Posted on 01/03/2010 11:00:10 AM PST by Gamecock
Ten years ago, on a cold winter morning in New York City, the Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission, established to investigate Pope Pius XII’s response to the Holocaust, met for the first time to discuss its future work. I was the only Israeli historian among the six scholars (three Catholics and three Jews) designated by the Vatican and leading Jewish organizations to study this hotly contested issue.
A little under two years later, the project was abandoned as a result of the Holy See’s unwillingness to release materials from its own archives that could help clarify issues that our team of scholars raised in our provisional report. Already at that time, in the last years of Pope John Paul’s pontificate, there were moves afoot to place Pius XII on the fast track to sainthood, but they were probably slowed down by Israeli and Jewish protests and a desire by church authorities to prevent a serious rupture in Catholic-Jewish relations.
At issue was the silence of Pius XII during the Holocaust and his indirect complicity in the Nazi mass murder of Jews. These allegations, which first emerged around 1964, had prompted the Vatican to publish 11 volumes of its own documents (edited by four trusted Jesuit scholars), most of them appearing in the 1970s. It was these documents in Italian, German, French, Latin and English that we were originally asked to review. The million or so unpublished documents from the pontificate of Pius XII (1939–1958) according to the Vatican’s most recent estimate, will only be available in about four years’ time.
It is in this context that we need to see the recent decree on the “heroic virtues” of Pius XII, just signed by Pope Benedict XVI. Most Jews have interpreted this act as yet another signal that the Vatican is determined to beatify the controversial wartime pope — whom some even consider to have been anti-Semitic — regardless of what the historical evidence may indicate.
The sharp response of Jewish leaders to Benedict’s decree prompted the Vatican’s press office director, Father Federico Lombardi, S.J., to release a conciliatory note distinguishing between the historical judgment of Pius XII’s actions (still an open question) and the saintly Christian life he apparently led. In particular, Father Lombardi was concerned to disclaim any notion that this decree was “a hostile act towards the Jewish people,” or an obstacle to Catholic-Jewish dialogue.
Nevertheless, the decree on Pius XII still raises concern not only about the continuing drive to beatify the wartime pontiff but also about the present pope and the state of relations between the Catholic Church and the Jewish people.
Regarding Pius XII, I personally have never seen him either as “Hitler’s pope” (the theory of British historian John Cornwell — a “lapsed” Catholic), or as the “righteous gentile” evoked by Rabbi David Dalin. My own provisional conclusion drawn from the study of thousands of documents is that the mass murder of Jews was fairly low on his list of priorities. Of course, much the same could be said of Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin, but they did not claim to be the “Vicar of Christ,” or to represent the Christian conscience.
Pius XII strikes me as a polished diplomat far more worried about the Allied bombing of Rome than about the thousand Roman Jews who were being deported by the Germans to their deaths in Auschwitz, virtually under the windows of the Holy See. True, other Roman Jews were discreetly given sanctuary in ecclesiastical establishments in and around Rome after October 1943, but it remains unclear if this was the result of a direct papal instruction.
In some instances we know that Pius XII did try to intervene against Nazi or racist anti-Semitic legislation, but in general this was almost always on behalf of baptized Jews since they were protected by the church as Catholics. Pius’s rare references to the mass murder of the Jews were invariably veiled and very abstract, as if he found it difficult to utter the word itself. Was it fear of further German reprisals? A latent anti-Semitism? Was it his visceral anti-Communism which also led him to hope for a Nazi victory in the East? Or perhaps the desire to spare German Catholics a conflict of conscience between their loyalty to Hitler, the fatherland, or their church? Whatever the reasons, this was hardly heroic conduct.
So why has Benedict XVI chosen to take this step now? Why risk unnecessary damage to Catholic-Jewish relations? My own inclination is to think that the present pope regards Pius XII as a soulmate — both theologically and politically. He shares with the wartime pontiff an authoritarian centralist world-view and a deep distrust of liberalism, modernity, and the ravages of moral relativism. He was 31 years old when Pius XII died in 1958, and already then regarded him as a venerated role model.
