'NORWAY ABLAZE - DENMARK SHAKEN'

On 22 April1945 Bishop Fjellbu preached in the church of St Martin-in-the-Fields, London. 'I wish to state publicly,' he said, 'that the foundations of the united resistance of Norwegian Churchmen to Nazism were laid by the Oxford Group's work.'58 In a press interview, the Bishop added, 'The first coming of the Oxford Group to Norway was an intervention of Providence in history, like Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain. They helped to bridge the gap between religion and the people and make it real every day. We have been fighting more than an armed army. We have been fighting godless materialism. The Oxford Group gave us men who helped us to fight for a Christian ideology.'59

Hambro, in the previous year, wrote, 'My thoughts go back to that first house-party in Norway in 1934 ... to Frank Buchman, the catalyst who made possible the united church front in Norway in this war...

'The Germans decreed in Norway that the Oxford Group was a part of the British Intelligence Service and should be harshly suppressed - a most flattering and slightly ridiculous compliment to the British Intelligence service. The Gestapo feared and hated the Oxford Group as they could never fear and hate the British Intelligence Service. They hated them as men hate and fear the ideals they have lost and prostituted, the faith they have betrayed. They feared them because instinctively they knew the Oxford Group was part of God's Intelligence Service preparing the way for an ultimate defeat of the principles of evil.'60

Buchman had known by early 1934 that he could not work in Germany in the same way as elsewhere. House-parties were spied upon, and large public demonstrations like those in the democratic countries were impossible. He counted upon such events in other countries having some effect upon German leaders, and ensured that news of them reached the highest possible quarters in Berlin. He also relied on the written word - sixteen books and booklets were published in Germany in the early 1930s - as well as on his speeches. At the same time, he had not given up the hope of reaching the leaders of Germany personally.

In September 1934 Moni von Cramon was invited by Himmler to the Nazi Party rally at Nuremberg, and arranged for Buchman and a few of his team to be invited too. Some months before, she had found herself one evening unexpectedly sitting next to Himmler at a dinner, and Himmler's questions had once again been about how the guidance of God worked out in her life. Feeling that 'such a chance God gives only once', she had told him in detail what a drastic change in her living and thinking it had entailed for her and had emphasised 'the significance for individuals, nations and the whole world, if God's plan were to be fulfilled'. He had listened quietly. Now, at Nuremberg, she and Buchman sat next to Himmler at an informal lunch. Their talk was once more about seeking the guidance of God, and Buchman spoke of the moral and spiritual pre-conditions involved. In the middle of the meal, Frau von Cramon was called to the telephone. It was her son to tell her of the death of her divorced husband. She returned to the table much distressed because, although her husband had been legally the guilty party, she had by now realised the part her self-righteousness had played in breaking up the marriage. She told Himmler this. 'If only you could hate this man who broke loyalty with you, you would not suffer so much,' he said.

''This brought us back to talking about God's absolute demands,' Frau von Cramon recalled. Then lunch broke up. Buchman's comment at this time was, 'We should have a greater commitment than these fellows.'

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