wehrmacht. Men who had devoted their lives to God found themselves advancing the cause of an abhorrent regime. Lauren Faulkner Rossi draws on personal correspondence, official military reports, memoirs, and interviews to present a detailed picture of Catholic priests who served faithfully in the German armed forces in the Second World War. Most of them failed to see the bitter irony of their predicament. Wehrmacht Priests plumbs the moral justifications of men who were committed to their religious vocation as well as to the cause of German nationalism. In their wartime and postwar writings, these soldiers often stated frankly that they went to war willingly, because it was their spiritual duty to care for their countrymen in uniform. But while some priests became military chaplains, carrying out work consistent with their religious training, most served in medical roles or, in the case of seminarians, in general infantry. Their convictions about their duty only strengthened as Germany waged an increasingly desperate battle against the Soviet Union, which they believed was an existential threat to the Catholic Church and German civilization. Wehrmacht Priests unpacks the complex relationship between the Catholic Church and the Nazi regime, including the Church’s fierce but futile attempts to preserve its independence under Hitler’s dictatorship, its accommodations with the Nazis regarding spiritual care in the military, and the shortcomings of Catholic doctrine in the face of total war and genocide.
Download or read book German Catholicism at War 1939 1945 written by Thomas Brodie and published by . This book was released on 2018-10-04 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: German Catholicism at War explores the mentalities and experiences of German Catholics during the Second World War. Taking the German Home Front, and most specifically, the Rhineland and Westphalia, as its core focus German Catholicism at War examines Catholics' responses to developments inthe war, their complex relationships with the Nazi regime, and their religious practices. Drawing on a wide range of source materials stretching from personal letters and diaries to pastoral letters and Gestapo reports, Thomas Brodie breaks new ground in our understanding of the Catholic communityin Germany during the Second World War.
Download or read book Catholics and Third Reich written by Karl-Joseph Hummel and published by Brill Schoningh. This book was released on 2018 with total page 315 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The attitude of the Catholic church, its bishops, priests and members from 1933 to 1945 is still one of the most controversial topics of contemporary history. Alignment or resistance, collaboration or distance? these are the poles of the controversy up to present day. The dispute over Pope Pius XII. and the holocaust is an especially fierce row. Well-known historians lead through the no longer transparent batch of assured facts and persevering historical clichés, of historical insights and moral judgements and prejudices. This book provides a reliable guideline through the widely branched and complex landscape of research and opinion. Those who want to discuss the role of the Catholic church in the Third Reich seriously cannot do without this comprehensive survey.
Download or read book Conflicts Compromises and Mutual Self interest how the Nazis and the Catholic and Protestant Churches Dealt with Each Other During the Third Reich written by Sebastian Dregger and published by GRIN Verlag. This book was released on 2008-08 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Essay from the year 2008 in the subject History Europe - Germany - National Socialism, World War II, grade: 71 = A, Oxford Brookes University, course: The Nazi Dictatorship, 1933-1945, 11 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: Free from any apologetic or debunking fuss, the essay depicts the complex relationship between the Nazi state and the Catholic and Protestant Churches during the Third Reich. Focussing on three major areas of conflict between the Churches and the Nazis(sychronization ('Gleichschaltung'), the Nazis' anti-church policies, the churches and euthanasia) the essay's argument is that a pragmatic approach by both Churches and the Nazis based on the preservation of mutual self-interest is the key to understand their dealing with each other in each individual case of conflict. In a second part, the essays seeks to explain why both protagonists preferred a pragmatic instead of a more radical and uncompromising approach to each other, stating that three factors are accountable for this: First, mutually shared political views based on anti-liberalism and anti-Marxism; second, a tremendous mispercerption of the regime's nature by both churches; third, the limits of anti-church policies among a population still being deeply Christianized.
Download or read book A Moral Reckoning written by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With his first book, Hitler’s Willing Executioners, Daniel Jonah Goldhagen dramatically revised our understanding of the role ordinary Germans played in the Holocaust. Now he brings his formidable powers of research and argument to bear on the Catholic Church and its complicity in the destruction of European Jewry. What emerges is a work that goes far beyond the familiar inquiries—most of which focus solely on Pope Pius XII—to address an entire history of hatred and persecution that culminated, in some cases, in an active participation in mass-murder. More than a chronicle, A Moral Reckoning is also an assessment of culpability and a bold attempt at defining what actions the Church must take to repair the harm it did to Jews—and to repair itself. Impressive in its scholarship, rigorous in its ethical focus, the result is a book of lasting importance.
