90 years ago--Association of National German Jews urges support for Hitler

I should have posted this a few months ago on the actual anniversary, but better late than never...On August 19, 1934, 17 days after the death of President Paul von Hindenburg, a referendum was held in Germany on whether to merge the posts of Chancellor and President. 95.65% of registered voters went to the polls, with 89.93% voting "Yes" to the following:

The office of the national president is united with that of the national chancellor. In consequence, the former powers of the national president pass to the leader and national chancellor, Adolf Hitler. He appoints his deputy. Do you, German man, and you, German woman, approve of the arrangement made in this law?

The 10.07% "No" vote was reported in Western newspapers as a triumph for the opposition to Adolf Hitler, who had been Chancellor for less than 19 months. However, that view proved to be inaccurate, as combining the offices of head of government and head of state had the effect of allowing Mr. Hitler to take the title Führer und Reichskanzler (Führer and Reich Chancellor), consolidating his dictatorial power as leader of the Nazi regime.

While looking for contemporary newspaper accounts of the referendum, I came upon the following article, published as "Special Cable to the New York Times and Montreal Gazette," published in the Montreal Gazette, August 18, 1934 (bold, capitals in original):

GERMAN JEWS TOLD TO VOTE FOR HITLER

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Berlin League Says Suffering Necessary to Mend Harm Done

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Berlin, August 17--The League of National German Jews, a small Jewish organization in Berlin, issued today a summons to all German Jews to vote for Chancellor Hitler in the plebiscite Sunday. The league declared the Jews' suffering in Germany had been necessary in order to clear away the damage done by "un-German elements." The statement reads:

"We members of the League of National German Jews, founded in 1921, have always, in war or peace, placed the good of the German people and the German Fatherland above our own good. Accordingly, we greeted the national uprising of January, 1933, although it brought rigors for us, for we saw it as the only means to clear away the damage done in fourteen unhappy years by un-German elements.

"We agree fully with the political testament of Reich President and Field Marshal von Hindenburg, who called the accomplishment of Reich Chancellor Hitler and his movement a decisive step of major historical importance and stated that reconciliation which will include the whole German Fatherland must follow the national awakening and unification of the German people.

"To the German Fatherland belongs body and soul that portion of the Jews who, like ourselves, know no other fatherland than Germany. In the spirit of the dead Reich President's testament, we support the unification of the offices of Reich leader and Reich Chancellor.

"We urge all Jews who feel themselves Germans to vote "yes" on August 19."

Until coming across this article, I had never heaerd of the Verband nationaldeutscher Juden (Association of National German Jews aka League of National German Jews). It was founded by Max Naumann in 1921 and was anti-Zionist, while favouring assimilation of German Jews into the German Volksgemeinschaft (folk community). The Association regarded the anti-Semitism of the early months of the Nazi regime as merely an attempt to stir up the masses. As to the likely future for Jews in Germany as a result of their support for the "Yes" vote in the referendum, it might have become apparent immediately if the following was any indication, as reported by Associated Press, and published in The New York Times, August 20, 1934 (bold in original):

Mueller Hails Hitler's Victory Over Jews: Says Anti-Semitism Is Christian Campaign

Berlin, Aug. 19--Five thousand members of the German Christian Society celebrating Chancellor Hitler's victory tonight heard Reichbishop Ludwig Mueller call anti-Semitism a Christian campaign.

His words left no doubt in the minds of his hearers that the German Protestant church under his leadership will be a racial institution.

"Hitler's fight is a fight for Christendom against Jews, the most savage enemies of Christianity," the Bishop asserted. "The German people, united today, may go through bitterness and distress but will win this campaign for Christianity even if the Jews get together and determine to destroy the nation."

Drawing a parallel between Christ and Chancellor Hitler, the Reich Bishop said:

"As in the days of the old Christians, faith is equal to confidence. Jesus, preaching the gospel, pleaded for confidence. So did our leader when he put the plebiscite as a question of confidence to the nation. We as true Christians had to give him our 'ja,' as only our consent gives him the right to defend our religion."

Bishop Mueller said the election result was "the beginning of the whole nation's Christianity, since it had the courage to vote for and stand behind the leader in his fight against the Jews."

Walter Kinder, Nazi radical church leader, closed the meeting, held in the Friedrichshain Convention Hall, with the German Christian society slogan:

"With God, under the leadership of Hitler, we will march on."

Richard Steigmann-Gall, in his book The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945 (2003), refers to Reich Bishop Mueller as "a theological moderate among the German Christians" (p. 159).

How did the Association of National German Jews' policy of appeasement and assimilation work out for them? Not too well: the Association was declared illegal and was dissolved on November 18, 1935, and Mr. Naumann was arrested by the Gestapo the same day, and interned at Columbia concentration camp. He was released after a few weeks, and died of cancer on May 18, 1939 at the age of 64. Most other members of the Association were exterminated by the Nazis during the Holocaust in World War II.

The Verband nationaldeutscher Juden wasn't the only Jewish organization in Germany that supported the Nazis; Der deutsche Vortrupp. Gefolgschaft deutscher Juden (The German Vanguard: German Jewish Followers) was founded in February 1933--almost immediately after Mr. Hitler took office as Chancellor--by Hans-Joachim Schoeps, a professor of religions and religious history at the University of Erlangen. The German Vanguard was basically a youth movement of intellectuals, with a membership of 150 students, and regarded itself as a Jewish political movement within a resurgent German nationalism, while disdaining Eastern European Jews, Zionism, Marxism, and liberalism.

The German Vanguard was dissolved in December 1935, the month after the dissolution of the Association of National German Jews. Professor Schoeps, a monarchist, fled to exile in Sweden late in 1938, and spent World War II in that country, while his parents were deported to Theresienstadt concentration camp in June 1942, and his father died there six months later. Professor Schoeps returned to western Germany in the autumn of 1946, resuming his position at the University of Erlangen in 1950. He died on July 8, 1980 at the age of 71.

100 years ago: The death of Austrian occultist Guido von List

On May 17, 1919, Austrian journalist and occultist Guido von List died at the age of 70. Mr. List was born into a Roman Catholic family in Vienna, but early in life he developed an interest in pre-Christian paganism. He began his journalistic career in 1877, and used his writings to promote Wotanism, a pan-Germanic völkisch movement worshipping pre-Christian pagan deities. He was influenced by the Theosophical Society and became increasingly interested in occultism, including the study of Runic alphabets.

Mr. List eventually promoted a belief that the modern world was degenerate, and claimed to have received a vision in 1917 that victory of the Central Powers over the Allies in World War I would be the apocalyptic cleansing event that would usher in a new Pan-German Empire based on Wotanism. Mr. List's alleged vision was proved erroneous by the November 1918 armistice and subsequent events. His health declined, exacerbated by food shortages resulting from the non-fulfillment of his vision. Mr. List died while on a visit to Berlin.

Guido von List achieved enough popularity in his own time to inspire the creation of societies promoting his ideas, the first of which was founded in 1908. His ideas influenced the creation of the Thule Society, occultist predecessor to the Nazi Party. While Mr. List's name is largely unknown today, his influence remains, and writers such as historian Joscelyn Godwin have noticed the similarities between the ideas promoted by Guido von List and the beliefs of New Agers and Green Party supporters today. For an example of a pro-Nazi organization that promotes ancient European paganism and is critical of Christianity, see the website of National Vanguard.

