Berlin (Germany): A Nazi-era church, decorated with altar carvings of German troopers, is up for sale here. The dilapidated Martin Luther Memorial Church, in the southern district of Mariendorf, has been put on sale after its congregation failed to raise enough money to restore it, according to media reports. The church has been closed for three years after its 150-ft tower — originally damaged by bombing during World War II — was found to be unstable. Parishioners tried to raise some of the estimated 2.5 million pounds for restoration but could not succeed. "Church members have been fervent in their desire to keep the church going, but over the past 25 years the size of its congregation has declined," Minister Hans-Martin Brehm was quoted by the media as saying. Consecrated in 1933 — the year Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany — the church was finished two years later and featured walls sporting swastikas and idealised carvings of Aryan figures, including a muscle-bound Christ. However, the swastikas, which are illegal in Germany, have since been removed. Even a bust of Hitler, which stood in the nave, has been replaced by a statue of Martin Luther. But a chandelier shaped like an iron cross, and an organ — first used at Nazi rallies in Nuremberg in 1935, are still intact, as are friezes of workers, soldiers and eagles. After World War II, the church was used briefly as a chapel by American servicemen — but it has proved an embarrassment to the authorities for almost half a century. Since the end of the war, however, the church, which revealed the uncomfortably close links forged between churches and the Nazis, has crafted a new image as a shrine dedicated to reconciliation in the light of the crimes of the Nazis.
Source: PTI
