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  • 2022-03-03 (xsd:date)
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  • Did Adolf Hitler Say 'Our Movement Is Christian'? (en)
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  • For years, a viral meme has been shared that features a picture of Adolf Hitler with a quote about Christianity. It read: We tolerate no one in our ranks who attacks the ideas of Christianity. Our movement is Christian. The quote meme with Hitler's photograph has shown up in tweets from actor and comedian Ricky Gervais, on Reddit's r/atheism subreddit, and in viral TikTok videos. This quote about Christianity came from real remarks given in a speech by Hitler in the German city of Passau. The date in the meme, Oct. 27, 1928, is also accurate. In 2003, author Richard Steigmann-Gall published the book, The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945. Hitler's quote about Christianity appeared on page 60. The citation for the quote read: BAZ NS 26/55 (27 October 1928: Passau). BAZ stood for Bundesarchiv Berlin-Zehlendorf. This citation led us to a book of speeches titled, Bundesarchiv Hauptarchiv der NSDAP, which was digitized to the online portal for the Berlin Document Center. We looked at the original documents from 1928 and transcribed the theme, introduction, and relevant portion of Hitler's speech that was given in Passau. The theme for Hitler's speech that mentioned Christianity was described as follows, first in English and then in the original German version from the book. Translations to English were made possible with Google Translate: The documents with the speech contained details that set the scene of what it was like on that October evening in Passau in 1928. The translation and original German version are both below: The part of the speech that appeared in the meme occurred in the second half of the prepared remarks. Before mentioning Christianity, Hitler appeared to have made references to the purported dangers of open borders. The meme said: We tolerate no one in our ranks who attacks the ideas of Christianity. Our movement is Christian. The actual quote, when translated with Google Translate, looked to be a bit longer. We bolded it below: The end of the speech was signed by Max Vogl, who appeared to have recorded the remarks that evening. Despite these remarks from Hitler in 1928, history showed in the years to follow that his National Socialist Movement sought to destroy Christianity. The New York Times reported that the movement could not adopt this radical stance officially until it had consolidated power, so the Nazis simply lied and made deals with the churches while planning a 'slow and cautious policy of gradual encroachment' to eliminate Christianity. The source for the Times' information was the Nuremberg Project, which outlined excerpts from evidence taken during the Nuremberg war-crime trials. CatholicCulture.org also chronicled the Nazi's violent persecution specificially of members of the Roman Catholic faith, which included mass arrests that sent scores of believers to concentration camps. In sum, yes, in 1928, Hitler told a crowd to not tolerate anyone who offended or attacked Christianity and also said that his movement was Christian. It was one of many speeches he gave that year. (en)
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