Jan. 17, 2008

Pellissippi State observes Auschwitz liberation with film discussion

Pellissippi State Technical Community College will commemorate the 63 rd anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp by hosting a discussion with documentary filmmaker the Rev. Steven D. Martin.

Martin, of Oak Ridge, will talk about his film “Theologians Under Hitler” at noon on Jan. 24 in the Community Room of the Magnolia Avenue Campus.

The film asks the question, “What does it mean when good, well-meaning, supremely intelligent people get it wrong?” Subjects of the movie:

• Emanuel Hirsch, dean of the theology school at Goettingen University when Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany. Hirsch supported Hitler and the Nazi Party. After leaving his post, he continued to teach in his basement. He never recanted his support of the Nazis after World War II ended.
• Paul Althaus, the 20 th century’s leading Martin Luther scholar. He was known as a moderate during Hitler’s reign; however, his beliefs were in line with other Nazi sympathizers. In 1933, when Hitler was named chancellor of Germany, Althaus published a booklet called “The German Hour of the Churches.” The first line read, “Our Protestant churches have seen the turning year of 1933 as a gift and miracle of God.”
• Gerhard Kittel, known as the century’s greatest authority on the Jewish background of the New Testament. Kittel was a professor at Tübingen University. He was also a founding member of the Nazi Party’s Research Section on the Jewish Question, a committee established to develop a theological rationale for the Holocaust.

Auschwitz was the largest Nazi concentration camp during the Holocaust. The camp, located in Poland, was liberated on Jan. 27, 1945. Ninety percent of the more than one million people killed at the camp were Jews from all over Europe. Most were killed in the gas chambers, but others died from starvation, forced labor, disease and medical experiments.

The exact number of people killed in Auschwitz is unknown—figures range from 1.1 million to 4 million victims.

Martin is the president of Vital Visions Inc., a nonprofit organization that uses film to educate and provoke dialogue about peacemaking. He has produced several films for public television, including “Muslims in Appalachia,” “Human Cloning: Bane or Blessing,” “Islam in America After September 11 th,” “Renewal or Ruin?” and “Storm Troopers of Christ: Baptism and the Jews in the Third Reich.”

Martin has been a minister with the United Methodist Church for 18 years. For the last two, he has been working with a group of religious leaders to raise awareness of the failures of the church during the Third Reich. In February 2007, Martin was honored at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum for his work on “Theologians Under Hitler.” 

This is the third year Pellissippi State has observed the anniversary of the Auschwitz liberation. The program is offered by Adult Education and the Magnolia Avenue Campus. The event is free.

To learn more about Martin, visit www.vitalvisuals.com or www.vitalvisions.org. For more information on the Pellissippi State observance, call (865) 329-3100 or visit www.pstcc.edu.

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