'Hitler's Pope' tried to help Jews, say documents

The Sunday Telegraph ^ | February 16, 2003 | Michael Burleigh

[MadIvan]

Vatican papers offering the first direct evidence that Pope Pius XII tried to help Jews during the Second World War have been discovered by an Italian expert.

The documents undermine critics' claims that Pius - condemned by critics as "Hitler's Pope" - put the interests of Rome first and did not protest about the fate of Jews during the Holocaust.

A letter, signed by the Pope in October 1940 and sent to Giuseppe Palatucci, Bishop of Campagna in southern Italy, instructed him to give money "in aid to interned Jews", to whom Pius also referred in an earlier letter as "suffering for reasons of race".

The bishop was already involved in assisting Jews through his nephew, Giovanni Palatucci, the police chief in Fiume, in north-eastern Italy. Palatucci had distributed false identity papers to 5,000 Croatian Jews, enabling them to leave local internment camps for relative safety in his uncle's southern Italian diocese, an operation that would later lead to the police chief's death in Dachau.

A second letter to Bishop Palatucci in November 1940 contained a cheque for 10,000 lira that was to be used for the "support of Jews interned in your diocese".

Supporters believe that the letters will help to repair the reputation of a man whom the present Pope, John Paul II, is seeking to make a saint but who has been accused of being anti-semitic, culturally Germanophile, rabidly anti-communist and conspicuously silent about the fate of Europe's Jews.

"They appear to give compelling proof that will testify to Pius's attitude towards the Jews," said William Doino, an authority on Pius XII.

"Given the dangers then existing and the reluctance of the Church to put such matters in writing, these letters are remarkable. They establish beyond question that Pius XII took a direct, personal interest in helping Jews [and] did so very early on in the war.

"Numerous authors have maintained that there is no credible written evidence that Pius XII himself ever gave direct orders to assist persecuted Jews. Now, we have that evidence."

Mr Doino believes that other new documents to be released by the Vatican to scholars this weekend will shed light on one of the most controversial figures in the Catholic Church's history.

They cover between 1922 and 1939, when the then Eugenio Pacelli was nuncio to Weimar Germany and later papal secretary of state when Hitler came to power.

Controversy has long dogged Pacelli, the principal architect of the 1933 concordat between Germany and the Vatican which ring-fenced Catholic schooling and public worship in a climate that was hostile to "political Catholicism".

While Britain, France and Italy had already established relations with Germany, the concordat is widely viewed as having conferred "respectability" on the Nazis.

The alleged silence of Pius, who became Pope a few months before the outbreak of hostilities in 1939, would later become a stick with which to beat the Catholic Church over its wartime record.

While more than 80 per cent of Italy's Jewish population was rescued, critics of the Church have claimed that individual Italian Catholics acted spontaneously, without aid from Pius XII.

Defenders of Pius XII say he detested the Nazis, signed the concordat to protect German Catholics and put German conservatives who were plotting to kill Hitler in touch with the British, who failed to take much interest in them.

[Campion]

I own the movie on video, and I don't recall any scene like that. However, the movie concerns O'Flaherty's efforts on behalf of Allied POW's, not Jews. The plight of the Jews really doesn't enter into the story much, one way or the other.

[pabianice]

Vatican papers offering the first direct evidence that Pope Pius XII tried to help Jews during the Second World War have been discovered by an Italian expert.

More likely, have just been forged...

[perform_to_strangers]

Okay, now I'll have to borrow it from the library to see for myself. I'll apologize if the scene isn't there. I remember it so clearly, though.

[Campion]

My, aren't we cynical, though.

Not much need for forgery in this case. The competent historians without an axe to grind are in agreement on the heroic conduct of Pius XII. The liberal propagandists who specialize in regurgitating each other's lies, on the other hand, will never be convinced.

Don't think I know what I'm talking about? Read this.

[perform_to_strangers]

Am I mixing it up with some other movie? There was a scene in it about O'Flaherty helping the Jews raise some huge number of pounds of gold? Pious Italians were bringing in their rosaries and wedding bands, and they just barely made the quota and Commander von Trapp was furious and doubled it?

