Hitler's Pope?

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I saw this argument on a website. Can anyone help? :

"Yeah. I have noticed there are an awful lot of lunatics who call themselves Christian. In fact the more religious a country is the crime and especially violent crime occurs within it.

Funny how the catholic church NEVER excommunicated him.

Hitler worked CLOSELY with Pope Pius in converting Germanic society and supporting the church. The Church absorbed Nazi ideals and preached them as part of their sermons in turn.

he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law. He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home.

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education. The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus. The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion. In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies,” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany."

I’m not sure what to think.
 
The_Catholic said:
I saw this argument on a website. Can anyone help? :
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Sure. The argument is absolute bunk. Let’s look at just one point:
He outlawed all abortion…
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No, he didn’t. Here’s the facts about abortion in Nazi Germany:

lifeissues.net/writers/air/air_vol16no1_2001.html

An excerpt (with emphases added):
Hence, in 1933, in their first year of power, the Nazis passed a law forbidding abortion to Germans, increasing the penalties as they had been before Weimar liberalization.(24) The Nazis wanted to increase the birthrate so as to have soldiers for their military. In March 1934, however, the Hereditary Health Court in Hamburg rendered a judgment which stated that abortion on grounds of racial health was not an offense. In its decision, it referred to a Supreme Court decision during the Weimar democracy seven years earlier, allowing the procedure for “medical necessities.”(25) In June 1935 the sterilization law was also amended to allow abortions on eugenic grounds and these abortions had to be followed by sterilizations, dependent – technically – on the woman’s consent.(26) Thus, sterilization, eugenics and abortion all come together.

For the first time in German history, abortion was legal. But one cannot ignore the roots reaching back almost fifteen years to the beginning of the Weimar democracy, during which time arguments had been made that unborn life was not that important so was therefore expendable. Despite the racial theories behind this decision there were some non-Nazis who approved because of the allowing of choice.(27) In 1938 the government announced that Jews could have abortions at any time, since this could only benefit the German people.(28) The Jews, as well as “unfit” Germans, had a “choice” most Germans did not. This meant that the Nazis saw abortion as a very useful weapon against undesirables; e.g. as an act of elimination.

During World War II the Nazis used sterilizations and abortions (also birth control and even the promotion of homosexuality) extensively in eastern Europe to carry out their eugenics policies. The specific aim was to keep eastern females available for slave labor while at the same time weakening eastern nations by hampering the reproduction of Slavic peoples.(29) Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS, a chief architect of the Holocaust, and personal friend of Adolf Hitler, once stated that the tragedy of abortion for German women was that afterwards women often could not have children. Not in the loss of an “individual life,” as he put it.(30) The Nazis used the word “parent” to describe pregnant women and the fathers of the unborn(31) and the word “child” to describe the unborn themselves.(32) Nazis forbade abortion in order to preserve German unborn but allowed, even encouraged, the destruction of non-German unborn.(33)

The website you reference is a pack of lies.

– Mark L. Chance.
 
The first thing to do when you read garbage like this, before trying to defend it, is ask for the source. If there is an unbiased, reliable, credible first hand source with references - which there rarely is - then, maybe it’s worth you’re time.
 
The_Catholic said:
"Yeah. I have noticed there are an awful lot of lunatics who call themselves Christian. In fact the more religious a country is the crime and especially violent crime occurs within it.

Funny how the catholic church NEVER excommunicated him.

Hitler worked CLOSELY with Pope Pius in converting Germanic society and supporting the church. The Church absorbed Nazi ideals and preached them as part of their sermons in turn.

he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law. He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home.

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education. The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus. The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion. In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies,” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany."

I’m not sure what to think.
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It’s all bunk. Demand sources. The only further thing I have to say is to look at how many people were killed in communist Russia. Atheist country.
 
I agree with those that posted before me. Ask for a credible, unbiased source! If they can’t provide one, it’s probably not even worth debating with them. 👍
 
The_Catholic said:
I saw this argument on a website. Can anyone help? :

"Yeah. I have noticed there are an awful lot of lunatics who call themselves Christian. In fact the more religious a country is the crime and especially violent crime occurs within it.

Funny how the catholic church NEVER excommunicated him.

Hitler worked CLOSELY with Pope Pius in converting Germanic society and supporting the church. The Church absorbed Nazi ideals and preached them as part of their sermons in turn.

he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law. He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home.

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education. The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus. The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion. In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies,” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany."

