White Rose Munich Student Resistance
Reading to the Religious: With You There Is Light
November 26, 2017 After Service at the St. James Episcopal Church, North Salem, New York The first excerpt I read last Sunday came from Chapter Three of “With You There Is Light.” Sophie Scholl attended St. Georges, the Protestant Church in Ulm, with her mother. Sophie noted reading Exodus 17:11 in her journal so I imagined…
Read MoreReading #4 from “With You There Is Light: Based on the True Story about Sophie Scholl and Fritz Hartnagel”
November 17, 2017. Books & Books in Grand Cayman, B.V.I. “Is today’s information overload the opposite problem of censorship?” The interested diverse crowd at my reading in November wanted to talk about Nazi Germany’s censorship and elimination of personal freedoms. We were discussing the Party’s control…
Read MoreDietrich Bonhoeffer (German, 1906-1945)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German theologian, pastor and political resistance activist involved in Berlin’s July 1944 plot to kill Hitler. Bonhoeffer assisted in providing intelligence that led to the uprising. Executed before the war’s end, he left behind diaries and letters written while in prison that testify to an enduring and unwavering faith. Here below is…
Read More#Resistance during the Age of Trump: Not at all like German Resistance during World War II
Note: The below personal essay describing a reading experience in September, 2017 provided this writer with the opportunity to further define “With You There Is Light” and its publicity platform. Although “resistance” is a popular word at present, future author readings will not address today’s appropriation and the attempt to often equate it with its…
Read MorePolitical Resistance History and Context in the Age of Trump, Part 2 of 4
For the liberal elite, Progressives, and #NeverTrumpers, resistance means opposition to the country’s sitting President. Referring to this ray of light in World War II history along with shouting “Nazi” and instilling fear in those who do not think or believe as strongly in another group’s identity politics obstructs the unification of this country.* Journalists…
Read MoreRe-Visiting The White Rose Student Resistance Movement in Munich
New Munich Student Resistance Installation (LMU, 2/17) Munich, June 10, 2017. Re-visiting the new installation at the University of Munich (LMU) furthered my commitment to sharing the history of the White Rose student resistance movement. During World War II, siblings Hans and Sophie Scholl, and Alexander Schmorell, began active opposition against Hitler and the Nazi Party.…
Read MoreSophie Scholl (German, 1921-1943)
Born on May 9, 1921 in Forchtenberg (Baden-Wuerttemberg), Sophie Scholl was the third child after her siblings Hans and Inge. She was followed by Elizabeth (“Liesel”) and Werner. Sophie’s father, Robert, had just been elected as a “democratic” Mayor of this small town. Many townspeople violently opposed his election as hanger-ons of the German monarchy. Robert refused to fight…
Read MoreWas Fritz Hartnagel a Nazi?
An Often Asked Question Gets Answered Again The last question came from a very bright student at the end of the fifth class I taught at my alma mater on “Sophie Scholl and the German Resistance against Hitler.” She asked, “Was Scholl’s boyfriend, Fritz Hartnagel, a Captain in the Wehrmacht, a Nazi?” During the last…
Read MoreReview by Rebecca Odessa, The Wisdom Daily
When Hitler came to power in the early 1930’s, Nazi ideology pervaded the German education system, leading to the indoctrination of an entire generation. When war enveloped Europe less than a decade later, that same generation trailed their maniacal leader into the abyss. A small group of Munich students, however, refused to follow. Instead, they…
Read MoreWhy Civil Resistance Works: Book Review by Alexandra Lehmann
Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Non-Violent Conflict by Erica Chenoweth. My rating: 3 of 5 stars. This book’s concept is pretty huge and its far-reaching case studies work to prove it. The author does not, however, clearly outline the criteria for a non-violent resistance’s success. It lacks the mention of the Czech resistance which successfully…
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