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August 27, 2003
Pius XII
Historian uncovers evidence of Pius XII's opposition to Hitler
In the America article, Gallagher focused on two diplomatic documents in particular -- a personal report by Cardinal Pacelli that he gave to Ambassador Joseph P. Kennedy, then U.S. ambassador to Britain, during an April 1938 meeting in Rome, and a 1939 report by Alfred W. Klieforth, then U.S. consul general in Cologne, Germany, following a three-hour meeting with the cardinal in Rome to discuss "the situation in Germany." Cardinal Pacelli was elected pope in March 1939.Gallagher quoted from Klieforth's report: "He (Cardinal Pacelli) opposed unilaterally every compromise with National Socialism. He regarded Hitler not only as an untrustworthy scoundrel but as a fundamentally wicked person. He did not believe Hitler capable of moderation, in spite of appearances, and he fully supported the German bishops in their anti-Nazi stand."
Yes, this an older post. But one of the commentors suggested that I move it back up because the discussion was continuing..
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» Pius XII and Hitler: Facts, not Fiction from DeoOmnisGloria.com
Was Pius XII really "Hitler's Pope"? Did he actually do enough to help the Jews? As Catholics, we should know the truth behind these fallacies, but more and more we are beginning to believe them. This is a call for you to learn facts, not the fi... [Read More]
Tracked on Aug 26, 2003 5:19:43 PM
Comments
Pius XII's perception problem that he needs to overcome is not necessarily his dislike of the Nazi party but the Jewish issue. He clearly detested Hitler and Nazi party, but the impetus for that dislike primarily seems to be Hitler's contempt for the Catholic Church and not Hitler's anti-semitism.
What Gallagher has uncovered is still more evidence of Pius XII's antipathy to Hitler, but there still isn't much to show that Hitler's anti-Semitic policies were at the heart of Pius XII's objections.
Fair or not, the anti-semitism piece is what Pius XII has to overcome. It still appears that the anti-semitic issue was ancillary, even though perhaps important, than was the anti-Catholic issue.
It is clear that the lesson of Pius XII is that the hierarchy has to stop playing politics and learn to stick its neck out and take a stand on moral issues.
Posted by: Ono at Aug 22, 2003 9:47:28 AM
Don't think there's much question of his opposition to Hitler. It's just that he didn't
speak out publicly, using the words Jew and Nazi, while extermination of the Jews was being attempted.
His 'opposition' looks pretty flabby compared to that of some of the saints Amy recently featured. They spoke truth to power. And suffered for it.
Posted by: Oyes at Aug 22, 2003 10:43:23 AM
Peace, all.
Good comment, Ono. I might also point out that if a historian has to "uncover" Pius XII's stand on Hitler, it probably wasn't all that obvious to the pope's contemporaries. I think the Vatican has an even greater challenge today. Sixty, seventy years ago the pope could have said, "Everybody, help the Jews," and Catholics might have grumbled, but they would have complied, given the threat of eternal damnation. Today, nobody gives a sneeze. Even orthodox Catholics wiggle out of a reasonable pacifism.
Posted by: Todd at Aug 22, 2003 10:46:35 AM
I have to disagree with Ono, I think there IS a perception of Pius XII being pro-Hitler despite there being no evidence of it. I call it the Dan Brown Da Vinci code syndrome. Spread lies in a book about the RCC and then say you've researched everything thoroughly and people will believe it even though its not true.
Take a look at the Amazon reader reviews of Cornwell's "Hitler's Pope" - many of those reviewers say Pius was a Nazi sympathizer even though Cornwell (in one of his rare moments of honesty) admits IN THE BOOK Pius hated Hitler. But when you have a title like that and a picture of the Pope coming out of meeting with what seems to be SS soldiers on the cover (actually they were Weimar Republic era soldiers but Cornwell's American publishers have never corrected the assumption), then what do you think Cornwell wants his readers to think. Not to mention the fact that 60 minutes did a whole segment on Cornwell and his book by Ed Bradley in which all of Cornwell's accusations were never questioned, the only pro-Pius person was the Postulater for his cause, Fr.Peter Gumpel (whose family was persecuted by the Nazis themselves) whose words were taken out of context to seem anti-semetic. Later on a seperate CBS news report about the Pope Cornwell was introduced as a "Vatican Insider" despite the fact that not only there's no evidence of this but he lied about how often (rarely if ever) he spent at the Vatican Archives researching his book.
