Just one of these martyrs was who was executed by the Nazis on 9 April 1945. A first-hand witness of Bonhoeffer’s execution said:
Bonhoeffer went calmly to his death. This morning as he was led out of his cell, he was observed by the prison doctor who said: ‘Through the half-open door I saw Pastor Bonhoeffer still in his prison clothes, kneeling in fervent prayer to the Lord his God. The devotion and evident conviction of being heard that I saw in the prayer of this intensely captivating man moved me to the depths.’ The prisoners were ordered to strip. Naked under the scaffold, Bonhoeffer knelt for one last time to pray. Five minutes later, he was dead. Bonhoeffer was condemned for his involvement in ‘Operation 7’, a rescue mission that had helped a small group of Jews over the German border and into Switzerland.
The 39-year-old theologian had also been involved in planning an unsuccessful assassination attempt on the life of Adolf Hitler. Bonhoeffer’s participation in the murder plot obviously conflicts with his position as a pacifist. His sister-in-law, Emmi Bonhoeffer, cited his reasoning. He told her: ‘If I see a madman driving a car into a group of innocent bystanders, then I can’t, as a Christian, simply wait for the catastrophe and then comfort the wounded and bury the dead. I must try to wrestle the steering wheel out of the hands of the driver.’
Interestingly, Bonhoeffer had safely escaped the troubles in Europe and gone to teach in New York in June, 1939. He abruptly returned less than a month later saying: ‘I have had time to think and to pray about my situation, and that of my nation, and to have God’s will for me clarified. I have come to the conclusion that I have made a mistake in coming to America. I shall have no right to participate in the reconstruction of the Christian life in Germany after the war if I did not share in the trials of this time with my people. Christians in Germany face the terrible alternative of willing the defeat of their nation in order that civilization may survive, or willing the victory of their nation and thereby destroying civilization. I know which of these alternatives I must choose. But I cannot make that choice in security.’
Bonhoeffer, even while in prison, maintained his pastoral role. Those who were with him spoke of the guidance and spiritual inspiration he gave not only to fellow inmates but to prison guards as well.
In a letter smuggled out of prison Bonhoeffer showed no bitterness but rather explained how, ‘We in the resistance have learned to see the great events of world history from below, from the perspective of the excluded, the ill-treated, the powerless, the oppressed and despised...so that personal suffering has become a more useful key for understanding the world than personal happiness.’
Like St Paul Bonhoeffer wrote letters from prison and his wisdom has continued to speak to every generation since his death. For example, on taking up the cross he said: ‘It is the fellowship of the Cross to experience the burden of the other. If one does not experience it, the fellowship he belongs to is not Christian. If any member refuses to bear that burden, he denies the law of Christ.’
He also had wonderful insight into the discipline of prayer which he taught was no more than a throwing oneself on God’s mercy and kindness to give us strength to pray.
O God, early in the morning I cry to you. Help me to pray and gather my thoughts to you, I cannot do it alone. In me it is dark, but with you there is light; I am lonely, but you do not desert me; my courage fails me, but with you there is help; I am restless, but with you there is peace; in me there is bitterness, but with you there is patience; I do not understand your ways, but you know the way for me. Father in Heaven, praise and thanks be to you for the night’s rest. Praise and thanks be to you for the new day. Praise and thanks be to you for all your loving-kindness and faithfulness in my past life. You have shown me so much goodness; let me also accept what is hard to bear from your hand. You will not lay a heavier burden on me than I can carry. You make all things serve for the best for your children. Lord, whatever this day brings, your name be praised.
Despite his suffering and eventual execution he refused to give into resentment or bitterness but learnt through his trial and suffering to love his enemy, uphold their dignity and be a witness of love.
There is a very real danger of our drifting into an attitude of contempt for humanity. We know quite well that we have no right to do so, and that it would lead us into the most sterile relation to our fellow-men. The following thoughts may keep us from such a temptation. It means that we at once fall into the worst blunders of our opponents. The man who despises another will never be able to make anything of him. Nothing that we despise in the other man is entirely absent from ourselves. Why have we hitherto thought so intemperately about man and his frailty and temptability? We must learn to regard people less in the light of what they do or omit to do, and more in the light of what they suffer. The only profitable relationship to others – and especially to our weaker brethren – is one of love, and that means the will to hold fellowship with them. God himself did not despise humanity, but became man for men’s sake.
Bonhoeffer wrote beautiful poetry and we conclude this article with a poem called ‘Who am I?’ which captured his hopes and fears, his ups and downs during his time as a prisoner:
Who am I? They often tell me
I would step from my cell’s confinement
calmly, cheerfully, firmly,
like a squire from his country-house.
Who am I? They often tell me
I would talk to my warden
freely and friendly and clearly,
as though it were mine to command.
Who am I? They also tell me
I would bear the days of misfortune
equably, smilingly, proudly,
like one accustomed to win.
Am I then really all that which other men tell of?
Or am I only what I know of myself,
restless and longing and sick, like a bird in a cage,
struggling for breath, as though hands were compressing my throat,
yearning for colors, for flowers, for the voices of birds,
thirsting for words of kindness, for neighborliness,
trembling with anger at despotisms and petty humiliation,
tossing in expectation of great events,
powerlessly trembling for friends at an infinite distance,
weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making,
faint and ready to say farewell to it all.
Who am I? This or the other?
Am I one person today, and tomorrow another?
Am I both at once? A hypocrite before others,
and before myself a contemptibly woebegone weakling?
Or is something within me still like a beaten army,
fleeing in disorder from victory already achieved?
Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, Thou knowest, O God, I am thine.
Dietriech Bonhoeffer
Pope John Paul II, in his encyclical on Christian Unity, Ut unum sint, pointed to the martyr witness of men and women from other Christian denominations who had laid down their lives for Christ as powerful and eloquent proof that disunity and division can be overcome as the Church seeks to be faithful to Jesus’ command that she be one as the Father and he are One. ‘These brothers and sisters of ours, united in the selfless offering of their lives for the Kingdom of God, are the most powerful proof that every factor of division can be transcended and overcome in the total gift of self for the sake of the Gospel’ (para. 1).
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