Personal Observations

Prior to reading the Newsweek article by Kenneth Woodward listed below, I too shared the belief that, while Pius XII may not have been indifferent or anti-Semitic as John Cornwell alleges in Hitler's Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII, he had certainly done too little to oppose Nazism and aid its Jewish victims.  As a Catholic, I was ashamed of that.  After reading Mr. Woodward's piece, however, I did some digging and found several articles on the Internet that speak favorably about Pius's attitude toward the Jewish people and his activities during World War II.  Given how widespread the belief that Pius did not do enough is, these articles astounded me.  What struck me most is that, first, many of the defenders of Pius XII are Jews who testify to what they know about Pius's actions.and, second, that it is Nazis who make the strongest argument that Pius was anti-Nazi.  Based on what I have read, I am very skeptical about Mr. Cornwell's conclusions.

The majority of the sites supporting Pius's actions are by conservative Catholic sources.  However, the most of the evidence they present is voluminous testimony from Jewish sources.  I find it difficult to believe that so many of these people could be so wrong about Pius's actions.  A good summary of the testimony they present comes from The Last Three Popes and the Jews, by Israeli diplomat, scholar, and, finally, Orthodox Rabbi Pinchas Lapide.  He states: "No Pope in history has been thanked more heartily by Jews."  Upon his death in 1958, "Several suggested in open letters that a Pope Pius XII forest of 860,000 trees be planted on the hills of Judea in order to fittingly honor the memory of the late Pontiff", because they believed: "The Catholic Church under the pontificate of Pius XII was instrumental in saving the lives of as many as 860,000 Jews from certain death at Nazi hands."

The most critical point in this issue is Pius's "silence" in the face of the Holocaust.  During Pope John Paul II's visit to the Middle East, almost every media piece raised the point that some were disturbed that John Paul II did not apologize for the Church's failure to act against the Holocaust.  What seems to be common knowledge here too is wrong.  It is known that Pius was in fact preparing a statement in 1942 condemning the Nazi's persecution of the Jews.  However, as a result of the Nazis' reaction to the Dutch Bishops' protest against the exportation of their Jewish co-nationals, he decided against making a public protest.  In Pius XII As He Really Was, Dr. Peter Gumpel S.J. writes:

The action of the Dutch bishops had important repercussions.  Pius XII had already prepared the text of a public protest against the persecution of the Jews. Shortly before this text was sent to L’Osservatore Romano, news reached him of the disastrous consequences of the Dutch bishops’ initiative. He concluded that public protests, far from alleviating the fate of the Jews, aggravated their persecution and he decided that he could not take the responsibility of his own intervention having similar and probably even much more serious consequences. Therefore he burnt the text he had prepared.  The International Red Cross, the nascent World Council of Churches and other Christian Churches were fully aware of such consequences of vehement public protests and, like Pius XII, they wisely avoided them.

[The Nazis] are in reality only miserable plagiarists who dress up old errors with new tinsel.  It does not make any difference whether they flock to the banners of the social revolution, whether they are guided by a false conception of the world and of life, or whether they are possessed by the superstition of a race and blood cult.

These sources also present several statements by Nazis, both before and during the war, that indicate that they considered Pius anti-Nazi.  The day after his election, the Berlin Morgenpost reported: 'The election of cardinal Pacelli is not accepted with favor in Germany because he was always opposed to Nazism and practically determined the policies of the Vatican under his predecessor."  A few weeks after Pacelli was elected pope, the German Reich's Chief Security Service issued a report on the new Pope that stated. "Pacelli has already made himself prominent by his attacks on National Socialism during his tenure as Cardinal Secretary of State, a fact which earned him the hearty approval of the Democratic States during the papal elections."

An analysis of Pius's 1942 Christmas message by Reinhard Heydrich's Reich Central Security Office concluded:

In a manner never known before, the Pope has repudiated the National Socialist New European Order.  His radio allocution was a masterpiece of clerical falsification of the National Socialist Weltanschauung...the Pope does not refer to the National Socialists in Germany by name, but his speech is one long attack on everything we stand for...God, he says, regards all peoples and races as worthy of the same consideration.  Here he is clearly speaking on behalf of the Jews...That this speech is directed exclusively against the New Order in Europe as seen in National Socialism is clear in the papal statement that mankind owes a debt to 'all who during the war have lost their Fatherland and who, although personally blameless have, simply on account of their nationality and origin, been killed or reduced to utter destitution.'  Here he is virtually accusing the German people of injustice towards the Jews, and makes himself the mouthpiece of the Jewish war criminals.