Sadly if you tell a lie often enough people believe it and thats whats happened to Pius XII.
Posted by: ita o'byrne at Aug 22, 2003 11:10:16 AM
The sad thing here is that Pius XII's contemporaries knew very well where he stood. However, history has been rewritten by people like Dan Brown and even Catholics just seem to believe it. It's amazing.
Pius XII doesn't have any problems, he stood firm. The New York Times (liberal even then) called him "a light in the darkness" and, as the evidence above shows, he was the only one who clearly understood Hitler from the beginning. Another point showing Ono's mistake: the chief Rabbi of Rome converted to Catholicism after he witnessed first-hand Pius XII's actions and comments. That speaks volumes about the man and about his critics.
I wish those who haven't actively researched the topic would do so before speaking. All of the evidence surrounding Pius XII shows he was a great Pope who saved more Jews than anyone else (including Schindler).
Jay
Posted by: Jay at Aug 22, 2003 11:45:55 AM
Jay is right. There's a superb piece by David Dalin on Pius that everyone should read, originally in the Weekly Standard and now on line at:
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/arch/dalin.html
In the non-Catholic world, many apparently reasonable people believe that Pius was not merely insufficiently assertive in his opposition to Nazism but actively approving. In the Washington Post some time ago Jonathan Yardley spoke very matter-of-factly about the pope's "sympathy" with Nazism, and more recently in the same paper a reviewer of "The Da Vinci Code" spoke of his "cooperation."
Posted by: Jim at Aug 22, 2003 12:10:24 PM
I think the point is that the uncovering of anything new--documents, letters, etc., does not mean much unless they show that the charge against anti-semitism was a significant factor in the Pius XII's dislike for Hitler. Right now, it seems that anti-catholicism was the primary factor. So there is obvious self-interest here which taints his motives, for better or for worse.
The other thing here is that the Church is going to have to live with this. Pius XII's support for the Jews was quiet, relatively safe, and was not characterized by the proper outrage. Now, if Bp. Gregory, in regard to the Gay Union issue, can call it "formal cooperation" not to "actively oppose" such legislation, or the if the Vatican can call it gravely immoral not to oppose such legislation, (note--not support, but "actively oppose"), then they should expect the Church to take some flak for not "actively opposing" the anti-Semitic and horrendous policies of the Nazis.
The quiet safe stashing away of a few hundred Jews, does not make up for the silence regarding millions killed. Pius XII's references to the Holocaust at the time were veiled and discreet. Even JPII has acknowledged "never again," should political expediency and personal safety hinder the proclamation of truth and justice.
Is it fair for Pius XII to be called cooperator with the Nazis? No. But we recognize that this is one of those mistakes that has done irreparable damage to the moral credibility of the Holy See. It still seems that to rehabilitate his image in the secular world, documents specifically addressing his moral condemnation of anti-semintism would have to be uncovered.
Posted by: Ono at Aug 22, 2003 1:05:19 PM
Well, duh! Pope Pius XII and the Catholic Church were regarded at the time by both the Nazis and their foes as being strongly anti-Nazi. Consider the praise of the Catholic Church in 1940 by Albert Einstein, for example, for its strong anti-Nazi stand. The historical record is crystal clear on this point. There is no valid historical argument on this point. The "controversy" has been made up out whole-cloth by those who hate the Church.
Posted by: Donald R. McClarey at Aug 22, 2003 1:09:42 PM
I have a theory that Cornwell trashed Pius XII and did so on the basis of skimpy research because his carefully researched effort on the death of Pope John Paul I (A THIEF IN THE NIGHT)went unappreciated and was impeded in progress by numbers of clerics who wanted to keep up appearances.
But Italy saved 85% of its Jews, thanks to the moves Pius XII made.
Posted by: Sandra Miesel at Aug 22, 2003 1:10:51 PM
Todd,
Below is an excerpt about this new find from the LA Times.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-pius22aug22,1,1927263.story
"A second document was found by Gallagher in June at Harvard University among the papers of U.S. diplomat Jay Pierrepont Moffat. One of the documents, written by U.S. Consul General Alfred W. Klieforth, recounted a 1937 meeting he had with Pacelli in Rome.
"His views, while they are well known, surprised me by their extremeness," Klieforth wrote. "He said that he opposed unalterably every compromise with National Socialism [Nazism]. He regarded Hitler not only as an untrustworthy scoundrel but as a fundamentally wicked person. He did not believe Hitler capable of moderation, in spite of appearances, and he fully supported the German bishops in their anti-Nazi stand."
