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Niemoller on Nazis. Whether or not it was "treason" for Pastor Niemoller to preach, write and talk as he has against the Nazi system, his published sermons* are undoubtedly among the most controversial ever preached. In Germany the Nazis claim to object only to what they call "Negative Christianity," claim to approve "Positive Christianity" (TIME, Aug. 10, 1936). Pastor Niemoller, in perhaps his most controversial sermon, boldly accused the Nazis of taking in this matter today exactly the line the Jews took when Christ was alive.
"I cannot help saying quite harshly and bluntly that the Jewish people came to grief and disgrace because of its Positive Christianity!" thundered Martin Niemoller from his pulpit on the Tenth Sunday after Trinity last year. "It [the Jewish people] bears a curse throughout the history of the world because it was ready to approve of its Messiah just as long and as far as it thought it could gain some advantage for its own plans and its own aims from Him, His words and His deeds. It bears a curse because it rejected Him and resisted Him to the death when it became clear that Jesus of Nazareth would not cease calling [the Jews] to repentance and faith, despite their insistence that they were free, strong and proud men and belonged to a pureblooded, race-conscious nation!"
Nobody in the congregation, least of all members of the Secret Police, failed to catch Pastor Niemoller's high-powered implication that the Nazis are proud, race-conscious exponents of pure blood and in these respects resemble Jews. No more provocative suggestions could have been made in Germany, but Pastor Niemoller continued his sermon by shouting: "Positive Christianity, which the Jewish people wanted, clashed with Negative Christianity as Jesus himself represented it! . . . Friends, can we risk going with our nation without forgiveness of sins, without that so-called Negative Christianity which, when all is said and done, clings in repentance and faith to Jesus as the Savior of sinners? I cannot and you cannot and OUR NATION CANNOT! 'Come, let us return unto the Lord!' "
Such sermons as this Pastor Niemoller preached Sunday after Sunday to Berlin's most fashionable congregation, and the fact that they stood and still stand by him is proof of how little liking German aristocrats have for the whole Nazi claptrap of neopaganism and "pure race." The issue of the Jews is a separate issue, and neither the Dahlem aristocrats nor their pastor have shown themselves pro-Semitic, if anything the reverse. In the fiery prisoner-pastor's words: "Dear brethren, the reason is easily given: the Jews brought the Christ of God to the Cross."
Thus in Germany today Niemoller equals Dynamite, his trial this week contributes mightily to the stresses & strains of the crisis faced by Adolf Hitler.
* HERE STAND I!, Willett, Clark &Co. ($2).