After the war was over, Pius XII received a large delegation of Roman Jews in the Vatican and ordered that the Imperial steps be opened for them to enter by. These steps were usually reserved for crowned Heads of State...The Pope received them in the Sistine chapel and, seeing that his Jewish visitors felt uncomfortable in that place, he came down from his throne and warmly welcomed them telling them to feel completely at home, saying "I am only the Vicar of Christ but you are His very kith and kin."

Please note that this page is not intended to be a plug for Pius XII's canonization (sainthood).  I know too little about the man to have an opinion about his saintliness.  My intent is to do what little I can to keep Mr. Cornwell's book from deepening the cynicism that exists concerning religion in general and organized religion in particular and from poisoning Jewish-Catholic relations.  For this reason, I think that it is vital that the truth concerning Pius's attitude toward the Jewish people and his actions during World War II be known.

I hope you find these sources as convincing as I do. (And, if my conclusion about Pius XII's attitude and actions changes, I will setup a page that presents evidence for that view.)

1/ Walter Sundberg in "Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil", a review of The Hitler of History, by John Lukacs in First Things, February, 1999, pp. 56-59. (I chose to note this rather than creating a link to the source because it is a single line in a long article.) [back to essay]

Christopher McGath
March 31, 2000
 

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Pius XII and the Second World War: According to the Archives of the Vatican

Pierre Blet S.J., Lawrence J. Johnson (Translator)
Paulist Press
September 1999
Hardcover - 416 pages illustrate edition

Fr. Blet was one of the four editors who spent 17 years working on the 12-volume The Acts and Documents of the Holy See Relative to World War II.  The short article, Pius XII is victim of calumny, scholar says, lays out some of Fr. Blet's views.  Fr. Blet has also offered criticisms of Mr. Cornwell's book.  Two works by another editor of The Acts, Robert A. Graham, S.J., are referenced below. [Lecture | Monograph]

List Price: $29.95

Available @ $20.00 (November 1999) from The Catholic Book Club
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or, if you don't want to shop at one of the megastores, you could go to: Yahoo: Booksellers
 

Reviews and commentary concerning this book

Pius XII and the Second World War by Pierre Blet, S.J.

Catholic Book Club listing
 

Vatican expert's book defends WWII policies of Pope Pius XII

John Thavis
Catholic News Service
October 11, 1999
 

Vatican Counters WWII Allegations

Victor L. Simpson
Associated Press Writer
The Washington Post
Friday, October 8, 1999
 

In Defense of Pius XII

Kenneth L. Woodward
Newsweek, March 30, 1998

Mr. Woodward's critique of Mr. Cornwell's book, The Case Against Pius XII; A new biography is scalding -- and deeply flawed (Newsweek, September 24, 1999) is referenced below.

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Pius XII and the Holocaust, A Reader

Entire book:
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights | Catholic Information Network

Excerpts:
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights | Defending the Faith

Cited at: Cybrary of the Holocaust: Online Education Web Sites (See abstract under Jewish Sources below)
 

Yours Is A Precious Witness: Memoirs of Jews and Catholics in Wartime Italy

Sr. Margherita Marchione, Ph.D.

The author uses documentary and untapped oral histories of Italian Jews and Catholics to show that Pius XII did not bow to the Nazis and Fascists or to the pressure of world opinion, but actually was responsible for saving thousands of Jews by hiding them in convents, monasteries and papal buildings.

List Price: $14.95 Available from Living His Life Abundantly and Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights.
 

Fr. Michael O'Carroll

The author comes to the defense of Pope Pius XII against critics who falsely accuse him of failing to protest publicly to Hitler thereby becoming responsible for Jewish lives. Fr. Carroll shows that Pius XII saved more Jews than all other governments and public agencies or organizations taken together.

List Price: $18.95  Available from Living His Life Abundantly.

James Akin

An article that originally appeared in the February 1997 issue of This Rock.

Author: Thomas Craughwell
Larger Work: Sursum Corda! (pages 52-59)
Publisher & Date: Foundation for Catholic Reform, Spring 1998

Description: An article which shows that Pope Pius XII was one of the Nazi's most determined opponents and saved hundreds of thousands of Jews.

Pius Defenders

Thomas Craughwell

A shorter work than the one listed immediately above. It presents evidence from three long-out-of-print books by respected scholars address the Pope's actions to save the Jews during World War II. According to Mr. Craughwell: "The evidence is incontrovertible."

The Frances and Jacob Hiatt Collection of Holocaust Materials
College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA

References on its own web server:

Did Pius XII do enough?

Reprinted from The Pilot, March 20, 1998
 

Pius XII: Years of Praise Years of Blame

Full text of a lecture delivered at Theological College, The Catholic University of America, on October 10, 1989, by Rev. Robert A. Graham S.J., who worked for nearly 17 years as one of the four editors of the 12-volume The Acts and Documents of the Holy See Relative to World War II.

