Shoah

Mennonites and Shoah and Me

In the past ten years, there has been an outpouring of research, by Mennonite historians and others, about Mennonite acquiescence and collaboration with, and outright support for, the Nazi regime in WWII. A number of academics have been writing about the issue for decades, but for the most part, the evidence has been ignored and even suppressed within the Mennonite church and its institutions, particularly MCC. It would be fair to say that the average Mennonite has never been aware of the extent of Mennonite collaboration and support of Adolf Hitler. Judging from some of the personal accounts of Mennonites’ “first encounters” with these revelations of Mennonite complicity, the experience can be shocking and faith-threatening. It can also be emotional and sorrowful, as some participants reported from the 2018 conference, Mennonites and the Holocaust, hosted by Bethel College.

I have been wading through a volume of writing on the subject: more than 50 articles, books, reports, and letters from various writers, covering the experiences of Mennonites in Russia, Germany, Canada, Paraguay, the U.S., and various European countries before, during and after WWII. For me, it has felt like an earthquake; the sudden shaking of my foundational understanding of our Mennonite past that I have always taken as truth.

Growing up Mennonite, our family was nevertheless exposed to many Jewish traditions, and they became embedded in our family traditions. My father taught Old Testament and Hebrew at AMBS, and together my parents had spent significant time living and studying in Israel. Mom and Dad, Ema and Abba as we affectionately called them, would often recite Jewish blessings before meals, usually in Hebrew: Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech ha’olam… (Blessed are you, oh God, ruler of the universe…). Ema covered the table with candles during Hanukkah, menorahs were always present; different groups of friends would join us in our home for Seder at Passover. Indeed, when I think back on them, they are not Jewish insertions into our Mennonite experience. Rather, they are part of the spiritual tapestry that enriched our family life, in our home and around our table.

I remember the times we spent as children leafing through the immense volume of Martyrs Mirror, published in 1950 by the Mennonite Publishing House, where my father worked for years. Of course, it was the pictures that held our attention: the Mennonite equivalent, perhaps, of watching horror movies. And growing up I was also aware of that unfathomable evil that had recently washed across Europe; those black and white newspaper photos of the ovens at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Somehow, I always imagined that these Mennonite and Jewish sufferings proved a shared history, that they bound us together spiritually. I guess I always saw a rough equivalency here: Mennonite martyrs, Jewish murders. We’re brothers and sisters. For some reason, I never asked obvious questions: why weren’t there Mennonite martyrs in Hitler’s Germany? Why didn’t Mennonites and Jews go to the gas chambers together?

The more I read about this uncovered history of Mennonites and the Holocaust, the more I felt that a wedge had been driven into my own past, a cruel tearing of the fabric of my worldview. For me, a new and monstrous history had appeared.

Can it really be possible, that…

…Mennonites knew their Jewish neighbors were being murdered around them and did nothing?

…many Mennonite ministers in Germany, Ukraine, and the free city of Danzig became members of the Nazi party?

…a Mennonite was largely responsible for building the barracks for the first concentration camp outside of Germany?

…Mennonites were silent, and some participated, as 3000 of their Jewish neighbors were led to pits and shot over a 3-day

period near Mennonite colonies in Ukraine?

…a Mennonite was tasked with compiling a list of 100 disabled persons to be killed by the Nazis?

…many Mennonite fathers and sons forsook nonviolence, joined the German military and Nazi SS, and fought for Hitler?

…Mennonites served as guards in Nazi concentration camps?

…Mennonite families received clothing taken from Jews who had been forced to strip, then were murdered by the Nazis?

…Mennonite families moved onto farms and into homes that had been taken from murdered Jews?

…German Mennonites largely bought into the Nazi ideas of German race purity and superiority?

…the overseer of the Nazi genocidal programs, Heinrich Himmler, saw Mennonites as great examples of Aryan purity?

…Mennonites used slave labor from concentration camps on their farms and in their factories?

…Mennonite conference leaders in Germany admonished their congregations to “not do anything that gives even the

faintest appearance of opposition to the policy of our Fuehrer”?

…Mennonites in North and South America published antisemitic propaganda before, during, and after the war?

…when most North Americans opposed Nazi Germany, the majority of Mennonite newspapers in North America published

antisemitic, pro-Nazi propaganda?

…two Mennonite North American newspapers were run by former Nazi staff after WWII?

…the MCC lied to our allies and knowingly helped Mennonite Nazis and collaborators to escape to North and South

America?

…the MCC, which relocated thousands of Mennonites to safety after the war, did not help to relocate even one Jew, even

though eight out of ten European Jews had been murdered, and those who survived had no safe place to turn?

…the MCC, which had used its considerable influence in the U.S. and allied governments to pave the way for German and

Russian Mennonites to relocate to the Americas, used none of its influence to petition the government to modify its quotas

for Jewish immigrants before, during, or after the war?

…the MCC, after almost completely ignoring the horror of the holocaust, and taking little leadership in addressing the needs

of Jews desperate for a safe haven, almost immediately turned against the state of Israel after the war without

acknowledging the unspeakable trauma they had just endured during WWII?

…some Mennonites have been active in promoting white supremacy in present-day North and South America?

…a Mennonite became one of the most important leaders of the white supremacy and antisemitic movement in the U.S.?

Of course, the above revelations did not involve all Mennonites. Some of them however describe the actions of many members and congregations. There were also individual Mennonites who did what they could under very dangerous conditions to aid victims of the Nazi terror. At least 40 Mennonites have been honored by Israel’s Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations for their efforts to rescue Jews from the Holocaust.

However, it is a salient fact that Mennonites have not come to terms with the scope of their complicity with, and silence in the face of, the murder of six million Jews and many other defenseless minorities by the German National Socialists. This is not, as some argue, an old historical issue where we should bury our past and let bygones be bygones. There is a direct line that can be drawn from the rise of the Nazis in the 1930s, through the holocaust, to the present political and social climate in North America. A strong argument can be made that Mennonites contributed to the present rise in violence against Jews, African-Americans, and other minorities in the U.S. and Canada. As Mennonite historian Lisa Schirch has argued, “While Europeans went through a process of de-Nazification to delegitimize antisemitic beliefs and confront the horror of the Holocaust, MCC-assisted Mennonites were not accountable for their participation in the Holocaust or challenged on their antisemitic beliefs.”

We also failed in many ways to challenge in our North-American Mennonite churches the voices of hatred and prejudice that allowed our own brand of white supremacy and antisemitism to flourish around us.

Until and unless we honestly come to grips with our WWII past, I believe that the Mennonite Church faces an existential threat. I believe that the Mennonite church as a whole, and MCC in particular, should publicly atone and seek the forgiveness of Jews for our egregious behavior toward the victims of the Holocaust. But it is not just the action of the leadership of our churches and institutions that is needed. All Mennonites in North America need to be aware of our complicity with the Germans during WWII. Pastors of our congregations need to educate themselves about this history, and then speak the truth to their congregations and educate them. Unless we come to terms with this history, I fear that we cannot hope to reclaim our standing as a historic peace church.

But more importantly, it is clear that the winds of antisemitism, white supremacy, and hatred & prejudice toward people of color are blowing strong in this country. It is not hard to envision a time in our future when violence may completely overcome reason, and, like the Mennonites of Germany, we will face a very difficult challenge adhering to our stated mission of “following Jesus' example in seeking peace and justice for all people.” Mennonites, and indeed the larger church, failed spectacularly at this in WWII. If we don’t accept the truth of this history, and our culpability, we will not be prepared for the spiritual strength and moral courage that will be required when it comes again.

Matthew Lind

October 31, 2022