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Positive Christianity is an ideology that refers to a form of Christianity consistent with Nazism. This was the long standing version. This was changed to remove the fact that Positive Christianity is a form of Christianity by instead simply stating that Positive Christianity is merely an attempt to reconcile Christianity (as if there is one true form of Chirstianity!?), and Nazism. This is not only not accurate for what it implies but its blatently POV pushing. This is why the professor corectly restored the NPOV and accurate version from Str1977, and as is the norm ML reverted in defesne of her fellow devout buddy. It said see, talk, but there was nothing in talk, but I'm leaving my explaination here.Giovanni33 07:52, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
For accuracy and NPOV
Professor33 made this change, with the edit summary "For accuracy and NPOV". I disagree. First of all, "ideology that refers to" doesn't really make sense. You can say, "An elephant is a large mamal that . . .", or you can say, "The word 'elephant' refers to a large mammal that . . ."; but you can't say, "An elephant is a creature that refers to a large mammal that . . . " If you're trying to say that Positive Christianity is something, don't say that it's something that refers to something, unless you're talking about the word, or unless you're saying that part of this ideology is to go around talking about how Christianity is consistent with Nazism.
Secondly, "refers to a form of Christianity consistent with Nazism" implies that that there is a form of Christianity which is consistent with Nazisim. That is hardly undisputed; hence it is POV. Remember that on Misplaced Pages, the rule is verifiability, not truth. That's not to say, of course, that we don't want truth (though actually, it's not true to say that Christianity is consistent with Nazisim), but simply that we can't insist on an edit just because we are convinced that the statement it makes is true. AnnH ♫ 07:57, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
- If you go back another step you will see where the error you mention for your first objection arose: http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Positive_Christianity&diff=60025918&oldid=59589812 I have reverted back to the long standing version which can be seen with my edit, which was simply fixing a link, to the change that Str1977 introduced. The professor correcting this did not fully correct it, hence the remaining problem. It is not corrected back to the long stadning version.
- As to your second point, this is not a question of a POV this is a verifiable fact, which happens to also be true: There is a form of Christianity practiced and adhered to by the far right-wing which are fascists of the Nazi variety, and one such form is known as Positive Christianity. There are two established facts here: One is that it certainly IS a form of Christianity by any general definition that identifies the religion, which necessarily must be broad to encompass all Christian groups and varieties. Otherwise we are pushing a POV that excludes Christian groups as Christian, i.e. they are not true Christians. This is the No True Scotsman Fallacy. The second fact is that such a form of Christianity is compatible with Nazism, since that was whole purpose of it, it raison d'existence, composed, almost totally, of fascists, and championed by no less than the Nazi leader Adolph Hitler and his Nazi Party platform which adopted Positive Christianity. We just went through a pretty good documentation of these facts from numerous sources on the Adolph Hitler talk page about this very subject, in particular of the various fascist Catholic leaders and movements. If this is not a case of it being compatible, I don't know what is. Do I need to copy the sources from there over here? I noticed in the debate there the other side was silence, as expected, having lost the debate, it was quickly archived.Giovanni33 08:29, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
some documentation
This is a small section from the the same argument, but that focused on denying that Hitler was not only not a real Christian, and that Hitler never expressed any Christian belief. This argument is almost identical here because Hitler was a Nazi and if he was also a Christian then one can be both a Nazi Christian and hence the two ideologies can overlap and be compatible.
Str1977 claims I have not been able to provide a single Christian believe that Hitler expressed. This is not true, unless one is blind and filters out all the obvious. I guess, though that according to Str1977 all these beliefs which Hitler did state are not really Christian beliefs?! Again, for the record Hitler stated his belief that Adam and Eve were created in God's image, in Heaven, Hell, a supreme being who created the universe, in Jesus as Christ, in life after death, special creation, original sin, expulsion from paradise, and divine judgment. Below I will give references to support each one of these statements of beliefs uttered by Hitler (left out here because of its length). But I guess none of this counts if one happens to belong to a brand of Christianity that is racist and anti-Semitic? This is the age-old Christian view that other Christians are heresies and therefore not true Christians. It’s the classic No True Scotsman Fallacy. There has been much study such as by the Scholar, and Professor of Jewish Studies' work: "The Aryan Jesus: How the Churches Nazified Germany" by Susannah Heschel, and Eli Black, professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College and chair of the Jewish Studies Program. The scholarship shows how there was a sect of Christians organized in Germany that sought to create a synthesis of Christianity and National Socialism by declaring Jesus an Aryan, eliminating the Old Testament from the Christian Bible, and running an anti-Semitic propaganda institute. But, again, these Christians are not true Christians? The Christian Identity Church, or the strong historical connections between Christianity, the Catholic Church, and Nazism, the Fascist Government in Italy, and the Falangist/Francoist government in Spain are likewise not true Christians, eh? Ofcoruse the reality is that many modern neo-nazis, Ku Klux Klan members and other nationalist racists groups maintain a strong emphasis in belief in a Christian God and Christian fundamentalism. Perhaps you should review
- Clerical fascism, on the role of Christianity in European fascist movements between the world wars
- Nazism, on the role of Christianity in the German Nazi movements
- Dominionism, Dominion theology, and Christian Reconstructionism on fascistic tendencies in contemporary Christian Right movements and groups
- Christian Identity, on the militant right-wing movement linked by some to Neo-Nazi ideology.
