Where Have You Gone, Martin Niemöller? A Nation Turns Its Lonely Eyes to You.
“First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me,
And there was no one left to speak for me.”
THE POET & THE PARTY
Martin Niemöller lived in Germany during the time of the “Deutsche Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei NSDP, the National Socialist German Workers’ Party.”
You probably know it as The Nazi Party.
Niemöller led the way in organizing what became known as Germany’s Confessing Church, a movement of pastors and churches that resisted Hitler’s attempts to re-form the church in his own image and fold it into the mission of the Nazi machine.
In a nation where the majority of Protestant pastors and churches fell in line with the State’s demands, Niemöller and the Confessing Church, at first, quietly refused to comply. Later, when pressure increased to submit to the Nazi worldview and its social policies, Niemöller and the Confessing Church openly defied this control and the subjugation of biblical doctrine to National Socialist German Workers’ Party dogma. The Confessing Church remained especially active in protesting against euthanasia and the persecution of the Jews.
The Nazis responded by attacking Confessing Church leaders and members. Among other actions, the State censored and surveilled them. They attacked them in the public press and ostracized them. They refused them the right to gather publicly. Nazi leaders canceled pastors’ salaries, prevented them from pastoring their congregations, or fired them outright. They later arrested them, placed them under house arrest, and even sent some to concentration camps.
For his leadership in the opposition to government policies, Niemöller was charged with treason. In his trial, he was found not guilty of treason but lesser crimes. The Nazi Party was not satisfied with this action and stepped in, declaring Niemöller a personal prisoner of the Fuhrer. He would spend 1938 to 1945 in numerous concentration camps, including Dachau.
THE POET & HISTORY
History has rightly remembered Niemöller as a hero. It is a distinction well deserved. Secular historians remember him only as a political hero, but this completely misses the basis and the objective of his fight: His faith in and service to Jesus Christ. Niemöller was a fearless leader in the fight for a free church and people. He was a determined defender of those who had been “cancelled” – those designated to be “unfit” by the State. Most importantly, Niemöller was a champion of the Gospel of Jesus Christ; Christians’ right to worship and live according to their understanding of Scripture, free of control, coercion, or oppression.
Still, it is often forgotten that, initially, Niemöller supported the Nazi party and its publicly announced vision, not its hidden agenda, but its publicly announced intention to unify the German nation for the health and hope of the German people.
In the elections of 1924 and 1933, Niemöller voted for the Nazi Party, hoping that Hitler would bring strength to Germans as they struggled to recover from the devastating reparations imposed on them after Germany’s defeat in World War I. The German people – individuals, families, and the nation – were deeply suffering with few prospects for the future. Hope was almost gone. The Nazis’ confidence and their call to German unity and renewed pride encouraged this pastor as he daily shepherded his flock. And so, initially, Niemöller supported politicians and policies that promised to undo the past, in the name of German strength and unity.
Until national unity and strength turned sour in a bad way.
THE POET & PERSECUTION
Nazi party leaders forced unity by moving in strength to exterminate all views different from their own. No organization was allowed an agenda different from that of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party.
Working to extend their control over society, the government worked with serpentine wisdom. Initially, the Nazis employed propaganda rather than force policy changes in the pursuit of their goals. The National Ministry of Propaganda and national media not only suppressed views different from those of the Party, but worked to unite Germans in defending Germany against those the leaders and media identified as enemies of progress. The Party labeled, slandered, vilified, and punished anyone who acted, spoke, or even thought outside of approved Party dogma and practice. Independent thinking was crushed. Politicians and propagandists lashed out at anyone who had the misfortune of being born outside of the new Unity, anyone seen as a threat to the party line: Russians, Poles, Gypsies, the infirmed, the deformed, political opponents, Evangelicals and others. Many were ostracized and shunned, lost their jobs or businesses, were made to leave educational institutions, had their pensions and social benefits taken from them, were harassed on the streets and in their homes, were sterilized against their wills, arrested, sent to labor camps, tortured and killed.
And then there were the Jews. Designated Enemy #1 of the people, the Jews and their defenders were subjected to even more intense persecution. Jewish people were not permitted to send their children to public schools. Jewish professors and students were forced out of universities. Jewish employees were fired from jobs in government and private sectors. Jews were required to wear identifying armbands in public. Their businesses were violently attacked, burned, and eventually closed or taken from them. Jews were not permitted entry in theatres or restaurants. They were not allowed to walk in certain areas of cities. Their homes were broken into and burgled in broad daylight. Jews were beaten on the streets and in their homes. Many were even murdered.
Today we would call it Cancel Culture.
On steroids.
And, as history records, it was enforced with a vengeance.
In 1933 alone, five years before Germany invaded Poland and launched the Second World War, almost 250,000 political opponents – not criminals, but people whose political views differed from those of the Nazis – were forced into concentration camps. No criminal charges were filed against them. None were needed: these deplorables disagreed with the Party line. Crime enough.
The concentration camps awaiting these political opponents, all German citizens, had no heat or beds, no sanitation, or even minimal medical facilities. In these camps, forced hard labor and even torture was the daily agenda. All this as “a means of both repression and redemption.” (Nikolaus Wachsmann; KL: A History of the Nazi Concentration Camps, 2015).
Political opponents were re-educated – forced repression in the name of redemption: “Get your heads right, or we’ll repress you right into redemption. You will remain unfit until you’re willing to conform and fall in line with the views of The Party.”
Six million Jews, however, were denied re-education, but instead were registered for repression in the camps without any hope of redemption. “Whatever you do, you are and will remain unfit,” the National Socialists told Jewish people.
Thirty thousand slave labor camps, 1000 concentration camps, and 11 million dead later, Allied Troops liberated the brutalized survivors of cancel culture taken to its logical and evil extreme.
THE POET & HIS EPIPHANY
After his initial infatuation with the Nazis and their promise of national unity and strength, Niemöller said that he indeed “got his head right.” He realized that God and The Truth demand a higher loyalty than any earthly cause, political view, or even personal feelings. He saw that no person should be canceled for their heritage or their political views. He saw that the Church has one Lord, and it is to Him and His truth that the church must be obedient, even at the cost of our livelihoods and lives
And so, he wrote the lines for which he is best known:
“First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me,
And there was no one left to speak for me.”
AN ADAPTATION
With respect and thanks to Pastor Niemöller, I offer this adaptation of his moving words:
“First they cancelled the conservatives, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a conservative.
Then they cancelled the CEOs, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not a CEO.
Then they cancelled the atheists, and I did not speak out,
Because I was not an atheist.
Then they cancelled me,
And there was no one left to speak for me.”
Rather than choose the same three groups named by Pastor Niemöller, I have used the perceived opposites of those groups. I have done so in order to redirect our attention from the individual groups mentioned and focus it instead on the universal principle: whatever the group, whoever the people, “coming for” or “cancelling” has no place in a free society.
And standing with culture as it cancels human beings has no place in the church of Jesus Christ.
Martin Niemöller, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Paul Schneider, Julius von Jan and one million cancelled German Evangelicals would agree. Millions of others, “cancelled” by the Nazi worldview and machine silently add their “Amen.”
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