In this revised dissertation, Martin Renghart provides an exhaustive account of the Silesian archdiocesan weekly journal, the Katholische Sonntagsblatt, published until 1941 in Breslau. While the reader occasionally struggles with this seven-hundred-page volume, Renghart's study rewards the effort because it extends beyond the Sonntagsblatt to provide essential nuances in the historiography of how much Cardinal Adolf Bertram did and did not oppose the National Socialist regime.

Renghart argues that a paucity of surviving sources and their wide dispersion has left the history of Silesia under the National Socialist regime understudied. This volume demonstrates how Renghart's research extended past the archives and libraries relating to Silesia to pastoral letters and diocesan publications throughout Germany. Renghart also used the Reich government and police organisations’ records to outline the regime's responses to the pronouncements of Bertram and the Sonntagsblatt. Finally, he makes good use of existing scholarship. He correctly problematises existing Bertram biographies as superficial or hagiographic, which makes his evidence-based argument all the more relevant.

The work does not entirely clarify Cardinal Bertram's control of the Sonntagsblatt. The archbishop appointed the editors and occasionally requested the publication of specific texts, but, according to Renghart, there is little record of Cardinal Bertram's influence, especially in written communication between the editors and the archbishop during the National Socialist era, when the threat of a Gestapo search was omnipresent. Instead, the Sonntagsblatt reported much about the archbishop, often from other publications that seemed better informed than the diocesan clergy.

Renghart argues that the Sonntagsblatt carefully distinguished political and pastoral comments on current affairs to avoid imperiling either the archbishop's or the paper's position. The first comments on National Socialism appeared in 1929. The editors explained that the incompatibility of church teaching and National Socialist beliefs required their condemnation (p. 43). In May 1931, however, under a new editor (Richard Gröhl, 1931–6), the publication adopted a more cautious editorial line. Instead of criticising National Socialist beliefs and practices, it ignored them and emphasised Catholic teachings, especially moral teachings. Gröhl also focused on the competition with Protestant sects and with Bolshevism. His anti-Bolshevism was religiously rather than racially based (p. 48). The Sonntagsblatt never enthusiastically endorsed the regime, but it presented its own views often by discussing conditions in other countries.

One of the strengths of this work is Renghart's comparison of Silesian conditions and publications elsewhere in Germany. Compared with these, the Sonntagsblatt was more reticent on political matters. Instead, Bertram's frequent use of petitions and protests to the authorities of the Reich government is well known. Renghart shows that Bertram relied on pastoral instructions and letters to voice his displeasure with government measures (p. 75). He urged Catholic newspapers to report on pastoral letters more extensively and frequently. Perhaps this reflected an increasingly frequent practice in the Sonntagsblatt to cite and quote from publications elsewhere in Germany and abroad to highlight oppositional voices strictly narratively, which would shield the Silesian editors from blame. In 1937, Bertram instructed the then editor Richard Adam to be even more cautious in what he published. The cardinal feared that additional government reprimands might give the regime an excuse to ban the publication altogether (p. 89). While Bertram refused to intervene in matters he considered hopeless, he continuously sought to protect German Catholic publications against a regime intending to eliminate them.

In addition to the need for political caution, the editors had to remember that most Sonntagsblatt readers lacked much beyond primary education. Thus, theological or philosophical articles would not only fail to find an audience but also cause readers to complain to the editors. Most readers lived in rural areas and appreciated a more pastoral, didactic approach. Bertram insisted that the weekly's primary purpose was to edify its readers and enrich their spiritual lives, not necessarily to guide them in the signs of the times. By contrast, the book reviews published in the Sonntagsblatt initially focused on apologetic works primarily directed at priests. After the National Socialist seizure of power, the focus shifted to reviews of works condemning what the Church called the new paganism of the times. While initially an anti-Bolshevik stand, it quickly became a critique of National Socialist thinking without naming the new regime. The periodical, however, avoided reviewing the most controversial publications while reviewing lesser-known works, perhaps to avoid the attention of state and party authorities. To avoid offending the regime while promoting a flourishing Catholic life in Silesia, in 1937 Cardinal Bertram instructed the archdiocesan clergy to submit news of significant parish religious events to the Sonntagsblatt for publication, especially news of priestly anniversaries, new church construction, pilgrimages, etc.

