Pope Pius XI (11th) and the alleged concordat with Hitler

[Larry1700]

I have a friend who is asking me the role of about Pope Pius XI (11th, not 12th – he was Pope from 1922-39), in the Holocaust. The allegation is that he signed a concordat with Hitler in 1933 to annihilate the Jews.

I have seen quotes from Jewish leaders praising Pope Pius XII (12th), but I’m looking for information about Pope Pius XI (11th).

 

[Barb3]

I’m not too sure about this but I believe the Church signed a Concordat with Hitler in Fulda, Germany in 1936. My son was in the military after the Vietnam war and was stationed for 3 years in Fulda, the seat of the Catholic Church in Germany. When he was there the “wall” separated East Germany from West Germany. Fulda was just a couple of miles from the “wall”. I spent a couple of months over there in the late 80’s and seem to recall information about the Concordat but honestly don’t remember too much about it a/c it was so long ago. I do believe I’ll have to “google” the situation to “jar” my memory.

 

[KyivAndrew]

I have a friend who is asking me the role of about Pope Pius XI (11th, not 12th – he was Pope from 1922-39), in the Holocaust. The allegation is that he signed a concordat with Hitler in 1933 to annihilate the Jews.

I have seen quotes from Jewish leaders praising Pope Pius XII (12th), but I’m looking for information about Pope Pius XI (11th).

Now that is just a patent lie. The concordat was signed to protect Catholics in the Reich. It had nothing to do with the Jews. You may want to read this thread on the subject of Pius XII and the Holocaust.
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=362611&highlight=Pius+Holocaust

As for Pius XI whom you originally address, he was a highly philo-semitic pope. He wrote an Encyclical against Nazi policies on the Jews Mit Brennender Sorge which stated: “Whoever exalts race, or the people, or the State, or a particular form of State, or the depositories of power, or any other fundamental value of the human community—however necessary and honorable be their function in worldly things—whoever raises these notions above their standard value and divinizes them to an idolatrous level, distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God; he is far from the true faith in God and from the concept of life which that faith upholds.” en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pius_XI

Also from Pius XI: “On September 6, 1938, a group of Belgian pilgrims presented Pope Pius XI with an ancient and valuable prayer book. Opening it on the second prayer after the elevation of the host, the Pope read out to them the passage in which God is besought to accept the altar gifts with the same graciousness in which He once received Abraham’s sacrifice. “Whenever I read the words: The sacrifice of our Father Abraham”, the Pope said, “I cannot help being deeply moved. Mark well, we call Abraham our Patriarch, our ancestor. Anti-Semitism is irreconcilable with this lofty thought, the noble reality which this prayer expresses.” And, with tears in his eyes, he concluded: “Anti-Semitism is inadmissible; spiritually, we are all Semites”. Neither Osservatore Romano nor Civiltá Cattolica mentioned a single word of this audience. Were it not for the authority of Don Luigi Sturzo, founder of the “Partito Populare Italiano” and Fascism’s oldest and most illustrious opponent,’ as well as the identical report in the Belgium newspaper Cite Nouvelle of September 15,1938, one might have doubted the papal words or tears.”
God Bless.

 

[Larry1700]

Thanks very much, KyivAndrew. Great information!

I would be very interested in comments from Jewish members of Catholic Answers.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

I have a friend who is asking me the role of about Pope Pius XI (11th, not 12th – he was Pope from 1922-39), in the Holocaust. The allegation is that he signed a concordat with Hitler in 1933 to annihilate the Jews.

I have seen quotes from Jewish leaders praising Pope Pius XII (12th), but I’m looking for information about Pope Pius XI (11th).

The Concordat is a fact - there is nothing remarkable about it. It’s interesting as the last in a series of concordats with German states, but that hardly makes it sinister. It’s not. People need to be less sensitive about it. Popes are not equipped with the ability to know the future - the fact that we know what happened, is no reason to attribute the same knowledge to those then living and acting. How were Vatican diplomats to know that Hitler would violate the Concordat or attack Poland a few years later ? To attribute what we know, a life-time later, to them, is confused, shabby, and dishonest, as well as hopelessly unrealistic. The Vatican can be criticised for how pressure was brought to bear on the German Centre Party, as a result of which the Catholic resistance to the NSDAP collapsed - but not for the Concordat as such. It may or may not have been unwise - that it was genocidal in intention on the part of both states signing it, needs proof. Something can perfectly well be a fit subject for criticism, without being in any way nefarious.​

So the alleged fact is true; there was a Concordat between two sovereign states: the Vatican City, and the German Reich. As for the alleged motive, that of annihilating the Jews, this was Hitler’s motive, but not the Vatican’s. There is no lack of evidence for what Hitler intended; there is a lack of evidence that the Vatican intended to annihilate the Jews. The Civilta Cattolica was apt not to be respectful of the Jews - but that does not amount to evidence of genocidal intention on the part of the Vatican; any more than US criticism of Israeli behaviour towards the Palestinians is evidence of genocidal intentions on the part of the US.

A site about Concordats: http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showsite.php?parent_org_id=844&org_id=858