Are Christians embarrassed that over 95% of Germans in WW2 were Christians?

Question

That means that 95% of the soldiers in Hitler's army were Christian. It means that 95% of the guards in the concentration camps were Christians. These facts can be found in most any encylopedia. Germany then was even more Christian than the USA is now.

Answer 1

In my Christian faith I am responsible for myself and how I live
according to Christ. They are responsible for there own actions.

Answer 2

Also, the USA was probably about 95% Christian then, and so was England. And many Christians were eventually sent to the same concentration camps as everyone else, if they stood up to Hilter.

Since the USA and England defeated Germany (with a little help from atheist Russia), what does your statistic prove, exactly?

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer (February 4, 1906 – April 9, 1945) was a German Lutheran pastor, theologian and participant in the German resistance movement against Nazism. He was involved in plots planned by members of the Abwehr (the German Military Intelligence Office) to assassinate Adolf Hitler. He was arrested in March 1943, imprisoned and eventually hanged, just before the end of the Second World War in Europe....

...Dietrich Bonhoeffer is considered a martyr for his faith; in the mid-1990s, the German Government officially absolved him of any "crimes" he might have committed pursuant to the positive law of the National Socialist regime. The calendars of the Episcopal Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America commemorate him on April 9, the date on which he was hanged in 1945.

An oft-quoted line from one of his more widely read books, "The Cost of Discipleship" (1937), foreshadowed his death. "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die." His books "Ethics" (1949) and "Letters and Papers from Prison" (1953) were published posthumously.

The theological and political reasons behind his shift from Christian pacifism, which he espoused in the mid-1930s, to participation in planning the assassination of Hitler are much debated....

Answer 3

No more so than atheists are embarrassed because 95% of the communists were atheists and killed over 100 million people during the 20th century. Although, I would have to challenge your assertion that 95% of the Germans were Christians. The nazis tried hard to purge out of their ranks Christians who where Christian in more than just name. Hitler himself was a pagan devoted to the old germanic gods. Many in his staff were spiritualists. And let us remember that Germans loved their country, too. Most fought not for the nazi ideal but to recover their lost national pride and to defend their homes. You are making a blanket statement that shows a complete disregard for historical fact.

Answer 4

It always makes me laugh (in a halfhearted ironic way) when Christians claim that Hitler was an atheist and therefore atheists were responsible for X million deaths.

Even if he was, and he wasn't, he didn't personally go around and kill millions of people ON HIS OWN! Almost all of those who did the killing were good old fashioned god-botherers.

Oh and the usually slippery evasion that they weren't real Christians is empty, if you had asked them at the time they were just as Christian as you are today, just like the Slave Traders and just as many would be today if the same thing happenend again.
Being a good person is INDEPENDENT of religious faith.

Oh and the reason for the question and my answer here is precisely the claim to moral superiority that believers make, and the usual claims about Hitler, Stalin et al.

Answer 5

Germany was not alone in antisemitism in Europe. For at least 600 years the Jewish people had been oppressed by Christians in many parts of Europe. The Holocaust was kept secret from the German people for most of the 40's. Many did not know until after the war that Jews and others were being killed. They were just being "resettled" out of the "homeland" said the propaganda coming out of the totalitarian government . No one could question this answer. The normal person knew not to question authority for fear of being "resettled" themselves. Gypsies, Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, Labor Union leaders, homosexuals, and anyone that got in the way of the Nazis were used as slave labor. It was cheap and useful to find "enemies" of the National Socialist Party government to put to work for the Reich. Germans were told from Hitler youth camps and all schooling that they were superior to not just Jews but EVERYONE. Jews were also linked to the communist in Russia. Communist Russia was the great fear fo the normal German. If was a "them vs. us" mentality during the mid and late 30's. A scape goat was needed for all the troubles in the thirties. The Jew was an easy target. The French, English, Spanish or any other European peoples and governments would not challenge. There are hundreds of books on the subject. How is it that today, not only Christians but almost all people allow situations like the genocide in many parts of Africa to exist? History does repeat itself for those who refuse to learn from it. Rod

Answer 6

No. Not embarrassed. Ashamed most likely. Many people have done stupid things in the name of religion while missing key principles in very the religion that they're supposedly acting in the name of. I'm more embarrassed of our President claiming that God told him to go to war. Is that so Mr. President? He's obviously not the best model of Christian values, just as Nazi Germany.

Answer 7

First of all, most Christians today would certainly not approve of what happened...

but...

most Christians do seem more likely to follow the given authority of the moment, especially if one employs bible-based rhetoric.

the more zealous in particular: when was the last time one of the doom-sayers on TBN pointed fingers at any "deceivers" or potential Revelationary "anti-christs" within their own flock?

It's incumbent on all decent people to question our "leaders," especially the ones who are quickest to demonize anyone who questions or critiques them.

Answer 8

Did you know that Hitler also betrayed the trust of the Christian community.He used the churches help to get him where he was at the time.

Answer 9

What's EMBARASSING is that YOU conveniently "accept" them to be or "believe" them to be christians; having no firsthand knowledge whatsoever of any of those peoples character, practices, etc. You have not even established; "what IS a Christian". Yet because they are classified as such, YOU accept that as truth.

No matter what a person CLAIMS to be, unless his actions manifest the evidence of being such, he is not.

Pertaining to being a Christian; you're not the Judge. But if you want to believe them to be Christian, to justify what YOU choose to believe, that's your right.

Talk about ignorant faith.

Peace

Answer 10

The Crusaders in the Middle Ages were Christian also. Heck even OJ probably attends church. You can't judge an entire religion by 1 region, peron, or people-group.