German Chaplains During World War 2 Analysis

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EVALUATING GERMAN CHAPLAINS AND THEIR LEGITIMACY The duties of a military chaplain obviously vary depending on the country, service, and denomination they serve under. It is unimaginable what the chaplains of Germany had to endure during World War II. Upholding the moral and ethical values of their religion while under the rule of a communist dictator, I’m sure, was extremely trying. Were they successful in their endeavors? Was their time served legitimate? The fact of the matter is that regardless of the area or situation in which we find ourselves, our faith is always legitimate. It is when a chaplain begins to lose their faith is when the purpose would no longer be legitimate. German military chaplains undoubtedly had a difficult task in front of them having to choose between an evil dictator, their country, and their faith. Now we will discuss the legitimacy of the German chaplain during World War II. Wanting to become a German chaplain during this time, in my opinion, would be absurd and completely contradictory to Christianity. Few chaplains that did not uphold the Nazi views were allowed to be chaplains (Bergen, 2004, 176). The German army could basically hand pick their chaplains to meet…show more content…
This seems like a reoccurring theme throughout history. The essay started out with a story of a chaplain walking into a hospital and received grief from disgruntled soldier and his group of comrades (165). Now at this point the chaplain could have simply said thank you for your service and moved on, but he was quite tactful about it. He stated a question to the heckler which shut his mouth and then moved on to have a discussion with the others. The text goes on to say, “the next day, his memoir reports, they all showed up at the worship services” (166). This chaplain’s effort to show compassion to these soldiers helped in bringing them to
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