“It was not atheism that was to blame for the crimes of National Socialism and Communism, but inhumanity, the will and the power to violently impose one’s own ideological ideas. That is the opposite of humanism and has nothing to do with atheism.”
It is quite obvious that politically conservative and fundamentalist church representatives have recently left no stone unturned in their efforts to raise the spectre of religion-free humanism. Studies show that more and more people in Germany either do not believe or are distanced from the major churches. “We are shocked that this social development has prompted the bishop to defame in this way the practical humanism that we shape every day for many people in Germany with positive effects,” continued Dr. Groschopp. In contrast to many religions, the Humanist Association, as a worldview community that has set itself the task of realizing human rights, is not missionary and therefore does not take away anyone’s faith, as Mixa claims. It is the people themselves who say goodbye to faith without losing their belief in humanity.
It is a deliberate falsification of the achievements of the Enlightenment if atheism is to be held responsible in this way for the worst crimes. We also point out that the church played a dubious role at best during the National Socialist era.
