Valentina Matvienko pointed out that "the Red Army opened the Auschwitz-Birkenau Extermination Camp and the people came back from hell." She conveniently forgot to mention that the same Red Army thereafter turned a part of the camp into an NKVD prison, and sent anti-Communist political prisoners back into hell.

While such selective amnesia continues to afflict Russians as they congratulate themselves for being the good guys of history, and while commentators like Juha buy into their selective forgetfulness, the mantle of gross hypocrisy hangs heavy over both.

As does the mantle of utter untruthfulness when Juha alledges that 70 years ago "Nazi ideology dominated in the churches" in Estonia. Nazi ideology dominated nothing in Estonia, not 70 years ago, or before, or after, least of all in Estonia's churches. As is typical of Russian propaganda, sweeping offensive allegations are made without any verifiable evidence being offered, and Juha embraces this unreservedly because in the circles he serves, political correctness decrees it to be so. In a simplistically silly, two-dimensional either/or template that frames Russia's world-view, Estonia either welcomed Stalin's occupation and oppression of their homeland, or it was Nazis. The fact that Estonians despised, and still despise, both of those foreign totalitarian ideologies seems beyond the ability of the Kremlin and their apologists to grasp.

Church history know very well about Baltic-German "Luther Academy" (Hitler's ideology) and the control of key Balticl-German churches, including the cathedral church of Tallinn: they had a leading role in Estonian church. 
Adolf von Harnack, also born in Estonia, was significant "ideological theology" for the view that the god of the Hebrew Scriptures was only a tribal was god and jealous; and therefore "to conserve the Old Testament after the nineteeth century as a canonical text in Protestantism, was the result of a religious and ecclesiastical paralysis". He was one of key perons to nazi-ideology according to which Christianity is in opposition to Judaim, without any bond between them but rather the sharpest opposition.
Estonian and German Church leaders endeavored to remove all Jewish influence from society and church. Alfred Rosenberg, also born in Tallinn, was the link between Liberal Protestantism and Hitler's Aryan agenda. On this basis the Liberal Protestant pastors founded the German Christian Movement in 1932: their symbol was a Christian cross with a swastika: they saw all Jews as a cancer to be excised. Theologians from Estonia and living still in then Estonia were an integral part of this nazi-ideology, as it is also reflected in the then drawings. Rosenberg was tried, sentenced to death and executed by hanging as a war criminal at Nuremburg. He argued for a new "religion of the blood", based on the supposed innate promptings of the Nordic soul to defend its noble character against racial and cultural degeneration.

In Finland, this nazi-situation was not so much better in the Churches. In August 1938 Finnish theologian Rafael Gyllenberg - wellknown university man also later - went to German nazi academy, Luther Academy, where later he once preached: "Lord - bless the German people and its leader. Lord - give power to Adolf Hitler in his political struggle. And you want to give him glory. Amen". Gyllenberg became very suitable clergyman, who did decisions who will get rights to study at the Academy, while Finland and German later had crusade against Leningrad. Antti Puukko- a Finnish theologian - won this right to study at Academy: Professor Puukko was a teacher for Aarre Lauha - also a student of Academy. Laura wrote his thesis about how the Bible would be prophecy about Lord's "Nordic People" (Zaphon. Der Norden und die Nordvölker im Alten Testament", Helsinki 1943). Later Lauha was bishop in Helsinki from 1964-1972.
Estonian war priests served faithfully for Nazi Holocaust, when people was brought to concentration camps in Estonia. Finnish war priests served faithfully for brothers-in-arms (Finland-German), when they with bishops proclaimed the destruction against Leningrad, sometimes even more severely than our political leaders. A Estonian Christian friend has written honestly about a problem of Estonian "conscience" but we could say this problem also with Finnish "conscience". These people never confess their own sins: "Kuid suurim, ja seni ka varjatum neist on süü Jumala rahva - juutide vastu. Ja selle süü nimi on holokaust. - - Ga kord, kui tuleb jutuks juutidele meie maal tehtud ülekohus, rõhutatakse eestlaste endi kannatusi, ei tee olematuks ega õigusta tuhandete juutide mõrvamist Teise maailmasõja ajal Eestis". Today, this evil is repeated in discrimination.

You can't help but come to the conclusion from what you read and watch on RT that you Russians HATE JEWS.  In fact I wouldn't be surprised if you all started your own Holocaust against the Jews in the near future.

