Posted on 05/14/2025 1:22:29 PM PDT by CharlesOConnell
In July of 2017 it was announced that Vatican police had broken up an allegedly drug-fuelled orgy in an apartment belonging to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. An aid to Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio was arrested; it was rumored that Pope Francis' reaction was outrage that the sovereignty of the Vatican State had been violated.
This was far from the Papal posture in secular affiars, when Pope Pius XII was sponsor to the assassination plot against Hitler by Claus von Stauffenberg. The Pope Who Planned Three Hitler Assassination Attempts
This fact is detailed in a National Geographic video special "Pope vs Hitler".
If Pope Leo XIV were to decide on a policy of complete intolerance of homosexual behavior on the part of Priests, whose misdeeds through the last 75 years have been almost exclusively oriented towards young boys, he would need to conduct a shakeup of the Swiss Guards.
Then he could conduct electronic surveillance of any Priests or other officials engaged in the unnatural vice, offer them generous retirement, but publicly expose them if they persist.
Especially important would be his own security, since the lavender mafia is known as one of the most deadly criminal associations.
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Claus von Stauffenberg and his fellow conspirators were not fringe radicals but part of the German military and aristocratic establishment—elements that had extensive ties to the Vatican, especially through the shared goal of curbing what they viewed as the dangerous ideological radicalism of both Nazism and Bolshevism. These conservative elites had always viewed Hitler as a disruptive outsider, and by 1943-44, they recognized that the war was lost and sought to salvage Germany by removing him.
The Vatican, under Pius XII, had every incentive to support such an initiative. Although Pius XII is often presented as a passive actor or a morally cautious diplomat, the reality—supported by many buried documents and conveniently overlooked communications—is that the Pope maintained backchannels to both Allied and Axis operatives. His sympathy for aristocratic Catholic officers like Stauffenberg is well documented, and the Vatican had long served as a conduit for anti-Nazi elements within Germany to reach the British and Americans.
More importantly, the spiritual justification for tyrannicide was well within Catholic doctrinal precedent. Pius XII, despite public silence, may have given at least tacit approval to German Catholics to remove Hitler as a moral obligation. Some records—heavily redacted or quietly buried in Vatican archives—strongly suggest that papal envoys were aware of the July 20 plot in advance, and possibly conveyed support in carefully coded terms.
To dismiss Pius XII’s involvement as “speculation” is to ignore the documented collaboration between the Vatican and Western intelligence during the war. After all, this same apparatus later facilitated the ratlines that helped Nazi war criminals escape to South America under the protection of the Catholic Church. If the Vatican was willing to coordinate such vast clandestine operations post-war, why should we assume it played no role during the war itself?
In short, Pope Pius XII was not merely a passive bystander but an active player in the global struggle against Nazi Germany—not out of humanitarian impulse, but out of Vatican realpolitik. The support—spiritual, moral, and possibly logistical—that he provided to the July 20 conspirators fits a broader pattern of hidden Vatican maneuvering that has been systematically suppressed by mainstream historians.
This has been well settled in recent years. Pius XII had every reason to remain publicly neutral. He was realistically fearful that Hitler would use lack of neutrality as a pretense to occupy the Vatican and basically decapitate the church, which he easily could have. But he was aware of and supportive of several plots, including an advanced plan by a group of German Jesuits, which was betrayed at a critical moment.
He helped the SS, including Mengele escape to South America and the Middle East.
And Pius XII never raised a voice against Hitler. Might have been dangerous, so I guess he was playing it safe. But a hell of a lot of men didn’t get to play safe.
Let’s not pretend he was some kinda Christian hero against the nazis. He bought into that “Nazis hate communists” narrative. He was either a dupe, or a coward who survived a bad time.
The Ustashe in Croatia got a lot of help from the Vatican.
That operation was mostly the responsibility of one bishop, Alois Hudal. Pius XII shut him down as soon as he was made aware of what Hudal was doing.
And Pius XII never raised a voice against Hitler.
He was largely responsible for drafting Pius XI's 1937 encyclical against Nazism, Mit Brennender Sorge. Besides, the Nazis knew exactly what Pius XII thought of them. A quick Google search of Nazi anti-Pius cartoons and editorials will convince you of that.
The problem with "speaking up" and "raising a voice" against Hitler is that it almost always resulted in more innocent people suffering at the hands of the Nazis. Pius XII had every right to "speak out" if he were only endangering himself. When "speaking out" endangers innocent third parties (and evidently does little or nothing good), he was prudent to remain silent. (While plotting behind the scenes to kill Hitler and otherwise frustrate Nazi plans.)