Canada's antichrist Liberal government plans to study reports on expanding euthanasia

I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live: Deuteronomy 30:19

For whoso findeth me findeth life, and shall obtain favour of the Lord.
But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul: all they that hate me love death. Proverbs 8:35-36

There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. Proverbs 14:12 (also Proverbs 16:25)

Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people. Proverbs 14:34

Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,...
...And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; Romans 1:22,28

Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong; Jeremiah 22:13a

It comes as no surprise to this blogger to see the rabidly antichrist Trudeaupian Canadian government of the Manchurian Pothead, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau fulfilling my prediction that the slippery slope argument will prove correct in Trudeaupia Canada as it did in Germany from the 1920s through the 1940s, with the legalization of euthanasia eventually leading to widespread killing. Doctor-assisted death is rapidly morphing into doctor-initiated death. As reported by Deborah Gyapong of Catholic News Service, December 18, 2018 (links in original):

OTTAWA – The Liberal government has promised to study three new reports on the possible expansion of the euthanasia law to include minors and those who suffer from mental disorders, but advocacy groups warn the government will likely expand the law after the 2019 election.

“My position is the Liberals do plan to expand the euthanasia law and Dying with Dignity is pressuring hard on the issue of advanced requests,” said Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition. “I also see them expanding it to children.”

The Council of Canadian Academies (CCA) submitted three separate reports in mid-December that studied whether to expand access to assisted suicide for “mature minors,” for those who had made advance requests for euthanasia should they become incompetent, and for those who suffer from mental disorders with no underlying physical condition that would make their death reasonably foreseeable.

“The results of these three independent reviews will help to inform dialogue on the issue of medical assistance in dying among Canadians and decision-makers,” said Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould, who tabled the CCA reports in the House of Commons Dec. 12, in a joint statement with Health Minister Ginette Pettipas Taylor. “Given the complexity and sensitivity of these topics, it will be important to take the time necessary to consider the evidence presented in the CCA’s reports.”

“It seems like they are trying to walk the line, just sort of put out the information and not really take the position,” said Amy Hasbrouck, a disability rights expert who heads Toujours Vivant/Not Dead Yet, an advocacy group for the disabled community.

Hasbrouck noted Quebec’s new government has indicated it will expand the province’s law to include advanced directives. As well, there is ongoing litigation at the federal and provincial level that would “dispense with the idea you have to be at end of life for death to be reasonably foreseeable,” she said.

There is also pressure for euthanasia of children, “oddly enough coming from the parents of children with disabilities,” she said, referring to a study done by the Canadian Pediatrics Society that showed most requests for the euthanasia of children under 17 came from the parents not from the children themselves.

Hasbrouck expressed disappointment there was not more representation on the CCA panel from the disabled community. Toujours Vivant was the only one to come from the disabled community. First Nations perspectives were also missing.

Schadenberg said he is glad the CCA reports were not consensus reports, but reflected the wide divergence of opinion on the various questions.

The CCA report offered pro and con arguments for child euthanasia, with no clear direction, says Schadenberg.

The CCA report on euthanasia for those with mental disorders alone also featured pro and con arguments, acknowledging the contentious nature of the issue, but warned if Canada were to allow it, based on the current “subjective assessment” of intolerable suffering, “it could become the most permissive jurisdiction in the world with respect to how relief of suffering is evaluated.”

“On the issue of mental illness, I can see them hesitating on that one,” Schadenberg said, noting that in order to allow it, the law would have to remove the section of the law that says death must be “reasonably foreseeable.”

But like Hasbrouck, Schadenberg is concerned expansion of the law could come through the courts.

The safeguard of “reasonably foreseeable” is already under challenge in the courts, he said, though the Supreme Court of Canada recently declined to speed up the case of Julia Lamb, a B.C. woman with spinal muscular atrophy who is not terminally ill, yet wants the ability access assisted suicide.

It also comes as no surprise to this blogger that Trudeaupia's Canada's most secular province, which was less than enthusiastic about fighting the Nazis during World War II, is already doing its best to implement Nazi policies, as reported by LifeSite News, December 12, 2018 (links in original):

Sick patients in Quebec are sometimes “abruptly” killed by doctors through the province’s euthanasia program with little or no effort to mitigate or relieve the patient’s suffering through non-lethal medical means, a study in an international medical journal is claiming.

“Requests for and provision of MAiD [Medical Aid in Dying] as documented in the chart can occur abruptly and without a documented evolution of the goals of care which may imply that requests for MAiD are not treated as having particular moral considerations but merely administrative or legal ones,” the study titled “Situating requests for medical aid in dying within the broader context of end-of-life care: ethical considerations” states.

“If MAiD is not ethically distinct from other end-of-life practices, then the timing would not appear to add any additional ethical concerns to those already expressed in relation to late discussion of end-of-life care options in general. If, however, MAiD is ethically distinct and should be treated with special consideration, the tendency to avoid, delay or have inadequate conversations about end-of-life care may be especially troubling in the context of their unknown impact on requests for assisted death,” the study added.

The study was published last month in the Journal of Medical Ethics

A leading bioethicist says the study shows the speciousness of claims by euthanasia advocates that ending a sick person’s life would only be done when nothing else can relieve the suffering.

“Euthanasia advocates are so full of it, promising that snuff medicine will only be a last resort when nothing else can be done to alleviate suffering. It’s never been true,” Wesley J. Smith wrote in a Dec. 10 article in National Review.

Smith said that once euthanasia is “normalized,” the next logical step is for it to simply become a “banal bureaucratic” process.

“And what else should we expect?” he asked. “Harnessing the authority of doctors in support of homicide transforms the act into a perceived beneficence, which quickly erodes the perceived intrinsic value of human life.”

“Over time,” Smith added, “euthanasia practice becomes a banal bureaucratic matter of checking the right boxes or finding ways to maneuver around the ‘protective guidelines’ — now perceived as ‘obstacles,’” he added.

“Humans are a logical species. Once we adopt a principle — here, that killing is an acceptable way to defeat suffering — we take the road wherever it leads,” he concluded.

Canada legalized euthanasia in 2016, with a reported 2,000 deaths by assisted suicide in the first year, more than were expected. The numbers since have soared with an at least 30-percent increase.

The government has also since pushed euthanasia through advertisements in hospital waiting rooms.

Two Canadian doctors and a bioethicist argued in the September edition of the New England Journal of Medicine for taking of organs from people who have chosen to end their lives through euthanasia while they are still alive.

This past fall it was reported that the Canadian government is now considering euthanasia for citizens suffering with mental illness, those who wish to produce an advanced directive and euthanasia for children.

It doesn't take much imagination to envision belief in the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ being classified as a "mental disorder" requiring pre-emptive euthanasia. Many years ago, I thought that the Antichrist would have to do a fair amount to get people to follow him and do his will, but I was wrong; by the time his identity is revealed, he won't have much to do to achieve his goals, since so much work is being done in advance to prepare the world for him.

