NAZIS REBUFFED

Southland Times, Issue 22473, 8 November 1934, Page 6

NAZIS REBUFFED

In the success of the “rebel” bishops of the Protestant Church of Germany, the Nazis have received their biggest rebuff since they came to power. Hitler and his lieutenants committed themselves to a plan to make religion a State department, and, with much thundering by General Goering, with honeyed threats from Dr. Goebbels, the official bishops were recruited to oust those who decfined to serve a Brown shirted God. After the Communists had been routed, the Nazi leaders said that the church remained the one organization to serve as a rallying point for a people anxious to eject the Swastika tyranny, and it was for this reason that they decided to control the religious orders through civil service bishops. From the outset there was opposition, and gradually this rebellion against the Nazi regimentation of religion expanded and deepened, until it was no longer possible for the leaders to ignore its growth. On the one hand the Hitlerites could not compose their differences with the Vatican, and amongst the German Catholics there was a large body of dissatisfaction, no less dangerous because it was not vocal. The Austrian tragedy worked much harm for Hitler amongst the German Catholics, and he could see in the extraordinarily high opposition vote in the last plebiscite—over four million dissident voters at a time when to reveal opposition was dangerous—some expression of the determination of the religious people, Catholic and Protestant, to resist the Nazi effort to dragoon them into worshipping a Statecontrolled God. After that poll Dr. Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda, spoke of the necessity for “winning the affection’' of the antagonistic voters; but the first break in the Nazis’ religious policy came when some sturdy peasant farmers forced their way into Hitler’s presence and made clear to him that to pursue the challenge to free Protestantism in Germany would be dangerous. It is not without significance that the first open display of jubilation at the success of the “rebel” bishops—those who had persistently refused to recognize the primate employed by the Nazi Government —should occur at Nuremberg, because it was there in 1923 that the Nazis gave their first show of strength in a march past Hitler. Adolf Hitler in the last few days disclosed that he had been impressed by the growing strength of the forces behind the free churches, and the relaxing of the Government decrees, as well as the calling off of the Storm Troopers, are the first fruits of his discovery. Dictators find that it is dangerous to interfere with the religious freedom of a religious people—Mussolini and Stalin made their discoveries, and Hitler has also realized that even the strong-arm methods of General Goering will not herd the German Protestants into churches to hear civil service bishops and to worship a Nazi God.