[Barnacle]

Ping

[edwin hubble]

You are mistaken, and misled by slander.

The best thing that could happen to a Jewish family under the Nazi occupation of Europe was to happen to be in Italy.
The worst (after Germany and Poland) was to be in Vichy France.

Check the numbers.

No coincidence here. The church was a strong (quiet) force.

[Barnacle]

You're welcome.

[edwin hubble]

You, also, are mistaken, and misled by slander.

The best thing that could happen to a Jewish family under the Nazi occupation of Europe was to happen to be in Italy.
The worst (after Germany and Poland) was to be in Vichy France.

Check the numbers.

No coincidence here. The church was a strong (quiet) force.

[GOPcapitalist]

Fellow freepers:

Be sure to cc this one to the email of Cragg Hines (cragg.hines@chron.com). Hines is a far left wing Hearst columnist and rabid catholic basher who publishes "Hitler's Pope" attacks on Pius every couple of months. It won't change his view because he's already decided that the facts don't matter, but it'll make him frustrated.

[maxwellp]

No, it was Gregory Peck. I remember the movie quite clearly. Peck was excellent.

[edwin hubble]

Great article, Campion. And written by a Rabbi.

Yes, over the centuries there was a history of mistrust and mistreatment of Jews by Christians. But the fact is that Pius XII helped Jews in WWII.

Just as there were those in the Southern U.S. before the Civil War who helped slaves escape to Canada to freedom. Also a fact.


Coincidentally, Edmund Campion, the martyred Jesuit helped hide and protect Catholics during the bloody persecution of Catholics in England. He continued to debate his torturers while on the rack.

[Romulus]

But I read that book cited in the link

Sucker.

[Alberta's Child]

Cardinal Roncolli saved about 800,000 Jews while he was a bishop in Turkey, he later became Pope John XXIII.

I've read that 800,000 figure posted elsewhere. Anyone who truly believes that the Catholic Church "did not do enough" to save Jews during the Holocaust should ask themselves how many Jews saved 800,000 Jews from the Nazis.

Case closed.

After WW II, the chief Rabbi of Rome converted to Catholicism.

This little tidbit, along with the conversion of people like Edith Stein (later canonized by Pope John Paul II), is probably the real reason for much of the animosity towards the Catholic Church in terms of its role in Europe during World War II.

[mlmr]

I have read Hitler's Pope too. There is a lot controversy about the book and its blatent lies. The author poorly researched the book and made his facts fit his thesis. First Things magazine and Richard Newhaus has done, I think a thorough job in refuting the book.


Don't believe everything you read.

[rmlew]

This little tidbit, along with the conversion of people like Edith Stein (later canonized by Pope John Paul II), is probably the real reason for much of the animosity towards the Catholic Church in terms of its role in Europe during World War II.
No, it has to do with the failure of the Church to explicitly condemn the Holocaust and because of 1800 years of Christian anti-semetism.
Pope Pius XII saved many Jews. However, as Papal Nuncio, Cardinal Pacelli failed to act agains the Nazis before they came to power. He chose to ignore them because they were anti-communist.

I have defended Pope Pius XII many times against leftist attacks and against misguided ignorami. However, I do not believe that he is a saint.
I don't care either way for Edith Stein. She was killed for being Jewish not for Cahtolicism. She is an odd person to see as a Catholic martyr. There are far better examples of Catholics who stood up to the Nazis and were martyred.

[unspun]

"Hitler's Pope," in a pig's eye. Hitler may have been born into a Roman Catholic family, but he was an occultist and social evolutionist.

Anything with a title like that advertises itself like a skunk.

[nickcarraway]

As Papal Nuncio, the majority of Cardinal Pacelli's pronouncements warned of the dangers of Nazism. He was one of the early people to be conerned about Nazism. He did try to work against it, but how much power does a Papal Nuncio have? Not that much I'm afraid.

[MarMema]

I just hope we get another Italian soon.

I Hope this for you as well!

[MarMema]

No matter, the utashe (which the vatican helped sneak out of Croatia before they could be tried as war criminals) are plenty of blood for the church.
No doubt those records have disappeared completely from Rome, but the US State Dept has some left.