75 years ago: Church of Norway clergy resign as civil servants while continuing as pastors

On Easter Sunday, April 5, 1942, bishops and a majority of the Church of Norway's pastors signed and proclaimed The Foundation of the Church: A Confession and a Declaration (Kirkens Grunn: En bekjennelse og en erklæring), in which they resigned as servants of the state, but vowed to continue their congregations as pastors. The declaration culminated a period of increasing frustration of the church with the government since the military forces of Nazi Germany had invaded and occupied Norway in 1940.

The Church of Norway, which was Lutheran and had a history of teaching obedience to the state, tried to get along with the Nazi occupation government, but the Nazis refused to honour their promises to respect Norwegians' freedom of religion or the Church's government and practices. On February 1, 1942, Vidkun Quisling was installed as Minister President of Norway; the country's equivalent of the Nazi Party was the Nasjonal Samling. On the day that Mr. Quisling took office, a mob of his sympathizers invaded Nidaros Cathedral and refused to allow the cathedral's dean to conduct services. The congregation gathered outside to sing "A Mighty Fortress is Our God," and all seven Church of Norway bishops resigned the next day.

Church Primate Eivind Berggrav was arrested shortly after the Easter declaration, and spent some time in Bredtvet concentration camp. The minority of pastors who didn't go along with the Easter declaration were tarred with the label of Quisling, and were not respected by the Norwegian people. The majority of Church of Norway clergy provided an inspiring example to Norwegians at large in resisting a state that was not only illegally and unpopularly occupying the country, but wasn't content to be just the state, but was refusing to respect the church's God-given role as the church. It's also worth noting that persecution by the state authorities produced a period of needed, if brief, independence for a church which under normal conditions was affiliated with the state, which was and is not the will of God. The existence in Europe of state churches, where people are "hatched, matched, and dispatched," has played a major role in that continent's sad drift into secular humanism, which can't stand against militant Islam. Courageous Christian pastors can still be found today, mainly in countries such as India, Myanmar, Vietnam, North Korea, Cuba, and Islamic nations.

For those interested in further reading, a recent book on the Church of Norway's experience during World War II (which inclued helping Jews) is Church Resistance to Nazism in Norway, 1940-1945 by Arne Hassing (2014).

50 years ago: Good riddance to Margaret Sanger

On September 6, 1966, Margaret Sanger died, eight days before her 87th birthday. Mrs. Sanger, born Margaret Higgins, was a nurse who opened the first birth control clinic in the United States in Brooklyn, New York on October 16, 1916. Promotion of contraception was illegal then, but Mrs. Sanger fought her case in the courts and eventually won the right to promote her views. She founded the American Birth Control League in 1921 and the Clinical Research Bureau in 1923, and with financial assistance from John D. Rockefeller, Jr., travelled to various foreign countries to promote birth control. Conflict within the ABCL led Mrs. Sanger to leave the organization in 1928 and she took full control of the CRB, renaming it the Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau. The ABCL and BCCRB merged in 1939 to become the Birth Control Federation of America, which changed its name to Planned Parenthood Federation of America in 1942. Mrs. Sanger helped to found the International Committee on Planned Parenthood in 1946, which became the International Planned Parenthood Federation in 1952.

Mrs. Sanger was a racist and eugenicist who had actual Nazis contributing to her Birth Control Review magazine. Planned Parenthood operates more than half of the abortion clinics in the United States; videos were made in 2015 that seemed to show personnel at Planned Parentood clinics offering to sell body parts of aborted fetuses. If the body count resulting from her ideas is any indication, Margaret Sanger may have been the most evil woman in history. She, like the Pharisees, had her reward; she was named Humanist of the Year for 1957 by the American Humanist Association, and has several buildings named in her honour.

This blogger has neither the time nor the desire to go into great detail about the evils of Margaret Sanger and Planned Parenthood; some of the blogs on my blogroll have material on these subjects (especially the Planned Parenthood body parts scandal), and readers are encouraged to search them for information. I recommend the book Grand Illusions: The Legacy of Planned Parenthood by George Grant (1988) as an excellent expose of Margaret Sanger and the organization she helped to found.

Roman Catholic priest in Northern Ireland is caught on video, snorting cocaine--in his apartment full of Nazi memorabilia

A night of jocularity in the life of a Roman Catholic priest in Northern Ireland--and wouldn't you know it, by horrible coincidence, the only time in his life he uses drugs, he gets caught on video. At least he wasn't molesting boys. Whatever happened to the kind of priest that Pat O'Brien and Bing Crosby used to play in the movies?

As reported by Ruth Warrander of the Dublin newspaper The Irish Sun, February 28, 2016:

AN IRISH priest has been caught on camera snorting a line of cocaine at a party in his house on church grounds.

Father Stephen Crossan, 37, was seen sniffing a large line of the drug through a note while chatting to a pal in a room full of Nazi memorabilia.

He places a cigarette in an ashtray and seems to say “I shouldn’t” before snorting white powder off a plate in a video obtained by the Irish Sun on Sunday.

The respected Father’s drug use came at the end of a two-day bender that ended with him inviting friends back to his parish home.

Crossan has admitted taking drugs. He confessed: “It was just the one night and that was it. I do not have an issue with drugs.”

A source said revellers went back to Fr Crossan’s home at 11am for seven hours after they had been asked to leave another house party.

They were shocked to see Nazi memorabilia including flags, hats and a Maltese falcon on a plinth on his mantelpiece.

A source said: “Stephen said he was a social worker but told us the truth when we realised he lived on church grounds.

“He had been drinking beers and Jack Daniels as well as taking coke.

“The house was really lovely, with plush carpets and antique furniture everywhere.

“But we were pretty stunned to see all the Nazi stuff everywhere — badges, hats and flags. He showed me all these pins — there must have been about a hundred badges.

“It was all over the house, it reminded me of that Nazi room in Father Ted — I told him that and he laughed it off.

“At one point Stephen put on a cap and did the Nazi salute but he was just messing around.”

The source continued: “There was a big rail of all of his gowns — we tried some of them on and danced about.

As reported by BBC News, March 1, 2016:

Police have begun an investigation after footage emerged of a Catholic priest caught on video snorting what appeared to be cocaine.

Fr Stephen Crossan is reported to have snorted coke through a £10 note during a night of drinking in July 2015 in Banbridge, County Down.

He was in a room containing Nazi memorabilia, and seemed to say "I shouldn't" as he snorted, the Sun on Sunday reported.

He has taken leave from the priesthood.

A spokesperson for the PSNI said: "Police are aware of the article in a Sunday newspaper and are making inquiries."

The bishop of Dromore said in a statement that he had no knowledge of the incident.

It allegedly occurred in the parochial house last July after a party.

The Sun on Sunday said it happened at what was then Fr Crossan's parish home in the grounds of St Patrick's Church, Banbridge, in July 2015.

Father Crossan told the newspaper that he took the drugs but said: "It was just the one night and that was it."

A source said that a group went to Fr Crossan's home after a party and found Nazi memorabilia including flags, hats and an eagle with a swastika on a plinth on his mantelpiece.

In his defence, Fr Crossan told the paper that he was not a Nazi and that he collected historical items from every country.

