In recent decades Germany has worked to build a culture of remembrance that includes coming to terms with difficult chapters in its history, such as German colonial genocide and the Nazi dictatorship. Remembrance of Nazi crimes and commemoration of the victims should help ensure that these atrocities are never repeated. But increased far-right populism and growing support for the AfD party are a serious cause for concern. What can be done to keep awareness of Nazi crimes and the Holocaust alive in Germany, to prevent people playing down this terrible chapter in its history, and to convey its significance to the younger generation?
Showing posts with label Nazi crimes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nazi crimes. Show all posts
Monday, August 05, 2024
Germany's Culture of Remembrance | DW Documentary
Aug 5, 2024 | Amid far-right populism and growing support for the AfD, what can Germany do to ensure the atrocities of its history are never forgotten or repeated?
In recent decades Germany has worked to build a culture of remembrance that includes coming to terms with difficult chapters in its history, such as German colonial genocide and the Nazi dictatorship. Remembrance of Nazi crimes and commemoration of the victims should help ensure that these atrocities are never repeated. But increased far-right populism and growing support for the AfD party are a serious cause for concern. What can be done to keep awareness of Nazi crimes and the Holocaust alive in Germany, to prevent people playing down this terrible chapter in its history, and to convey its significance to the younger generation?
In recent decades Germany has worked to build a culture of remembrance that includes coming to terms with difficult chapters in its history, such as German colonial genocide and the Nazi dictatorship. Remembrance of Nazi crimes and commemoration of the victims should help ensure that these atrocities are never repeated. But increased far-right populism and growing support for the AfD party are a serious cause for concern. What can be done to keep awareness of Nazi crimes and the Holocaust alive in Germany, to prevent people playing down this terrible chapter in its history, and to convey its significance to the younger generation?
Monday, April 13, 2009
SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL: In an Easter sermon that has drawn widespread criticism, the Catholic bishop of Augsburg has linked the crimes committed under Nazi and Communist regimes to atheism. Atheist groups have reacted with fury and accuse the cleric of rewriting history.
A Catholic German bishop has come under fire for his remarks condemning atheists. In a sermon given on Easter Sunday, the bishop of Augsburg, Walter Mixa, warned of rising atheism in Germany. "Wherever God is denied or fought against, there people and their dignity will soon be denied and held in disregard," he said in the sermon. He also said that "a society without God is hell on earth" and quoted the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky: "If God does not exist, everything is permitted."
Most controversially, he linked the Nazi and Communist crimes to atheism. "In the last century, the godless regimes of Nazism and Communism, with their penal camps, their secret police and their mass murder, proved in a terrible way the inhumanity of atheism in practice." Christians and the Church were always the subject of "special persecution" under these systems, he said.
However, critics accuse Mixa of rewriting history. The bishop's claim that humanity automatically arises from religious faith is "totally untenable," Rudolf Ladwig, president of the Germany-based International League of Non-Religious and Atheists (IBKA), told SPIEGEL ONLINE. Mixa's words are part of a "long-term strategy by the Church to exculpate, in a historically inaccurate way, the history of its own institution as relates to fascism." >>> By Markus Becker | Monday, April 13, 2009
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