by VorJack
Glen Urquhart is a Republican candidate for congress in the state of Delaware. Here are his thoughts of the separation of Church and State:
Urquhart is backing away – slightly – from that statement, according to Delaware Online. He says he did not mean to imply that liberals were Nazis. What he did mean was that we should be careful with the phrase “separation of Church and State”
“Let’s all be careful about what phrases we use without thinking them through,” he said. “The Nazis used the same separation-of-church-and-state rhetoric for a very, very bad purpose. I didn’t mean to suggest — and I am not suggesting — that people who are liberals are Nazis.”
He might have a point in that “separation of Church and State” has become a cliche in America, and we need to be careful to explain what we mean when we use it.
But still, I think he’s got the history wrong. The Nazi party has a twisting history with official Christian churches, but I don’t believe they ever officially advocated an absolute separation of Church and State.
They did end up formalizing their relationship with the Catholic Church, and this ended up cutting out much of the Church’s political influence. But this was at least half at the instigation of the Vatican, which was seeking concordances to create a clear legal relationship between the Church and certain Governments. The Vatican got official channels though which to lodge complaints, which the Nazis then proceeded to ignore.
Republicans can be very selectively revisionist about history. Part of the reason that the States is set up the way it is, is because the founding fathers explicitly wanted their country to NOT be under the power of churches.
Yeah, nazis absolutly separated themselves from religion:
http://www.nobeliefs.com/nazis.htm
To say Nazis wanted separation of church and state is not true. In fact Hitler tried to use the church for his purposes and the church tried to use Hitler to secure influence and getting money from the church members. The so called “Reichskonkordat”, the concordat between Nazis and the catholic church is still the law today in the Federal Republic of Germany. The state collects taxes and with these every member of the catholic (and protestant) church has to pay a church-tax.
There was a christian opposition against the nazis – but that was a minority of small groups and individuals. The institution of the catholic church was pro-nazi. You will find pictures of bishops and other high clerics saluting with the “Heil Hitler”.
Hitler himself effectfully made use of the catholic antijudaism and large parts of the catholic community followed Hitler to antisemitism.
Hitler visited Oberammergau, a bavarian village well known for a play, showing the passion of Christ. The play had a definite antijudaic tone since hunderds of years. And beeing there, Hitler said publicly: “seeing this play I declare myself as christian in its fullest and deepest meaning”.
greetings from Germany
Gereon
As far as I´m aware, you´re correct, but even if Hitler did advocate Separation of Church and State, it´s entirely irrelevant. Hitler was also a vegetarian, loved his dogs and built autobahns, but nobody is making the argument that these activities inevitably lead to pushing Jews into gas chambers. Although Palin probably will in a couple of days.
Urquhart is a tool, and one could certainly be forgiven a certain amount of vitriol in any response to his ideological fustercluck. Said vitriol appears to be studiously avoided in your post, Vorjack, and I’m not sure that’s a good thing. Urquhart is demonizing and dehumanizing his opponents by uncreatively associating them with a universally reviled political party. He’s not only being insulting, he’s flat-out wrong; Jefferson didn’t use the phrase “separation of church and state,” he used even stronger language: “…a wall of separation between church and state.” It’s alright to call an idiot an idiot when it’s so clearly earned the appelation.
Citation needed, auf Deutch, bitte.
Sorry, can’t find the original Hitler quote.
But here is a good source quoting in indirect speech:
Source:
Rolf Hochhuth, “Der Stellvertreter. Historische Streiflichter” , 1980, p. 247
“Die Oberammergauer Festspiele müssten unbedingt erhalten werden. Denn kaum je sei die jüdische Gefahr am Beispiel des antiken römischen Weltreichs so plastisch veranschaulicht worden wie in der Darstellung des Pontius Pilatus bei diesen Festspielen, erscheine dieser doch als ein rassisch und intelligenzmäßig so überlegener Römer, dass er wie ein Fels inmitten des vorderasiatischen Geschmeißes und Gewimmels wirke. In der Anerkennung der ungeheuren Bedeutung dieser Festspiele für die Aufklärung auch aller kommenden Geschlechter sei er (Hitler) ein absoluter Christ”.
Informative, and disappointing, since I recall Oberammergau as such a charming tourist trap.
A page in the book Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen 1932- 1945 speaks to the issue:
http://books.google.com/books?id=cL9O3SJH-PoC&pg=PA1059&lpg=PA1059&dq=Trennung+von+Kirche+und+Staat+Hitler&source=bl&ots=WFa5zL1vXq&sig=dagP98B4bEfUGzQzBxY3fB19nb0&hl=en&ei=i_ETTK2dPIG78gaywIWJCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CDIQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=Trennung%20von%20Kirche%20und%20Staat%20Hitler&f=false
To add to what Gereon said about the Nazi party’s endorsement of religion:
The Nazi party banned freethinker (religious skeptic) organizations. They persecuted known atheists. That’s direct government interference in people’s right to express their religious views. Hardly what I’d call separation of church and state.