He said he had been on sick leave with depression at the time of the video and that he had since left the Church but was being backed by the parish.

In his statement, Bishop of Dromore John McAreavey said that Fr Crossan had asked for and been granted leave from his pastoral duties at Seapatrick parish in May 2015. He said he had been receiving counselling and was considering his future.

At the start of February 2016, the statement said that the priest had asked for an extended leave of absence from the priesthood.

Bishop McAreavey said he was concerned for the priest's health.

Fr Crossan is no longer living at the parochial house.

80 years ago: German Reichstag passes the Enabling Act

On March 23, 1933, the German Reichstag passed Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich (Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the State), popularly known as the Enabling Act, handing over its legislative powers, including the approval of treaties with foreign nations and the initiation of constitutional amendments, to Adolf Hitler's cabinet for four years.

According to William L. Shirer in The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (1960), "...the act stipulated that the laws enacted by the cabinet were to be drafted by the Chancellor and "might deviate from the constitution." No laws were to "affect the position of the Reichstag"--surely the cruelest joke of all--and the powers of the President remained "undisturbed."" Under the act's terms, Mr. Hitler and the Nazis could ignore the civil liberties provisions in the German constitution and issue decrees without having them passed by parliament.

Only the Social Democratic delegates voted against the act, the Communists having been imprisoned. Centrist and moderate rightist parties voted in favour of the act as a "lesser of evils." Some may notice a similarity between the Enabling Act and the Patriot Act in the United States--a terrorist act of dubious origin leads to legislative approval for dictatorial powers for the executive branch of government, and the abolition of civil liberties. There is one significant difference between the two: The Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 is 132 pages long, whereas Germany's Enabling Act of 1933 consisted of just five paragraphs, implying that the German legislators had actually read the bill they were voting on.

Dutch appeals court upholds fine for Orthodox Jewish rabbi who refused to carry a national identity card

The Netherlands, Belgium (see post below)--weren't these countries opposed to the Nazis? Here they are 70 years later, increasingly adopting the Nazis' policies. The times they are a'changin', as reported by Associated Press and Kobi Nahshoni of Ynet News, February 28, 2013:

A Dutch appeals court has upheld a €60 ($90) fine against an Orthodox Jew who refused to show police an identity card, citing religious reasons.

The Hague Appeals Court ruled that a law which makes it mandatory for all people older than 14 to carry ID cards and show them to police upon request does not have a religious exemption.

The man, whose name was not released due to privacy laws, had argued it was against his religious beliefs to carry anything but his clothing on the Jewish Sabbath.

The ruling didn't say why police approached the man.

The law was introduced in 2005 amid a wave of anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim sentiment. Carrying ID cards hadn't previously been mandatory in the Netherlands since the Nazi occupation in World War II.

Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, president of the Conference of European Rabbis, said in response that "the problem of carrying an ID card on Shabbat is not new, and even in Nazi Germany religious authorities discussed whether and how should one go out to the public domain with certificates.

"I hope the Jewish community in Holland reaches an agreement with the authorities on this issue," he concluded.

Availability of Mein Kampf comic books in Japanese bookstores prompts a complaint from the Israeli Ambassador--and an agreement to publish comic books of Old Testament stories

As reported by Itamar Eichner of Ynet News, February 19, 2013:

Israeli Ambassador to Japan Nissim Ben-Shitrit visited a book store at a Tokyo Metro station recently, and he was shocked to discover a manga comic book with a drawing of Adolf Hitler on its cover.

An inquiry revealed that the book, which had been distributed in many book stands in Japan, was a Japanese translation of the Nazi leader's autobiography, "Mein Kampf."

Following the inquiry, the ambassador scheduled a meeting with the comic book's publisher, which was also attended by two of the book's illustrators.

Ben-Shitrit expressed his discontent with the publication and explained why it was so problematic. The publisher apologized, saying he did not think the book would offend anyone's feelings.

The publisher told the ambassador that the "Mein Kampf" comic book had sold tens of thousands of copies and was already sold out. As he could not repair what was done, Ben-Shitrit tried to come up with an idea to tilt the balance.

After contemplating several solutions, the publisher accepted the ambassador's offer to issue a manga version of the Bible stories.

During the meeting, the parties agreed to publish three different books." Hitler's illustrators "fixed" their mistake by drawing the Bible heroes.

The Bible stories comic books are now offered for sale in Japan's book stores both in Japanese and in English.

"When I saw the drawing of Hitler with swastikas and Japanese captions, I was shocked," says Ben-Shitrit. "It's unthinkable that an enlightened person would read Hitler's book. Luckily, the book has exhausted itself and is no longer on the shelves.

"Now I'm hoping that young people in Japan will be exposed to the heroes of the Bible. I don't think that they maliciously intended to publish something anti-Semitic. It’s a small company that publishes manga books, and they thought their readers would be interested in it."

110 years ago: Kaiser Wilhelm II expresses his religious views

Much of the content of this post is taken from the book Evangelist of Race: The Germanic Vision of Houston Stewart Chamberlain by Geoffrey G. Field, published by Columbia University Press in 1981.

Theologians taking an increasingly liberal and allegorical view of the Bible, especially the Old Testament; a form of replacement theology; an identification of Christianity with the interests of one's own nation, and a mystical view of that nation and its leaders in God's unfolding plan--if those sound like things that are present in the early 21st century, they were also present in the early 20th century--in Germany.

As Germany's head of state from 1888-1918, Kaiser Wilhelm II (1859-1941) was also the head of the nation's Lutheran church. In the early 1900s Kaiser Wilhelm became a great admirer of the ideas of Houston Stewart Chamberlain (1855-1927), a native of England who had moved to Germany as a young man and had become a firm Germanophile. The book by Mr. Chamberlain that ttracted the admiration of the Kaiser was titled Die Grundlagen des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts, published in Germany in 1899 and published in English in 1910 under the title The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century.

Chamberlain's aim in the Foundations was to substantiate two fundamental convictions--that humanity was divided into distinct races which differed in their physical structure and mental and moral capacities, and that the struggle and interaction of these races was the main propelling force of history and the key to understanding cultural, political, and social development...His book was designed to show the Germanic or Teutonic race as the main architect of modern European civilization. (Field, p. 180).

So taken was the Kaiser with Mr. Chamberlain and his magnum opus that he wrote the following in a letter to Mr. Chamberlain on December 31, 1901 (Field, p. 253):

Truly, let us thank Him up there, that he still views us Germans with such favor; for God sent your book to the German people and you personally to me. You were chosen by Him to be my ally and I shall thank Him eternally that He did so...The German Michael is waking up and that is good for him, then he will be on the alert and will achieve something; and once he has begun to work he will accomplish more than anyone else...Once the Teutonic Catholics have been brought by you into the open conflict between Teutons and Catholics, that is "Romans," then they wil be "awakened" and will "know" that which the father confessors have been trying to hide from them--that they are being kept in humiliating subjection to "Rome" as an instrument against "Germany"...And now, for the New Year 1902, I wish God's blessing and Christ's strength to you my comrade-in-arms and ally in the struggle for the Teutons against Rome, Jerusalem etc. The feeling of fighting for a cause that is absolutely good and holy carries the guarantee of victory.

