Origins

• born 1892 in Wright City, MO - father Gustav pastor in the Evangelical Church of Germany
  
• 1907 left home for Elmhurst prep school
  
• 1910 to Eden Theological Seminary near St. Louis
  
• 1913 to Yale Divinity School
  
• 1915 sent by synod to Bethel Evangelical Church in Detroit, founded in 1912 by working class Germans
  
• 1925 criticized consumer culture of Bruce Barton's The Man Nobody Knows - "The gospel of Jesus is not a gospel of obvious success, but of ultimate success through ultimate failure." - felt that the Protestant middle class had lost ideals of service, self-sacrifice, benevolence and the desire to realize these ideals in society
  

Theologian

• 1928 to Union Theological Seminary in New York, until 1959
  
• 1929 joined Socialist Party of Norman Thomas
  
• 1932 wrote Moral Man and Immoral Society - rejected pacifism and advocated sanctions against Japanese invasion of Manchuria
  
• 1933 - wrote Reflections on the End of an Era - rejected liberal belief in a society of progress, regeneration, Christian love, peace, brotherhood; especially opposed liberal belief in a utopia created by scientific knowledge; urged Christians to seek a god of justice, not love.
  
• 1935 wrote Beyond Tragedy - emphasized central importance of original sin; man could do good, but also driven to do evil. "man is mortal. That is his fate. Man pretends not to be mortal. That is his sin." - "The church is not the Kingdom of God... rather, it is the place of mercy, reconciliation, consolation."
  

World War II

• 1938 was implicated at Dies Committee hearing because he led some meetings of the anti-Franco American Friends of Spanish Freedom - FBI would open a file on Niebuhr
  
• 1940 wrote Christianity and Power Politics - supported interventionism of FDR, need to aid Britain against Hitler
  
• 1941 helped found Union for Democratic Action - liberals who broke from Socialist Party but were still pro-labor, and supported FDR's lend-lease plan
  
• 1941 wrote Nature and Destiny of Man - critical of optimistic American Century idea of Henry Luce, the pretension of Americans to virtue by assuming the white man's burden - Kierkegaard's idea of anxiety, the existential dread of man facing own moral inadequacy - paradox of free will but the inevitability of sin - "man is most free in the discovery that he is not free" - man's achievements contained seeds of won destruction
  
• 1943 wrote Open Letter to FDR, from UDA, rabbi Stephen Wise, to urge FDR to allow more Jews to immigrate into U.S.
  
• 1944 wrote Children of Light and the Children of Darkness - Nazis were the Darkness and Democracies were the Light, but democracy was not the solution to evil in the world
  
• 1945 said dropping A-bomb was necessary to shorten the war
  

Cold Warrior

• 1946 article "The Fight for Germany" argued that communism was a greater evil than Nazism
  
• 1947 helped found the Americans for Democratic Action on Jan. 4 - grew from UDA and liberal opposed to Henry Wallace and to the Popular Front - included Eleanor Roosevelt, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., Averill Harriman, Walter Reuther, David Dubinsky, Hubert Humphrey
  
• 1948 was on cover of Time March 8 with article by admirer Whittaker Chambers - called "the official establishment theologian" - supported Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan
  
• 1949 wrote papers for World Council of Churches (founded 1948 in Geneva) - opposed American laissez faire ideology and European neutralism of Karl Barth, who argued that the church should only preach the Gospel and stay out of politics
  
• 1949 - became advisor to State Dept. PPS of George Kennan, admired by Dorothy Fosdick, daughter of Harry Emerson Fosdick, and by Marshall Shulman, assistant to Dean Acheson - opposed any intervention in China - opposed H-bomb as a quick fix to difficult world problems - atomic weapons were "our ultimate insecurity and our immediate security"
  
• 1950 - opposed Korean War because it would lead to Asian war with China that the U.S. could not win - favored return of Taiwan to mainland China
  
• 1951 - sent open letter to Truman May 15 critical of the Loyalty Program and J. Edgar Hoover - became head of Resettlement Campaign for Exiled Professionals to help immigration of European intellectuals to U.S.
  
• 1952 wrote Irony of American History - critical of both liberals and communists who sought to create an ideal technical order - America was not special or unique in world history - Americans were responsible for their actions despite the inevitability of the sins they would commit - paradox and irony had replaced older humanistic "faith in mankind" - history was not a progressive march interrupted by temporary setbacks, but was a drama of human weakness and strengths
  
• 1953 - opposed clemency for Rosenbergs - praised Pat McCarran's Senate Internal Security subcommittee
  
• 1954 wrote The Self and the Dramas of History - critical of Freudian therapeutic goal of overcoming anxiety and guilt - critical of neo-Freudian Erich Fromm who said it was possible to lead a life free of anxiety and that people should reject religions that caused needless guilt - critical of Paul Tillich who emphasized the fullness of being, wholeness of self, rather than sin and responsibility - critical of Alfred Kinsey and his scientific reports on sexual behavior of males in 1948 and of females in 1953 that made the achievement of orgasm the highest goal, and the frequency of orgasm the measure of human intimacy and sexuality - Niebuhr argued that human fulfillment could not be sought directly, but was the by-product of participation in historical struggles
  
• 1956 - critical of Karl Barth's advice to the Hungarian Reformed Church to cooperate with the communists during the Hungarian uprising - was also critical of Ike's do-nothing response to the crisis - instead, urged a tougher anti-communist policy
  
• 1957 - critical of the vote of support given to Billy Graham's crusade by the New York Protestant Council of Churches - critical of Graham's bland acceptance of American culture and his simple answers to human problems, his assurance that good people will act really good, his easy cost-free piety - Niebuhr believed "experiences are fleeting" and that faith was not an experience but the foundation for experience - the moral life was not a restful state, but was a life of seeking justice, a constant struggle against the reality of sin - what distinguishes a Christian is the depth of discontent, seeking a hidden God who "always confronts man first as an enemy, not as a friend" - the Christian must reject easy answers and utopian promises and self-pride - the self was always deluding itself and in danger of self-destruction
  
• 1960 supported John Kennedy, but then came to believe that JFK lost sight of true justice, was a moral nihilist who had no standards
  
• 1964 was awarded Medal of Freedom by LBJ - opposed Goldwater's conservative abstraction of individual freedom - government was not the enemy of the people but a necessary social contract by people to preserve freedoms in a sinful world
  
• 1968 opposed Vietnam War and did not support Hubert Humphrey
  
• 1971 - died June 1 at age 78