"The EU may fall apart again"

photo: vaticannews.va

Cardinal Reinhard Marx praised the European Union as a "great peace project" and warned that this success is threatened by nationalism.

The Archbishop of Munich and Freising explained at Sunday's service in Munich that he himself is an "enthusiastic European". When his father visited him in Paris during his studies, it was a "joy" for him to see "what Europe had set in motion after the war".

The cardinal added that it was not certain "whether it will succeed, whether it will not fall apart again" if "nationalism" is "promoted" by parties such as the AfD. Marx stressed that this is "still" not the majority opinion of the people.

Hitler with Catholic dignitaries

Remembering the Nazi opponent Fritz Gerlich

Marx used the service to remember the publicist Fritz Michael Gerlich (1883-1934), who was murdered 90 years ago in the Dachau concentration camp. It is important to be vigilant, as Gerlich was. "Fritz Gerlich would also write articles today with wide vigilance, but clearly! And that is what we must do now," Marx urged. He recalled the unanimous "clear judgment" of the Diocese of Freising and the German Bishops' Conference: 'National nationalism and Christianity are incompatible. Period."

Very early on, even before Hitler came to power, "there were enough people, Fritz Gerlich was one of them, who made it absolutely clear: Hitler means war, oppression and terror." Gerlich, who is currently undergoing beatification proceedings, was initially "a Protestant, a Calvinist and also quite a die-hard nationalist". His encounter with Therese Neumann, a well-known Catholic mystic under the name Resl von Konnersreuth, and the circle around her led to "his conversion", which did not lead "away from the problems of the world" but "quite the opposite".

"Basic Law"

"As a spiritual text"

It was clear to Gerlich "that what the Nazi regime was doing was completely incompatible with the Christian view of man." It was not for nothing that Hitler had every issue of "Der Gerade Weg," the magazine for which Gerlich was responsible, consistently opposed to Hitler and National Socialism. From March 1933 Gerlich was imprisoned without trial, repeatedly and cruelly tortured, transported to Dachau on the night of 1 July 1934 and shot there.

Marx recalled that a few weeks ago the "75th anniversary of the Basic Law" (the German equivalent of the Constitution) was celebrated. Its first article, "Human dignity is inviolable. It is the duty of all state organs to respect and protect it" - always struck him "as a spiritual text". The Basic Law was "also a reaction to Germany's total moral decline". To this day he still wonders: "How could such a country have reached such a slippery slope in a few months, where the most brutal crimes took place? The fact that the entire judicial system, the intellectuals, the educated people, did not resist but approved the murders - unbelievable!"

Defying the beginnings

Marx stressed the relevance for today: 'We must resist the beginnings. It begins with thinking, with talking." He doesn't believe that history simply repeats itself, "but there is always a tendency to take the wrong path, to divide people into different classes," Marx warned, "there is always a temptation to assert domination over the other and thus replace justice with power."

(Archdiocese of Munich - VN: en)

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