According to Professor Field (p. 253):

With good reason did one close aide of Wilhelm regret that "religion and mysticism are now playing an increasingly large part in the Emperor's speeches."

At the time that Mr. Chamberlain's book was attracting attention, a liberal view of the Bible was becoming more popular in Germany. In January 1902, an Assyriologist named Freidrich Delitzsch delivered an address to the German Oriental Society titled Babel und Bibel (Babylon and the Bible), in which he argued the cultural superiority of ancient Babylon over Israel, and that evidence from recent excavations at Nineveh and Babylon showed strong Babylonian influences over Israel. Mr. Delitzsch also argued that the monotheism of the Old Testament was largely borrowed from Babylonian sources. Kaiser Wilhelm invited Mr. Delitzsch to a private audience a month later and was shocked by the professor's rejection of the deity of Jesus Christ and the divine inspiration of the Old Testament (Field, p. 255).

While still professing to be a devout Lutheran, the Kaiser, under the influence of the ideas of Mr. Chamberlain, was gradually changing his religious views. A year after his original lecture, Mr. Delitzsch addressed the German Oriental Society, and criticized churches and schools for resisting "science" concerning the Old Testament. The Oriental Society's president, Admiral Hollmann, was sensitive to the criticism coming from Bible-believing Christians, and requested Kaiser Wilhelm's formal permission before publishing Professor Delitzsch's views in the society's bulletin. The Kaiser, who was having trouble clarifying his views, received a lengthy letter from Mr. Chamberlain, who argued that God's revelation in history was continuous and not limited to Israel, and that in the modern age, "Germany had a special mission: to rediscover and safeguard the vital essence of Christianity" (Field, p. 257).

Influenced by Mr. Chamberlain's letter, the Kaiser wrote his reply to Admiral Hollmann on February 15, 1903. Quoting Professor Field (pp. 257-258):

Wilhelm's letter to Hollman endeavored to harmonize these ideas with a somewhat more orthodox position; the result was confusing, but illustrative of the intellectual transition he was making. He reproached Delitzsch for his polemical style and for disturbing the faith of many contemporaries, and went on to discuss two forms of revelation--"historical" and "purely religious, preparing the way for the future Messiah." The first was almost pure Chamberlain: there was a continuous revelation in history in figures like Hammurabi (the hero of Delitzsch), Homer, Charlemagne, Luther, Shakespeare, Goethe, Kant, and Kaiser Wilhelm I. For the sake of orthodoxy he added Abraham and Moses to the list. God, Wilhelm claimed, guided mankind's advance by "donating" to nations the great intellects of the world; he also "revealed himself differently to the different races according to their position and rank in the scale of civilization." With his description of the second, "more religious," form of revelation, Wilhelm attempted to draw closer to orthodox Protestants and fulfill his obligations as head of the church. Here he declared that a single thread of revelation ran from Abraham and Moses, through the Prophets and the Psalmists to Christ himself. Abraham's race was portrayed as "ever trying to hold fast to their monotheism" under repeated and heavy pressures, and protected by God until the heralded Messiah appeared. In the latter parts of the letter, however, Wilhelm returned to Chamberlain, borrowing ideas and extracting whole phrases to argue that sections of the Old Testament were historical and "did not reveal God's word." Their value was symbolic only. From his constant repetition of the word "perhaps," it seems that Wilhelm both sensed his own underlying confusion and wished somehow to soften the contrast between himself and Protestant orthodoxy. Nonetheless he pressed on with a Chamberlain-style conclusion reaffirming faith in the "one and only God," recognizing that modern research would alter perceptions of the Old Testament and predicting (in words drawn from Chamberlain) "that much of the nimbus of the chosen people [the Jews] will thereby disappear.

Published on February 19, 1903, the Kaiser's letter caused an uproar. Some conservative circles saw it as marking a breach with...liberal Protestant theology, although they disapproved of the new direction Wilhelm had taken. Very few contemporaries suspected the influence of Chamberlain...

For all his influence over the Kaiser's letter, Mr. Chamberlain took exception to much of it, denying that Abraham was a historical figure at all and objecting to the idea that Abraham was a herald of Christ. Mr. Chamberlain also disputed that the Jews had developed a true monotheism (Field, p. 259).

Again quoting Professor Field (pp. 259-260):

Under Chamberlain's guidance Wilhelm's opinions gradually shifted from Lutheranism to a racist Germanic Christianity; the Hollmann letter marks a stage in this journey. Moreover, the unrelenting hostility toward Catholicism and Judaism that fills this correspondence offers a vivid illustration of how closely the German state was identified with Protestantism and how deeply ingrained was repugnance to genuine religious pluralism in the highest circles of the land.

The humiliation of defeat in war and the social disintegration of the Reich in 1918 reinforced the worst racial fears of Wilhelm and Chamberlain. In its last decade their correspondence moved in that strange paranoid world of collapsed empires, Bolsehvik terror, Jewish and Freemason conspiracies, and secret hopes for a new crusade against the forces of racial decay and materialism that is so characteristic of the writings and letters of the extreme right in the postwar era. Wilhelm blamed the Jews for Germany's defeat, his own exile, and the Weimar Republic, and accepted the notorious Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion as an accurate description of their unwavering conspiratorial resolve. His letters, very disjointed in thought, violent in rhetoric, and punctuated by scores of exclamation marks, reveal a mind derailed, a fertile intelligence brought--on the subjects of race and religion at least--to the borders of insanity. He continued to read Chamberlain and was enthralled by Mensch und Gott in 1921. By this time he had abandoned Abraham and the Old Testament altogether--his world, like that of Chamberlain, was one massive struggle, a vast theodicy of German and Jew.

Mr. Chamberlain became an early and enthusiastic supporter of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, especially after Mr. Hitler paid a visit to Mr. Chamberlain, then in failing health, at his home in Bayreuth in 1923. Although he was a man of the Second Reich, Mr. Chamberlain is often thought of as a spiritual father of the Third Reich, and the Nazis paid tribute to his influence on his death. Mr. Hitler paid a last visit to Mr. Chamberlain shortly before his passing, and attended his funeral (as did Prince August Wilhelm, son of the former Kaiser) (Field, pp. 432-445).

10 years ago: The death of Hugh Trevor-Roper

Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight! Isaiah 5:21

Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, Romans 1:22

On January 26, 2003, British historian Hugh Trevor-Roper died at the age of 89. Mr. Trevor-Roper was reputed to be an expert on 17th-century Britain and Nazi Germany, but was exposed as a fool when he vouched for the authenticity of the "Hitler diaries" in the early 1980s, which were exposed as a hoax. Mr. Trevor-Roper mocked Christian belief in the truth of the history recorded in the Bible--a period of history that wasn't his specialty--but he couldn't recognize the fraudulence of documents from a very recent period of history that was his specialty.

Dutch church official apologizes for commemorating the deaths of World War II German soldiers along with Holocaust victims

Some people just aren't ready for "reconciliation." File under "It probably seemed like a good idea at the time"--another backlog item, as reported by Jewish Telegraphic Agency, October 29, 2012:

THE HAGUE (JTA) -- A Netherlands church official apologized to a Jewish group for a memorial ceremony that commemorated Holocaust victims with soldiers who died fighting for Nazi Germany.