- Theocracy
- Positive Christianity
But I wonder, if Hitler was not a Christian--how was he able to fool all dominant Christians of his day and time? I guess Str1977 must know something that the leaders in the Catholic Church at the time were not able to see for themselves!
The fact is that Hitler's Germany simply amalgamated state with church as in a theocracy. The religion was Christianity. Soldiers of the vermacht wore belt buckles inscribed with the following: "Gott mit uns" (God is with us). His troops were often sprinkled with holy water by the priests. It was a real Christian country whose citizens were indoctrinated by both state and church and blindly followed all authority figures, political and ecclesiastical. This may not be a comfortable truth for you, but it’s the truth nonetheless.
Hitler, like some of the today's politicians and preachers, politicized "family values." He liked corporeal punishment in home and school. Jesus prayers became mandatory in all schools under his administration. While abortion was illegal in pre-Hitler Germany, he took it to new depths of enforcement, requiring all doctors to report to the government the circumstances of all miscarriages. He openly despised homosexuality and criminalized it.
Heinrich Himmler was the head of the much-feared SS. Himmler was a devout Catholic who attended mass regularly, and he ordered all SS troopers to make the following oath: "I swear before God this holy oath, that I shall give absolute confidence to the Fuehrer of the German Reich and people."
Rudolph Hess was Hitler's longtime confidante (and Hitler's deputy Fuehrer until his bizarre flight across the lines), and Hitler dictated Mein Kampf to him. Hess was a Christian, and at Nuremberg he stated that "No matter what human beings do I shall some day stand before the judgment seat of the Eternal. I shall answer to Him, and I know he will judge me innocent".
Joseph Goebbels was Hitler's propaganda minister. Like Hitler, he was raised Catholic. He claimed that "Christ could not possibly have been a Jew", and in a radio broadcast in 1936, he proclaimed that "We have a feeling that Germany has been transformed into a great house of God, including all classes, professions and creeds, where the Fuhrer as our mediator stood before the throne of the Almighty."
Hermann Göring was head of the Luftwaffe and Hitler's second in command. He described himself as a Protestant, and of Hitler, he testified that "although he himself was a Catholic, he wished the Protestant Church to have a stronger position in Germany, since Germany was two-thirds Protestant."
Anti-Semitism has a long history within Christianity. The line of "anti-Semitic descent" from Luther to Hitler is "easy to draw," according to American historian Lucy Dawidowicz. See The War Against the Jews, 1933-1945. First published 1975; this Bantam edition 1986, p.23. ISBN 055334532X In her The War Against the Jews, 1933-1945, she writes that both Luther and Hitler were obsessed by the "demonologized universe" inhabited by Jews, with Hitler asserting that the later Luther, the author of On the Jews and Their Lies was the real Luther. Dawidowicz writes that the similarities between Luther's anti-Jewish writings and modern anti-Semitism are no coincidence, because they derived from a common history of Judenhass, which can be traced to Haman's advice to Ahasuerus, although modern German anti-Semitism also has its roots in German nationalism and Christian anti-Semitism, a foundation she says was laid by the Roman Catholic Church and "upon which Luther built." Are you now going to say that Luther was not a real Christian? If not and if Luther is a real Christian then why would Hitler follow and admire Luther if Hitler is was not a real Christian? You can't have it both ways.
You claim that Christianity depends on a line of descent of Jesus to royal blood from the Old Testament, however this is nonsense because this line of descent is traced through the father and the Christian belief is that Mary was virgin who gave birth to Jesus! So no genetic connection with the human father, thus no royal connection to the Old Testament. Christians belief Jesus to be the son of God and THAT is what Christian belief rests on. And, that is what Hitler believed. If Christians can believe things that are nonsensical then why do you deny Hitlers religious but nonsensical belief that Jesus was not a Jew but an Aryan? Religion does not need to make sense. Its a question of faith, right? Again, you can't have it both ways. Giovanni33 07:51, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well said, Giovanni. I don't think anything you are saying is controversial even though it may not be comfortable for certain people, understandably. For such folks, I'd hope that a healthy and open understanding of the dark side of Christianity is acknowleged. Aside from certain ideological similarities, the relationship between the Church and fascist movements in various countries has often been close. Another early example is Austria which developed a quasi-fascist authoritarian Catholic regime some call the "Austro-fascist" Ständestaat between 1934 and 1938. There is little debate over Slovakia, where the fascist dictator was a Catholic monsignor; and the Independent State of Croatia, where the fascist Ustashe identified itself as a Catholic movement. The Iron Guard in Romania identified itself as an Eastern Orthodox movement (with no connection to Roman Catholicism), and had particularly strong leanings toward clerical fascism. (See also Involvement of Croatian Catholic clergy with the Ustaša regime.)
- The Vichy regime in France was also deeply influenced by the reactionary Catholic-influenced ideology of the Action Française. Many of its members were reactionary Catholics who were condemned but 1938 the condemnation was lifted. Conversely, many Catholic priests were persecuted under the Nazi regime, and many Catholic laypeople and clergy played notable roles in sheltering Jews during the Holocaust. So the picture is not one-sided, although I think Giovanni has acknowleged this. Fascist movements like Rexism in Belgium and the Christian Social Party also combined fascist and conservative populist Catholic elements. It seems rather convenient to simply say the Church's far right wing are really not real Christians. Again, its the No True Scotsman Fallacy. Hitler was a Christian, folks. Not your garden variety, but a right-wing fanatic characteristic of many that we find today.Professor33 18:51, 20 June 2006 (UTC)