I think in Urquhart’s warped mind that just proves his point. He seems to think liberals are just like the Nazis, and the issue of separation of church and state is the start of their evil oppressive regime.
Hmmm. I thought Adolf Hitler didn’t even speak English, but I suppose I could be misinformed.
Sounds like this douche bag has been masturbating to Jonah Goldberg’s “Liberal Fascism” with Glenn Beck. Goddamn revisionist history fucktards.
Hitler also said, “Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it.” The Republicans have this one down to a tee.
Jefferson quotations on religion, the vast majority of them obviously hostile to religious interference in governmental affairs:
http://www.nobeliefs.com/jefferson.htm
http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1650.htm
I thought that was a quote from Joseph Goebbels?
According to the website I looked at, Hitler used the phrase. Of course, this is the internet. Wikipedia says Hitler coined the phrase “Big Lie” in Mein Kampf in 1925.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Lie
I do hope you’re not suggesting there may be mis-information on the Internet … next you be saying the the Bible doesn’t accurately records the words that Jesus spoke!
Hilter also liked mustaches. I think there’s an obvious lesson there.
Some did members of Village People …. !
“So” not “Some” … dooohhh!
Hitler wore pants.
Pants are evil.
Kilts everyone!
Seconded… Kilts are always worn by the good guys
Just once I’d love someone to ask these conservatives why they want Big Government (their favorite boogie man) to interfere with their religion. If we knock down that wall of separation the government won’t be able to keep it’s grubby hands off of their church. If the church can interfere with the government then the government will have free reign to interfere with the church. Do you really want to go down the road where we have a priest-politician class like Iran has with their mullahs?
Plus someone should point out to them that there is no guarantee that their particular brand of religion will end up on top. The largest denomination in America is Catholicism. If we go by majority rule then we’ll be forcing our kids into mass in no time.
They envision a set of circumstances in which the relationship is one-sided: they wish for church to get all over their state but state to have no influence over their church.
Insane, I know.
His statement is symptomatic for the extend of how little the average American knows about history – especially when it come to history not directly relating to the US.
Hitler always gave the appearance of being a god-fearing Christian. “God with us” was even embossed on the belt-buckles of the infamous SS.
He said “separation of church and state” isn’t in the letter to the Danbury Baptists. He’s right. It says “separation between church and state”. Holy shit! That changes everything!
The complete text:
Jefferson’s Letter to the Danbury Baptists
The Final Letter, as Sent
To messers. Nehemiah Dodge, Ephraim Robbins, & Stephen S. Nelson, a committee of the Danbury Baptist association in the state of Connecticut.
Gentlemen
The affectionate sentiments of esteem and approbation which you are so good as to express towards me, on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association, give me the highest satisfaction. my duties dictate a faithful and zealous pursuit of the interests of my constituents, & in proportion as they are persuaded of my fidelity to those duties, the discharge of them becomes more and more pleasing.
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.
I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & your religious association, assurances of my high respect & esteem.
Th Jefferson
Jan. 1. 1802.
Hitler’s job would have been much easier if he had whipped his followers into a religious frenzy.
Right wing ‘conservative’ fuckwits want a Theocracy. They always have, and they always will — but not for the reasons they claim. The danger in any move toward state-sanctioned religion becomes apparent when you realize what happens when a religion, any religion, is officially sponsored by the state — it is at that point that freedom of religion (or freedom to recognize reality and disbelieve), ends. To make matters worse, religious zeal and commitment by each faction to its own version of the fiction of divinity, will pretty much guarantee bloodshed. Christians and Christian sects (Catholics, Protestants, Anabaptists, etc,), Jews and Jewish sects (Orthodox, Reformed, Hasedic, etc.), and Muslims and Muslim sects (Sunni, Shia), are by definition, history, and action, set on destroying those who do not submit to their political authority.
I believe he used a form of religious frenzy to whip the Germans into the army he wanted. Of course it was his version of the christian religion, in which Hitler was the messiah not Jesus.
I completely agree that if a theocracy ever becomes the government of this nation it will cause wide spread bloodshed and will probably break the nation into several different little countries with each run by their own little version of religion. Something like what you have in the Middle East.
But now, six weeks later, Urquhart says the statement was taken out of context…
What is the appropriate context for reassigning a Thomas Jefferson quote to Adolph Hitler?
“Faith was at the center of the creation of the United States,” he said. ” … We have it on our money, ‘In God We Trust.’
What a moron. Does he not know that phrase was added in the mid-20th century?
Urquhart says he stands “absolutely” with Jefferson on the need to protect religious liberty.
Right, that’s why he’s reassigning TJ’s quotes to Hitler.