5 Minute Reflection #14.02: If You See Something, Say Something

"If you see something, say something." We hear that continuously in airports, train stations and other public places. It's about fighting terrorism. It's about trusting no person, no parcel, no behavior that appears out of place. It's also about resisting the temptation to look the other way, the temptation to avoid involvement. 

Today is the 30th anniversary of the death of Martin Niemöller, a German Lutheran pastor known for his outspoken pacifism. Ironically, Niemöller was a successful and decorated U-Boat commander in World War I. After the war, following in his father's footsteps, he took a sharp turn and was ordained a Lutheran Minister in 1924. Niemöller wrote about this journey in a book called, Vom U-Boot zur Kanzel (From U-boat to Pulpit). 

First a supporter of Hitler and the Third Reich, he took another sharp turn and became an outspoken opponent. Niemöller was arrested several times and spent eight years in concentration camps until the liberation of Dachau in 1945. He was a contemporary and colleague of theologians Karl Barth and Dietrich Bonhoeffer in the Confessional Church and the Pastors' Emergency League, respectively. For his anti-Nazi activities, Bonhoeffer was executed by hanging in the Flossenbürg concentration camp at dawn on April 9, 1945, just two weeks before the camp's liberation. 

Niemöller has been criticized for early alignment with Hitler and for various apparently anti-Semitic statements. However, former cellmate Leo Stein having escaped to America, wrote a 1941 article about Niemöller for The National Jewish Monthly. Stein's article suggests that Niemöller's repudiation of the Nazi Regime and all of its policies was ultimately complete and unequivocal. Nevertheless, Niemöller himself never denied his own guilt during the early years of the Nazi regime. In 1959, asked about his former attitudes by Alfred Wiener, a Jewish researcher into racism and war crimes, Niemöller stated that his eight-year imprisonment by the Nazis became the sharp turning point in his life, after which he viewed things differently.

Today, Niemöller is remembered for the following saying:

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out — 
because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out — 
because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out — 
because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out — 
because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me — 
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

May I suggest two points of reflection?

1. Never be afraid to take a sharp turn in your point of view. It would be a shame to require seven years in a concentration camp to rise above the fog.
2. If you see something, say something.