Dietrich Bonhoeffer was born 4 February 1906 into a wealthy and influential family.  His father was a phychiatrist and university professor in Berlin.  His motehr came from a family of military and government leaders, and ministers.  Dietrich was destined to follow after his mother’s side of the family, pursuing a theological education.
Bonhoeffer began university studies in 1923, studying at Tübingen, Rome, Berlin, and New York.  His primary focus was, “Who is Jesus Christ for us today?”  It was his vital and and serious answer to this question that led him into such violent opposition to Nazism, a course that would eventually lead to his death.
Concerned with the secularization of the Church and the nomialization of churchgoers, Bonhoeffer aligned himself with the Confessing Church, a movement that woufht to purify the Church and restore true Christian teaching and practice.  Much of his energies were directed against a movement called the German Christian Church, which started in 1928 and aligned itself with National Socialism.  In response to perceived threats, Bonhoeffer, Karl Barth, Martin Niemöller and other protestant leaders met at Barmen, where they passed the Barmen Declaration.  The document took a bold stand against the Nazi Government and made strong claims about the role of the Church.
 In the years leading up to the Second World War, Bonhoeffer’s resistance to Nazism grew in strength.  In 1935, he started up a seminary to teach ministers for the Confessing Church.  In 1937, the Nazi government, recognizing the threat of such an institution, closed the school.  In short order, the Nazis arrested over two dozen of his students.
 Bonhoeffer was an influential voice in Protestant circles during the thirties.  He used this influence to bring the issue of anti-Semitism before the Church and to condemn the Governments actions against Jews.  At a conference in Bulgaria, the delegates, at Bonhoeffer’s urging, enacted a resolution condeming the anti-Semitism of the German government.  Bonhoeffer repeatedly fought against other members of the Confessing Church over the “Jewish Question”.  Time and again he lamented the cowardice of the Church on this issue.
 As the violence against Jews spread, Bonhoeffer became increasingly concerned.  He condemned the Church leaders for their failure to defend “non-Aryan” Christians.  Many in the Confessing Church were not as interested in tthedefense of Jews as Bonhoeffer felt they should be, which led to division within this organ of resistance.
 In the years 1937-39, Bonhoeffer travelled throughout Germany secretly teaching his former students.  The Gestapo, wary of his activities, banned him from Berlin in January 1938.  It was during this period that the Nazi’s “Kristallnacht” night of destruction took place.  Distressed, Bonhoeffer noted the event in his Bible next to Psalm 74: “They said in their hearts, let us plunder their goods!  They burn all the houses of God in the land…O God, how long is the foe to scoff?  How long will the enemy revile your name?”
 In early 1939, Bonhoeffer became involved in the German resistance movement.  Bonhoeffer struggle with how he ought to react to the Nazi government, sometimes encouraging silence and submission, but it soon became apparent that passive resistance was not enough and rhetoric was certainly insufficient.
 In June, Bonhoeffer went to the New York to teach theology.  This refuge was to be short lived.  Convicted by his conscience, Bonhoeffer wrote: “I have come to the conclusion that I made a mistake in coming to America…I shall have no right to take part in the restoration of Christian life in Germany after the war unless I share the trials of this time with my people.”  Bonhoeffer returned to Germany the next month.

 During the war, Bonhoeffer became increasingly involved in resistance activities.  Eventually he acquired a post in German counter-intelligence, which he used to help the resistance and to smuggle Jews out of the country.  Eventually, the Gestapo discovered his operations, and he was imprisoned in April, 1943.  It was not until over a year later that the extent of Bonhoeffer’s resistance was to be revealed.
 In July 1944, after the failed bomb plot to kill Hitler, an intensive investigation was begun, which eventually revealed Bonhoeffer as one of the conspirators.  Bonhoeffer, once a confirmed pacifist, had become involved in a plot to kill the leader of his own nation.  As the war drew to its close, Hitler issued orders which dictated that all those who participated in the plot were to be killed.  On 9 April 1945, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was hanged in Flossenberg camp, just days before the camp was liberated by the Allies.  A German doctor witnessing the event wrote: 
                                                                     “I saw Pastor Bonhoeffer . . . kneeling on the floor praying
                                                                     fervently to God. I was most deeply moved by the way
                                                                    this lovable man prayed, so devout and so certain that
                                                                    God heard his prayer. At the place of execution, he again
                                                                    said a short prayer and then climbed the few steps to the
                                                                    gallows, brave and composed. His death ensued after a
                                                                    few seconds. In the almost fifty years that I worked as a 
                                                                    doctor, I have hardly ever seen a man die so entirely      
                                                                    submissive to the will of God.”
 The doctor’s portrait is one that could have been painted at any point in Bonhoeffer’s life.  The man was motivated by his desire to act faithfully to Jesus Christ, trying to answer the question “Who is Jesus Christ for us today?”  His understanding of the role of a faithful Christian led him to oppose the Nazi government in speech, print, and action, resisting intrusion into the Church, helping Jews flee the country, and eventually attempting to kill Hitler.                                                                                                                                         Flossenberg Camp