I am a Finnish private man and I cannot speak in the name of the Russian state. I have noticed that a few of my Russian friends are Jews, but they come also from other religions and nationalities. Russia has a deep historical respect for Jews: the Jews had an important role in the beginning of communism and the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union played also an important role to stop Holocaust in the Baltic region, Poland and Germany. Now Jewish groups arrived in Moscow. Russia has diplomatic relations with Israel, but also with Israel's neighbors. I think that Russia wants to regional and global peace! Certainly, they also have different views on Middle East politics. Certainly they also have different views of certain individuals: some of the oligarchs flew to Israel after their crimes in Russia. Racial and religious discrimination is strictly prohibited by Russian legislation; law enforcement and political leaders speak seriously about the importance of the legislation that racism, extreme groups and anti-Semitism should not come more popular. Some of the Russian neo-Nazis have received - unfortunately - protection in Finland!

Are you an adept of the holocaust cult, Juha? Do your also worship the flying saucers?

Juha, what you have now written in attempted justification of your original slur that "Nazi ideology dominated" in churches in Estonia is simply dishonest. In support of your assertion, you refer to just two individuals: Adolf von Harnack and Alfred Rosenberg.

Von Harnack was the son of Baltic Germans. He was not an Estonian. He was born in Estonia in 1851 and died in Germany in 1930, BEFORE the rise of Nazism. He left Estonia at age 21, and lived and worked almost all his adult life in Germany. Characterising Estonia in any way with him is mischievious, and you know it.

Rosenberg was also the son of a Baltic German family. He was born in Estonia in 1893, but left for Germany at age 25 where he eventually became a Nazi activist and rejected Christianity altogether, so he can hardly be represented as framing any kind of Christian theology anywhere. Eventually he became Hitler's minister for conquered Eastern territories, includingthe territory Germans called "Ostland", which lumped occupied Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania together in an artificial conglomerate that was designed to permanently destroy them all. Representing Rosenberg as some kind of Estonian hero is an abominable deceit, Juha, and if you don't know it, you should!

In your lamentable post you go on to claim that these characters supposedly influenced "key Baltic-German churches." But Baltic Germans were not Estonians, and Baltic German churches were not Estonian churches. Your misrepresenting one for the other is simply deceitful, and you know it.

In your own imaginings "Estonian war priests (whoever and whatever they are!) serve faithfully for the Nazi Holocaust." You provide zero evidence.

The problem with your reasoning, as I have explained elsewhere, is this: you begin with a politically motivated conclusion which has a life of its own quite independent of facts, and you then work backwards to selectively pick half-truths, distortions and outright untruths to try to justify those beginning conclusions. You do not allow facts to shape your conclusions; instead, you use your ready-made conclusions to limit and distort facts. I don't know why you do this, Juha -- that's for you to explain. I merely know that you do do it, and I have factually demonstrated it time and again.

In Juha's post of January 30, 18:08 he quotes an unnamed "Estonian Christian friend". The quote is in Estonia, and its translation is as follows:

"But greater, and thus far more concealed is guilt against God's people, the Jews. The name of that guilt is 'holocaust'. Whenever conversation turns to the injustice done to Jews in our land, Estonians' own sufferings are stressed instead. These do not render nonexistent nor justify the murder of thousands of Jews in Estonia during the Second World War."

This, as so much of Juha's offerings, is misleading.

(1) In pre-War Estonia, Jewish people enjoyed legislated cultural autonomy, which is comemmorated in Jewish records to this day. Nowhere else in Europe or the world did Jews enjoy such a legally-guaranteed privilege, and most certainly not in Russia. In fact throughout all of Estonia's long history, there is not a single account of an anti-Jewish pogrom, which were so common in Russia at the time.

(2) The murder of Jews in Estonia was a German enterprise, run almost exclusively by Germans. But alas, to Estonia's shame not totally exclusively. A few Estonians, as individuals, did also participate. But not as representatives of Estonia or as agents of any Estonian government or policy. There was no sovereign Estonia under German occupation, just as there was not under Soviet occupation.

(3) The fact of these events is no secret in Estonia, and is even openly proclaimed and regretted from the very highest government levels, including on each Holocaust Day commemoration.

(4) Whereas Russia pays lip-service to the suffering of Jewish people, it is in deepest denial of the suffering that Russians, in the service of the Soviet state, brought to Estonia. Needless to say, it has never even investigated, much less prosecuted any such criminal. This does not bother Juha one little bit -- just ask him if it does. However, it does justifiably anger Estonians, and this anger is likely to be apparent when conversation turns to these matters.

