Msgr. Paul V. Garrity
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a 20th-century Lutheran theologian who was executed by the Hitler regime in the closing days of World War II. Shortly after Hitler’s rise to power in 1933, Bonhoeffer did a radio broadcast that was mysteriously cut short that warned his audience about the depravity of the man who was now leading the German people.
He remained a thorn in the side of the Gestapo until he was accused of being part of a plot to assassinate Hitler. His death was the death of a martyr who had courageously resisted the anti-Semitism and murderous behavior of the Nazi regime.
Most troubling of all for Bonhoeffer was the behavior of the German people, many of whom were complicit in Hitler’s atrocities either by their active support or their conscious silence.
Dachau, one of the death camps that saw the incarceration and execution of thousands of Jews was not out in the countryside. It was and is less than a short trolley-ride from downtown Munich.
National Socialism was embraced by thousands of Germans who believed Hitler’s propaganda and endorsed his grandiose plans for a thousand years of prosperity under the Third Reich. Bonhoeffer and others who resisted Hitler found it unconscionable that good German people could stand idly by as atrocities were committed in their name.
In some of his writings, Bonhoeffer formulated what has come to be known as the Theory of Stupidity.
“Against stupidity we have no defense,” he wrote. “Neither protests nor force can touch it. Reasoning is of no use. Facts that contradict personal prejudice can simply be disbelieved — indeed, the fool can counter by criticizing them, and if they are undeniable, they can just be brushed aside as trivial exceptions.”
While there is no comparison to the political climate of Nazi Germany and what is taking place in our own country today, Bonhoeffer’s Theory of Stupidity may very well help us to understand people who deny that racism is real, that anti-Semitism is on the rise, and that climate change presents a clear and present danger to our nation and our planet.
The Theory of Stupidity is not really about people being stupid, though the Flat Earth Society may have a few members who are not cognitively gifted. This theory is really about relatively intelligent people who choose to ignore simple facts and basic logic.
St. Thomas Aquinas would call this “ignorantia invinciblis,” invincible ignorance. It is an ignorance that persists because of prejudice or preconceived notions that masquerade as absolute truth. It has less to do with intelligence and more to do with wishful thinking that has been allowed to grow unchecked for many years. Today, we might call this unconscious incompetence.
Whatever theory we use to understand our contemporary political climate, it is very clear that today’s polarizations are rooted in disagreements over simple facts. There is an old adage that says we are all entitled to our own opinions but not to our own facts. This has apparently gone out the window and been replaced by what some people refer to as alternative facts.
A case in point is what took place at the Capital on Jan. 6. Some people have been convicted of leading an insurrection against our government. They are now serving long prison sentences. This has not prevented some of our Solons from describing those who stormed the Capital as tourists who were merely there to take pictures.
In a 1948 speech to the British House of Commons, Winston Churchill paraphrased philosopher George Santayana’s famous aphorism about remembering the past. According to Churchill, those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat it. These are very sobering words at a time when certain books are being banned in school systems around the country.
In the 1930s, books were banned and even burned in Nazi Germany because they contained ideas that were opposed to Nazism. (Albert Einstein and Helen Keller were among the offending authors.)
Today children’s books that talk about families with two mommies or two daddies are being taken off the shelf. We should also remember that gay people were among the first prisoners to die at Dachau.
Slavery is a very dark chapter in American history. Pretending that it had some positive features for the enslaved whitewashes history and is the kind of memory that Santayana and Churchill had in mind.
The Nuremberg rallies of the 1920s created the cult of Adolf Hitler in which good, smart people chose to ignore the truth that was staring them in the face. As a result, millions of people died.
Jim Jones convinced over 900 people to drink poisoned Kool-Aid at Jonestown in Guyana. Cult followers suspend reason and follow their cult leaders to their own demise.
Cult leaders and cult behaviors appear in every age. In our own age, the only antidote is common sense and respect for the truth. There are no such things as alternate facts. The moon is not made of green cheese and asserting that it is can never make it so.
Msgr. Paul V. Garrity is a senior priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and former pastor of St. Mary’s Parish in Lynn.
