PREFACE (from book)
After the end of World War Two in 1945, a special report was released about the town of Dachau, barely one kilometre away from the Nazi concentration camp and a mass grave of 32,000 Jewish victims and others who had been gassed, flogged, hung, shot, or used in medical experiments.
When the Allied forces liberated the camp, they did not only arrest the prison guards. The local townspeople were also held responsible and were forced to re-bury the bodies and to clean out the “death trains” that had carried thousands to be tortured and murdered. But while doing so, most of the townspeople pled, ‘Unfair, not guilty!’ [1]
They admitted they had an idea of the horrors going on next door at the death camp, but they argued that they’d never participated. The official U.S Army report read:
Although the population as a whole realized the utter bestiality of the death Camp and the nauseating occurrences beyond the barred gates of the Camp, they were afraid even to say anything – much less do anything – because the shadow of the Camp hung over them as well.[2]
The report goes on to tell of the recurring excuse of the locals, “Was können wir tun? What could we have done?” Some German churches even admitted that when they heard the screams from the death trains passing by during a Sunday worship service, the worshippers learned to sing louder to drown out the noise. Just like the priest and Levite in Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan, they “passed by on the other side”, ignoring the desperate need right in front of them (Lk 10:15-37).
Every year in South Africa we lose more unborn babies to abortion than our total death toll from both crime and car accidents combined. Estimates are that some 250+ infants are slain daily in the womb. Since 1997 (when abortion was legalised), over 1,700,000 infants have been killed in South Africa (some say up to 2.5 million).[3]
If the townspeople of Dachau were held morally culpable for turning a blind eye to the atrocities committed next door, will history say the same about our nation? And worse, what will be said about God’s Church?
[1] https://www.gracechurch.org/sermons/13351
[2] https://www.scrapbookpages.com/DachauScrapbook/DachauLiberation/aftermath03.html
[3] https://www.christianaction.org.za/index.php/get-involved-catlist/1030-march-for-life-2022
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