After 1933, commentary on poverty, poor living conditions, or the diocese's efforts to retain its real estate in Czechoslovakia disappeared (p. 184). The Sonntagsblatt increasingly included brief mentions of assemblies and other celebrations at which speakers had criticised the regime's measures or ideology without including a summary of the speeches given. Also, the weekly reported on actions taken by the regime against Silesian clergy and faithful only with delay and then preferred to cite reports of the events published elsewhere rather than rely on its sources, again as a measure to deflect the regime's anger. Renghart shows that similar publications in other dioceses were more courageous in their coverage, for example in reporting convictions of Catholic priests in special courts. Often, the Sonntagsblatt could only allude to the harassment of the Church by the regime. In September 1939, for example, the periodical reported that German Railways no longer provided pilgrimage trains (p. 212). Another strategy used to remind readers of the regime's persecution of the Church was to report on the persecution of the Church in other countries, such as Mexico, Spain and the Soviet Union (p. 249). Furthermore, during the war, the Sonntagsblatt lacked enthusiasm for the regime's war aims. It offered petitions for peace rather than for victory and demanded a just reordering of Europe, which countered the National Socialist vision of a German Empire spanning the continent (p. 589).

To reassure the faithful, Catholic publications, including the Sonntagsblatt, attempted to portray a strong, secure Church sure to survive whatever would come (p. 227). The weekly avoided discussing the fate of Polish agricultural workers in Silesia or Jews in general. Readers did not learn about Bertram's insistence on continued pastoral care for the Polish minority in Silesia until the regime forbade it in 1939 (p. 626). Out of fear of being tarred by the same brush, the Sonntagsblatt sought to distance the Church from its Jewish roots or any evidence of Jewish influence. While noting an absence of open opposition among the faithful and clergy, the regime never believed the Silesian clergy supported the regime wholeheartedly (p. 415). Of Bertram, the regime was even more suspicious and did not hesitate to search his offices and confiscate some of his publications (p. 594). Renghart claims that the survival of the Church depended on an uncomfortable stalemate: the regime could not destroy the Church without provoking open opposition. At the same time, the Church largely remained loyal to the government and kept its official confrontations to a minimum (p. 363). Renghart argues that this explains the comparatively low number of priests executed by the regime (ten) and the relatively peaceful relations between the Church and the regime's functionaries in Silesia. By his nature, Cardinal Bertram avoided political engagement and encouraged his faithful, especially his priests, to do likewise (p. 380). Renghart notes that anyone whose only source of information about the events of 1933 was the Sonntagsblatt would have remained ignorant of the momentous events occurring (p. 451). Renghart criticises Bertram for his defensive posture and excessive caution, and he points to other bishops who took much more significant risks, such as Galen. Renghart, however, argues that not just fear but also a profound sense of responsibility for his clergy and his diocese motivated Bertram's political caution (p. 409).

Ultimately, Renghart successfully portrays Cardinal Bertram and the Sonntagsblatt as devout, seeking the salvation of the faithful, committed to the defence of the clergy and the institutional Church, and with a traditional respect for government power. Recent analyses of other German bishops have shown that the reasons for their behavior during the National Socialist period are complex and highly individual. Bertram oversaw an extremely heterogeneous diocese in desperate times, which he believed he had done successfully. He lacked the defiance of Galen or Preysing and could perhaps have been better compared to the archbishops of Cologne, Cardinal Schulte and the later Cardinal Frings.

There is little to criticise in this monumental study. Merely an opening statement defining the archdiocese of Breslau as a diaspora archdiocese is misleading, especially after the creation of the diocese of Berlin in 1930 (p. 33). Lower Silesia and Lusatia are diaspora regions, but Upper Silesia, especially the mountainous areas along the Czech border and the Upper Silesia industrial regions, were firmly in Catholic hands. Later in the work, Renghart offers a more nuanced analysis that confirms this judgement.

All in all, Renghart's study is an essential contribution to scholarship, not only because it exhaustively accounts for the archdiocesan press of Breslau during the National Socialist era but also because it reminds us that, too often, the history of the Church during that era is written with a broad brush, when nuance, differentiation, and above all archival research are crucial to understanding the Church in Silesia and beyond.