After I\u2019d given a talk to mark the 70th anniversary of Dietrich Bonhoeffer\u2019s execution, I got a letter complaining that Bonhoeffer had been drained dry of meaning and was of no more use to the church. Here\u2019s what I replied.<\/p>\n
Bonhoeffer was theological. We don\u2019t all have to write two doctoral theses by the age of 24. But we do have to approach every challenge as fundamentally a question about God. The German Christians were seduced into treating the f\u00c3\u00bchrer as God. Bonhoeffer and the Confessing Church saw that the problem with the Nazis was first a theological problem.<\/p>\n
Bonhoeffer was about Jesus. The Bonhoeffer of popular theology is the one who talks from prison about the \u201cworld come of age\u201d\u009d and \u201creligionless Christianity.\u201d\u009d But what put him in prison was Jesus. The church fears that when it says the word Jesus it\u2019s assuming an imperialistic oppressive voice that dominates, excludes, or devalues other voices. The church has too often assumed such a voice. But Jesus doesn\u2019t assume such a voice. Bonhoeffer knew that when the church stops talking about Jesus, it has nothing to say. And when it assumes dominance, it\u2019s not talking about Jesus.<\/p>\n