I would say that Pius' opposition wasn't as covert as one is lead to believe. Notice: "His views, while they are well known, surprised me by their extremeness," Klieforth wrote."
Pius was considered to be anti-Nazi at his death in 1958 and his role during WWII was praised by Jew and non-Jew alike. Since then, history has been maliciously revised so that the (incorrect) common knowledge today is that Pius was sympathetic to Nazism, even pro-Nazi, motivated by anti-Semitism and a naive, irrational anti-Communism. Communism is painted as benign, benevolent socialism, when it had already slaughtered/starved millions by the era of these newly-found documents.
Posted by: Michael at Aug 22, 2003 1:32:53 PM
Sandra,
The theory that John Paul I was murdered. Is that nonsene, or solid?
_
Posted by: AB at Aug 22, 2003 4:28:08 PM
Peace, Michael.
I think we have two intertwined, but possibly separate issues. First, it is possible for a person to be anti-Nazi and anti-Judaism. Pius XII may well have thought Hitler to be evil, and he may have resisted him conservatively at every turn. FDR was a bit more active, but Roosevelt also turned away boatloads of Jews to the alarm of his wife and other Americans.
The "revisionism" is raised because Pius XII sainthood supporters have come to the forefront. Pius XII may have been a good man. He probably was. He did a great deal for Jews. A sure path to sainthood would have been far more dangerous for him than a papacy that dodged material horrors others had to suffer. I think his canonization cause is premature. Surely there are saintly heroic lay people from that era who would be great role models.
Posted by: Todd at Aug 22, 2003 9:41:30 PM
Don't forget, too, that when the Church did speak out against the Nazis, the Nazis reacted by specifically rounding up Catholics who had converted from Judaism. That was how Edith Stein wound up in the camps.
Posted by: Berni at Aug 22, 2003 11:11:35 PM
Berni:
Bingo. It's all well and good to say now that Pius XII shd. have spoken up, and that he was more worried about Catholics than Jews. When you're sitting in the curial office, however, knowing that a stroke of your pen can wipe out thousands of innocents, it's probably a lot more complicated.
Also, regarding the Vatican's call to actively oppose gay marriage and such. Are thousands of people going to die if we do so? Do we bear the guilt of the thousands who will be marched and trained off to the crematoriums for our actions?
I think inferring that Pius XII was more interested in the health and salvation of Catholics than of Jews requires a less charitable construction of his actions than the Catechism allows us.
Posted by: Brian at Aug 23, 2003 10:35:43 AM
No John Paul I was not murdered. A pulmonary embolism is a reasonable guess, although heart attack was listed as cause of death by a doctor who had never examined him, did not examine the body nor question witnesses and remains JP II's personal physician. John Cornwell's book on that, A THIEF IN THE NIGHT, is excellent. David Yallop's IN GOD'S NAME, the book that cried murder, is worthless. See my recent CRISIS article at www.crisismagazine.com
Posted by: Sandra Miesel at Aug 23, 2003 10:37:09 AM
Sandra,
Thanks,
_
Posted by: AB at Aug 23, 2003 10:48:36 AM
Folks, documents from 1937, 1938, 1939, etc, cannot justify Pius XII's silence toward the fate of the Jews in the years 1940-1945. You're grasping at straws here.
Cornwall's conclusions in "Hitler's Pope" seemed reasonable to me. Probably as well researched as "Thief in the Night", Sandra.
Those darn 'infallibility' claims prevent too many people from looking objectively at this.
Posted by: CB at Aug 23, 2003 11:49:51 AM
CB read the New York Times editorial about the Pope's Christmas message of 1942. The darn contempt many people have about the Catholic Church prevent them from looking objectively at this.
Posted by: Donald R. McClarey at Aug 23, 2003 12:04:08 PM
A THIEF IN THE NIGHT is presented as a record of research. Cornwell is personally interviewing witnesses and comparing their statements against each other. In HITLER'S POPE, he paid a few visits to the Vatican archives and found one document that he made sound incriminating. There's no comparison. And for less effort he sold a lot more books.