Rob Mutsaerts, a bishop from Den Bosch in the southern Netherlands, in a letter last week expressed his regret to the small Jewish organization JFN.

Mutsaerts apologized for a sermon delivered Oct. 20 in a church in nearby Geffen in which Pastor David van Dijk read out the names of German soldiers who died in Geffen during World War II along with the names of local Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust.

“You are shocked, and those are feelings we cannot change,” Mutsaerts wrote . “We would like to extend our apologies for the pain and sorrow that the naming of all the names has unintentionally caused to Jews.”

Van Dijk’s sermon was delivered after city officials canceled the planned unveiling of a monument in Geffen displaying the names of the German Wehrmacht soldiers along with the Holocaust victims. All the names were removed from the monument following protests by Jewish organizations and individuals.

A Dutch rabbi, Wim van Dijk, demanded that the names of his relatives be removed from the monument.

The pastor read the names jointly in church as a sign of “reconciliation” shortly after the unveiling of the monument without the names.

Australian Neo-Nazi "ethicist" Peter Singer receives his country's highest civilian honour

Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people. Proverbs 14:34

Surely some future historian, surveying our times, will note sardonically that it took no more than three decades to transform a war crime into an act of compassion, thereby enabling the victors in the war against Nazism to mount their own humane holocaust, which in its range and in the number of its victims, may soon far surpass the Nazi one. It is significant that, whereas the Nazi holocaust has received lavish TV and film coverage, the humane one goes rolling along largely unnoticed by the media. Malcolm Muggeridge, Sanctity of Life, Chatelaine, December 1979, p. 138

Professor Peter Singer, an "ethicist" whose views on the sancity of human life I find virtually the same as those of the Nazis, was named a Companion (AC) in the General Division of the Order of Australia in the Queen's Birthday 2012 Honours Lists (see page 8 of linked document):

For eminent service to philosophy and bioethics as a leader of public debate and communicator of ideas in the areas of global poverty, animal welfare and the human condition.

John Hawkins of Right Wing News has compiled some revealing quotes from major figures in the animal rights movement. Of interest for this post are these, merely a small sample to illustrate Professor Singer's low view of the sanctity of human life:

An animal experiment cannot be justifiable unless the experiment is so important that the use of a brain-damaged human would be justifiable. — Peter Singer, godfather of the animal rights movement, Animal Liberation: A New Ethic for Our Treatment of Animals, 2nd. edition, 1990.

Surely there will be some nonhuman animals whose lives, by any standards, are more valuable than the lives of some humans. — Peter Singer, godfather of the animal rights movement, Animal Liberation: A New Ethic for Our Treatment of Animals, 2nd edition, 1990.

There are some circumstances, for example, where the newborn baby is severely disabled and where the parents think that it’s better that child should not live, when killing the newborn baby is not at all wrong … not like killing the chimpanzee would be. Maybe it’s not wrong at all. — Peter Singer, godfather of the animal rights movement.

Your dog can show you when he or she wants to go for a walk and equally for nonviolent sexual contact, your dog or whatever else it is can show you whether he or she wants to engage in a certain kind of contact — Peter Singer, godfather of the animal rights movement.

The one thing I would agree with concerning Professor Singer's "eminent service to philosophy and bioethics" is that while many who share his outlook pussyfoot around the implications, Professor Singer isn't afraid to take his views to their logical conclusions and state them.

Although Peter Singer is of Jewish background, that doesn't seem to have had much influence on his philosophy, as reported by Dan Goldberg of Jewish Telegraphic Agency, June 24, 2012:

Although his family has a Passover seder -- “with a beet root instead of a lamb shank” -- and he celebrates Purim with his grandchildren, and Rosh Hashanah, Singer says Jewish traditions “did not play much of a role in my life.”

He concedes, though, that his family history did play a part in the development of his theories.

“As three of my grandparents died in the Holocaust, and the fourth was fortunate to survive in Theresienstadt, that was very much present in my life,” he said. “I am sure that it had some impact on my thought -- on my abhorrence of cruelty, of the naked use of power over the defenseless and, of course, of racism.”

His parents, he says, gave him the choice of whether to have a bar mitzvah celebration. He declined.

“I never believed in a god,” he said. “There may have been times when I wondered if there might be a god, but it always seemed to me wildly implausible that a god worth worshiping could allow the Holocaust to occur.”

French Jewish leader finds it shocking that his country's soccer team didn't consider going 853 miles out of their way to visit Auschwitz

If Jews wonder why Gentiles often regard Jews as excessively self-obsessed, the folowing item might offer a hint. As reported by Ynet News, June 18, 2012:

The president of the umbrella organization of France's Jewish communities said it was “shocking” that France’s soccer team did not visit Auschwitz. The team is playing in the European championship, which is being held in Poland and the Ukraine.

According to the JTA news agency, the British, Italian, Dutch and German teams all visited the Nazi extermination and concentration camp near Krakow.

The French team should have visited the camp “in light of how soccer players serve as role models for young people,” wrote Dr. Richard Prasquier, president of CRIF – the umbrella organization of French Jewish communities.

Prasquier published the statement on June 12 on the CRIF website, under the title: “My (probably unheeded) commentary.”

He added the visit was also necessary because of “the ignorance of many young people,” despite efforts to educate them about the Holocaust.

Prasquier noted that the French team was based at Donetsk in Ukraine, 853 miles from Auschwitz, while the British and Italian teams were based in Krakow.

“However, an airplane would have shortened the trip. The fact that the visit was apparently not even considered is shocking,” Prasquier wrote.

The original French version of Mr. Prasquier's editorial, titled Mon édito, probablement inattendu..., was published by
Conseil Représentatif des Institutions juives de France on June 12, 2012, and includes the following:

Il est vrai que l’équipe de France est établie à Donetsk en Ukraine à 1373km d’Auschwitz, alors que les Anglais et les Italiens sont installés à Cracovie, à une soixantaine de km du camp...Mais l’avion raccourcit les distances et le fait même que la visite ne semble pas avoir été envisagée est choquant.

Mr. Prasquier admits that the French team is based in Donetsk, Ukraine, 1,373 kilometres (853 miles) from Auschwitz, while the English and Italian teams are based in Krakow, only 60 kilometres (37 miles) from Auschwitz. Most people are capable of understanding the difference in distance between 37 miles and 853 miles, and I doubt that Mr. Prasquier would travel 853 miles for a brief sightseeing trip. From my perspective, 853 miles is the approximate distance between Edmonton and Vancouver to the west and between Edmonton and Winnipeg to the east--in each case a different time zone. Only someone as self-absorbed as Mr. Prasquier would find it "choquant" (shocking) that the French soccer team wouldn't consider spending money on air fare to go hundreds of miles out of their way. It doesn't seem to have occurred to him that the main priority of the French soccer team is playing soccer in the Euro 2012 tournament (part of which is being held in Ukraine, hence their base in Donetsk), and not pursuing education in Holocaust studies.