I told a couple of examples about permanent church fellowship between Germany and Estonia. In addition, I said a couple of things about the Nazi connections in Finnish Church. Now I'll tell a few new examples. "Marzipan" didn't tell any examples about Estonian honest, heroic priests and Church organization, who would were opposed to Hitler's actions, SS-Waffen and the Holocaust in Estonia. Why?
Estonian SS-soldiers fought in the name of God and Adolf Hitler, as some ago Keino Kerde, the chairman of the "Estonian volunteer SS veterans" said that he relied on God and Hitler. Estonian church gave support for a new Nazi religion, and we do not know any official and significant Estonian ecclesiastical resistance against this new Estonian-Nazi religion/ideology. We cannot hear even about then worships, prayers or official statements of the Estonian Lutheran Church against the Holocaust, which was implemented on their own small villages. Why?

Valter Viks was eager to combine the freedom movement of the war veterans and the Nazi spirit in this ecclesiastical activity. Later he fled to Chicago to continue as priest, when German siege against Leningrad collapsed and the Soviet troops were arriving to the west. In the 30's Viks with MAN Lutheran priests held a celebration of "Revolutionary War", and these priests chanted incantations against the Russians, Jews and Communists (these concepts were equal in then thoughts).
Estonian Archbishop Johan Köpp sent the priests with the soldiers, when they gathered the Jews in concentration camps. When the Soviet Union broke German-Finnish siege of Leningrad, Köpp hurried to pray at the St. John's Church and he asked that the fight would be still victorious against the Soviet Union and the Communists. God didn't seem to listen to archbishop's prayer for Hitler's troops.
In summer 1944 convoy no. 73 brought 300 Jews from France to Paristo jail in Tallinn. 90 % were executed. No any Estonian priests said protest against this execution. Why they were silent, if they were God's servants in the true church, not Hitler's servants - and even more: why modern church of peace time cannot ask forgiveness because of these own sins?

During the Soviet Estonia, it was a strong, open religious revival from 1970 to 1988. For example, Andrew Hart (at the South Carolina University, policy studies), Ph.D., has written an excellent short analysis about this Estonian religious revival. Many young Estonians went to the Lutheran churches, folk sang songs and church hymns. Lutheran Church was powerful in the annual song festivals, which then began with prayer and Bible reading. This pattern continued until 1988, but then Estonia built a new national policy and nationalist cultural life. Since 1988, the Lutheran Church has been active in the Estonian political system, a key player in Heritage Movement, but Estonian people are now less religious than any other people in Europe.
We can remember what happened in 4 June 2011. The Church became once again a place for political needs: in Tallinn, Tammsalu (the vicar of Lutheran Church) prayed his devotion and satisfied well the needs of president Toomas Henrik Ilves, who was the leader of this meeting; and on the same day in Tartu (Estonia) archbishop Andres Pöder spoke his words for new Estonian policy-oriented memory. I have met Pöder and it was easy to feel his ideological political views! Estonia church and state found a new "holy day": the Memorial Day of Deportations. In practice, church became a part of Estonian political propaganda, but church doesn't say anything openly for the social and human rights of the oppressed Russians in Estonia.
In spring 2011, the Estonian president Ilves and clergy unveiled yet another memorial plaque in the Estonian MILITARY church (only in world!). It was for memory of Waffen SS Regiment 46, which from 26 July 1944 was commanded by Alfons Rebane, "Nazi butcher", as the American Jewish Congress described him in 1999, because Rebane was responsible for the slaughter of Jews and Russians". "Of course", in 1999 "Church without conscience" took part in ceremony of reburial. According to Ilves, the words of the American Jewish Congress were "ideological aggression against Estonia".

But ROC went totelly on Stalin's side in the war, despite the destruction he and Lenin had caused to the Church. They even gave prayers when Stalin was ill and dying, just like they did for all the czars.Would you call that opportunism or what? ROC was deeply infiltrated with siloviks who were striving for atheism. When are you going to write about those traitors of religion and humanism which supported Stalin and Lenin in ROC? Or are you one alike?

