Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “Thoughts on the Day of the Baptism of Dietrich Wilhelm Rüdiger Bethge,” May 1944:
We thought we could make our way in life with reason and justice, and when both failed, we felt that we were at the end of our tether. We have constantly exaggerated the importance of reason and justice in the course of history. You, who are growing up in a world war which ninety per cent of mankind did not want, but for which they have to risk losing their goods and their lives, are learning from childhood that the world is controlled by forces against which reason can do nothing; and so you will be able to cope with those forces more successfully. In our lives the ‘enemy’ did not really exist. You know that you have enemies and friends, and you know what they can mean in your life. You are learning very early in life ways (which we did not know) of fighting an enemy, and also the value of unreserved trust in a friend. ‘Has not man a hard service upon earth?’ (Job 7.1). ‘Blessed be the Lord, my rock, who trains my hands for war, and my fingers for battle; my rock and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield and he in whom I take refuge’ (Ps. 144.1f). ‘There is a friend who sticks closer than a brother’ (Prov. 18.24).