I’m not sure what to think.
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It’s good that you ask. The problem with American society is that way too many people rant and complain about the Catholic Church without using sense or logic. Thank you for taking the time to overcome the nonsense in the quote you put in.

If I can be completely frank, usually the people who rant like that are idiot bozos without any real education on what they say. They pontificate as if they’re experts, but let’s view them for what they are: the modern equivalent of the nutcase on the street. They need to learn to shut up. If they wanna criticise, fine, but they need to quit being so frickin stupid. They are re-Crucifying Christ with their acrimonious nonsensical allegations against His Church.

Notice how these pompous blow-hards never use references. There are two reasons for that: #1, there are no documented references for their claims (again, no proof for what they say, cause it just isn’t true) and #2, they’re probably so stupid they don’t even know how to reference things or understand the importance of it. There’s a reason why they post that on the internet: it’s the only place where they can speak. Nobody in real life wants to hear their rubbish.

So, let’s take this step by step, so we can tell these people off when they just won’t shut up. (To the original poster: If it seems like I’m ticked at you, I’m not, of course, since I know you’re on our side. My hostilities are aimed toward the people who made those claims. Again, I think it’s great that you work to fight back to put them in their place.)

Hitler worked CLOSELY with Pope Pius in converting Germanic society and supporting the church.

This is just nonsense from people who don’t know history. How did they work closely? Historians tell us that Hitler had a plan to kidnap Pius XII. It’s true. Pius XII knew of the threat and drafted his own resignation, to go into effect if that should happen. That’s not a close relationship. That’s downright hostile. (Sanchez, 77-78)

Hitler wasn’t interested in spreading the Catholic message. Hitler was not a practising Catholic; Nazism was its own religion that had its own mysticism and beliefs (even a source as pedestrain as Wikipedia and The History Channel reports on it). He wanted to spread Nazism, not Catholicism.

The Church absorbed Nazi ideals and preached them as part of their sermons in turn.

Again, just dead wrong. We have cases of Bishops and Cardinals standing up to the Nazis. The Dutch Bishops did so, for example. (Sanchez, 133). The German Cardinal August Graf von Galen condemned the Nazi agenda and the deportation of Jews. He preached it from the pulpit and those sermons were published. Does that sound like he preached Nazi ideals?

Pius XII’s speeches repeatedly spoke out against the Nazis. He did not mention the Nazis by name, but he spoke out against what they were doing. It was clear for whom the message was meant. Again, people don’t know history, but if they did, they’d know these aspects.

When Pius XI was Pope, Eugenio Pacelli (who would later be Pius XII) was his Secretary of State. In that time, the Pope wrote an encyclical that was stinging against the Nazis. It was so offensive to the Nazis that it had to be smuggled into Germany. It was read from the pulpit on Sunday in all German parishes.

True, Pius XII was not Pope at that time, but he was Secretary of State, a close associate of Pius XI. He had (name removed by moderator)ut into what the document would say.

Now, it is true that Pius XII did not excommunicate Hitler, but you know what? The Catholic Bishops in Nazi-occupied territories sternly told the Pope not to, because if he did, it would only enrage Hitler even more (Dalin, 79). It was bad enough that the Jews were being killed off; you know that Hitler would have gone after Catholics next. He already started; priests like the Franciscan Maximilian Kolbe and nuns like the Discalced Carmelite Edith Stein were carted off and killed in Auschwitz. Those were the two most famous examples; there were many, many, many more.

(continued on next post)
 
(continued)“he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law. He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home.”

Is that so? I must have missed the memo where the Pope said to kill all homosexuals. I guess that means suicide for me (joke).

Nazis were not against abortion. They were for it. They saw killing off the weak as a way to make the human race evolve better.

See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_abortion#1920s_to_1960s and lifeissues.net/writers/air/air_vol16no1_2001.html.

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education. The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus. The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion. In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies,” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany."

Yeah, Luther said that. But Luther wasn’t a Catholic, was he. What he said did not affect Catholic Doctrine. For the last 500 years, Luther hasn’t been a favourite in the Church.

But you know what? In a way, Hitler’s extremely negative relationship with the Pope doesn’t matter. What matters were the results.

Result #1
Pius XII was responsible for protecting half a million Jews from the Nazis. He ordered convents to be opened up to them and allowed use of other Church property. He also opened up his own home: Castel Gandolfo, the Pope’s Summer Residence, was opened to Jewish people fleeing from the Nazis.

