Recently we watched a movie called A Call to Spy. It was about World War 2 and Britain’s efforts to send agents into Nazi occupied France to gather intelligence and help organize resistance fighters. One out of three of these agents never made it back home.

The movie specificially focuses on the inclusion of women in these ranks and the account is based upon real people who actually operated behind enemy lines. The movie showed the tactics of the Nazis to capture spies and force information from them. It also showed the methods of Hitler’s hordes to control the populace by instilling intense fear into them, along with flooding them with propaganda.

As I watched, I could not help but see similarities between the Nazis and so many of the churches and church leaders who protect abusers and oppress the abused. There is bullying. Threatening. Silencing. False teaching (propaganda). And then there were the scenes in the movie of women spies who had been captured, tortured, and imprisoned.

I know that I will be accused of exaggerating and there will be the angry responses of “how dare you accuse your brothers in Christ of being like the Nazis.” But it’s true. There are definite similarities in methodology.

And I would simply say – if you don’t want to be accused of being like a Nazi, then don’t be like a Nazi.