Rupert Mayer: Disgrace or Credit to the Nation?


  • 1st Picture for document
    Magnifier

Father Rupert Mayer’s receipt of the Honor Cross for Combatants to in June of 1935 is remarkable: It was awarded to him even though he had hitherto raised vehement protests at Nazi events (in 1934, against the defamation of Freemasons, Jews and Jesuits as enemies of the state; in 1935, against the abolishment of denominational schools) and his conduct had also gone on record at the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior, the Minister President and the Gestapo.


Interestingly, in the wake of his clashes with the Nazi regime, his order and his defense lawyer tried to bring Mayer’s patriotism and willingness to sacrifice for the Fatherland to bear at his trials. This certificate, among other things, was intended to document this. Conversely, the Nazis accused him of frivolously using his wartime service and his wound suffered in World War I against the state and thus disgracing the German people.


Source / title


  • © Archiv der Deutschen Provinz der Jesuiten, Akz. 298/2010, Nr. 124 d (4.3.3)

Related topics