He saved way more people than Oskar Schindler.

Result #2
After he died, Jewish leaders hailed Pius XII. Said Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir:
“We share in the grief of humanity at the passing away of His Holiness Pope Pius XII. In a generation affected by wars and discords, he upheld the highest ideals of peace and compassion. When fearful martyrdom came to our people in the decade of Nazi terror, the voice of the Pope was raised for the victims (emphasis mine). The life of our times was enriched by a voice speaking out on the great moral truths above the tumult of daily conflict. We mourn a great servant of peace.”

On Youtube, I got into an argument with some moron who complained that the Church invented both Communism and Capitalism. I don’t usually post on those things, but when I see people spreading idiotic errors like that, I need to fight back. I told him that no historian agrees with him and his claims have no basis with people who know about these things. He came back and said that his understanding of history is something hidden, like knowledge passed down from secret societies. I replied to him one last time that I’m not going to waste myself arguing point by point with him because he clearly doesn’t know what he’s talking about; the proof that he’s an idiot: he said the Church created both Capitalism and Communism. I told him that makes utterly no sense (they’re two systems that directly contradict each other). He never replied. Amazing how just a little glimmer of truth will make these people shut up, isn’t it?

I worked hard on preparing this response for you, including putting in references (I wanted to put my money where my mouth is). I hope you put it to good use. I know it isn’t formatted well and it’s all a mess, but the essence is in there. I was just more eager to answer your post and explain things right that I just put this together hastily.

Works Cited:
(In addition to the websites I put in above; sorry, I know this isn’t proper Turabian format)

Dalin, David G. The Myth of Hitler’s Pope: How Pope Pius XII Rescued Jews from the Nazis
Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2005.
Rychlak, Ronald J. Righteous Gentiles: How Pius XII and the Catholic Church
Saved Half a Million Jews from the Nazis
Dallas, Texas: Spence Publishing Company, 2005.
Sanchez, Jose. Pius XII and the Holocaust: Understanding the Controversy.
Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2002.
 
JesuXPIPassio said:
(continued)“he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law. He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home.”
Is that so? I must have missed the memo where the Pope said to kill all homosexuals. I guess that means suicide for me (joke).

Nazis were not against abortion. They were for it. They saw killing off the weak as a way to make the human race evolve better.

See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_abortion#1920s_to_1960s and lifeissues.net/writers/air/air_vol16no1_2001.html.

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education. The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus. The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion. In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies,” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany."
Yeah, Luther said that. But Luther wasn’t a Catholic, was he. What he said did not affect Catholic Doctrine. For the last 500 years, Luther hasn’t been a favourite in the Church.

But you know what? In a way, Hitler’s extremely negative relationship with the Pope doesn’t matter. What matters were the results.

Result #1
Pius XII was responsible for protecting half a million Jews from the Nazis. He ordered convents to be opened up to them and allowed use of other Church property. He also opened up his own home: Castel Gandolfo, the Pope’s Summer Residence, was opened to Jewish people fleeing from the Nazis.

He saved way more people than Oskar Schindler.

Result #2
After he died, Jewish leaders hailed Pius XII. Said Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir:
“We share in the grief of humanity at the passing away of His Holiness Pope Pius XII. In a generation affected by wars and discords, he upheld the highest ideals of peace and compassion. When fearful martyrdom came to our people in the decade of Nazi terror, the voice of the Pope was raised for the victims (emphasis mine). The life of our times was enriched by a voice speaking out on the great moral truths above the tumult of daily conflict. We mourn a great servant of peace.”

On Youtube, I got into an argument with some moron who complained that the Church invented both Communism and Capitalism. I don’t usually post on those things, but when I see people spreading idiotic errors like that, I need to fight back. I told him that no historian agrees with him and his claims have no basis with people who know about these things. He came back and said that his understanding of history is something hidden, like knowledge passed down from secret societies. I replied to him one last time that I’m not going to waste myself arguing point by point with him because he clearly doesn’t know what he’s talking about; the proof that he’s an idiot: he said the Church created both Capitalism and Communism. I told him that makes utterly no sense (they’re two systems that directly contradict each other). He never replied. Amazing how just a little glimmer of truth will make these people shut up, isn’t it?

I worked hard on preparing this response for you, including putting in references (I wanted to put my money where my mouth is). I hope you put it to good use. I know it isn’t formatted well and it’s all a mess, but the essence is in there. I was just more eager to answer your post and explain things right that I just put this together hastily.

