The Protestant Reich Church was formed by Adolf Hitler in 1933, by merging 29 regional churches into one church. The founding of the church was the result of work by the German Christians. It was based on Nazi ideas of creating a "positive Christianity", namely purifying Christianity of any Jewish elements including even the Old Testament, an idea which had existed in Christianity since the time of Marcion of Sinope, but the Protestant Reich Church did so for racial more than theological reasons. Soon after its founding the religion portrayed Jesus as an "Aryan" and had eliminated the Old Testament in its entirety. Ludwig Müller was elected "Reich Bishop".

Although initially supported by the regime, the Nazis eventually lost interest in the experiment after it failed to supplant or absorb traditional Christianity. After 1937 relations between the Reich Church and the Nazi government began to sour.

During the war Alfred Rosenberg (a prominent member of the neo-pagan Thule Society) drew up a thirty-point program for a new "National Reich Church", which he hoped could replace Christianity entirely following victory in the war:

• The National Reich's Church of Germany categorically claims the exclusive right and the exclusive power to control all churches within the borders of the Reich; it declares these to be national churches

• The German people must not serve the National Reich Church. The National Reich Church is absolutely and exclusively in the service of but one doctrine: race and nation.

• The field of activity of the National Reich Church will expand to the limits of Germany's territorial and colonial possessions.

• The National Reich Church does not force any German to seek membership therein. The Church will do everything within its power to secure the adherence of every German soul. Other churches or similar communities and unions particularly such
  
  
  
  as are under international control or management cannot and shall not be tolerated in Germany.

• The National Reich Church is determined to exterminate irrevocably and by every means the strange and foreign Christian faiths imported into Germany in the ill-omened year 800.

• The existing churches may not be architecturally altered, as they represent the property of the German nation, German culture and to a certain extent the historical development of the nation. As property of the German nation they are not only to be valued but to be preserved.

• The National
  
  
  
  Reich Church has no scribes, pastors, chaplains or priests but National Reich orators are to speak in them.

• National Reich Church services are held only in the evening and not in the morning. These services are to take place on Saturday's with solemn illumination.

• In the National Reich Church German men and women, German youths and girls will acknowledge God and his eternal works.

• The National Reich Church irrevocably strives for complete union with the state. It must obey the state as one of its servants. As such it demands that all landed possessions of all churches and religious denominations be handed over to the state. It forbids that in future churches should secure ownership of even the smallest piece of German soil or that such be ever given back to them. Not the churches conquer and cultivate land and soil but exclusively the German nation, the German state.

• National Reich Church orators may never be those who today emphasize with all tricks and cunning verbally and in writing the necessity of maintaining and teaching of christianity in Germany; they not only lie to themselves but also the German nation, goaded by their love of the positions they hold and the sweet bread they eat.

• National Reich Church orators hold office, government officials under Civil Service rules.

• The National Reich Church demands immediate cessation of the publishing and dissemination of the Bible in Germany as well as the publication of Sunday papers, pamphlets, publications and books of a religious nature.

• The National
  
  
  
  Reich Church has to take severe measures in order to prevent the Bible and other christian publications being imported into Germany.

• The National Reich Church declares that to it, and therefore to the German nation, it has been decided that the Fuhrer's "Mein Kampf" is the greatest of all documents. It is conscious that this book contains and embodies the purest and truest ethics for the present and future life of our nation.

• The National
  
  
  
  Reich Church has made it its sacred duty to use all its energy to popularize the coeternal "Mein Kampf" and to let every German live and complete his life according to this book.

• The National Reich Church demands that further editions of this book, whatever form they may take, be in content and pagination exactly similar to the present popular edition.

• The National Reich Church will clear away from its altars all crucifixes, Bibles and pictures of Saints.

• On the altars there must be nothing but "Mein Kampf", which is to the German nation and therefore to God the most sacred book, and to the left of the altar a sword.

• The National Reich Church speakers must during church services propound this book to the congregation to the best of their knowledge and ability.

• The National Reich Church does not acknowledge forgiveness of sins. It represents the standpoint which it will always proclaim that a sin once committed will be ruthlessly punished by the honorable and indestructible laws of nature and punishment will follow during the sinner's lifetime.

• The National Reich Church repudiates the christening of German children, particularly the christening with water and the Holy Ghost.

• The parents of a child (or if a new born child) must only take the German oath before the altar which is worded as follows: The man:"In the name of God I take this Holy oath that I the father of this child, and my wife, are of proven Aryan descent. As a father I agree to bring up this child in the German spirit and as a member of the German race". The women: "In the name of God I take this Holy oath that I (name) bore my husband a child and that I its mother am of proven Aryan descent. As a mother I swear to bring up this child in the German spirit and as a member of the German race". The German diploma can only be issued to newly born children on the strength of the German oath.

• The National Reich Church abolishes confirmation and religious education as well as the communion the religious preparation for the communion. The educational institutions are and remain the family, the schools, the German youth, the Hitler youth, and the Union of German girls.

• In order that school graduation of our German youth be given an especially solemn character all churches must put themselves at the disposal of German youth, the Hitler youth and the Union of German girls on the day of the state's youth which will be on the Friday before Easter. On this day the leaders of these organizations exclusively may speak.

• The marriage ceremony of German men and women will consist of taking an oath of faithfulness and placing the right hand on the sword. There will not be any unworthy kneeling in National Reich Church ceremonies.

• The National Reich Church declares the tenth day before Whit Sunday to be the national holiday of the German family.

• The National Reich Church rejects the customary day of prayer and atonement. It demands that this be transferred to the holiday commemorating the laying of the foundation stone of the National Reich Church.

• The National Reich Church will not tolerate the establishment of any new clerical religious insignia.

• On the day of its foundation the Christian cross must be removed from all churches, cathedrals and chapels within the Reich and its colonies and it must be superseded by the only unconquerable symbol of Germany the "Hakenkreuz" (swastika).