In late October the Zenit news agency ran an interview with Jewish historian Michael Tagliacozzo, head of the Beth Lohame Haghettaot, the Center of Studies on the Shoah and Resistance in Italy. (Beth Lohame Haghettaot in Israel is one of the worlds largest museums and centers of documentation on the Holocaust.)
Throughout interview Tagliacozzo presents historical documentation showing Pius XII did everything within his diplomatic power to protest the Nazi treatment of Jews and ordered members of the Church to protect and hide them from the Germans. Most compelling was Tagliacozzos account of his own experience in wartime Rome:
"After the Nazis action [of arresting and deporting thousands of Italian Jews on October 16, 1943], the Pontiff, who had already ordered the opening of convents, schools and churches to rescue the persecuted, opened cloistered convents to allow the persecuted to hide. Msgr. Giovanni Butinelli, of the parish of the Transfiguration, told me that the Pontiff had recommended that parish priests be told to shelter Jews.
"I personally know a Jewish family that, after the Nazis request for 50 kilos of gold, decided to hide the women and children in a cloistered convent on Via Garibaldi. The nuns said they were happy to take the mother and girl but they could not care for a little boy. However, under the Popes order, which dispensed the convent from cloister, they also hid the boy.
"I myself was saved from persecution thanks to the Churchs help. I remember it was October 16, a rainy day. It was a Saturday, the third day of the Jewish feast of Sukkot. I had sought refuge in Bologna Square.
"When the Germans arrived, I was able to escape through a window and I found myself on the street in my pajamas. A family helped me and hid me. I then went to my former Italian teacher who let me stay in her home and asked several priests to find me a safe place.
"Finally, after almost a week, thanks to a recommendation of Fr. Fagiolo, I was hidden in the Lateran. I remember they treated me wonderfully. After not having eaten for two days, Fr. Palazzini gave me a meal with all Gods goods: a bowl of vegetable soup, bread, cheese, fruit. I had never eaten so well."
When asked what he thought of Cornwells book, Tagliacozzo replied, "I havent read it, but I know that much nonsense is written and, unable to contribute new arguments, they give exaggerated interpretations. I am an historian and I do not look for controversies."
Incidentally, little more than a month before the paperback release of Hitlers Pope, a new book, Hitler, the War, and the Pope, appeared. Undertaken several years before Cornwells book appeared, the new bookby law professor Ronald J. Rychlakis a meticulous refutation of the "black legend" of Pius XIIs silent complicity with Hitler. It wont get the press Cornwells book didfew in the secular world care about a pope who is holy, even saintlybut its an honest, scholarly antidote to the dissembling poison of Cornwell. Look for an article by Rychlak, "Historical Dishonesty: The Lie of Hitlers Pope," in next months issue of This Rock.