I posted this once before when this apologetic was first raised. Here it is, in full:
For a far more comprehensive and nuanced take on Frank Buchman, see "" Here are several quotes:?
- Buchman told the New York World-Telegram in 1936, ¡°I thank Heaven for a man like Adolf Hitler, who built a front-line of defence against the anti-Christ of Communism.¡±
- ¡°But think what it would mean to the world if Hitler surrendered to the control of God. Or Mussolini. Or any dictator. Through such a man God could control a nation overnight and solve every last, bewildering problem ... Human problems aren¡¯t economic. They¡¯re moral and they can¡¯t be solved by immoral measures. They could be solved within a God-controlled democracy, or perhaps I should say a theocracy, and they could be solved through a God-controlled Fascist dictatorship.¡±
- On reading the World-Telegram interview, the theologian Reinhard Niebuhr wrote, ¡°The social philosophy of the Oxford group, long implicit in its strategy, is made explicit, and revealed in all its childishness and viciousness.¡±
It is within this context that Buchman's "quest for world peace, included attending two Nazi rallies and lunching with Himmler wherein they discussed "politics and spirituality." (citation: ,?Philip Boobbyer)?Heinrich Himmler, of course, was Reichsfuhrer-SS, head of the Gestapo and the Waffen-SS, the architect of the mass murder of Jews in the Third Reich.?Keep in mind this meeting was in 1936, less than a year after German Parliament passed the anti-Semitic ¡°Nuremberg Laws,¡± the ¡°National Citizens Law,¡± and the ¡°Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor.¡± These laws were the basis for the exclusion of Jews ... from all public business life and for the reclassification of the political rights of Jewish citizens. The Jews are returned to the legal position they had occupied in Germany before their emancipation in the 19th century. Jews can no longer exist as German citizens or marry non-Jews." (Citation:?).
From the point in time this posted picture quote references, Frank Buchman was perfectly willing to ignore the plight of Jews as he pursued his "quest for world peace."?He joined a large list of organizations, including the Catholic Church which would make accommodations with the Nazi party. ?
There is a reason why Buchman needed to change the name of the Oxford Group to the Moral Rearmament Army. It had become irrevocably tarnished by Buchman's dangerously naive take on Nazism, fascism and the unamerican attraction to a "theocracy-controlled democracy."?
I post this in order to provide a counterpoint to the unqualified assertion Buchman was pursuing world peace. Context is imperative when it comes to history. Like so many others of that era, this quest combined Nazi appeasement with wishful ¡°pie in the sky¡± thinking. The cost of ignoring the fate of Jews in Germany, in associating with Nazis and ignoring Jewish leaders of that time, contributed to the creation of a holocaust that would take the lives of more than 6 million Jews.
The hubris necessary to consider that an appeal to fascist butchers and invoking the name of god would somehow lead to world peace can hardly be ignored. Am I saying Buchman is to blame for all of this? Of course not. He¡¯s just one of many religious leaders and organizations which put the goal of stopping a yet-to-occur world war and their fortunes ahead of the already-occurring marginalization and oppression of Jews. His ¡°quest for world peace¡± should be placed firmly within this larger context.
Finally, the original posted picture shows verbatim text from a Wikipedia Page called . Here is what Wikipedia put on that front page as a warning:
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Crescentdave