Your statements are far from reality of Soviet people and church. It is quite Christian that Russian Orthodox believers pray for peace and life, because Nazi-German and its partners (racist racial doctrine) would not have secured the lives of the Slavic people! But we have several examples of actions against Orthodox priests and believers - before war, during the war and after war. Executions included torture, prison camps, labour camps and mental hospitals. During the first five years of Soviet power, 28 Russian Orthodox bishops and over 1200 priests were executed; and many others ere imprisoned or exiled. The believers and the church remembered these experiences well. From 1932-37 Stalin declared the "five year plans of atheism", and consequences we know... It is trued that when Hitler together with Finnish soldiers and priests invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, Stalin ended the anti-religious campaign in order to rally the country. And after war - between 1945 and 1959, the official organization of the church was even greatly expanded, but still individual members of the clergy were still occasionally arrested and exiled. A new period of persecution began already in the late 1959s under Khrushchev. A more aggressive period of anti-religious persecution began in the mid 1970s. We can say that the the Orthodox Church was trying to survive with then state authorities though ingenuity, but they had also unfortunately to suffer, they did not in any case turned fully on "communist side"! The situation of the ROC and the religions is quite different and better in today's Russia, which is a constitutional state!

Juha, have you thought that perhaps Estonian and German Lutherian churches also just tried "to survive with then state authorities", just like ROC? ROC was paraying for Stalin, a murderous dictator and no protests wete heasrd from the clergy. How were they better than those so called "war priests" of your former church?

It is true Horst, that many Christians in Hitler's Estonia (as in Soviet Union) are trying to just survive - they don't become an open resistance. Of course, we have famous examples also about the participants in the swastika of the Aryan ideology without any criticism. You can be or even must be clever and cunning, but not dedicated to the ideology of evil. Above all, I want to emphasize - as I said in this article - that I am impressed by the fact that the Russian Orthodox Church and Chaplin are talking about xenophobia, racism, anti-Semitism and extremism. Of course, I'm not any idealist: in all countries, in all religions and churches, we can find errors in history and practices. The world is not so easy place to live. Now I would like to turn to the leaders of our time, and ask, how they speak against discrimination. When I can hear in Estonia and Finland, that the religious leaders would criticize against russophobia and discrimination? What is the Estonian Lutheran Church in relation to the rights of Russian-speaking poor population in Narva? We can hear about more and more new monuments in the Estonian war church in honor of the Waffen-SS troops, but I don't see that those acts and blessings would reduce the stigma of Russian population. How Finnish church did own argumentation, when it was a case about the web site - dedicated for terrorist activities (some "journalists" are involved in the fighting with guns and bombs, other for financing; and as whole website is publishing propaganda for religious and national confrontations and anti-Semitic ideology)? In Finland, the church argued (I have documents) that it is not right to blame against this web site, because the web site is officially a legitimate organization! The religious double standards arises as soon as the churches are silent about extreme movements. The Orthodox Church is not silent. 

RESPONSE TO JUHA'S POST OF JANUARY 31, 19:16

Juha asks why I did not present examples of ecclesiastic opposition to Hitler.

There were about 4,400 Jews in Estonia before WW2. Soviets deported 400 and  3,000 others left with the Red Army ahead of the German advance of 1941. There were very few local Jews in the country during the German occupation. I say this not to mitigate Nazi crimes (overwhelmingly Nazi German crimes) against Jews, but point out that Jewish issues were nowhere near as prominent in the actual world of Estonia in 1941-44 as in much of the rest of Europe, and as they might be in retrospective projections which armchair critics like Juha make.

Juha also overlooks the condition of Estonians in 1941.  Soviets had invaded their peaceful country, overthrown its government by force, destroyed its nationhood and began an apalling regime of mass terror to bludgeon people into submission. In just one night of June 14, 1941, ten thousand innocent men, women and children were dragged from their homes, trucked to locked cattle wagons parked at railway sidings across the country, left sweltering there without food and water for several days, and then transported in a several-weeks journey to Siberian slavery, where most died of hunger, cold, disease, overwork, or execution. In fact, people began dying in locked wagons before the trains even started to move.  Hundreds more were executed in cold blood at home, and thousands  forcibly conscripted into the Red Army and taken to the Russian hinterland to work in labour batallions, where many likewise died. Meanwhile, Russian "destruction batallions" roamed the country, destroying crops, buildings, anything that might be useful to the approaching Germans.

