A STATUE of a rather youthful Dietrich Bonhoeffer by the sculptor Tim Crawley is among those of the ten martyrs of the 20th century on the west front of Westminster Abbey. He is one of seven martyrs represented in the nave screen of St Albans Cathedral. He is also commemorated in the Church of England’s calendar on 9 April. While he was by no means the only person to be murdered by the Nazis as a result of political actions motivated by his Christian faith, the choice of this German pastor, theologian, and resistance member for both Westminster Abbey and St Albans Cathedral reflects his strong English connections, including his friendship with George Bell, Bishop of Chichester and fellow ecumenist, and his time (1933-35) as pastor of two German churches in London, one of which now bears his name.
For someone who died at the relatively early age of 39, his literary output is enormous. The Cost of Discipleship and Life Together, as well as his Letters and Papers from Prison, are now regarded as classics. “Costly grace” and the need “to drive a spoke in the wheel” have become part of the vocabulary of theologians and preachers.
IN RESPONSE to the recent co-option of the Bonhoeffer narrative by conservative Evangelicals who support President Trump (Comment, 4 April), members of Bonhoeffer’s extended family and more than 800 Bonhoeffer scholars around the world issued a strong statement demanding: “Stop taking Bonhoeffer’s name in vain.”
The questions behind this, and the dangers posed by it, are hard to bear, but in many ways they are not new. In the 1950s and ’60s, Bonhoeffer’s theology (in its unfinished form) was taken up with enthusiasm, not only in Germany but also in the United States and the UK. In letters written from his prison cell in 1944 to his friend Eberhard Bethge, Bonhoeffer proposed that the Christianity of the future would be religionless — an idea that was endorsed by John Robinson in his 1963 classic, Honest to God, but also, for example, by Harvey Cox in his The Secular City, or by the East German theologian Hanfried Müller.
For Müller, religionless Christianity was the modern atheist state that the GDR aspired to become: an idea that could not have been further from what the Lutheran pastor and disciple of Karl Barth had intended.
An anniversary of someone whose legacy has been taken up by so many causes, inevitably including some to which Bonhoeffer himself would have strongly objected, raises the question, What we are to do with Bonhoeffer today? If we object to the usurpation of the Bonhoeffer narrative by right-wing Christians supporting Trump and his policies, what are we to put in the place of such arguments?
INEVITABLY, much of the retelling of the Bonhoeffer story, certainly on a popular level, has focused on the last two years of his life, and on his death as a result of his implication in the attempt to overthrow the Hitler government. Yet, Bonhoeffer recognised and articulated the danger ensuing from the Nazi movement very early on (both before and after Hitler’s rise to power). The much-quoted phrase about putting the spoke in the wheel is actually from a paper given to a group of pastors in early 1933, “The Church and the Jewish Question”, in which Bonhoeffer identifies the Church’s responsibility to challenge the State and its policy decisions regarding Jews.
Bonhoeffer’s only radio address, “The Younger Generation’s Altered View of the Concept of Führer”, dates from about the same time, broadcast on the day after Hitler was elected Reich Chancellor. In it, Bonhoeffer prophetically warns of the cult of leadership, and argues that, if leaders succumb to the wishes of their followers, they are in danger of becoming mis-leaders (Verführer). Although the full text could still be published, the broadcast itself was cut short, as the microphone was switched off by an employee of the radio station.
BONHOEFFER’s friendship with Bell, and his time as pastor of two churches in London, are well remembered, but, during his time in England, Bonhoeffer kept in regular contact with his family, friends, and colleagues at home, and was well informed about developments and events in Germany. He regularly returned to Germany to challenge and encourage colleagues in the emerging Confessing Church.
Comparisons between the 1930s in Germany and our own time are not uncontested, but, without the ability to see patterns and phenomena repeating themselves, no lessons could be learned from history. It is, perhaps, here that our re-reading of Bonhoeffer could begin. The opening words of Bonhoeffer’s first sermon as a curate were “Christianity means decision.” Making the radical decision to follow Christ — a decision that would demand no less than everything, even life itself — requires discernment, observing the “signs of the times”, and formulating a response, taking stock, and also repentance.
One such reckoning is “After Ten Years”, written as a gift to some of Bonhoeffer’s close friends and co-conspirators, for the New Year 1943, only a few months before his arrest in April that year. Here, Bonhoeffer combines hindsight and foresight in a way that can only be described as prophetic: “We have been silent witnesses of evil deeds; we have been drenched by many storms; we have learned the arts of equivocation and pretence; experience has made us suspicious of others and kept us from being truthful and open; intolerable conflicts have worn us down and even made us cynical. Are we still of any use?
“What we shall need is not geniuses, or cynics, or misanthropes, or clever tacticians, but plain, honest and straightforward human beings. Will our inward power of resistance be strong enough, and our honesty with ourselves remorseless enough, for us to find our way back to simplicity and straightforwardness?”
In the final paragraph, Bonhoeffer speaks of having learned “for once to see the great events of world history from below, from the perspective of the outcasts, the suspects, the maltreated, the powerless, the oppressed, the reviled. . .”: a theme in Bonhoeffer’s theology that perhaps had its roots in his encounters with Black churches and Christians in Harlem during his time at Union Theological Seminary in New York in the early 1930s, and is found in the liberation theologies of the late 20th century.
THERE is, in Bonhoeffer’s writings, a cantus firmus of hope that a future — that rebuilding life — is possible. Throughout his letters from prison, there are plans for a future in freedom: of being reunited with friends and family; plans to travel — for example, to Africa and India; but essentially a future that is God’s future and gift.
“I believe that God can and will bring good out of evil, even out of the greatest evil. For that purpose he needs people who make the best use of everything. I believe that God will give us all the strength we need to help us resist in all time of distress. But he never gives it in advance, lest we should rely on ourselves and not on him alone.
”A faith such as this should allay all our fears for the future. I believe that even our mistakes and shortcomings are turned to good account, and that it is no harder for God to deal with them than with our supposedly good deeds. I believe that God is no timeless fate, but he waits for and answers sincere prayers and responsible actions.”
BONHOEFFER has been called a martyr, or even a Protestant saint — language with which he himself may not have been comfortable; but he spoke of his desire to become a person of faith. Like the lives of all those recognised by others as saints, his life should challenge us to follow Christ in our own time and circumstances. Like the saints of other times, Bonhoeffer was a complex character (as recent biographies have sought to explore). Yet, like the saints of old, this 20th-century German pastor, theologian, and ecumenist asks challenging questions of us today.
There is more to discover than can be obscured through the co-option of his legacy by those whom he would have deemed unchristian and, indeed, inhumane. Even if we remain circumspect in making direct comparisons between the 1930s and our own time, re-reading Bonhoeffer’s writings can teach us not only the need for decision, but also for the art of discernment, and the imperative to act before it is too late.
Dr Natalie K. Watson is a theologian, publisher, and writer based in Peterborough.
The Revd Dr Sam Wells reads his foreword to a new edition of Ethics (SCM Press) here
