Bonhoeffer's second trip to America

So the next question is conscripted service. Many of the confessing church pastors were conscripted. Bonhoeffer could not see himself fighting for Germany in the coming war. But there was no such thing as consciences objectors, Paul Stohr had already done so, then he was arrested and shot.

So Bonhoeffer decided the best plan was to go to America through his connections to teach. His brother Karl-Freidrich had been invited to lecture in Chicago, so they journeyed the Atlantic together. But from the moment he arrived he questioned his decision. Even on the ship over, he wrote about the necessity of being where God is, where God has led us ... "He takes us with him. Or have I, after all, avoided the place where he is? The place where he is for me? No, God says, you are my servant."

Right after he arrives he writes in his journal:

With all this, only Germany is missing, the brothers. The first lonely hours are difficult. I do not understand why I am here, whether it was a sensible thing to do, whether the results will be worth while ... I have now been almost two weeks without knowing what is going on there. It is almost unbearable...

It was this feeling that led him to turn down all of the offers, except teaching for two months, but even that he cut short.  In a letter of explanation to Niebuhr:

I made a mistake in coming to America. I must live through this difficult period of our national history with the Christian people of Germany. I will have no right to participate in the reconstruction of Christian life in Germany after the war if I do not share the trials of this time with my people ... Christians in Germany will face the terrible alternative of either willing the defeat of their nation in order that Christian civilization may survive, or willing the victory of their nation and thereby destroying our civilization. I know which of these alternatives I must choose; but I cannot make that choice in security.

On July 7th, less than a month after his arrival, his ship was taking him back to Germany.

 When he arrived in London, Niebuhr suggested another project to John Baillie and Bonhoeffer received an invitation to deliver the Edinburgh "Croall Lectures" the following winter. Bonhoeffer accepted and sent Baillie the topic: "The Death of the Christian Message." This was a theme of his youthful days. Bethge tells us that when he was 14, just after WWI, he obtained a reproduction of the lithograph Vom Tode by Max Klinger. He later remarked, almost incidentally, that he expected an early death. The war broke out a few days later.

Bonhoeffer returned to Germany where he sought the duty of chaplain, but the rule was that only people with a record of active duty could become chaplains, all other applications were to be refused.

Next time I will try and share a little more on the conspirators. Here is a taste from Bethge:

all those capable of action suffered from paralysis of the conscience. The patriot had to perform what in normal times is the action of a scoundral. 'Treason' had become true patriotism, and what was normally 'patriotism' had become treason. An officer saw the diabolical reversal of values, and acted entirely alone to prevent new outrages in other countries, such as those he had experienced in Poland--and the pastor [Bonhoeffer] approved of what he did. He was willing to incur the odium of having his name mentioned only cautiously after the war, of risking everything, even his good name. ... the most conscientious person was the one who had to accept disgrace ... Germany's name could no longer be rescued through ordinary but blind respectability. Throughout the world, 'treason' is normally viewed as a horrible sentiment, characterized by speculation for personal advantage and the intent to injure one's own country. The opposite was true of Oster, Dohnanyi, and Bonhoeffer.

Bonhoeffer would write in Ethics "what is worse than doing evil is being evil."