In 1941, for example, after being asked by French Marshal Henri Philippe Petain if the Vatican would object to anti-Jewish laws, Pius XII answered that the church condemned racism, but did not repudiate every rule against the Jews. But many scholars accuse him of … 32. Israel Pocket Library, Holocaust, p. 133; Gutman, Israel, Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, p. 1137. Revelations From The Archive Leiber also maintained that Pus suspended clausura rule to allow nuns, brothers, and father to hide Jews. One is composed of those who claim Pope Pacelli did his utmost to save Jewish lives while necessarily taking precautions to safeguard the Catholic populations of Europe. An internal memorandum from papal adviser, Angelo Dell’Acqua, said the information in the Jewish Agency reported needed “to be verified…because the Jews also tend to easily exaggerate.” He also expressed concern that the Holy See might be pressured to come to an agreement with the United States on “the Jewish question,” which he argued might somehow endanger Jews and the Vatican. 26. In the 1970s, Karl Wolff, the commander of the police in Rome, claimed that on September 13, 1943, Hitler gave the order to “occupy Vatican City, secure its files and art treasures, and take the Pope and Curia to the north” to prevent the pope from being taken by the Allies.” David Kertzer argues the story is dubious given that the Germans could have kidnapped the pope anytime during their occupation of Rome. There was no need to offend the “good sense of the Italian people” by putting Jews in in concentration camps when “the racial Law sanctioned by the Fascist Government against the Jews five years ago is sufficient to contain the tiny Jewish minority within its proper limits.” Hence, he said, “the German Government will want to desist from the deportation of the Jews, whether that done en masse, as happened this past October, or those done by single individuals.”, In proposing that the pope make a statement Tacchi Venturi asked, “If one renews the harsh measures against the minimal Jewish minority, which includes a notable number of members of the Catholic religion (Jews who intermarried), how will the Church be able to remain silent and not loudly lament before the whole world the fate of men and women not guilty of any crime toward whom it cannot, without failing to carry out its divine mission, deny its compassion and all its maternal care?”, The pope asked the Secretariat of State’s expert on all Jewish questions, Monsignor Angelo Dell’Acqua, whether he should follow the recommendation of Tacchi Venturi. Dell’Acqua advised the pope not to make a public statement or put anything in writing. Submitted to The Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with Jews. In Rome, at that time, every kind of paper and information could be bought. The opinions, facts and any media content in them are presented solely by the authors, and neither The Times of Israel nor its partners assume any responsibility for them. Pius XII refused.(11). Israel Gutman, ed., Encyclopedia of the Holocaust. Orphans The pope instead took his suggestion that the papal delegate in Jerusalem offer to look into each case individually. (5), Within the Pope’s own church, Cardinal Theodor Innitzer of Vienna told Pius XII about Jewish deportations in 1941. 13a. He received information about a German plan, Operation Yellow, to lay mines to deter British naval support of Holland. Not only did Pius XII publicly condemn Hitler's murderous ideology, and Nazi war crimes against Jews and many others — the Holy See was among the earliest world leaders to do … Roncalli forwarded the report to the Vatican, which had claimed it did not know about the report until October. The answer more than likely lies somewhere in between and it’s this ‘in between’, which will be the focus of scholarly examination, which will take some time because there are 53 miles of stacked shelves, containing files with more than one million papers. “The persecution of the Jews that the Holy See justly deplores is one thing, especially when it is carried out with certain methods,” Dell’Acqua wrote, “and quite another thing is to be wary of the Jews’ influence: this can be quite opportune.”, Kertzer noted that “the Vatican-overseen Jesuit journal, La Civiltà Cattolica, had been repeatedly warning of the need for government laws to restrict the rights of the Jews in order to protect Christian society from their alleged depredations.” Dell’Acqua also feared angering the Germans by openly highlighting “the mistreatment to which the Jews are allegedly being subject (emphasis added).” Dismissing Tacchi Venturi’s advice, Dell’Acqua recommended that the Vatican make a general statement to the German ambassador to the Holy See, urging him not to aggravate “the already grave situation of the Jews.” Furthermore, he suggested the Jews should be told to stop complaining about their treatment. The preliminary report released by the IJCHC also asked the Vatican for access to non-published archival documents to more fully investigate the Pope’s role in the Holocaust. “Pope Pius XII and the Vatican Archives,” Inside the Vatican, [undated] accessed September 22, 2020. Lisa Billig, who represents the American Jewish Committee at the Holy See, explains what scholars are keen to uncover. The more important story, according to Rabbi David Rosen, international director of interreligious affairs for the American Jewish Committee, was that one of the recipients of the letter, Angelo Roncalli, the papal representative in Paris, ignored the papal directive. The