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The title of John Cornwell’s book suggests
(falsely) that Pope Pius XII
was a willing agent or supporter of Hitler.
In defense of Pope Pius XII
By Robert G. Fin
n British author Mr. John Cornwell in his new book, Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII, stated that the late Pope was an anti-Semite who was well informed about the extent of Nazi persecution of Jews but failed to do anything about it.
Unfortunately, the book’s sensationalism landed it on the pages of popular magazines and made it the subject of countless columns and editorials, most of which blindly accepted the book’s assertions as true, i.e., that the Pope personally was responsible for permitting the Holocaust and helping the Nazis gain power.
So, it is about time to set the record straight: The book’s title is suggesting that Pius XII was a willing agent of Hitler or, in some way, was “in Hitler’s pocket.” The subtitle is equally provocative. It suggests that there are dark “secrets” about Pope Pacelli in a style of “tabloid” biography that has become popular in recent years. Finally the photo on the book’s cover is also deceiving. It depicts Archbishop Pacelli leaving a government building in Berlin, and is saluted by the German guards. This official visit of the then nuncio took place not later than 1929, that is four years before Hitler came into power on January 30, 1933. Since Pacelli left Germany in 1929, and never returned there, using this photograph is misleading and tendentious.
Before becoming Pope Pius XII, Eugenio Pacelli was secretary of state in the Vatican under Pope Pius XI. In 1937, Pacelli was the author of the German language encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge (With burning Anxiety). It was issued by Pope Pius XI, who was in declining health. The encyclical was addressed to the church in Germany, and criticized various aspects of the Nazi regime, including the mistreatment of people because of their race or nationality.
By the encyclical, Pius XI was responding to the Nuremberg Laws issued on September 15 and November 15, 1935, which became the legal basis for the exclusion of Jews from civil rights. The Reich Citizenship Law stipulated that only Germans and Aryans could be citizens of the Reich. Those racially Jewish lost their political rights through this law.
A subsequent series of implementation ordinances systematically excluded Jews from German life. In 1938, for example, Jewish doctors were no longer allowed to practice medicine, all Jewish organizations had to register with government authorities, and banned from work in real estate and loan negotiations.
A second law, the “Law for the Protection of German Blood,” prohibited marriages and extramarital intercourse between Jews and Germans. These laws passed by the Reichstag and signed by Hitler were upheld by Germany’s highest court, the Reichsgericht in 1936. In response, Pius XI’s Mit Brennender Sorge clearly upholds the inalienable rights of all people and races:
God’s commandments are independent of time, space, or nation. As God’s sun shines on all the human race without distinction, so His law knows no privileges, no exceptions. Rulers and ruled, great and small, rich and poor, depend equally on His word. The fundamental fact is that man as a person possesses rights given him by God, which must be preserved from every attempt by the community to deny, or hinder their exercise. The Bishops of the Church of Christ must watch that such pernicious error, which usually brings in its train even more pernicious errors finds no support among the faithful. (“Mit Brennender Sorge,” 1937)
A later encyclical of Pope Pius XII, “Summi Pontificatus,” repeated the same theme. The Gestapo seized all copies in Germany, destroyed printing presses, and arrested people, all in order to prevent its distribution in the country.
The New York Times editorialized on Christmas day in 1941: “The voice of Pius XII is the only voice in the silence and darkness that developed in Europe this Christmas. . . . He is the only ruler left on the continent of Europe who dares to raise his voice at all.”
Under Pius XII, hundreds of thousands of Jews throughout Europe were saved from the Holocaust through false baptismal certificates, shelter in convents and other church facilities. The rules for cloistered convents were changed for this purpose.
What is ignored by Cornwell is the fact that millions of non-Jews, too, were killed in the same Holocaust, and many of them were Catholics.
Although a proper reply to all of Cornwell’s allegations and distortions might require a volume twice the size of his book, we should list a few historical facts. For instance, the day after Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli was elected pope, a Berlin newspaper commented: “The election of Cardinal Pacelli is not accepted with favor in Germany because he was always opposed to Nazism.”
We should also quote some contemporary observers:
- Countering Cornwell’s accusations, the Israeli diplomat Pinchas Lapide stated: “The Catholic Church under the pontificate of Pius XII was instrumental in saving as many as 860,000 Jews from certain death at Nazi hands. This figure exceeds by far those saved by all other churches and rescue organizations combined.” (Pinchas Lapide, Three Popes and the Jews, New York: Hawthorn Publishers, 1967.)
