his political career, Koch was also the elected praeses of the Synod of the old-Prussian Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia. Although Koch gave preference to the Deutsche Christen Movement over traditional Protestantism, his contemporaries regarded Koch as a bona fide Christian, whose success in his church career could be attributed to his commitment to the Lutheran faith. Koch officially resigned his church membership in 1943, but in his post-war testimony he stated: "I held the view that the Nazi idea had to develop from a basic Prussian-Protestant attitude and from Luther's unfinished Protestant Reformation." On the 450th Anniversary of Luther's birth (10 November 1933), Koch spoke on the circumstances surrounding Luther's birthday. He implied that the Machtergreifung was an act of divine will and stated that both Luther and Hitler struggled in the name of belief. It has been speculated that Koch's conflicts with Rosenberg and Darré had a religious element to them; both Rosenberg and Darré were anti-Christian Nordicists who did not believe that the Nazi Weltanschauung ("world view") was compatible with Christianity. See also Günther Vollmer References Sources Медведев Д.Н. Сильные духом /Вступ. ст. А. В. Цессарского; Ил. И. Л. Ушакова. — М.: Правда, 1985. — 512 с, ил. (Medvedev D.N. Strong in spirit / Ingress. Art. A.V. Tsessarsky; Il. IL Ushakova. - M .: Pravda, 1985. - 512 s, ill.) Michael D. Miller & Andreas Schulz: Gauleiter: The Regional Leaders of the Nazi Party and Their Deputies, 1925-1945, Volume II (Georg Joel - Dr. Bernhard Rust). R. James Bender Publishing, 2017. . Volkmann, Hans-Erich, ed. Das Russlandbild im Dritten Reich. Köln: Böhlau, 1994. Wistrich, Robert S. Who's who in Nazi Germany. New York: Routledge, 2001. External links 1896 births 1986 deaths Aktion T4 personnel Christian fascists Gauleiters German Army personnel of World War I German Lutherans Heads of state convicted of war crimes Heads of government who were later imprisoned Holocaust perpetrators in Poland Holocaust perpetrators in Ukraine Members of the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic Members of the Reichstag of Nazi Germany National Socialist Working Association members Nazi Party officials Nazi Party politicians Nazis convicted of war crimes Nazis who died in prison custody People from Elberfeld People from the Rhine Province People of Reichskommissariat Ostland Politicians from Wuppertal Prisoners sentenced to death by Poland Prisoners who died in Polish People's Republic detention Reichskommissariat Ukraine Sturmabteilung officers 20th-century Freikorps personnel Volkssturm personnel