Why are young Christian men trying to rehabilitate Adolf Hitler?

Recently, a troubling trend has emerged on social media: young Christian men are trying to rehabilitate the image of Adolf Hitler.

If you read that and did a double take, I understand. Not long ago, such a thing would have been unthinkable. But we live in an age when the unthinkable happens with some regularity. So, we should probably start thinking about it.

The most striking aspect of this reappraisal is how sinful it appears. Yet no one can say precisely what’s sinful about it. These men assert they’re “just asking questions.” Surely there isn’t anything wrong with that, is there?

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This fails the smell test, even if we can’t identify the odor.

The core accusation

A clue can be found in these young men’s disrespect for Baby Boomers. Early signs of trouble began with the phrase “OK Boomer,” a rejection of adult authority that grew popular during COVID. The phrase “Boomer Brain” followed, expressing frustration with their elders’ unwillingness to consider their perspective.

The Hitlerphiles are largely Millennials — the Boomers’ children. And both phrases are angry jabs aimed equally at biological dads and elders in the faith. This plants us squarely in Fifth Commandment territory.

What fuels this anger? Many observe that Boomers’ kids — Gen X, Millennials, and some Gen Z — will be the first generations to be less well-off than their parents. The claim is that Boomers inherited unprecedented prosperity and squandered it within a generation. The Boomers then left behind crumbs — and a set of bootstraps for the kids to pull themselves up by — as they sailed into retirement collecting seashells.

Here’s a meme and a tweet I saw just today that reflect these ideas.

But is the perspective accurate?

Prosperity or affluence?

The claim hinges on the word “prosperity.” Merriam-Webster defines it as “the condition of being successful or thriving; especially economic well-being.”  But biblically, Proverbs 10:22 says: “The blessing of the Lord makes one rich, and He adds no sorrow with it.”

What America experienced from 1950 to the early 2000s doesn’t meet the biblical definition. Instead, our material abundance came paired with widespread spiritual poverty and social misery.

“Affluence” better describes post-war America — “the state of having a lot of money or owning many things.” Scripture warns us often of affluence’s dangers. As Jesus himself said:

“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:19-21).

If God’s blessings make one rich without sorrow, then riches with sorrow cannot be God’s blessings. Material abundance coupled with sorrow must instead stem from idolatry. And the Boomers might have been one of history’s most idolatrous generations.

Consider: Boomers feared “selling out” in the 1960s. Yet after the dollar decoupled from the gold standard in 1971, near-endless dollars entered circulation via Federal Reserve debt. The Boomers ultimately sold out for the highest price imaginable: around $20 trillion.

Boomers also presided over the demolition of the family. Enforced feminist careerism and hormonal birth control drained young women’s fertility. No-fault divorce destroyed countless marriages. And abortion has claimed 60 million pre-born infant lives. All to serve the gods of pride, greed, and lust over biblical commands.

Then, as Boomers started families in the 70s and 80s, dual-income households became the norm, with “latchkey kids” raising themselves at home. (Recall that Ferris Bueller only got his “day off” because mom had to leave for work.) Meanwhile, cheap Chinese goods flooded American markets, decimating blue-collar manufacturing jobs and forcing men into offices. This meant crushing college debt to fund a white-collar career, whether a man was suited for it or not.

These idols — cheap foreign goods, feminism, divorce, casual sex, abortion, and usury — were the Boomers’ gods. The social consequences of their worship hit with a rush, leading to the neon exuberance of the 1980s. 

The high wore off after 9/11, the Dotcom Crash, and the 2008 financial crisis. All these and more left behind a devastated economic, social, and political landscape, paired with spiritual impoverishment inside the church and out.

This is what Millennials inherited entering adulthood in the 2010’s.

Repeating the mistake

Rather than learning from their parents’ mistakes, however, many of their sons are now following a similar pattern of idolatry. They’re looking to another “golden calf” to deliver the prosperity their fathers failed to pass down or teach them how to build.

For their idol, young men have chosen a figure purpose-built to offend dad as he sails into retirement. But like a blitzkrieg attack, there’s more at work than shock value.

Following the disillusionment that accompanied COVID, young (and not-so-young) Christian men began reevaluating what they’d been told about history. With high-speed Internet access in their pockets and a burgeoning digital world of conspiracy theory, the men found their way into the dark corners of the Internet. 

There, Adolf Hitler is portrayed as the sacrificial victim of the 20th century. 

On sites like 4chan and in pseudohistorical documentaries, Hitler appears as the West’s suffering servant. Nazi Germany is cast as the lone bulwark against “Jewish capitalism” to the West and “Jewish communism” to the East, which is how the Nazis saw themselves. And it’s claimed that Hitler — who made Christian-sounding noises early in his political career — had to die so that globalism could live.

After Hitler’s death, it’s claimed that “Talmudic Jewish” idols of usury, feminism, and abortion formed globalism’s foundations. This led to the “post-war consensus” and “Trashworld,” shorthand for our modern predicament.

Biblically, we might understand usury, feminism, and abortion as worshipping Baal, Ashtoreth, and Molech — false gods who delivered affluence to the Israelites (and the Boomers) but not biblical prosperity.

Rather than turning to Christ’s sacrifice for deliverance from false gods, however, young Christian men and the influencers they follow are being discipled in Hitler’s fictitious sacrifice instead. This has resulted in even deeper spiritual poverty that is damaging churches, families, friendships, and reputations. Like a metastasizing cancer, the idol-worshippers have also begun attacking older ministers who remained faithful when many others in their generation did not.

Which returns us to the Fifth Commandment. Boomers famously rejected God the Father in favor of idols, and their sons are doing likewise. I believe this is God’s generational judgment for faithlessness.

Sadly, I have little hope the Boomers will repent for unleashing Hell. At the same time, the Fifth Commandment doesn’t come with an asterisk. Children must honor parents regardless. And a father’s sins don’t wipe away his sons’ sins. Or his daughters’.

Instead, this idolatrous chain must break. Yes, future generations may toil under the repercussions of their parents’ choices. We may indeed “lose down here” as a result. That would be wholly just. 

But a second helping of idolatry won’t save anyone.

A biblical answer

Thankfully, hope remains eternally in God’s Word. 

Late in life Solomon wrote, probably from firsthand knowledge: “Better a poor and wise youth than an old and foolish king who will be admonished no more” (Ecc 4:17). Much earlier he had written, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding” (Prov 9:10).

Solomon’s trajectory is instructive. When Solomon feared the Lord, his kingdom was Scripture’s most prosperous. Then he bowed before the false gods of his many wives and his kingdom became merely affluent, then shattered.

There’s still time for young Christian men to return to worshipping the Holy One, the true Suffering Servant of history (Isa 53:3-5), the Way, the Truth and the Life Jesus Christ (Jn 14:6). My prayer is that rather than becoming like their maniacal, warmongering idol (Ps 115:4-8), they’ll embody the fruits of the Holy Spirit — love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal 5:22-23).

These might not be “based.” But they are Christian. 

If young men repent today, they may lose the world but they will keep their souls. Lord willing, they may even lead their fathers in the same.