Does it matter if Hitler was an Atheist?
I wrote this in response to someone who was wrongly convinced that Adolf Hitler was an atheist. This person was using the Third Reich as an example of what happens to nations led by Atheists. They did not want to hear about Sweden or Japan.
I had actually invested a considerable amount or research and thought to the issue of Adolf Hitler’s alleged atheism. It is clear he was Roman Catholic. He talks about God and Jesus in his speeches and his writing. Regardless, there is that pesky, urban myth that he was secretly some sort of Atheist.
First off, while the myth is patently absurd, it is pervasive. Right wing pundits like Bill O’Reilly spread this lie with impunity. This makes it very hard to counter.
As Hitler once observed, “--that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.”
-Adolf Hitler , Mein Kampf, vol. I, ch. X
Then it occurred to me that the beliefs of Adolf Hitler were completely irrelevant. While it is true that Hitler was the elected leader of the nation, it was the German population who carried out the final solution. There is not a single shred of evidence to show that the German population was anything but Christian.
According to the website for the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, a religious census taken in 1925 revealed that of an overall German population of 65 million, 40 million belonged to the main Protestant (Evangelical Lutheran) church, 21 million to the Roman Catholic church, and 620,000 to various smaller, mostly Protestant denominations.
Let me repeat this. It does not matter what faith Adolf Hitler followed or did not follow. What matters is that the German people were Christian. These were the people running the trains, operating the gas chambers and manning the incinerators. For this reason, the crime of the Holocaust falls squarely upon Christianity.
I had actually invested a considerable amount or research and thought to the issue of Adolf Hitler’s alleged atheism. It is clear he was Roman Catholic. He talks about God and Jesus in his speeches and his writing. Regardless, there is that pesky, urban myth that he was secretly some sort of Atheist.
First off, while the myth is patently absurd, it is pervasive. Right wing pundits like Bill O’Reilly spread this lie with impunity. This makes it very hard to counter.
As Hitler once observed, “--that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.”
-Adolf Hitler , Mein Kampf, vol. I, ch. X
Then it occurred to me that the beliefs of Adolf Hitler were completely irrelevant. While it is true that Hitler was the elected leader of the nation, it was the German population who carried out the final solution. There is not a single shred of evidence to show that the German population was anything but Christian.
According to the website for the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, a religious census taken in 1925 revealed that of an overall German population of 65 million, 40 million belonged to the main Protestant (Evangelical Lutheran) church, 21 million to the Roman Catholic church, and 620,000 to various smaller, mostly Protestant denominations.
Let me repeat this. It does not matter what faith Adolf Hitler followed or did not follow. What matters is that the German people were Christian. These were the people running the trains, operating the gas chambers and manning the incinerators. For this reason, the crime of the Holocaust falls squarely upon Christianity.