“Still, doesn’t explain Ireland not giving Jews asylum. Admittedly, FDR refused asylum to them as well, but that was simply because FDR was an evil tyrannical power-mad SOB. Not sure what the Irish excuse was.”
I’m not sure of Ireland’s logic, but the refusal of entry certainly occurred prior to anyone’s knowledge of death camps; at the time most countries denied them entry the camps didn’t even exist yet. Seeing many FReepers reaction to absorbing 10% of Mexico’s population today, I’d imagine that Ireland couldn’t absorb them - it was primarily an agrarian country (”Angela’s Ashes” can give you an idea as to the hunger in WWII Ireland).
Irish people certainly don’t have to explain themselves to Lutherans in that regard; Martin Luther’s own words about Jews played no small role in the mass murder.
Luther said some bizarre and reprehensible things in his old age, to be sure. But acually, Luther’s words played a very small role, especially since the Nazi regime was the first time most Lutherans had ever heard those words of Luther. Bonhoeffer, who often quoted Luther in his writings, had never even heard the words in question before the Nazis tried to quote them.
The Lutheran church was the home to many converted Jews, several of whom were pastors. The Kirchenkampf began when the Nazis tried to force Lutherans to kick Jewish converts out of their congregations and then attempted to deny pastorhood to Jewish pastors. Then they made it illegal for Lutheran pastors to teach from the Old Testament, something Luther and every other Christian leader throughout history had done regularly.
The fact is the only Lutheran or Catholic people in Germany who remained loyal to Hitler were those who really didn’t care much for their faith—Easter and Christmas Christians. Of course, as I’m sure you’re aware, those kind constitute the great bulk of society.
Hitler and his ilk abused the image of Luther largely for secular purposes. Luther was seen by many Germans through a secular lense: He had basically invented the modern German language and created a sense of national German identity. It was this that the Nazis exploited. Th only “Christians” who might have been moved by Luthers later writings in Jews were cultural Christians—CINOs—anyway.
However, it was from among the leadership of the tens or hundreds of thousands of confessing Lutherans, as well as not a few devout Catholics, that Hitler took some of his first political prisoners. And the Valkyrie plot was led by von Stauffenburg—a devout Catholic—with support from devout Lutherans in the Abwehr and the conservative Prussian officer class.
In fact, together the Christians probably could have toppled Hitler if they had ever been able to get organized. You had some who wanted a form of democratic Christian socialism, others who wanted to bring back the Kaiser, and still others like Bonhoeffer who didn’t care much either way, so long as you got rid of Hitler.