first is “what details reached Pius regarding the persecution and murder of the Jews throughout Europe, and whether the information arrived in the Vatican from sources considered reliable by Pius and his close circle.” A second question is one of timing. I wish to mention that I have been asked both from the Catholic and Protestant side if the Holy See could not do something on this subject...in favor of these unfortunates.” The letter, which was a direct appeal to the Pope himself, without intermediaries, provoked no response. Taylor asked if the Vatican could corroborate the information in the report and, if it could, to use its authority to arouse public opinion and call for an end to the killing. What finally compelled him to do so was a study of the recent books about Pope Pius XII, and particularly those assailing his conduct during the Holocaust. Moreover, Kertzer notes, the pope wanted good relations with the Germans to protect Vatican City and the Germans believed remaining respectful toward the pope had propaganda value. Martin Gilbert, The Second World War: A Complete History, (NY: Henry Holt And Co., 1992); During World War II, the Vatican was one of the few places on … He was also Vatican Secretary of State and responsible for the Reich Concordat of 1933 that effectively neutered Catholic opposition to the Nazis. Pope Pius XII’s response to the Holocaust is of profound significance for Jewish–Christian relations. For fifty years, the debate has continued to rage. This was conveyed to the United States in a letter on October 10, 1942. He arranged asylum for Jewish people. A Review-Article By Kenneth D. Whitehead (The Political Science Reviewer, Volume XXXI, 2002)I. (31), In 2006, an Israeli scholar, Dina Porat, discovered correspondence between Haim Barlas, an emissary of the Jewish Agency sent to Europe to save Jews in the 1940s, and Giuseppe Roncalli, who later became Pope John XXIII. During his tenure, he … 34. But these successes only highlight the amount of influence he might have had, if he not chosen to remain silent on so many other occasions. He merely called the war “dreadful” and argued it is the duty of all “to do everything to ban once and for all wars of aggression as legitimate solution of international disputes and as a means towards realizing national aspirations.” He added that “the idea of war as an apt and proportionate means of solving international conflicts is now out of date” and that “the Christian and religious mentality reject modern war with its monstrous means of conducting hostilities.” The pope defended the punishment of war criminals, but objected to the collective punishment of nations. Before he became pope, he served as both the Vatican’s ambassador to Germany and the Vatican’s Secretary of State. Gutman, Israel. It would have been really helpful to have had support from the Holy See on this issue.”(29), In 2004, news was disclosed of a diary kept by James McDonald, the League of Nations high commissioner for refugees coming from Germany. Michael D. Olson Introduction What did the Catholic Church, in particular its leader Pope Pius XII, do to address anti-Semitism and the Holocaust during World War II? Hilberg, Raul, The Destruction of the European Jews, p. 315. The pope said he would consider the statement on anti-Semitism, but never made one. He was head of his church and was in direct communication with bishops everywhere. During the German occupation of Hungary in March 1944, he, along with the papal nuncio in Budapest, Angelo Rotta, advised the Hungarian government to be moderate in its plans concerning the treatment of the Jews. The claim that the Vatican needed to remain neutral in the war has also been refuted. In the spring of 1940, the Chief Rabbi of Palestine, Isaac Herzog, asked the papal Secretary of State, Cardinal Luigi Maglione to intercede to keep Jews in Spain from being deported to Germany. Roosevelt’s envoy to the Pope, Myron Charles Taylor, then sent it to the Vatican. Whilst the Pope condemned the effects of war on its innocent victims, Pius XII failed to specify the persecution of Jews nor did he publicly protest the transportation of Rome’s Jews to the concentration camps in 1943, refusing pleas for help on the grounds of neutrality. Pope Pius XII Prophecy and the Third Secret of Fatima – Did he reveal the hidden secret? One example was that churches flew Nazi flags and prayed for protection of the “Fuhrer and the Reich” on Hitler’s 50th birthday in 1939. Mankind owes that vow to the innumerable sorrowing host of mothers, widows and orphans who have seen the light, the solace and the support of their lives wrenched from them. The report revealed that Jews were being rounded up, taken out of the Warsaw Ghetto and executed. It is easily forgotten that Pope Pius XII lived in pre-Vatican II times when traditional anti-Jewish Catholic teaching was the norm, until this was reversed by the publication of Nostra Aetate in 1965 which transformed Catholic-Jewish relations for the better. The Jerusalem Post. Conclusion. Gutman, Israel, Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, p. 1136. Monday’s opening of the Vatican archives covers the period of the Holocaust and is an important moment in Jewish-Christian relations. 33. The legacy of Rolf Hochhuth’s play, The Representative which portrayed Pius as more concerned with safeguarding Vatican interests than with the fate of Jews, should not be underestimated; nor should hundreds of years of Christian anti-Jewish teaching. Perl, William, The Holocaust Conspiracy, p. 197. 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