Works Cited:
(In addition to the websites I put in above; sorry, I know this isn’t proper Turabian format)

Dalin, David G. The Myth of Hitler’s Pope: How Pope Pius XII Rescued Jews from the Nazis
Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2005.
Rychlak, Ronald J. Righteous Gentiles: How Pius XII and the Catholic Church
Saved Half a Million Jews from the Nazis
Dallas, Texas: Spence Publishing Company, 2005.
Sanchez, Jose. Pius XII and the Holocaust: Understanding the Controversy.
Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2002.
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Thanks alot, it was awesome. I will be using much of it in my response to this guy.
 
The_Catholic said:
Thanks alot, it was awesome. I will be using much of it in my response to this guy.
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Yeah I forgot to mention this since I really wanted to get that response out to you quickly, but you might want to add that one of the book I cited Righteous Gentiles was written by a Rabbi.

In fact, the Chief Rabbi of Rome during Pius XII’s time, Israel Zolli, was hidden by the Catholic Church from the Nazis. He actually converted to Catholicism after he said he received a vision of Jesus, and took the Christian Name of Eugenio in honour of Pius XII (whose birth name was Eugenio Pacelli). Zolli was at the heart of it all: he was in Rome and at the summit of Judaism. Yet he praised the Pope for his hard work and even honoured him by taking on his name.

If Pius XII really was Hitler’s Pope, you’d have Jewish people hating him. Yet look where we are. Jewish leaders, scholars, historians and rabbis exhonerate the Pope and in fact praise him for the work he did.

People and their interesting versions of history… and by interesting, I mean stupid, backed up by a grand total of zero facts and using a grand total of zero brain cells.

I lost patience with these kinds of people long ago. It’s exhausting to deal with because everytime I encounter someone like that, I don’t want to let them go. Even though it’s like teaching advanced history to a bunch of brain-dead idiots, I can’t sit on my hands and let them do that.

The difference between us and them is that they come up with fake facts on the whim while we work to disprove their “facts” using sources and logic. It’s exhausting, but I feel we have to do it. Otherwise they’ll continue doing that and give the Church a worse reputation than it deserves. There are popes and bishops who did horrible things in the past, but historians showed us the Church during the Holocaust doesn’t qualify.

And this is never going to stop. For every liar out there that I correct, there are hundreds more that I never encounter, never get to show them how wrong they are. My whole life will be spent on that. I’m not even 24 yet and already I’m exhausted.
 
I find it very ironic that many groups includng some protestant christains will charge the church with aiding the Nazis, however to my knowledge no accusations have come from the Jews themselves. In fact, the Jewish community says to the contrary! Who knows better but the victom? Right!

Can one imagine telling person Y, that person X mugged and robbed you. Only to hear person Y say, no he didnt. Yes he did! NO HE DIDNT! YES HE DID! I said NO he didnt, …In fact person X aided me, says Y.

Just who should we believe?

In Christ!
 
When there are two, strongly-held, yet divergent views on a subject (like Pius XII) it is usually the case that the truth is often in the middle. Pius cared about the Jews, but never made it a point to “go public” with any significant case against the Nazis or Hitler. He wrongly thought going public would hurt his own people.

Please see the following review of two books about Pius – both books by devout lifelong Catholics. Interestingly, one who opposed Pius’ policy of silence was the first American to achieve the rank of nuncio, or papal ambassador, Joseph P. Hurley. Hurley was overruled and the policy of silence remained in place.

Pius was a good man, but he could have been far better. So could we all.

spectator.co.uk/print/the-magazine/books/839276/the-pope-was-wrong.thtml
 
vertex said:
When there are two, strongly-held, yet divergent views on a subject (like Pius XII) it is usually the case that the truth is often in the middle. Pius cared about the Jews, but never made it a point to “go public” with any significant case against the Nazis or Hitler. He wrongly thought going public would hurt his own people.

Please see the following review of two books about Pius – both books by devout lifelong Catholics. Interestingly, one who opposed Pius’ policy of silence was the first American to achieve the rank of nuncio, or papal ambassador, Joseph P. Hurley. Hurley was overruled and the policy of silence remained in place.