Moreover, the German-born Joseph Ratzinger (today Benedict XVI) certainly knew that Pius XII (an aristocratic Roman) was also a passionate Germanophile, surrounded by German aides during and after the war, fluent in the German language, and a great admirer of the German Catholic Church. Not only that, but Ratzinger probably also knows that Pius XII personally intervened after 1945 to commute the sentences of convicted German war criminals. This solicitude for Nazi criminals contrasts sharply with Pius XII ignoring all entreaties to make a public statement against anti-Semitism even after the full horrors of the death camps had been revealed in 1945.
In this context it is profoundly unsettling to think that the ultraconservative Benedict XVI and his entourage can identify so completely with Pius XII as a man of “heroic virtue.” The present pope, no doubt, deplores anti-Semitism, though his statements on the subject have been noticeably less robust than those of his predecessor, John Paul II.
At Yad Vashem last summer he expressed no personal regret as a German for the unspeakable horrors of the Shoah, even though he had once been a member of the Hitler Youth. True, he had little choice in the matter. However, he was disturbingly vague about the truly monstrous German role in the Holocaust. Earlier in 2009, Benedict also showed remarkably poor judgment (to put it charitably) in reinstating an unrepentant Holocaust-denying British bishop into the mainstream Catholic Church, an action he only retracted after worldwide Jewish and Catholic protests.
These mistakes appear to follow a pattern and may even indicate a regression from the real progress in Catholic-Jewish relations under Benedict’s predecessor. One can only hope they are not irreversible since the stakes are high and no sane person can be interested in undermining the bridges across the abyss that have been so painstakingly constructed.
Robert S. Wistrich is director of The Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the author of A Lethal Obsession: Anti-Semitism from Antiquity to the Global Jihad (Random House, January 2010).
Perhaps ya’ll’s finger frothing cliques should get some new mirrors and check them to answer that question.
I’m not in charge of nor do I have anything to do with
the Vatican Affiliates/ Papal Submissives’ BASHING BRIGADES running amuck DEMANDING of Prottys kowtowing, submission, compliance and lots of other fool things to their Vatican Affiliate/ Papal Submissives’ heretical labels, dogma, doctrines, rituals etc.
I’m a Pentecostal Protty, in case that’s been forgotten.
No it doesn't - It simply means that the individual Catholic posters are just that - individuals. It's a matter of authority - and I don't have any more authority to speak on behalf of my Church than you do on behalf of yours.
That doesn't mean we should try to be poor apologists, and it doesn't excuse bad manners on either side. And so far as orthodoxy goes, I assure you that the Catholic posters will keep each other honest - but that only means that we are trying to elaborate on what was first said by Christ through the Church.
From simple nomenclature to apologetics, RCs on this board are evasive, abrasive, and defensive. This latest of yours is in character.
1) I was asking for the meaning of what you said to be clarified so that I could jump in and respond to it - I hardly appreciate being accused of malice for having done so.
2) No one group has a monopoly on evasive, abrasive, and/or defensive posters. Some of the most abrasive posters and some of the most evasive posters on this thread are Protestants.
Those who will not define their faith, cannot speak for their faith, and will not be held to what they maintain for their faith, might consider it an option to keep their comments to themselves.
I don't know who you speak of... I don't see anyone like that here on either side.
I was trying to be a good submissive Protty and not assume his state of mind in any way but it seemed to make him angrier. I was afraid I was going to be burned at the cyber stake.
With a text book case of Croiser envy.
Certainly a reasonable concern.
LUB
Nope.
Just but it does sound like another outrageous Vatican Affiliate/ Papal Submissive’s crazy fantasy in their own unique reality.
Protty mouth alert (of the pentanostril persuasion).
Love it.
Thanks much. Great belly laugh.
Besides . . . a bonus . . .
it illustrates
Vatican Affiliates/ Papal Submissives’ pettiness so exquisitely.
Protty mouth alert.
“Vatican affilates/...submissives”, etc.
Titanites, it’s all just more of the same.
So many threads degenerate into this.
It becomes a bunch of nonsense in a revolving door that goes nowhere and accomplishes nothing (except the generation of ill-will).