Posted by: Sandra Miesel at Aug 23, 2003 3:16:32 PM
CB,
Documents from 1937, 1938, 1939, etc, DO counter the bill of goods being sold to us that Pius XII was fundamentally an anti-Semite and was favorable towards Hitler/Nazism. Remember how we were told that Cornwell (not Cornwall) was shocked, shocked, shocked about uncovering a diplomatic memo in the Vatican archives describing Pacelli's impressions of a group of Marxist revolutionaries in Munich in the 1920's and how this was evidence of a deeply-rooted anti-Semitism. Cornwell and his ideological compatriots are out to align Pius XII with Hitler. They want to say that Pius ignored the Holocaust because he and Hitler were both Jew haters. The Kennedy/Klieforth documents are useful in countering this idea. Here we have another confirmation that Pius called Hitler evil, that he thought he was a liar, that the Pope was utterly opposed to Hitler, not "Hitler's Pope". Ask yourself if Cornwell is a reliable source if he was so fundamentally wrong on this issue.
Posted by: Michael at Aug 23, 2003 5:33:29 PM
Michael, Cornwell made none of the assertions you claim. Have you read his book? Read the last brief summary chapter, if nothing else.
Maybe more to the point, IN THIS VERY FORUM (Amy's column) a few months ago, John Allen noted and marveled at the prevelence and openness of anti-semitic thought and expression within the Vatican. Nothing much has changed since 1941. Or 1641.
Posted by: CB at Aug 24, 2003 9:01:11 PM
Catholic anti-Semitism is an old story. It's something I've exposed, always to people who will not recognize it when they see it (in the writings of Maria Valtorta, for instance).
But let's limit ourselves to what Pius XII did or didn't do. We know he was opposed to Hitler before the war, as the newly discovered documents demonstrate. It's strongly believed that he wrote Puis IX's letter MIT BRENDENER SORGE whichpowerfully cndemned Naziism. The Nazis were enraged when this anti-Nazi pope was elected, as they said in their own newspapers. The NY TIMES did praise the Pope's wartime satements. He did arrange for Jews to be hidden in religious houses and the Vatican and Castel Gandolfo. He has been ably defended on all these points by the 11-vol set of wartime Vatican documents, nby Fr. Gramham, by Fr. Blet, by Fr. Gumpel, by Fr. Rylchak, by Sr. Marchione and others who are personally familiar with the primary sources or lived through the events.
As a personal note, my Jewish father, to whom the Holocaust was a fervent personal cause, was proud to have had an audience with Pius XII at the close of the war. He has served in the Army Air Corps during the Italian campaign. This is witness to what Jewish opinion thought about this pope in those days
Posted by: Sandra Miesel at Aug 25, 2003 2:34:15 PM
1938 wasn't the key year for Pacelli's record regarding the Nazis. Ten and 12 years before, he was instrumental in negotiating state to state agreements between the Vatican and the German states, including Bavaria (the original Nazi stronghold), and as essentially the Pope (his predecessor's) foreign minister, he INSTANTLY negotiated a deal with Hitler. So the big year for his reckoning is 1933 -- when the Vatican could certainly have excommunicated all Catholics in the Nazi party, as they did later (under Pacelli as Pope) with all Catholics in Communist governments. Pacelli's partisans cannot claim he didn't know what and who the Nazis were, nor what they intended to do -- yet his reaction wasn't to fight 'em, but to over-rule the German bishops who DID want to fight.
Pacelli's political achievement in working with Nazism except insofar as such negotiation hurt the RCC's temporal interests is precisely his moral failing. Every statement I've ever seen which seeks to praise this Pope, pretty much confirms the indictment. Did he excopmmunicate Nazis? Nope. Did he honor the Catholics (like von Papen) who put Hitler in power? Yup. Just how DID this guy consider the interests of the Roman Catholic Church. QED.
Dunno why this is so hard for folks to see -- confusing power with purpose, perhaps.
Posted by: theAmericanist at Aug 25, 2003 9:31:41 PM
Also, in 1933 Edith Stein wrote the Pope (PiusXI) begging for a public condemnation of Nazi persecution of the Jews (" ... for which the whole world waits.")
You can find this letter on the web.
Even our Catholic saints condemned papal silence and inaction on this matter.
Americanist, some look but strive not to see, for ideological reasons.
Posted by: CB at Aug 26, 2003 12:13:45 PM
CB, Re: Edith Stein's letter to the Pope, this is from the Catholic League's website. http://www.catholicleague.org/research/rychlakcomm.htm
Stein wrote in April, 1933. Mit brennender Sorge was written in 1936-37, delivered to Germany in March of 1937.
