8 April 1945 A.D. Defiant Lutheran Theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Hanged by Nazis
8 April 1945 A.D. Defiant Lutheran Theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Hanged by Nazis Editors. “Defiant theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer is hanged.” History.com. 2009. http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/defiant-theologian-dietrich-bonhoeffer-is-hanged . Accessed 7 Apr 2015. On this day in 1945, Lutheran pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer is hanged at Flossenburg, only days before the American liberation of the POW camp. The last words of the brilliant and courageous 39-year-old opponent of Nazism were “This is the end–for me, the beginning of life.” Two days after Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, lecturer at Berlin University, took to the radio and denounced the Nazi Fuhrerprinzip, the leadership principle that was merely a synonym for dictatorship. Bonhoeffer’s broadcast was cut off before he could finish. Shortly thereafter, he moved to London to pastor a German congregation, while also giving support to the Confessing Church...