Pope comes under criticism in Israel

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – The Vatican had to play down Pope Benedict's teenage membership of the Hitler Youth on Tuesday as Israeli disappointment at a lack of emotion in his remarks on the Holocaust dogged his tour of the Holy Land.

The speaker of the Knesset, echoing many of his compatriots, accused the German-born pope of showing detachment on Monday from Jewish suffering under the Nazis. He referred to Benedict as "a German who joined the Hitler Youth and ... Hitler's army."

The Vatican spokesman at first flatly denied that Benedict, 82, was ever in the Nazi youth movement. But when reporters noted the pope himself spoke of his membership in a 1996 book, he revised the statement to say: "He was enrolled involuntarily into the Hitler Youth but he had no active participation."

The pontiff, described by one Israeli newspaper columnist as coming across as "restrained, almost cold" during his visit to Jerusalem's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial, prayed at Judaism's Western Wall on Tuesday and visited Islam's Dome of the Rock -- holy sites at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

He later held an open-air mass under the walls of the Old City in the Garden of Gethsemane for hundreds of Catholics who applauded Jerusalem's patriarch for a welcome speech that spoke of the "agony of the Palestinian people" under occupation.

Benedict XVI stoked the flame and laid a floral wreath. Then, having met and conversed with six Holocaust survivors, he pronounced his address: "I have come", he said, "to stand in silence before this monument, erected to honour the memory of the millions of Jews killed in the horrific tragedy of the Shoah. They lost their lives, but they will never lose their names: these are indelibly etched in the hearts of their loved ones, their surviving fellow prisoners, and all those determined never to allow such an atrocity to disgrace mankind again. Most of all, their names are forever fixed in the memory of Almighty God. "One can rob a neighbour of possessions, opportunity or freedom", he added. "One can weave an insidious web of lies to convince others that certain groups are undeserving of respect. Yet, try as one might, one can never take away the name of a fellow human being". "The names enshrined in this hallowed monument will forever hold a sacred place among the countless descendants of Abraham. Like his, their faith was tested. Like Jacob, they were immersed in the struggle to discern the designs of the Almighty. May the names of these victims never perish! May their suffering never be denied, belittled or forgotten! And may all people of goodwill remain vigilant in rooting out from the heart of man anything that could lead to tragedies such as this! "The Catholic Church, committed to the teachings of Jesus and intent on imitating His love for all people", said the Pope, "feels deep compassion for the victims remembered here. Similarly, she draws close to all those who today are subjected to persecution on account of race, colour, condition of life or religion - their sufferings are hers, and hers is their hope for justice. As Bishop of Rome and Successor of the Apostle Peter, I reaffirm - like my predecessors - that the Church is committed to praying and working tirelessly to ensure that hatred will never reign in the hearts of men again. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the God of peace". "Gazing upon the faces reflected in the pool that lies in stillness within this memorial, one cannot help but recall how each of them bears a name. ... Who could have imagined that they would be condemned to such a deplorable fate! As we stand here in silence, their cry still echoes in our hearts. It is a cry raised against every act of injustice and violence. It is a perpetual reproach against the spilling of innocent blood. It is the cry of Abel rising from the earth to the Almighty". Then, in order to "give voice to that cry", the Pope read some verses from the Book of Lamentations which begin: "The favours of the Lord are not exhausted, His mercies are not spent". Having complete the reading, the Pope said: "I am deeply grateful to God and to you for the opportunity to stand here in silence: a silence to remember, a silence to pray, a silence to hope". At the end of the ceremony, the Holy Father signed the Yad Vashem visitors book in which he wrote a verse from the Book of Lamentations: "His mercies are not spent".

Here's a caption under a photo of Pope Piux XII at Yad Vashem . . .

In 1933, when he was Secretary of the Vatican State, he was active in obtaining a Concordat with the German regime to preserve the Church's rights in Germany, even if this meant recognizing the Nazi racist regime. When he was elected Pope in 1939, he shelved a letter against racism and anti-Semitism that his predecessor had prepared. Even when reports about the murder of Jews reached the Vatican, the Pope did not protest either verbally or in writing. In December 1942, he abstained from signing the Allied declaration condemning the extermination of the Jews. When Jews were deported from Rome to Auschwitz, the Pope did not intervene. The Pope maintained his neutral position throughout the war, with the exception of appeals to the rulers of Hungary and Slovakia towards its end. His silence and the absence of guidelines obliged Churchmen throughout Europe to decide on their own how to react.

If I were Pope Benedict XVI, I wouldn't have even bothered to show up at the place at all.

“If I were Pope Benedict XVI, I wouldn’t have even bothered to show up at the place at all.”

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Indeed.

The Vatican took Israel to task over the historical inaccuracies of that exhibit.

However, it remains on prominent display (and was discussed during the EWTN broadcast last night), and Pope Benedict did show up after all.