Gerrit Hendrik Kersten

Who was Gerrit Hendrik Kersten?

Gerrit Hendrik Kersten was a Dutch Christian minister and politician. In 1907, Kersten founded the Netherlands Reformed Congregations. Eleven years later, in 1918, he had established the Reformed Political Party. He was the party's first member of the House of Representatives, being elected in 1922. He would remain in parliament until 1945.

On the evening of 10 November 1925, Kersten, staunchly opposed to Roman Catholicism, proposed an amendment to the 1926 budget for the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Kersten's proposal came down to ending financial support for a Dutch office at the Holy See. The amendment was adopted the next day, with support from government party Christian Historical Union.

This led to the resignation of four Catholic government ministers and the fall of the first government of Hendrik Colijn. The fall of the cabinet became known as the Night of Kersten.

Kersten was a staunch critic of the policies of Colijn. The speaker of the Dutch parliament had parts of Kersten's contributions to debates edited in the Proceedings no less than thirteen times between 1922 and 1940.

During the Second World War, Kersten denounced resistance against the Nazis, claiming they were sent by God as punishment for desecration of the Sunday. He also refused to sign a 1941 protest of the convent of Dutch churches against the persecution of Jews during the war. Kersten aided the Dutch underground which shipped Jews from Rotterdam to safe houses in southern Holland, but was still considered a collaborator after the war. After the end of the war, a government committee barred him from Parliament. He focussed on writing theological works. Kersten died three years later, in 1948.