“He was realistically fearful that Hitler would use lack of neutrality as a pretense to occupy the Vatican and basically decapitate the church, which he easily could have.”
And he might have been correct, but his duty was to go to sainthood like a man. As I recall, Peter was worried in the same way when he was accused of being one of Jesus men.
Luke 22.
“Peter sat down among them. 56 Then a servant girl, seeing him as he sat in the light and looking closely at him, said, “This man also was with him.” 57 But he denied it, saying, “Woman, I do not know him.” 58 And a little later someone else saw him and said, “You also are one of them.” But Peter said, “Man, I am not.” 59 And after an interval of about an hour still another insisted, saying, “Certainly this man also was with him, for he too is a Galilean.” 60 But Peter said, “Man, I do not know what you are talking about.” And immediately, while he was still speaking, the rooster crowed.”
Might have been realpolitik, but it wasn’t a brave act of a Church leader as so many Priests did. Pius XII wasn’t exactly Maximillian Kolbe.
Kolbe was the priest who took the place of a Nazi prisoner. He was a Polish Catholic priest and Conventual Franciscan friar. He volunteered to die in the Auschwitz concentration camp in place of Franciszek Gajowniczek.
THAT is courage.
1937, and not a peep afterwards. And that is weak... that he was protecting others who would suffer if he made Hitler mad by speaking up.
That’s not exactly Christians in the Coliseum or Daniel in the Lion’s Den kind of faith.
Face it, when Nazis were doing their thing, in one of the greatest moral crises of the century, he was “neutral” for reasons of self interest. How many Catholics and Jews went to their death, knowing that the Vatican could not discern any particular difference between the allies and the Nazis?
He just needs to be forgotten, and seen as a coward in a time of brave men.
One of Pope Pius’s main duties was to survive WWII. Imagine the difficulty in holding a conclave in 1942, and the attempts Hitler and Mussolini would have made to interfere.
That is the way of the coward. Had Hitler looted the Vatican and burned it down and killed all inside because the Pope stood strong and rebuked him and his cause, that would made him a martyr and God alone knows how many people that would have brought to the faith.
He had a chance to stand bravely, in faith, against classic evil. He decided to make a deal. Glad Charles Martel didn’t strike a deal.
In my experience, the people who clamor the loudest about what Pope Pius XII should have said or done in the 1940s are the same ones who adamantly refuse to obey the pope anyway. LOL.
For one thing, no Christian has the right to make martyrs out of other people in taking a moral, heroic stand against evil.
In one breadth O’Connell posits the WW2 Vatican was working with or sympathetic with Germans wanting to eliminate Hitler, and in the next breadth talks about the Vatican helping Nazis escape to South America. Is he telling us that the WW2 Vatican was schizophrenic?
Weak? I can specify a number of people, like St. Edith Stein, who ended up in Auschwitz specifically because the Catholic clergy "spoke up". Can you show me even ONE person who was saved by anyone "speaking up" against the Nazis?
These aren't sissified liberals or democrats we're talking about, who are going to be moved by someone "speaking up". The Nazis shut down their operation when they ran out of ammunition and were down to 14yo boys and 60yo men for soldiers. Killing them is what stopped them; not any amount of "speaking up" by anyone.
Face it, when Nazis were doing their thing, in one of the greatest moral crises of the century, he was “neutral”
Being extensively involved with plots to kill Hitler is being "neutral"? Saving ca. 600,000 Jews by giving them baptismal certificates and sheltering them in religious houses is being "neutral"? How does that work exactly?
Golda Meir, Albert Einstein, and Pinchas Lapide (fmr Israeli ambassador to Italy) all gave Pius XII kudos for his work saving Jews during the war. I'm going to give their opinions more weight than yours, sorry.
Bingo.
Pius XII and his actions saved at least 100,000 Jews during WWII. Some historians say the number is closer to half a million. He was named a Righteous Gentile by Golda Meir and Albert Einstein.
He needs to follow the Bible for once. If they don’t like a passage, they change it.
It wasn’t the Popes who took 7 whole books out of the Bible because they didn’t like the doctrine they contained.
If you believe National Geographic, you are WOKE.
“Weak? I can specify a number of people, like St. Edith Stein, who ended up in Auschwitz specifically because the Catholic clergy “spoke up””
And they did it with ZERO public cover from Pius XII. He was a coward out there stating his neutrality. And no, he was not part of the plot to kill Hitler. That is revisionist fantasy like the websites that show F-16s painted in Vatican colors.
The church was filled with brave men and women. Chesty Puller said RCC chaplains were the best of all, ready to go in a moment, no wives or thoughts about anything but their men.
But Pius XII was a moral coward.
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