White House regrets Obama's mention of "Polish death camp"

Don't you think this story would have received much more attention and the remark in question much more criticism if it had been made by Dan Quayle instead of B. Hussein Obama? As reported by Ron Kampeas of Jewish Telegraphic Agency, May 30, 2012:

WASHINGTON (JTA) -- The White House expressed its regrets about President Obama's use of the term "Polish death camp."

In a statement Wednesday morning, Tommy Vietor, the spokesman for the U.S. National Security Council, said the president "misspoke" during his presentation of a posthumous Medal of Freedom a day earlier to Jan Karski, a Polish resistance fighter who was among the first to report German atrocities in his country.

"He was referring to Nazi death camps in Poland," Vietor said. "We regret this misstatement, which should not detract from the clear intention to honor Mr. Karski and those brave citizens who stood on the side of human dignity in the face of tyranny."

During the ceremony, Obama said of Karski, "Fluent in four languages, possessed of a photographic memory, Jan served as a courier for the Polish resistance during the darkest days of World War II. Before one trip across enemy lines, resistance fighters told him that Jews were being murdered on a massive scale, and smuggled him into the Warsaw Ghetto and a Polish death camp to see for himself. Jan took that information to President Franklin Roosevelt, giving one of the first accounts of the Holocaust and imploring to the world to take action."

Poles insist on the term "Nazi death camps" to describe facilities such as Auschwitz and Sobibor.

In a tweet reported first by BuzzFeed, Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski said that Obama "will apologize for this outrageous error," ascribing it to "ignorance and incompetence."

Other officials also weighed in with outrage on social media.

Holocaust historians say the record of Polish behavior during the Holocaust is vexed and contradictory. There was much collaboration with the Nazis, and the resistance did little to protect Jews until 1942, reflecting the pervasive anti-Semitism that infected the country before the German invasion in 1939.

Karski himself in his first dispatches fretted that native Polish anti-Semitism would frustrate efforts to save the Jews. In a February 1940 dispatch quoted in The Holocaust Encyclopedia, Karski said that Nazi anti-Jewish measures were creating "something akin to a narrow bridge upon which the Germans and a large portion of Polish society are finding agreement." A Jewish-Polish resistance would encounter "serious resistance" among large parts of Polish society, he reported.

On the other hand, once the scope of the genocide became clear, some of the Polish resistance sought to rescue Jews.

The Anti-Defamation League in a statement Wednesday praised the White House for its "regrets" on the matter.

"The misnomer 'Polish camps' unjustly implies that the death camps in Poland were built in the name of the Polish people rather than by the Nazi regime," the ADL said. "While the White House acknowledged that the president misspoke, the administration should turn this mistake into a teachable moment for American public and explain more fully why the expression 'Polish death camps' offends our strong ally, Poland, and distorts the history of the Holocaust."

More than 90 percent of Polish Jewry's prewar 3.5 million Jews was wiped out in the Holocaust, and efforts by Jews to return to their homes after the war were in some cases met by pogroms instigated by neighbors who had taken over their properties.

The tiny community that persisted in postwar Poland lay low, in part because anti-Semitism was still pervasive. Only in recent years, after the fall of communism, has the community undergone a minor revival.

50 years ago: Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann is executed in Jerusalem

On May 31, 1962, Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann, 56, was executed in Jerusalem. On December 15, 1961, a three-man Israeli court panel had sentenced Mr. Eichmann to death by hanging, four days after being convicted of all 15 charges against him. The charges were:

1/Causing the enslavement, deportation and murder of Jews;
2/Causing the deaths of millions of Jews;
3/Putting millions of Jews in ghettos, labour and concentration camps with the aim of destroying them (the Jews, that is);
4/Sending thousands of Gypsies to extermination camps;
5/Causing the inhuman treatment, deportation and murder of Jews in Axis-occupied areas;
6/Inflicting physical and mental harm on millions of Jews;
7/Planning a program for sterilization of Jews;
8/Deporting 100 Czechoslovakian children from Lidice to Poland, where they were killed;
9/Persecuting Jews on religious, racial, political and national grounds;
10/Appropriating Jewish property by force;
11/Deporting over 500,000 Poles;
12/Deporting 14,000 Slovenes;
13/Being a member of the SS;
14/Being a member of the Nazi Security Police;
15/Being a member of the Gestapo.

Go here to see an article about Gabriel Bach, the prosecutor in Mr. Eichmann's trial.

One little joke about the Holocaust, and they're all over you

For in many things we offend all. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body.
Behold, we put bits in the horses' mouths, that they may obey us; and we turn about their whole body.
Behold also the ships, which though they be so great, and are driven of fierce winds, yet are they turned about with a very small helm, whithersoever the governor listeth.
Even so the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth!
And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell.
For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind:
But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. James 3:2-8

The justly-fired railroad employee responsible for the following incident apparently didn't understand that neither Jews nor Gentiles find anything humourous in the genocide of Jews by Nazis in World War II. From Belgium--which, like Trudeaupia (formerly Canada)--arrogates to itself the right to pass judgement on other countries, comes this item, as reported by Maayana Miskin of Arutz Sheva, May 4, 2012:

Passengers on a train in Belgium got a shock this week as the following announcement came over the speaker, “Welcome to the train to Auschwitz. The Jews are asked to get off at Buchenwald.”

More than 55,000 were murdered at the Buchenwald concentration camp during the Holocaust.

A railroad employee who heard the announcement ran to the room with the microphone, but found it empty. A short time later a second employee took to the sound system to apologize for the “unsuccessful joke.”

The Belgian national railroad, SNCB, denounced the incident, which took place on the Brussels-Namur line.

The employee has been found and fired, SNCB officials stated.

European Jewish Congress President Dr. Moshe Kantor recently warned that anti-Israel sentiment in Europe could lead to a “tsunami of hate” being unleashed against European Jews. The European Jewish Parliament has reported a “surge in anti-Semitism” as well.

A recent Anti-Defamation League (ADL) poll found “disturbingly high” levels of anti-Semitism among European respondents.

May 29, 2012 update: Here's another one, as reported by Jewish Telegraphic Agency, May 29, 2012:

ROME (JTA) – A crude joke about the Holocaust has cost a public health official in the town of Pavia his job, according to Italian media reports.

Giuseppe Imbalzano, 59, submitted his resignation Monday after a meeting with Pavia’s public health service director, according to reports.

At a meeting last week with local and regional officials, Imbalzano reportedly told a joke that asked the difference between Jews and cakes. The punch line stated, “When you put cakes in the oven they don’t scream.”

Imbalzano told the newspaper Il Giorno that he had not meant any harm.

“It was a silly joke that didn’t have any offensive spirit,” he said. “I never would have imagined that such nonsense would have stirred up such a storm.”

Imbalzano said others at the meeting smiled at the joke.

70 years ago: Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King invokes God and speaks in favour of a new world order

And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.
And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. Revelation 21:1-4

On September 4, 1941, Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King spoke at Mansion House in London as the guest of Lord Mayor Sir George Wilkinson and the Corporation of London. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was also in attendance. Mr. King said, in part:

We are fighting to defend democratic and Christian ideals. We believe that everything which free men value and cherish on this side of the grave is in peril in this war. The right of men, rich and poor, to be treated as men; the right of men to make the laws by which they shall be governed; the right of men to work where they will, at what they will; the right of womankind to the serenity and sanctity of the home; the right of children to play in safety under peaceful heavens; the right of old men and women to the tranquillity of their sunset; the right to speak the truth in our hearts; the right to worship, in our own way, the God in whom we believe. (Cheers.)...

