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Review Summary: This is preaching, not history |
Date: 2008-12-04 |
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Details: I bought this book in part because of the impression I got from the many positive reviews I saw here that I might learn something of value about the history of church and state during this important period.
But I am very disappointed to find myself in a church, when I thought I had entered a library. As a clergyman myself, I know preaching when I see it and this book is preaching with an extremely unscholarly, imaginative, conservative slant, which is no surprise given the fact that the author isn't a historian, but the pastor of Chicago's conservative Moody Memorial church.
Here's a good example from chapter 2. After pointing out that Adolf's last name would have been "Schiklgruber" if his wandering grandfather had not showed up at age 84 and given his wife's 39 year old illegitimate son, Alois, his providentially better last name of "Hitler".
What kind of historian speculates, as this author does: "Can anyone deny that it was GOD who, at least indirectly, determined that Hitler would have a name that sounded pleasant to the German people and that he would survive his childhood?"
On the same page, Rev. Lutzer points out that Adolf was the third child of his father's third marriage, and of five children all but he and his younger sister survived to adulthood.
What kind of historian speculates, as this author does:
"Think of how different the history of the world would have been if Adolf had died in infancy as did two of his brothers and a sister."
( p 41-42)
If you want to know how unGodly the U.S. is and how much like the Nazis we liberal Christians and secular Americans are, then read this lentgthy sermon to the bitter end. |
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Review Summary: Corruption of Religion |
Date: 2008-08-08 |
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Details: I've given 'Hitler's Cross' 5 stars even though I am not a Christian and don't hold with many of the author's theological opinions. Still, this is a book worth reading and, although I am a student of Holocaust studies, this book illuminates Naziism in a new light.
The book is well researched and readable. It demonstrates the intelligent and infinitely malign calculation of Hitler as he set about remolding Germany in his own image. The book discusses, at length, Hitler's largely successful corruption of religion, all with the singleminded purposes of producing the perfect Nazi man and woman--people devoid of Judeo-Christian morality, perfect weapons in the strengthening and perfection of the National Socialist State.
The book also draws parallels with the secularization of the Greater Reich and the progressive secularization of America and the West. I'm not religious but I agree with the author on this point. A secularized nation is a nation with weakened values. People, without a solid moral framework, are a people adrift, capable of personal or state-inspired evil.
Ron Braithwaite author of novels--'Skull Rack' and 'Hummingbird God' on the Spanish Conquest of Mexico |
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Review Summary: Hitler's Cross |
Date: 2008-02-26 |
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Details: A richly interesting book on where was the church during the monstrosity of Hitler's Third Reich. This book tells how the church remained passive and indifferent instead of standing true to it's first call which is preaching the gospel and the love of Jesus Christ. This book shows the comparison of Hitler's rise to the coming reign of the Antichrist and the danger when nationalistic pride replaces God's call. A very interesting book. |
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Review Summary: A history lesson and a warning for the church today |
Date: 2006-11-04 |
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Details: Erwin Lutzer's name is not likely to be the first to come to mind when people talk about prominent chroniclers of the history of Nazi Germany, but he has certainly done his homework here and presents - in a nutshell - how Adolf Hitler was able to take over the German church. There were resisters, of course, and Lutzer focuses in large part on Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who went so far as to become involved in an assassination plot on Hitler. This book is an interesting read for those who are interested in the history of the Third Reich.
However, Lutzer uses all of this history to build up to his final chapter about the American church in our own day. The book is a wake-up call: the church needs to become involved in politics and lawmaking, or it will be swept aside. While it is true that the church needs to focus primarily on peoples' spiritual needs, inaction in law-making will lead the church inexorably toward irrelevance and ineffectiveness in all things. I'm sure that critics will immediately bring up the fact that our country has separation of church and state; however, this simply prohibits the setting up of a state religion (if you want to know the problems with the state and the church being under one umbrella, then examine medieval European history and the conditions in Islamic countries today).
In the U.S. the church is still subject to the laws of the state and, therefore, it should also be allowed to legally exert influence on the shaping of those laws. Lutzer uses the following quote from Rausas Rushdoony's book titled "Law and Liberty" to highlight the necessity of the church taking a role in the shaping of our country's laws: "Behind every system of law there is a god. To find the god in any system, locate the source of law in that system...When you choose your authority, you choose your god, and where you look for your law, there is your god."
The church has already been bulllied by the law, which has been shaped primarily by secular humanists, for the past three and a half decades; inactivity on the part of individual members, as well as the body as a whole, will not make conditions better in America. Unless we want to see the influence of Christ and His church diminish until, as in Nazi Germany, the church is under the goverment's thumb rather than separate from it, we had better heed Lutzer's call to action and get involved. This does not mean that every Christian has to become a politican/lawmaker - although we need Christian lawmakers, too - but that the church needs to make its voice heard, and that starts simply at the voting booth. |
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Review Summary: A fascis-ating read |
Date: 2006-08-26 |
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Details: The revealing story of how the cross of christ was used as a symbol of the nazi agenda.
The book begins with the rise of Hitler, where his beliefs stemmed from, the manipulation of the people and how he replaced the cross with the swastika. The book then gets into the church and the role it played. Quite a bit is dedicated to Dietrich Bonhoeffer who was executed at age 39. He gave his life for what he believed in. There are good books available on Bonhoeffers writings. The book ends discussing Americas own hidden cross. |
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out of 18 Reviews
