The role of the churches in the Third Reich is still controversial today. Did they come to terms too quickly with the new authorities, even allowing themselves to be "brought into line"? Did the churches share the guilt, and did they adequately acknowledge this guilt in retrospect? What was the significance of church resistance? In his compact overview, Christoph Strohm describes how, shortly after the National Socialists came to power in 1933, a concordat with the Catholic Church was signed, the German Christians were founded, and the Confessing Church was formed. He explains state church policy before and during World War II and the churches' reactions to their own oppression and to Nazi crimes. Finally, he describes how the churches dealt with the question of guilt after 1945.