- The head of Italy’s wartime “Jewish Rescue Committee,” Dr. Rafael Contoni, would insist that “The Church and papacy saved Jews as much and in as far as they could save Christians. There would have been many more victims had it not been for the efficacious intervention of Pius XII.”
- The former Chief Rabbi of Rome during the war, Emilio Zolli, who later became a Catholic, wrote at the end of his account of wartime events: “Volumes could be written on the many efforts of Pius XII and the countless priests and religious who stood with him throughout the world during war. No hero in all history was more militant, more fought against, none more heroic than Pius XII in pursuing the work of true charity, and this on behalf of all the suffering children of God.” (Emilio Zolli, Before the Dawn, New York: Sheed and Ward, 1954).
- And when Pius XII died on October 9, 1958, Ms. Golda Meir, later prime minister of Israel, sent a telegram to the Vatican in which she said: “We share in the grief of humanity. When fearful martyrdom came to our people during the time of Nazi terror, the voice of the Pope was raised for the victims. The life of our times was enriched by a voice speaking about great moral truths above the tumult of daily conflict. We mourn a great servant of peace!”
In April 1999, Jewish and Catholic leaders erected a stark reminder of the Holocaust in a garden that belongs to the Vatican: a four-foot-high bronze menorah specially fitted with six candles to symbolize the six million Jews who were killed by the Nazis.
The menorah which was delivered by a group of Jewish leaders from New York and New Jersey, was placed in the courtyard of the Pontifical North American College of Rome, a seminary which was built on Vatican property.
The original idea for the menorah came from Gunther Lawrence, executive director of the Interreligious Information Center of New York City. His proposal was immediately accepted by the leaders of the North American College and Cardinal Edward I. Cassidy, president of the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.
During the dedication ceremony, the mourner’s prayer, the “kaddish” was said by the senior Rabbi of Manhattan’s Park Avenue Synagogue. Afterwards, Rabbi John Bemporad, the director of the Center for Interreligious Understanding at Ramapo College, in New Jersey, delivered the address. His concluding words were: “There are important things we can do between Catholics and Jews given the total cooperation we already have.”
A final word about John Cornwell. He remarked that he worked “for months on end” in the Vatican’s Archives. That could be easily checked because one has to apply to use the Archives, sign in and out every time one uses the Archives, and a log is kept of every person who uses them, including the days and time spent therein. The log books show that Cornwell was admitted to the Archives from May 12, 1997 to June 2, 1997, hardly “for months on end,” but for a period of three weeks. The logs also show that in this very limited time period Cornwell did not come every day, and on those days when he did come, his visits were very brief.
In order to prepare a serious scholarly analysis, and to consolidate the dialogue between Jews and Catholics, six scholars have been called to participate in a commission that will examine the Vatican documents, stressing historical truth and using methodology that is common to all professionals.
The commission consists of three Jews and three Catholics. The Jewish scholars are: Michael Marrus, historian and dean of Graduate Studies, University of Toronto; Bernard Suchecky, researcher, Free University of Brussels, and Robert Wistrich, professor of History and Hebrew Studies, University of Jerusalem.
The Catholics are: Eva Fleischner, professor emerita, Montclair State University, New Jersey; the Jesuit Gerald Fogarty, Department of Religious Studies, University of Virginia; and Rev. John Morley, a scholar on the Holocaust, Seton Hall University, New Jersey.
There is nothing to be feared from the truth. As surely as the Vatican is convinced that John Cornwell has given us a spurious and biased account, the Church is equally confident that the mentioned six specialists will do their utmost to bring the truth to light.
Reverend Robert G. Fin was born in Hungary and studied for the priesthood in Rome. He was ordained in Czechoslovakia in 1943 and taught Latin and Russian in Czechoslovakia, Romania and Hungary. He was put into a concentration camp with other priests in Hungary in 1950 and escaped to the United States in 1951. He joined the Gannon University faculty in 1953 in Erie, Pa., where he taught Russian. Fr. Fin is now semi-retired, but continues to teach in the Adult Education and Kids College departments at Gannon.
Back to Homiletic & Pastoral Review Table of Contents November 2000