Confessing Church

Confessing Church

By Hans F. Bayer

The Confessing Church (Bekennende Kirche) constitutes a movement (from September 1933 onward) mainly within the German Protestant Church whose very existence helped discredit the doctrinally liberal, extremely nationalistic, and racist anti-Semitic efforts of the "German Christians" (roots in Prussia and Thuringia) and the totalitarian German state under Hitler which backed the "German Chris­tians." In the initial phase of the movement the Confessing Church was unanimously committed to the Reformation Confessions, upheld true faith, Protestant preaching, and above all the con­fession that Jesus is supreme Lord of all. It main­tained that these essentials were being seriously limited and compromised by the German Chris­tians and the totalitarian regime they supported. Among the major theologians influencing the Confessing Church were K. Barth and D. Bonhoeffer, while the Berlin pastor M. Niemöller, H. Lilje, and others led the movement organiza­tionally. In the beginning of 1934 representatives of 170 Reformed Churches met at Barmen for a "free" synod. This precipitated the now famous May 1934 gathering of 139 Reformed, Lutheran, and Union representatives from 18 territorial churches. The Barmen Confessional Synod (May 29-30, 1934, under H. Asmussens coordination) which issued the Barmen Declaration (B.D.), for­mally opposed and condemned the establishment of the exclusive and centralized rule of the Nazi-German Christians within the Protestant state-church and established a Provisional Church Ad­ministration for pockets of the Confessing Church within the parochial administrations of the Ger­man Christians. It insisted on the distinct sover­eignties of the state and the church (articles one and five of the B.D.).

The Confessing Church had partial roots in the confessional revival of the nineteenth cen­tury (with conservative and nationalistic ten­dencies) and was also strongly influenced by those (esp. K. Barth, M. Niemoller, and D. Bonhoeffer) who stressed the need for "confessing Christ" in the contemporary political and eccle­siastical situation (e.g., Jesus as supreme ruler over all of life [articles two and three of the B.D.]; the stance against euthanasia and anti-Semitism; the refusal to accept the Nazi Führer Prinzip [leader principle; article four of the B.D.]; a statement rejecting the totalitarian state as opposing the scriptural mandate [article five of the B.D.]). Subsequent synods were held in Dahlem (1934), Augsburg (1935), and Bad Oeynhausen (1936) on account of—and de­spite—increased persecution by Hitler's regime. Internally, however, the Confessing Church was not unified for very long. The self-understanding and legal status of the Confessing Church ranged from cooperation (mostly in the South of Ger­many where the German Christians had been less influential; [see also the influence of the less combative, yet partially resistant Lutheran Council with Bishop A. Marahrens of Hanover, T. Wurm of Würrtemberg, and H. Meiser of Bavaria]) with the German Christians and state agencies to viewing the Confessing Church as a separate and distinct ("true", M. Niemöller) church body (mostly in the North and Northeast of Germany [esp. Prussia and Saxony] where the German Christians had more influence). From 1936 onwards the Confessing Church lost much of its involvement in the Lutheran state church in the South, which reinforced the above-mentioned internal rift.

Prior to—and during—World War II the Con­fessing Church underwent much harassment by the German Secret Police (Gestapo; e.g., the ar­rest of M. Niemöller and other pastors as early as 1937; drafting of nearly half of all clergy; barring of paper for printing Bibles). There also existed two distinct branches of the Confessing Church: one following the union of Lutheran and Re­formed Churches, the other pursuing exclusively Lutheran state-church purposes.

Following the collapse of Nazi Germany and the German Christian effort, representatives of the Confessing Church were initially significantly in­volved (together with the Lutheran Council) in re­building the Protestant state-church (renamed Protestant Church of Germany) (Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, EKD) after World War II in 1945. The Stuttgart declaration of guilt (October 1945) exemplified this. All structures of the Con­fessing Church were merged with the Protestant (Lutheran) state church by 1948. After 1949 even the influence of the concerns of the Confessing Church began to wane; they nevertheless still live on in various current movements.

Bibliography. A. Frey, Cross and Swastika; S. Her­man, Rebirth of the German Church; P. B. Means, Things That are Caesar's: The Genesis of the German Church Conflict; K. Scholder, Churches and the Third Reich.

Source: Elwell, Evangelical Dictionary of Theology.