Homily for Mass of the 2nd Sunday of Lent, Year B St Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney, 25 February 2024

It was known as The Nuremberg Defence. Following the Second World War, an International Military Tribunal was established by the principal Allied powers, tasked with prosecuting those responsible for the most heinous of the Nazi “crimes against humanity”. The so-called ‘Nuremberg Trials’ convicted nineteen officials for their roles in planning and carrying out these atrocities. Among them were: Luftwaffe chief and Nazi politician, Herman Göring; propagandist and deputy führer, Rudolf Hess; and Minister of Armaments and War Production, Albert Speer. Apart from disputing the authority of the tribunal, the most common excuse of the accused was ‘I was just following orders’—the Nuremberg Defence.