Wednesday, March 30, 2005

Bonhoeffer

One of the commemorations this year around the ending of WWII sixty years ago is of the death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. He was my age, thirty-nine, when he was executed for plotting against Hitler. The church remembers him on April 9th. There is a quite profound article about Bonhoeffer by Lisa Dahill in The Lutheran magazine for April. It examines the difference between decision-making and discernment, captured in a line of scripture quoted in a sermon Bonhoeffer gave: "We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you." (2 Chronicles 20:12)

The author writes that discernment is, first,
the humble recognition of our humanity, our radical humilty before God, our constant need to be shown the way—and our constant temptation to think we know better than God. [...]

The primal human temptation isn't eating the forbidden fruit itself, but the attempt to claim a sure knowing of the good. [...]
There are more riches in the article. Along with many books by and about Bonhoeffer, a fairly recent documentary is available, e.g., through Netflix.

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