12/20/16 Smithsonian has an article about the Nazi redefinition of Christmas:
According to undercover police observers, 4,000 supporters cheered when Hitler condemned “the cowardly Jews for breaking the world-liberator on the cross” and swore “not to rest until the Jews…lay shattered on the ground.” Later, the crowd sang holiday carols and nationalist hymns around a Christmas tree. Working-class attendees received charitable gifts.
For Germans in the 1920s and 1930s, this combination of familiar holiday observance, nationalist propaganda and anti-Semitism was hardly unusual. As the Nazi party grew in size and scope–and eventually took power in 1933–committed propagandists worked to further “Nazify” Christmas. Redefining familiar traditions and designing new symbols and rituals, they hoped to channel the main tenets of National Socialism through the popular holiday.
Given state control of public life, it’s not surprising that Nazi officials were successful in promoting and propagating their version of Christmas through repeated radio broadcasts and news articles.
Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/nazis-fought-original-war-christmas-180961513/#LZR3JFoJiJclGFAA.99Give the gift of Smithsonian magazine for only $12! http://bit.ly/1cGUiGvFollow us: @SmithsonianMag on Twitter
The Nazis created a state religion that was based on northern European paganism. This was most visible with the SS. Children were given to the SS to raise, and part of their indoctrination was with this Nazi religion.
ReplyDeleteThe left likes to claim that the Nazis were Christians, but they were not. At the top levels, they resembled a violent version of late '60s hippies - astrology, eastern mysticism, spiritualism of various sorts, etc.