Were the Scholls, Sophie and Hans, close to Catholic conversion?

(1.30 minute read)

I do not think so.

Even though their sister, Inge Scholl, had written in one of the White Rose's accounts that her siblings were spiritually inclined to the Roman Catholic faith near the time of their deaths (state ordered execution by guillotine for "accusations" of treason), it is important to remember she had no bearing on the White Rose's activities as her brother and sister kept their efforts hidden from their own family.

Their mother, Magdalena (Müller) Scholl, was a Lutheran lay preacher, and an active one in the congregation the family attended in. Robert Scholl, the father; fierce anti-Nazi politician and economic planner [tax consultant], encouraged the children to explore the world around them, examining and interpreting info, arriving at their own conclusions. This style of learning would be instrumental in fighting Nazi indoctrination; thinking for oneself through adaptive education.

Even though the Scholl children expressed disillusion at organized religion (or lack thereof), Sophie in particular felt more empowered by the service she experienced during a standard Catholic church event. She described how it felt less like a lecture and more of community through ritual. To say the two were Catholics awaiting their fates is a historical disservice though. Their close friend and fellow collaborator, Christoph Probst, was baptized Catholic before he was beheaded.

Her answers to Gestapo police interrogator Robert Mohr is straight out of Lutheran theology:

[Scene from the film as record from the actual Gestapo transcripts]
Mohr: You may have used false slogans but you used peaceful means.
Sophie: So why do you want to punish us?
Mohr: Because it is the law. Without the law there is no order.
Sophie: The law you are referring to protected free speech before the Nazis came to power in 1933. Someone who speaks freely now is imprisoned or put to death. Is that order?
Mohr: What can we rely on if not the law? No matter who wrote it.
Sophie: Our conscience.
Mohr: Nonsense! [Grabbing two books, one in each hand, as though weighing them against each other.] Here is the law and here are the people. As a criminologist, it is my duty to find out if they coincide and, if not, to find the rotten spot.
Sophie: The law changes. Conscience doesn’t.

It is possible any religious elements included at all, Christianity in particular, were meant to appeal to people outside of Germany to widen the film's audience, especially the United States, home to the world's second largest ethnic German community besides Germany itself. The director, Marc Rothemund, is an avowed atheist, so bias due to faith is unlikely.

http://www.independent.org/news/article.asp?id=2022

Today, February 22, 2019, is the 76th anniversary of Sophie, Hans, and the their friend, Christoph Probst's death fighting for freedom.

~~/o/