Karl Barth's Römerbrief (1919, revised 1922) shattered liberal Protestant theology with its insistence on God's absolute otherness, launching Neo-orthodox theology and transforming 20th-century Protestant thought.

Barth's theology of divine transcendence and human unworthiness resonated with poets writing after World War I; W.H. Auden's religious poetry drew directly on Barthian Neo-orthodoxy, as did much mid-century Anglo-American Christian verse. This theological shift prompted poets to grapple with existential questions in the aftermath of conflict.