As you can read below, Mit brennender Sorge, was a very powerful critique of Nazi ideology, especially its glorification of the German nation and the bogus notion of a separate German race. Is this not part of what Edith Stein was asking for? To quote her letter, "Is not this idolization of race and governmental power which is being pounded into the public consciousness by the radio open heresy?" http://www.bc.edu/research/cjl/meta-elements/texts/news/News_Feb2003.htm#Stein
You wrote in an earlier comment about "silence toward the fate of the Jews in the years 1940-1945". Read Rychlak's entire essay, how is it silence when the pope protested against the treatment of Jews in Vichy France, to give one example. "Silence" means nothing, the Vichy protests were concrete actions, not "silence".
Right back at you when you say, "some look but strive not to see, for ideological reasons". The ideology is "the pope was silent" and nothing anyone documents is ever enough to shake that faith.
To theAmericanist: You can see how Mit brennender Sorge obviously hurt "the RCC's temporal interests" vis a vis Germany. How does that fit into your thesis?
Catholic League quote begins now:
[Question from the joint International Jewish-Catholic Historical Commission]
#27.In 1933, Edith Stein wrote to Pius XI asking him to issue an encyclical condemning anti-Semitism. This may have been the first of many appeals made to the Vatican for intervention on behalf of the Jews. Though the date falls beyond the parameters of our mandate, the document is relevant because of its content. How was this letter received? Is the letter itself in the archives, and if so may we see it?
Point: [Rychlak's response]
Her letter resulted eventually in Mit brenender Sorge. Mit brennender Sorge was one of the strongest condemnations of any national regime that the Holy See ever published. It condemned not only the persecution of the Church in Germany, but also the Neo-paganism of Nazi theories. “Whoever exalts race, or the people, or the State, or a particular form of State... above their standard value and divinizes them to an idolatrous level, distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God,” wrote the Pope. There was even a brazen swipe at Hitler:
“None but superficial minds could stumble into concepts of a national God, of a national religion; or attempt to lock within the frontiers of a single people, within the narrow limits of a single race, God, the Creator of the universe, King and Legislator of all nations before whose immensity they are ‘as a drop of a bucket’ (Isaiah XI, 15).”
The encyclical concluded that “enemies of the Church, who think that their time has come, will see that their joy was premature.”
Unlike most encyclicals, which are written in Latin, Mit brennender Sorge was written in German for wider dissemination in that country. It was smuggled out of Italy, copied and distributed to parish priests to be read from all of the pulpits on Palm Sunday, March 14, 1937. No one who heard the Pontifical document read in church had any illusion about the gravity of these statements or their significance. Certainly the Nazis understood their importance.
An internal German memorandum dated March 23, 1937, called Mit brennender Sorge “almost a call to do battle against the Reich government.” All available copies were confiscated. German printers who had made copies were arrested and the presses were seized. Those convicted of distributing the encyclical were arrested, the Church-affiliated publications which ran the encyclical were banned, and payments due to the Church from the Government were reduced.
The day following the release of Mit brennender Sorge, a Nazi newspaper, the Voelkischer Beobachter, carried a strong counterattack on the “Jew-God and His deputy in Rome.” Das Schwarze Korps, official paper of the SS, called it “the most incredible of Pius XI’s pastoral letters; every sentence in it was an insult to the new Germany.” The German ambassador to the Holy See was instructed not to take part in the solemn Easter ceremonies, and German missions throughout Europe were informed by the Nazi Foreign Office of the “Reich’s profound indignation” They were also told that the German government “had to consider the Pope’s encyclical as a call to battle... as it calls upon Catholic citizens to rebel against the authority of the Reich.”
Hitler verbally attacked the German bishops at a mass rally in Berlin, and he dictated a letter of protest to the Pope, complaining that the Vatican had gone to the people instead of coming to him. Vatican Secretary of State, Eugenio Pacelli (the future Pope Pius XII), rebuffed German protests, noting that the German government had not been cooperative in the past when the Vatican complained about the various matters (including the Nazis treatment of Jews). In May, Hitler was quoted in a Swiss newspaper saying, “the Third Reich does not desire a modus vivendi with the Catholic Church, but rather its destruction with lies and dishonor, in order to make room for a German Church in which the German race will be glorified.”
Posted by: Michael at Aug 27, 2003 1:01:19 AM
