Fourth Trial

The weekly "Eleison Comments" of Bishop Williamson

Number CCXCI (291)

9 February 2013

FOURTH TRIAL

A reader asks about my latest trial and condemnation for “Holocaust denial” by the Regional Court of Regensburg in South Germany on January 16. Readers will remember that my original offence was on November 1, 2008, to have told a Swedish interviewer for Swedish TV in the privacy of the sacristy of the German Seminary of the Society of St Pius X, but on German soil, that I believed neither that “Six Million Jews” died under Hitler’s rule in the Second World War, nor that one single Jew died in a “gas-chamber”.

For expressing these beliefs in Germany, where “holocaust denial” is a statutory crime, I was tried and condemned by the Regensburg Regional Court in 2010, and the punishment was to be a fine of €10,000. I appealed. The same Court condemned me again in 2011, but the fine was reduced to €6,500. I appealed again, so the case went higher, to the Provincial Court in Nuremberg, which I was told is less subject to outside pressure. And the three judges dismissed the case on procedural grounds, obliging the Bavarian State to pay my legal expenses, but also leaving it free to correct its procedural errors and start all over again.

Now not only does what is known as the “Holocaust” serve as the secular religion of the New World Order (Auschwitz replaces Calvary, the gas-chambers replace the Cross of Our Lord, and the Six Million play the part of the Redeemer), but also it seems to me that the post-World War II Germans have difficulty in respecting themselves unless they are beating their breast for the alleged crimes of the Third Reich. So they pursue “Holocaust denial” with a vengeance, and on January 16 I was prosecuted for the third time in front of a lady judge of Regensburg.

Two German lawyers fought hard in my defence, but in vain - I was condemned again. However the lady judge did lessen the stigma attaching to the accusation, and out of compassion for my unemployed state she did reduce the fine to €1,600. No doubt the Bavarian State would be happy to be rid of the case, if only I would accept to pay the much reduced fine. A noble colleague in the SSPX begged for the privilege to pay it all by himself. But much more than just money is at stake. A great nation, the true religion and God’s World Order are all involved.

“Truth is mighty and will prevail”, said the Latins. So any nation, religion or World Order resting on untruths is fragile and will crumble in the end. Now truth lies in the matching of my mind to reality, and not to cravings for national self-respect, nor to felt needs of religion, nor to the demands of any godless World Order. And historical truth goes by evidence, the most reliable kind of which is the material relics of the past, because these are in principle quite independent of human emotions. “For this was I born, and for this I came into the world; that I should give testimony to the truth,” says Our Lord (Jn. XVIII, 37). What tranquillity in the divine words !

I kindly refused my colleague’s offer. I have appealed again.

Kyrie eleison.