Unfortunately, that is true, and it doesn't look like it will end any time soon. The Admin Mod (a Protestant) made 2 posts in an attempt to coach, but they were so casually brushed aside with lame justification.
NOT HERETICAL
and therefore acceptable to me as well as all those under the broad umbrella of the Vatican.
I have invited ANY of the Vatican affiliates to offer a different NONheretical term that was MUTUALLY acceptable. There's been only one response which was, sadly, not acceptable. They have only themselves to thank for any term I use. How anyone would imagine that Vatican Affiliates was something to be offended at only their strange cognitions could explain.
As we have seen,
particularly the more rabid Vatican Affiliates, Papal Submissives, Roman Catholics, Papists, et al
seem to spend a LOT of time looking for things to be offended over.
They and their ARROGANT DEMANDS have resulted in such labels and yet they still wail, whine, throw dust in the air
AND DEMAND, DEMAND, DEMAND, DEMAND MORE AND MORE AND MORE CONFORMITY TO THEIR DEMANDS.
Almost sounds and feels like The Vatican edicts must have felt 400-600 years ago.
CONFORM! KOWTOW! SUBMIT!!!
OR ELSE!
I don't think I've ever seen a more unseemly, more obnoxious, more mean-spirited, more unGodly, more horrific, more hypocritical, more duplicitous, more quick to be offended over nothing to relatively nothing; more UNinsightful; MORE BRITTLE, MORE THIN SKINNED, more jerk-like; greater volcanoes of bile; gaggle of GROUCHY whiners in my 63 years of living.
If Mary herself has any awareness of this gaggle of grumps, she must be shaking her head in terminal disgust.
Sheesh what a stinking pile of hideousness.
If I were a non-Christian considering Christianity, I'd want to run as far and as fast as I could from such a dreadfully horrific example of so called "Christianity."
One could have logically thought that "Vatican Affiliates" Great. Covers the Romans as well as the nonRomans in communion with Rome and submitted to The Pope. Similarly, "Papal Submissives." I've seen post after post about how all the different rites under Rome's umbrella are submitted to the Pope. That sounded like a good label that folks would be proud to be part of.
But NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO this wonderful gaggle with chronic ingrown toenails has chosen to wail yet more and louder over the very conciliatory effort designed to try and please the chronic grouches.
I'd have been proud if someone had called me a Pentecostal Affiliate. I'd have been proud if anyone had called me a Holy Spirit submissive. I guess the Papists are really NOT proud to be affiliated with the Vatican and are NOT really proud to be submitted to the Pope. Who'd a thunk!
And/or else, they just enjoy being TERMINALLY CONTRARY Welllllllllllll blow the man down. What a surprise. I know. What a surprise. NOT. However, I've held out and somewhat still do to enjoy those dear precious Roman Catholics who are authentic Christians and act like it enough to enjoy good fellowship and dialogue with.
However, the rest of the sorry lot can go suck rocks or chase ducks or sit on pine cones for all I care. I have not a shred of resepct left for all of you combined. I don't see your Christianity as worth a pig's snort. Any of you who think or care about a shred of my respect [I can't imagine that there are any--but just in case]--it will have to be earned. You've burned up whatever reserve amount there was left.
BTW, though I realize that Pentenostril was most likely mean spirited--I love it. You don't know how touching it is given my nose. I'll long remember it with great fondness.
I am SEW not interested in this thread. A newspaper article to deal with something so heated and controversial? No thanks. I’ll remember the chief rabbi of Rome who converted to Catholicism after the war, and let it lie there.
Apparently they have.
That is their purpose. This thread is considered a success for those who hate the Catholic Church.
What ever you do when you get to heaven, don’t step on a duck.
LOL.
That was one of my mother’s sayings.
She had a lot of them. Most of them were a bit askew from most folks sayings.
She grew up poor white trash in the South pulling cotton with blacks when she was 6 years old to keep her dad out of prison for borrowing money on cattle he didn’t have to feed his family during the depression.
Praying for the FREEPATHON, Jim. Sure wish we could get a safe off shore backup. Guess OThuga is working hard to insure no where is safe.
