This year mark’s the 80th anniversary of the arrest of German pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer because of his opposition to Hitler’s regime. Coincidentally, it comes as a major movie about Bonhoeffer, called God’s Spy, is being filmed in Ireland by director and writer Todd Komarnicki. Bonhoeffer challenged the exploitation of the poor and weak, all victims of injustice.
At the heart of his Christianity is a desire to explore the importance of Christ for the world as it now stands.
Bonhoeffer’s Jesus was not a distant God but a personal God who transcends space and time, context, race, language – an intimate God concerned about humanity. For Bonhoeffer, being in the world but not of the world meant following Christ to the cross and in the end, he gave his life for what he preached.
He was executed in Flossenburg concentration camp just two weeks before the Allied forces liberated the camp and three weeks before Hitler’s suicide.
Bonhoeffer witnessed the Nazi regime first-hand; in prison he ministered to the victims caught in this web of wickedness. He believed the meaning of history is tied up with an that which takes place in the depth and hiddenness of a man who ended on the cross. The meaning of history is found in the humiliated Christ.
The traditional Western concept of God was disengaged with a world that was becoming more secular. The problem was that many had come to view God as absent from the real concreteness of this world
Therefore, Christ is the “centre of history” but is “hidden” on the cross. Bonhoeffer witnessed “the world from the perspective of Christ, who came as the suffering God, who alone can help humanity in its tragic situation”.
He argued that religion had become less relevant to the increasingly secular and scientific world around him. The traditional Western concept of God was disengaged from a world that was becoming more secular. The problem was that many had come to view God as absent from the real concreteness of this world.
In the face of the atrocities of the Nazi regime, Christianity had failed for not speaking out against Hitler’s regime. Consequently, its voice became completely mired in its own antiquity. The church’s failure to respond to the crisis highlighted the need for a complete re-evaluation of what the church should be and what the church should do.
Ethical crisis
In this ethical crisis, he called on Christians to act responsibly, to live a “costly” Christianity and not a “cosy” Christianity. Christianity in a world come of age no longer needs a powerful God who gives aid to human weakness. Instead, humanity come of age needs to be confronted by the weakness of God.
He would literally walk up to the members of the far right who are using the fears of local communities to whip up division, prejudice, hate and intolerance and look them directly in the eye
So where would we find Bonhoeffer in the Ireland of 2023? Were he still with us, he would be standing in the front row of the spate of protests about refugees in Ireland today. He would not tar all those in attendance with the same brush. He would be sympathetic to those who feel that their own communities have been subjected to economic and social neglect and would want to work with them to revive their neighbourhoods.
He would also be calling for the provision of much better channels of information and meaningful supports to those communities where integration is required for incoming refugees. However, he would literally walk up to the members of the far right who are using the fears of local communities to whip up division, prejudice, hate and intolerance and look them directly in the eye.
[ True Christianity means speaking out against populism and extremismOpens in new window ]
[ A modern martyr who opposed church silence over NazisOpens in new window ]
His message would be loud, clear and unflinching: that their actions fail every ethical and human audit and have no place in a just society. He would tell them bluntly that using refugees to advance their political agenda is profoundly unethical because it dehumanises people by treating them as a means to an end rather than as ends in themselves.
He would also work with individuals such as Peter McVerry to make a more effective practical response to the homeless crisis; collaborate with people with disabilities and their families so they can get the fair deal they are long overdue; stand with those who are experiencing discrimination or injustice in any form and offer tenderness and healing to the victims of clerical abuse.
When I enter the front gate of Trinity College and look to my left at the statue of Edmund Burke I often think of Bonhoeffer. His work is a potent reminder of Burke’s famous words: “All that is needed for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing.” Bonhoeffer’s life prompts us to believe that keeping aloof ultimately involves complicity. He remains the perfect antidote to lethargy or indifference.
Today more than ever, in a world rocked by violence and injustice, we still need to hear the essence of Bonhoeffer’s message: ‘We speak when we do not speak. We act when we do not act.’
John Scally is a lecturer in theology at Trinity College Dublin.