Martin Niemöller founded the Confessing Church and opposed Nazi control of German Protestant churches. In 1934, he helped establish this movement to defend church independence against the Nazi-aligned German Christians and state interference.
Niemöller had initially supported some nationalist and conservative ideas, but he became increasingly opposed to Hitler’s attempts to subordinate Protestant institutions. He was arrested in 1937 and later imprisoned without a normal release, becoming a prominent example of clerical opposition.
The Nazis held Niemöller first in Sachsenhausen concentration camp and then in Dachau. He survived the war and later became active in the peace movement. His well-known postwar warning about failing to speak for persecuted groups exists in several versions, and the wording is often misquoted or attributed too broadly.
Niemöller was not the only Protestant opponent of Nazism. Dietrich Bonhoeffer also resisted the regime and was executed in 1945, but he was a separate figure and did not found the Confessing Church with Niemöller.