Peter Gumpel, S.J.
Church historian who has studied Pius extensively as relator for his canonization process.
The Tablet, February 13, 1999

From article:
[A]s a German I know the history of my country and have lived under the Nazi regime in both Germany and Holland. The fact that several members of my family were killed by the Nazis and that I myself had twice to go into exile in order to avoid a similar fate, allows me to be particularly sensitive to the monstrous crime of the Holocaust and to the justified reactions of Jews to what millions of their people have suffered.

Thomas J. Nash
From Lay Witness, the publication of Catholics United for the Faith
October 1998

This site also contains several links at the bottom of the page.

Author: Stephen Boyle
Title: Pius XII and the Jews: Greatness dishonored
Larger Work: Homiletic & Pastoral Review (pages 26-32)
Publisher & Date: Ignatius Press, April 1999

Description: A summary of the position of Pius XII and the Catholic Church against the Nazis. In particular, addresses question of Pius's "silence".

Sister Margherita Marchione, Ph.D.

A Catholic Response, Inc.

Numerous links to articles on the subject of Pope Pius XII during WWII.

What's New? on "The Abundant Life"
Living His Life Abundantly®
Broadcast on Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN)
June 27-July 3, 1999 and July 4-10, 1999
[Programs #149 & #150]

Guests: Sr. Margherita Marchione, Ph.D., Jeffery Rubin, Elizabeth Altham and William Doina

Abstract:
Much misinformation has been advanced about the role of the Church during the Second World War. Some have gone so far as to accuse Pope Pius XII of silence during this tragic time. Our guests maintain that the official Church spoke loudly and clearly against Nazi policies, and saved thousands of Jews and other refugees from deportation to death camps.

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Cybrary of the Holocaust: Online Education Web Sites

Cites Pius XII and the Holocaust, A Reader
Abstract:

This web site has the entire text of the book Pius XII and the Holocaust: A Reader, which contains documentation on the Catholic Church's role in the Holocaust. About 50% of this volume was written in 1963 by Dr. Joseph Lichten, a Jewish Polish lawyer who served as the Director on International Affairs Department for the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith.

The Holocaust: Pius XII

Includes

A Question of Judgment: Pius XII & the Jews
Dr. Joseph L. Lichten

Dr. Joseph L. Lichten, who died in Rome, in December, 1987, was a long-time proponent of mutual understanding and cooperation between the Catholic and Jewish communities in both the United States and Europe. He was born in Poland, received his Doctor of Law degree from the University of Warsaw, and engaged in international diplomacy with the Polish government. In 1963, shortly after the initial production of Rolf Hochhuth's play, The Deputy, and while serving as director of the International Affairs Department for the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, he wrote this monograph. It was published by the National Catholic Welfare Conference, forerunner of the United States Catholic Conference.

Rev. Robert A. Graham, S.J. is a scholar and writer of distinction in the fields of international affairs and Vatican history. A former editor of America magazine, Father Graham has written numerous articles and several books, his best known being Vatican Diplomacy. He writes a regular column on the Vatican for Columbia magazine. His past 17 years have been devoted to the monumental task of editing an 11-volume series containing the documents of the Vatican Secretariat of State during World War II.

Sources: Eternal Word Television Network; article first appeared in Catholic Family #10, Autumn 1991.
 
 

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The Case Against Pius XII; A new biography is scalding -- and deeply flawed

Kenneth L. Woodward
Newsweek, September 24, 1999
 

David Van Biema
Time, Religion section
September 20, 1999, Vol. 154 No. 12
 

Owen Chadwick
The Tablet, September 25, 1999
 

Dr. Peter Gumpel, S.J.
Church historian who has studied Pius extensively as relator for his canonization process
Zenit News Service, Rome, September 16, 1999

From Zenit News Service | Eternal Word TV Network | About.com
 

Includes:

I. Historian Refutes Claims of "Hitler's Pope"
Zenit News Service, September 7, 1999

Criticisms by Pierre Blet,.S.J., one of the four editors who spent 17 years working on the 12-volume The Acts and Documents of the Holy See Relative to World War II and author of Pius XII and the Second World War: According to the Archives of the Vatican.

II. Historians Reveal Cornwell's Errors
Zenit News Service, September 10, 1999

Criticisms by Italian writer Antonio Spinosa.

III. Special Report: Hitler's Pope
Zenit News Service, Rome, September 16, 1999

Reprint of Cornwell's Pope: A Nasty Caricature of a Noble and Saintly Man;
Point by Point Rebuttal by Church Historian, Dr. Peter Gumpel.

L'Osservatore Romano (official Vatican newspaper), 13 October 1999
Presents rebuttals of Mr. Cornwell's claims concerning his research.
 
 

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