ST BARNABAS ANGLICAN CHURCH - BLUFF, DURBAN
  • Home
    • Vestry Minutes and Annual Reports
    • Ministries
    • Annual Plans
    • Who's Who
    • Service outline for Sunday
    • Technology
    • Contact Us
  • Funeral Regulations
  • Rectors Page
  • Mission
    • Up Coming Events
    • Food for Thought
  • Sermons
  • Parish News
    • Articles
    • Parish Photo Gallery
  • History
  • Links
  • Weekly Pew Leaflet
  • Covid 19
  • Call to Prayer 2021
    • Fundraising

I did not Speak Out

7/18/2018

0 Comments

 
​Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) was a prominent Protestant pastor who emerged as an outspoken public foe of Adolf Hitler and spent the last seven years of Nazi rule in concentration camps.
Niemöller is perhaps best remembered for the quotation:
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out--
Because I was not a Socialist.

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 quotation stems from Niemöller's lectures during the early post-war period. Different versions of the quotation exist. These can be attributed to the fact that Niemöller spoke extemporaneously and in a number of settings. Much controversy surrounds the content of the poem as it has been printed in varying forms, referring to diverse groups such as Catholics, Jehovah's Witnesses, Jews, Trade Unionists, or Communists depending upon the version. Nonetheless his point was that Germans—in particular, he believed, the leaders of both Catholic and  Protestant churches—had been complicit through their silence in the Nazi imprisonment, persecution, and murder of millions of people.
Only in 1963, in a West German television interview, did Niemöller acknowledge and make a statement of regret about his own antisemitism. (hostility or prejudice against the Jews). Antisemitism is generally considered to be a form of racism. Nonetheless, Martin Niemöller was one of the earliest Germans to talk publicly about broader complicity in the Holocaust and guilt for what had happened to the Jews. In his book Über die deutsche Schuld, Not und Hoffnung (published in English as Of Guilt and Hope)—which appeared in January 1946—Niemöller wrote: "Thus, whenever I chance to meet a Jew known to me before, then, as a Christian, I cannot but tell him: 'Dear Friend, I stand in front of you, but we can not get together, for there is guilt between us. I have sinned and my people has sinned against thy people and against thyself.'" 
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Author

    My name is Barnabas Sibusiso Nqindi, rector of St Barnabas-Bluff. I enjoy a good debate and I love to see people grow in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ

    Archives

    March 2020
    February 2020
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    March 2014
    August 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011

    Categories

    All
    Break Up
    Community
    Confirmation
    Conflict
    Cut
    Discern
    Egoism
    Evangelism
    Faith
    Gifts
    Growth
    Listening
    Maturity
    Ordained
    Poor
    Prayer
    Priest
    Secret
    Send Away
    Service
    Static
    Tensions
    Time
    Triune God
    Understanding Patience
    Work

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • Home
    • Vestry Minutes and Annual Reports
    • Ministries
    • Annual Plans
    • Who's Who
    • Service outline for Sunday
    • Technology
    • Contact Us
  • Funeral Regulations
  • Rectors Page
  • Mission
    • Up Coming Events
    • Food for Thought
  • Sermons
  • Parish News
    • Articles
    • Parish Photo Gallery
  • History
  • Links
  • Weekly Pew Leaflet
  • Covid 19
  • Call to Prayer 2021
    • Fundraising