...We, in Canada, were greatly heartened when, three years ago, the President, after referring to the Dominion of Canada as a part of the sisterhood of the British Empire, declared that the people of the United States would not stand idly by if domination of Canadian soil were threatened by any other Empire. I reciprocated at once by recognizing Canada's responsibility to do what lay within her power to prevent attacks through our territory upon the United States. These declarations were the starting point of our agreement for joint defence.

To-day, fortunately, we are witnessing the birth of still wider arrangements for joint defence between the British Empire and the United States. Your declaration, Prime Minister, that in the Far East, Britain would stand at the side of the United States, is a sure sign of the deepening interdependence of the free world...

...Much is being said about a new world order to take the place of the old world order when the war is at an end. If that new order is not already on its way before the war is over, we may look for it in vain. A new world order cannot be worked out at some given moment and reduced to writing at a conference table. It is not a matter of parchments and of seals. That was one of the mistaken beliefs at the end of the last War. A new world order to be worthy of the name is something that is born, not made. It is something that lives and breathes; something that needs to be developed in the minds and the hearts of men; something that touches the human soul. It expresses itself in good will and in mutual aid. It is the application, in all human relationships, of the principle of helpfulness and of service. It is based not on fear, on greed, and on hate, but on mutual trust and the noblest qualities of the human heart and mind. It seeks neither to divide nor to destroy. Its aim is brotherhood, its method cooperation.

While the old order is destroying itself, this new relationship of men and nations has already begun its slow but sure evolution. It found expression when Britain determined to put an end to aggression in Europe; when other nations of the British Commonwealth took their place at the side of Britain, and when the United States resolved to lend its powerful aid to the nations which are fighting for freedom. It has found its latest expression in the Atlantic Charter. All these factors are combining to create one great brotherhood of freedom-loving peoples. It must now be wholly clear that if a new world order based upon freedom is to assume some definite shape, this can only be effected through the leadership of the British Commonwealth of Nations and the United States of America working in wholehearted cooperation toward this great end. (Cheers.) On such a foundation of unity of purpose and effort, all free peoples may well hope to build an enduring new world order.

A new heaven and a new earth--are not these, in very truth, what we seek to-day? A heaven to which men and women and little children no longer will look in fear, but where they may gaze again in silent worship and in thankfulness for the benediction of the sun and the rain; an earth no longer scarred by warfare and torn by greed, but where the lowly and the humble of all races may work in ways of pleasantness and walk in paths of peace.

And the sea no longer will be the scene of conflict, nor harbour any menace; it, too, will gladden the hearts of men as it unites, in friendly intercourse, the nations of the world.

Then...shall all men's good
Be each man's rule, and universal Peace
Lie like a shaft of light across the land.
And like a lane of beams athwart the sea,
Thro' all the circle of the golden year."

This new heaven, this new earth, is the vision which, at this time of war, unites, inspires, and guides Britain, Canada, and other nations of the British Commonwealth, the United States, and our Allies in all parts of the world. No lesser vision will suffice to gain the victory. No lesser service to humanity will hold the faith and win the gratitude of mankind. (Loud cheers.) The Times, September 5, 1941, pp. 5-6.

The poem from which Mr. King quoted is The Golden Year by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

It may seem shocking to readers in 2011 that a Prime Minister of Canada (especially one from the Liberal Party) would publicly state that Canada was fighting a war for "democratic and Christian ideals," but such a comment was considered to be stating an obvious truth; and the "Christian ideals" that Mr. King had in mind had nothing to do with current Liberal/Trudeaupian "ideals" such as abortion on demand, sodomite "rights," or official multiculturalism. If any Canadian politician now were to positively invoke Christianity, his political and media opponents would be calling for his removal from office. Mr. King's invocation of "Christian ideals" stands in stark contrast to the behaviour of another Liberal Prime Minister, Jean Chretien (whose name, ironically, means "Christian"), 60 years later, when his office ordered that the name of Jesus Christ was not to be mentioned at the 9/11 memorial service--although no such restrictions were imposed on clergy from other faiths. And in contrast to the United States, which held a day of prayer, Trudeaupia (formerly Canada) just observed a day of mourning, with a completely atheistic public ceremony.

The reader will note that when Mr. King quoted the passage on the new heaven and the new Earth, it was in the context of a kingdom brought about by human effort. Mr. King's invocation of such a kingdom is similar to that of the Emerging Church and other "deeds, not creeds" religious liberals today. Revelation 21:2 clearly states that the new heaven and new Earth come down from God out of heaven, nor from man on Earth.

Raelians want to reclaim the swastika

As reported by Postmedia News on July 2, 2011:

TORONTO — An extraterrestrial-centric religious sect will attempt to “reclaim: the swastika in Toronto on Sunday.

Members of the International Raelian Movement have chosen the city’s gay pride festivities as their venue to celebrate a second annual event they call World Swastika Rehabilitation Day.

“The goal is to return the swastika’s true meaning of peace and harmony to this ancient symbol regretfully hijacked by the Nazis,” said movement spokeswoman Brigitte Boisselier in a press release.

The Raelians, who believe human scientists from another planet, called Elohim, created all life on Earth, represent themselves with a swastika intertwining with a Star of David.

Their symbol speaks to “the infinity of time,” Boisselier said.

She cited the swastika’s historical use by “many peaceful religious groups, especially in Asia,” as reason to reclaim it.

The Raelian movement was sparked in the early 1970s by sect leader Claude Vorilhon, also known as Rael.

I find it appropriate that the Raelians are using the occasion of a sodomite pride parade to call for the reclamation of the swastika.

New book claims that the Red Cross and the Vatican helped thousands of Nazi war criminals escape justice after World War II

As reported by Randy Boswell of Postmedia News on May 27, 2011:

A new book claims thousands of potential Nazi war criminals and collaborators escaped justice in the years after the Second World War with help from the Vatican and Red Cross, using false documents and altered identities to emigrate undetected to a host of haven countries - including Canada.

Gerald Steinacher, author of Nazis on the Run: How Hitler's Henchmen Escaped Justice, probes newly opened files from the International Committee of the Red Cross and other war-era archives to reconstruct the strategies of evasion and routes to freedom used by potential war-crimes suspects, including SS officers, National Socialist Party officials and other possible perpetrators of Holocaust-era atrocities.

As many as 8,000 ex-Nazis whose wartime activities should have been probed by Allied authorities reached Canada or Britain by questionable means, Steinacher found, though even more made their way through Italy to Spain or South America to live out their lives...

... In the case of Vatican authorities, Steinacher asserts that "many leaders of the Catholic Church - sometimes knowingly, at other times unwittingly - also were involved in large-scale Nazi smuggling. A key motive for the clergy was the need to fight against 'godless communism.' "

Steinacher added in the interview that because some ex-Nazis were "good Catholics" they were often treated sympathetically by the church and provided with letters of support or other help when they sought travel visas to emigrate overseas.