I do not know of any section of the German
Protestant Confessional Church whose pastors have refused to preach, to serve, to ordain and bless the atrocities and horrors committed by the German armies and their leaders." The Dean comments that this should be denied if it can be denied with knowledge. Unfortunately, no denial can be fully satis- factory, for (1) neither Mr. Wiener nor anybody else in this country has more than scrappy knowledge of the actions and sufferings of the Con- fessional Church during the war, and (2) no one can tell what sections of " the Confessional Church " may be more or less known to Mr. Wiener.
It is known that, at the time of Munich, Kerrl accused leaders of the Confessional Church d treason because they had prayed for peace, not victory. It is known that Hitler's appeal for a holy war against Russia fell flat. We have news of Christians in Germany meeting in cold and un- lit churches to pray for those being bombed in English cities. We know Mr. Wiener's account of Niemoller's quarrel with Hitler, as cited by the Dean, is false. Stories accumulate to show that many Christians in Germany did what they could to help the Christians in the over-run countries. I know personally very many of the leaders of the Confessional Church. The suggestion that they have preached and blessed the German atrocities is both stupid and scaocralous. I commend as sober and well- informed Dr. Rieger's The Silent Church (S.C.M. Press).
The attempt to show that Luther is the father of the Nazis has for years been part of Goebbels' or Rosenberg's propaganda, which Mr. Wiener seems to have carried forward. This propaganda has a basis in selected facts, and may be countered by other selected facts. That Luther said many wild and monstrous things, that an understanding between us and even the loyal Confessional Church will be very difficult, that German Lutheranism has a bad record of subservience to militarism and the State are facts neither new nor unimportant. But if Mr. Wiener's book is as unbalanced and inaccurate in general as in the passage quoted by the Dean, I shall have to buy it and add it to my collection of Nazi literature.
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