25 years ago today (6 March 1984) Martin Niemoeller died in Wiesbaden, Germany. He was Pastor of a wealthy church in Berlin-Dahlem when Hitler came to power and advocated voting for Hitler in 1933 on the grounds that he would clean Germany up. When his eyes were opened to the realities of what was going on (the appointment of Ludwig Mueller as Reichsbischof and the passing of the Aryan Law), he helped found the Confessing Church and joined the resistance. He spent eight years in Moabit Prison, Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps and was eventually released in 1945 from Austria.
He is best known for the ‘confession’ he wrote after his release:
Als die Nazis die Kommunisten holten,
habe ich geschwiegen;
ich war ja kein Kommunist.
Als sie die Sozialdemokraten einsperrten,
habe ich geschwiegen;
ich war ja kein Sozialdemokrat.
Als sie die Gewerkschafter holten,
habe ich nicht protestiert;
ich war ja kein Gewerkschafter.
Als sie die Juden holten,
habe ich geschwiegen;
ich war ja kein Jude.
Als sie mich holten,
gab es keinen mehr, der protestieren konnte.
Niemoeller was a great man who did not need to have his memory sanitised, but stood out as a leader who demonstrated in his own life the power of changing one’s mind. A good biography can be found on the EKD website (in German).
Many English people have never heard of him, but he is worth reading and his story is worth telling.
Nick Baines's Blog 
March 6, 2009 at 8:09 am
Thanks, Nick for an inspiring reminder of a great man. I wonder if the movie industry will take an interest sometime? perhaps there’s just too much material there for them to turn into a film — drnking under a shower…?
March 6, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Thanks Bishop Nick,
Niemoeller’s confession was something that accompanied me through my pre-conversion days in NUS politics and campaigning (I think I had it on an Amnesty International poster), then formed a part of my Christian vocational awakening, so I feel good being reminded of it as I pray for others’ vocational journeys on this ember day. D’you think we could get him commemorated in the lectionary?
I had an elderly parishioner a while back who had liberated Dachau; we talked of many things, but mostly the spirit of Niemoller’s confession
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