Barmen Declaration

…Declaration of Barmen, or the Barmen Declaration, that defined the Christian opposition to any interpretation of Christianity based on racial theories. The major theological influence was that of Karl Barth, who held that the only way to offer effective resistance to the secularizing and paganizing of the church in Nazi…

The famous Barmen Declaration of 1934 (see Barmen, Synod of), largely based on a draft that Barth had prepared, expressed his conviction that the only way to offer effective resistance to the secularizing and paganizing of the church in Nazi Germany was to hold fast to true…

…in this respect is the Barmen Declaration, formulated in 1934 by a group of Reformed and Lutheran churchmen in opposition to the Nazi-influenced “German Christians.” Because of the advance of the ecumenical movement, recent confessional statements have usually been unitive rather than divisive. The doctrinal basis of the World Council…

…Reformed background joined in the Barmen Confession of Faith. This confession was the basis for resistance to the German Christians’ racist understanding of Christianity, which enjoyed the support of the Nazi government. The Reformed Alliance remains active in unified Germany.

…out of which came the Barmen Declaration (see Barmen, Synod of). This statement affirmed traditional Protestant doctrine and led to the formation of the Confessing Church (Bekennende Kirche), which comprised pastors and congregations loyal to traditional confessional standards. The remainder of the decade was marked by continued theological and political