BillyCalderwood.com

Kristin’s brother, Mark, gave me this amazing documentary on Dietrich Bonhoeffer the last time he was here. For me it was a captivating film. Director Martin Doblmeier does an outstanding job recreating Bonhoeffer’s life even through periods of time where there were few photographs of him. Inspiring is perhaps to light a word for this retelling of the story of the theologian and Nazi resister who gave us Life Together and The Cost of Discipleship. I was so taken by Bonhoeffers struggle to understand his world in its time and his place in it. The documentary also exposes in very graphic terms the nationalistic captivity of many groups within the German church. This nationalism would cause an almost unbridled embrace of the Fuhrer and the rise of the Third Reich. It also chronicles those in Christian leadership who opposed the policies of the Reich. (In my opinion, the fusion of nationalism with Christianity has a long history of deeply disturbing consequences)

Bonhoeffer was given the opportunity to teach at a seminary in New York and avoid the horrors of the war in his homeland. Yet soon after his arrival he wrote:

I have made a mistake in coming to America. I will have no right to participate in the reconstruction of Christian life in Germany after the war if I do not share the trails of this time with my people. Christians in Germany will face the terrible alternative of either willing the defeat of their nation in order that Christian civilization may survive, or willing the victory of their nation and thereby destroying our civilization. I know which of these alternatives I must choose but I cannot make that choice in security. Dietrich.
(Letter to R. Niebuhr, 1939)

His choice to leave this security would eventually cost him his life. In spite of the remarkable clarity and courage he displayed in overwhelming circumstances, Bonhoeffer wrestled with his own self doubt and weariness. Shortly before his death Bonhoeffer would write:

Who am i? I have been told I suffer the days of misfortune with serenity, smiles and pride, as someone accustomed to victory. Am I really what others say about me? Or am I only what I know of myself? …Bedeviled by anxiety, waiting great events that might never occur, fearfully powerless and worried for friends far away, weary, and empty in prayer, in thinking, in doing, weary, and ready to take leave of it all. Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine. Whoever I am, you know me, O God, you know I am yours.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer 1944

An incredibly worthwhile 90 min. retelling of the story of one man’s humble apprenticeship to Jesus and the courageous, brilliant and sacrificial leadership that would flow from it.

(By the way, for you red envelope people, this film is available on Netflix)

For those of you who are interested, I’ve included a few additional quotes below of Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his own words:

There is no way to peace along the way of safety. For peace has to be dared. It is the great venture. It can never be safe. Peace is the opposite of security. To demand guarantees is to mistrust and this mistrust in turn brings forth war. Battles are won, not with weapons, but with God.
(Speech at Fano Conference: The church and the People of the World, 1934)

Should the leader allow himself to succumb to the wishes of those he leads, who will always seek to turn him into an idol, then the image of the leader will gradually become the image of the misleader. This is the leader who makes an idol of himself and who thus mocks God.
(Radio Speech: The Younger Generation’s Changed View of the Concept of Fuhrer, 1933)

I discovered later, and am still discovering right up to this moment, that is is only by living completely in this world that one learns to have faith. By this-worldliness I mean living unreservedly in life’s duties, problems, successes, failures. In so doing we throw ourselves completely into the arms of God, taking seriously not our own suffering but those of God in the world. That, I think, is faith.
(Letter to Eberhard Bethge, 1944)

We have for once learned to see the great events of world history from below, from the perspective of the outcast, the suspects, the maltreated, the powerless, the oppressed, the reviled, in short, from the perspective of those who suffer. Mere waiting and looking on is not Christian behavior. Christians are called to compassion and action.
(After Ten Years: A letter to the family and conspirators, 1942)

The church is the church only when it exists for others. The church must share in secular problems fo ordinary human life, not by dominating but by helping and serving
(Outline for a book, 1944)

The church has three possible ways it can act against the state. First, it can ask the state if its actions are legitimate. Second, it can aid the victims of state action. The church has an unconditional obligation to the victims of any ordering society, even if they do not belong to the Christian society. The third possibility is no just to bandage the victim under the wheel but to jam a spoke in the wheel itself.
(The Church and the Jewish Question, 1933)