When the German occupation began, Estonians were in deep trauma, shock and terror, frightened out of their wits and in deep mourning, as almost every family had lost loved ones to Soviet brutality. They were without government, leadership, country or hope, and in pain beyond description. In such a condition, people do not think, about the suffering of others -- they are numb in their own pain and horror, and have no more tears to shed. And looming over it all was the imminent return of Soviet horror, because Estonians knew that Germany would not win the war, and that Soviet monsters would return.

Does that answer your question, Juha?

RESPONSE TO JUHA'S POST OF  JANUARY 31, 19:37

You write of "a strong, open religious revival from 1970 to 1988." This was not particularly religion-oriented, but freedom-oriented. Estonians have always tried to make the best use of opportunities they have to build unity and resistance to Soviet rule, and the church was one of various vehicles that suited this purpose. Please do not misrepresent this as an example of supposed Soviet largesse toward either Estonia or religion. The fact that Estonians are probably the most irreligious people in Europe speaks strongly for the fact that they weren't all that different under Soviet occupation.

Like in most countries, including for example Britain, which is not particularly Christian, the established church plays a role in national life. Estonians. like Britons, may accept this for reasons of sentiment, but do not take it particularly seriously.

The memorial to Estonian deportations is not a holy day - it is a grotesque day occasioned by Soviet mass atrocities. The memory of loved ones Estonians lost, and the memory of their suffering and death -- that is sacred. And you'd better remember it.

You talk about "oppressed Russians" in Estonia, but if you ever actually try to delineate and define the elements of their supposed "oppression", you will quickly find that you are repeating empty accusations, not verifiable facts. I have commented on such "oppression" accusations of  yours in other posts under other topics, and if you choose to favour us with specifics here, I will analyse and comment on them again.

As for your florid accusations regarding Alfons Rebane, Russians are livid at his memory not because there is any record of him committing war crimes (allegations of these derive exclusively from the KGB, and it alone), but because he was the most successful and talented Baltic soldier opposing the Red Army.  Do read what Wikipedia has to say about him. And notice also the following quote from the on-line Jewish Virtual Library:

"Towards the end of 1943, it became apparent that numbers of volunteer recruits became inadequate to meet the needs of the German military, so conscription was introduced. The Estonian 20.Waffen-Grenadier-Division der SS (estnishe Nr. 1) is an example of such a conscript formation, which proved to be outstanding soldiers with an unblemished record."

Marzipan's style of humor is extremely black and it is not now very appropriate: he writes that in Estonia there was no Holocaust and Jewish issues in years 1941-44. He apparently writes with black humor, and means that during those years they did not discussed about the Jews, but all Jews were just killed. He also writes with black humor, because he is unlikely to lie, when he writes that there is no discrimination in a modern Estonia. I write my answers in two parts.
Firstly, I will tell a few words (first two parts) about the Jewish question in old Estonia and Baltic countries. Then I will write something (next two or three parts) about discrimination in modern Estonia. My purpose is not - of course - some old speculation about history, but rather moral and honest life in our own world. 
Marzipan referred also to a special situation in history: it is true that the Soviet Union carried a people from Estonia to Siberia. The Soviet Union did similar operations also in relation to several Russians. Of course, the decisions and strategy of these painful operations were made  in the leadership of Soviet Union, in which especially a Georgian Joseph Stalin was crucial. Social conditions were difficult at that time. That transport and population transfer were not punitive. The Soviet Union knew very correctly strategically and tactically that threat was approaching from Germany via the Baltic region.

Round-ups and killings of the Jews in Baltic countries (inc. Estonia) began perhaps by the extermination group Einsatzkommando 1A under M Sandberger, part of Einsatzgruppe A led by W Stahlecker. For "success" of these arrests and executions, the support of LOCAL COLLABORATORS were crucial and significant through Estonia. Estonia became a part of the Reichskommissariat Ostland: Security Police was established under the leadership of Estonian Ain Mere in 1942. Estonia was declared Judenfrei already at the Wannsee Conference. Jews - 929 persons - were killed to this moments.
The Estonia state archives contain several death certificates and lists of Jews shot dated July, August and early September 1941. We know that Nazi govern found the Baltics countries as their main area for mass genocide. Lutheran Church in Baltic Countries (as also neighbor church in Finland) were totally silent about this mass genocide. Consequently, Jews from countries outside the Baltics were shipped there to be killed: 10 000 Jews were killed in Estonia. 22 concentration and labor camps were established on Estonia territory. Vaivara concentration camp served as a transit camp and processed 20 000 Jews. And Marzipan wrote that there were no Jewish issues on Baltic countries!