Only the arms of God.
Prayers for your health and family. Hugs to Sheila, too.
“It isn’t a wafer.”
“Wafer” refers to shape and general physical description, and even this word cannot pass for that purpose without offending you?
I will continue to call it a wafer.
“THE BUDDHA OF CHRISTENDOM”
From Things To Come -— A Journal of Biblical Literature, December, 1894
Dr. Robert Anderson, C.B., has again laid all who value true Christianity under a deep debt of gratitude. His latest work has just been issued, and it bears the above title. This is not to explain the book before reading it, but rather to incite curiosity to read; and, that it’s reason is manifest.
The book is against traditional religion as being contrary to true Christianity: against the religion of Christendom as being opposite to the Christianity of the New Testament.
Dr. Anderson starts with the great and solemn fact, that in the spiritual sphere some disaster has fallen upon the human race, which makes it impossible for man ever, of himself, to get spiritually right, apart from grace; and causes him ever and inevitably to degrade, corrupt, and pervert spiritual things.
This is true of every form and face of religion, of Judaism in the wilderness and the Land; of Buddhism in India; and of Christianity in Christendom. All alike have become degraded, and were it possible to wipe the slate and commence de novo, we should find in due course the same corruptions and the same abominations. For the human mind in human nature is the same in every age.
Dr. Anderson gives the coup de grace to the pernicious theory that “we must go back to the first three centuries if we want to see pure primitive Christianity.” Well, he goes back to those centuries, and, quoting from contemporary authorities, he enables us to see what it was. Within a century and a half from the apostles, “Christian doctrines had become corrupted by the teaching of Greek paganism. Pagan baptism had superseded Christian baptism.... Christian thought had become leavened by the Gnostic philosophy, which regarded every thing corporeal as evil.” And then we see the strange anomaly, that side-by-side with the corruption of doctrine there was “an attempt to set up a more fastidious morality, and a more exalted piety than were taught by Christianity itself.” We see the same phenomenon today before our very eyes.
A terrible picture is drawn of the ecclesiastical evils of those early centuries, to which too many Christians look back with longing eyes but uninformed minds. Dr. Anderson shows that we cannot even go back to the first century to find ecclesiastical purity, for during the apostle Paul’s own lifetime the churches had given up him and his teaching (2 Timothy 2:15).
We shall hope from time to time to give some valuable extracts from this work. It is indeed “a book for the present crisis.”
We close our first notice with the following extract. After showing the teaching of the New Testament to be salvation by grace alone, he says (page 230):
“This will not be found in the newspapers. Neither will men believe it. The religion of Christendom is a systematized denial of it. But human religion has always been anti-Christian. The Lord Jesus preached the gospel to sinners, and ‘the common people heard Him gladly,’ for they owned that they were sinners; but the religious people retaliated by crucifying Him. And when His Apostle, addressing his co-religionists, announced that he had been commissioned to preach the gospel to the heathen, they flew into a frenzy of passion, cast off their clothes, threw dust in the air, and shouted: ‘Away with such a fellow from the earth; it is not fit that he should live.’ He had not, like some of his ‘successors,’ committed odious crimes, he had only preached forgiveness to common sinners in their sins, not through religion, but through Christ. And if this preaching excited furry in the days of real priests and real altars, need we wonder at opposition to it in these days of sham priests with sham altars? There is the religion of the Buddha of Christendom, which, like a pirate, holds the tortuous channel of salvation by ordinances; while Divine grace has cleared the way right out into the open sea.”
In the days of pagan Rome, the Church was on the side of the martyrs. In the days of Papal Rome, God was on the side of the martyrs, while the devil was on the side of the Church.
“The position maintained by the martyrs was no mere negation of the false; it was a testimony of the true. The Christian converts of early days turned from idols to ‘serve the living and true God.’ The martyrs of later days turned from ‘the Church,’ that they might be loyal to Christ. So it must ever be. There can be no true loyalty to the King without finance denouncing the pretender. Loyalty to Christ implies the repudiation of what is false to Christ. Christendom being what it is, every true Christian is, of necessity and in the very nature of things, a Protestant.”
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