timschochet, on 14 Sept 2010 - 2:14 PM, said:
The truth is that, almost from the beginning of his life, Adolf Hitler destested all forms of religion, especially Christianity.
He admired the ways the Catholic church used symbolism and ritual and imitated this in the Nazi party. But he saw his movement as opposition to the Church, and this is clear from his very early speeches. Hitler's two greatest influences on his thinking about religion in the early years were Nietzsche and Hegel, both of whom considered German culture heavily weakened by Christianity. His greatest romantic influence was Wagner, who sought to return Germany to the anti-Christian
folk of the pagan gods. Hitler chose the swastika as the Nazi symbol very specifically as an alternative to the cross.
All of Hitler's speeches and vague mentionings that appear to be favorable of Christianity were nothing more than a sop to the Bavarian working class, which was strongly Catholic and which Hitler needed to soldify power in the early years. He admitted as much to his cohorts, according to direct sources (Joseph Goebbels' diary among others.) Once in power, Hitler and his pal Walter Rosenberg, a lifetime opponent of the church, immediately began persecuting ministers and priests. Their ultimate goal was a Germany without Christianity.
All of this is very well established in history, and only certain people with an axe to grind are attempting to rewrite the facts. As most people here know, I am an atheist myself, and I have no love for religion. But what I really hate is when people attempt to twist facts in order to argue their warped POV.