Introduction; 1. The first postwar anthologies, 1945–9; 2. The battles over the reichskonkordat, 1945–57; 3. Generation gaps and the Böckenförde controversy; 4. Gordon Zahn versus the German hierarchy; 5. The storm over the deputy; 6. Guenter Lewy and the battle for sources; 7. The Repgen–Scholder controversy; Conclusions.
Mark Edward Ruff re-examines the bitter controversies in the Federal Republic of Germany over the Catholic Church's relationship to the Nazis.
Mark Edward Ruff is Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies at St Louis University, Missouri, and the author of The Wayward Flock: Catholic Youth in Postwar Germany, 1945–1965 (2005), and co-editor of Die Katholische Kirche im Dritten Reich (2011). He is the recent recipient of research fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Alexander-von-Humboldt Foundation.
'This is a timely and fascinating account of how, under pressure
from Pius XII, the Catholic Church in Germany propagated a
narrative of Catholic martyrdom in the Third Reich, and in so doing
ignited a controversy over the Catholic role in Nazi Germany that
lasted for more than three decades and in which both the Church's
defenders and detractors distorted its actual record in the
Third Reich for reasons of state and ideology. Armed
with an impressive mastery of both the primary
sources and the enormous volume of often contentious secondary
literature this conflict engendered, Ruff reviews the way in which
the Church's efforts to whitewash its Nazi past provoked a vigorous
counterattack from Social Democrats and liberals. But perhaps
the most impressive aspect of Ruff's work is the objectivity
and empathy with which he reconstructs a conflict that
excited the passions of those on both sides of the debate and that
directly challenged the Church's moral authority in postwar
Germany.' Larry Eugene Jones, Canisius College, New York
'In his extraordinary study, Mark Edward Ruff revisits debates
about the Catholic past, from the stance of German Catholics in
1933 to the choices of their Pope in wartime. He showcases each
controversy in its time (for it very much mattered precisely when
each happened), and achieves an exemplary study of the relevance of
religion to the making of Europe after World War II.' Samuel Moyn,
author of The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History
'Ruff has produced an engaging and masterful account that will be
consulted for decades to come.' Noel D. Cary, The Journal of Modern
History
'… is highly persuasive. As such, the book will have ramifications
for historians of modern Germany and Europe, as well as for
intellectual historians and historiographers.' Lauren Faulkner
Rossi, The American Historical Review
'Future historians beginning work on this subject would do well to
consult The Battle for the Catholic Past as both an indispensable
guide to the field's historiographical genealogy, and
simultaneously an aid for discerning those topics and methodologies
neglected by the post-war period's culture wars, and thus required
to break new intellectual ground.' Thomas Brodie, European History
Quarterly
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