Pius was a good man, but he could have been far better. So could we all.

spectator.co.uk/print/the-magazine/books/839276/the-pope-was-wrong.thtml
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That charge of the “silent Pope” has already been dealt with. When the before mentioned Dutch Bishops publicaly condemned the round-ups and deportations, Hitler was infuriated, and ordered an expansion and intensification of the Jew-hunts–including the searching of Dutch monastaries, churches, and convents–the result being more Jews ended up in Nazi hands (along with their Catholic religious shelterers). The contemporary demand that Pius XII should have explicitly and publicaly spoken out is so much nonsense. Joseph Hurley was wrong then and Pius XII was right then–especially when delegations of Jews demanded that the Pope be discreet as not to draw attention tho the church’s rescue efforts.
 
I STRONGLY recommend Hitler, The War and The Pope by Ronald Rychlak.
He has almost as many notes as there are pages to read: it is a well-researched piece.

He sets up the historical context.

And he does provide information on those Catholic personalities who did not live up to Christian ideals.

But Pope Pius XII is not one of those personalities.

BTW, John Cornwell printed a retraction for his book, Hitler’s Pope in the Dec 9, 2004 issue of Economist
: “I would now argue,” he says, “in the light of the debates and evidence following ‘Hitler’s Pope’, that Pius XII had so little scope of action that it is impossible to judge the motives for his silence during the war, while Rome was under the heel of Mussolini and later occupied by the Germans.” …
 
By the way, all Catholic Nazi party members (along with Communist party members) were excommunicated by the German Bishops in February 1932

This included Hitler.

As far as I know, the excommunion was never rescinded.
 
It must be remembered that all anti-Catholicism - Protestant, secular or otherwise - makes liberal use of propaganda.
 
The_Catholic said:
I saw this argument on a website. Can anyone help? :

"Yeah. I have noticed there are an awful lot of lunatics who call themselves Christian. In fact the more religious a country is the crime and especially violent crime occurs within it.

Funny how the catholic church NEVER excommunicated him.

Hitler worked CLOSELY with Pope Pius in converting Germanic society and supporting the church. The Church absorbed Nazi ideals and preached them as part of their sermons in turn.

he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law. He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home.

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education. The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus. The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion. In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies,” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany."

I’m not sure what to think.
Click to expand...
Without wanting to subscribe to the hateful rhetoric of the quoted post, I would like to ask (because I don’t know - and not to pick a fight):

WAS Hitler or other leading Nazi’s (those that were members of the RC church, that is) ever excommunicated, and if not, why not?
 
LutheranDK said:
Without wanting to subscribe to the hateful rhetoric of the quoted post, I would like to ask (because I don’t know - and not to pick a fight):

WAS Hitler or other leading Nazi’s (those that were members of the RC church, that is) ever excommunicated, and if not, why not?
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That’s already been addressed. Please see Post #6 on this thread.
 
**The headline of this thread is rubbish.
I can tell you, that what I remember from the time when I was a small kid of between 3 and 5, the war was to us hell itself.

Mom was (just as dan wom I naturally saw very little) very religious and her hope lay on Pope Pius XII.
This Pope was before the war apostolic nuntius in Germany. He often interferred before the war or rather when war „lay in the air“ but finally wasn’t allowed to enter he gouvernement.

Many Catholics where killed, just as Jews. Of course not as many as the 5 Million Jews, but a huge number of Catholics, and I remember the monks of Birnau, who where murdered by the SS and burried hastily behind the Church. Mom was novice in 1938. One day the SS was there and order was: „Either you are all out or we are in“ and all where forced to take a civilian occupation – so mom became nurse in hospital. Funnily Dad was novice too with the Redemptorists. Same occured to him and he became a certified accountant. (Both met, fell in love, married and I was born 1940).
Christianity, Church, Faith, was horror to Hitler as to Stalin, both former Catholics (respectively Orthodox Christian).

Now Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli, who was elected Pope in 1939, already tried in 1916 to persuade the war-parties. In 1917 he became Apostolic Nuntius in Bavaria/Germany. His intervenes on the war parties where here, as later with Hitler, all in vain. March 1939 he became Pope Pius XII. (1939-1958). His first Encyclical was “Summi pontificatus“ against war and racism.

Now what’s very remarkable and always deliberately forgotten, is: In Sept. 1944 Pope Pius XII. The cursed those who begun the war.

Some of the press year after year again and again pronounce this devilish “news” the Pope ref. the Church was for Hitler.
Rubbish and ignorant! And even more so; the intention of atheists to make the church incredible. No! The contrary is true.

But how often wo we have the fact, that ridiculous dispatches are taken as true, whilst the truth stays behind, because people prefer lies as they fit better into their view of things.
**
 
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