Postpone Move To Beatify Pius Xii, Israeli Envoy Suggests

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Bones…it would seem that there are some out there that no matter how many sources you provide etc. will still believe that he was anti-semitic, did not do enough, did not speak out enough etc.
what a shame 😦
 
Steven_Merten said:
I am certian that had Pope Pius XII lead Catholics and other Christians not to kill for Hitler, because Hitler was fighting an unjust evil war, not only would the Vatican have been bombed but Pope Pius XII would have been tortured and his mutilated body would have been hung on the gates of the bombed Vatican rubble.
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Not at all. Why would they bomb the Vatican when they could just send a battalion or so of foot soldiers to capture it? There were certainly enough German soldiers stationed in Rome to do that. Furthermore, bombing is notorious inaccurate. They’d have risked damage to their own installations by using air power.

Secondly, I have read that Pius XII wrote a Letter of Abdication to be effective and proclaimed if he were ever taken prisoner by the Germans. The Nazis would not have captured the Pope, but only Cardinal Pacelli. The Church would have been without a Pope, but that’s happened from time to time over the centuries.
 
Karin said:
Bones…it would seem that there are some out there that no matter how many sources you provide etc. will still believe that he was anti-semitic, did not do enough, did not speak out enough etc.
what a shame 😦
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stfrancisvernon.org/stkolbe.htm

Here’s another one. John Paul II’s homily at the Canonization of St. Maximillian Kolbe.

**By His Holiness Pope John Paul II on October 10, 1982

"For towards the end of July, 1941, when the camp commander ordered the prisoners destined to die of starvation to fall in line, this man-Maximilian Maria Kolbe-spontaneously came forward and declared himself ready to go to death in the place of one of them. This readiness was accepted and, after more than two weeks of torment caused by starvation, Father Maximilian’s life was ended with a lethal injection on August 14, 1941. ** All this happened in the concentration camp at Auschwitz where during the last war some four million people were put to death, including the Servant of God, Edith Stein (the Carmelite Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross), whose cause for beatification is in progress at the competent Congregation. Disobedience to God-the Creator of life who said, “Thou shalt not kill”-caused in that place the immense holocaust of so many innocent persons. And so at the same time, our age has thus been horribly stigmatized by the slaughter of the innocent.
** Father Maximilian Kolbe, himself a prisoner of the concentration camp, defended in that place of death an innocent man’s right to life. Father Kolbe defended his right to life, declaring that he was ready to go to death in the man’s place, because he was the father of a family and his life was necessary for his dear ones. Father Maximilian Maria Kolbe thus reaffirmed the Creator’s exclusive right over innocent human life. He bore witness to Christ and to love. For the Apostle John writes: “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16).**
** The Church has venerated Father Maximilian as “Blessed” since 1971."**
 
bones_IV said:
I have no recollection of John Paul II saying that Kolbe was anti-semitic. Let me ask you this. Why would an anti-semite allow Jews into his monastery? Matthew Bunson of EWTN stated, “I know of no valid reason of any kind to accuse St. Maximilian Kolbe of anti-Semitism.”
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He was not anti-semitic as such -that’s correct - but did share some of the antipathetic attitudes towards Jews that all Catholic Poles had, and still have to some extent. It’s a very common trait among Poles, which I experienced as a first generation Polish-American growing up in a Polish community in New York with many acquaintances among Polish-Americans as well as emigrés.
 
Richardols said:
Not at all. Why would they bomb the Vatican when they could just send a battalion or so of foot soldiers to capture it? There were certainly enough German soldiers stationed in Rome to do that. Furthermore, bombing is notorious inaccurate. They’d have risked damage to their own installations by using air power.

Secondly, I have read that Pius XII wrote a Letter of Abdication to be effective and proclaimed if he were ever taken prisoner by the Germans. The Nazis would not have captured the Pope, but only Cardinal Pacelli. The Church would have been without a Pope, but that’s happened from time to time over the centuries.
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“The authors of the new book, Werner Kaltefleiter and Hans Peter Oschwald, say that Pope Pius had signed the resignation letter, stipulating that he would revert to the status of a cardinal if he was taken hostage, the Italian ANSA news agency reports. Excerpts from their forthcoming book have appeared in the German daily Bild.”

[catholicexchange.com/e3news/index.asp?category_id=117&article_id=180136]](Catholic Exchange)
 
Richardols said:
He was not anti-semitic as such -that’s correct - but did share some of the antipathetic attitudes towards Jews that all Catholic Poles had, and still have to some extent. It’s a very common trait among Poles, which I experienced as a first generation Polish-American growing up in a Polish community in New York with many acquaintances among Polish-Americans as well as emigrés.
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But that doesn’t speak for all Catholic Poles does it? Why would Pope John Paul II canonize somone for sharing antipathetic attitudes? Isn’t that the same thing as calling somenone at antisemite?
 
Karin said:
I wonder if your prediciton is true…will Jews be as willing to save us as Catholics where in helping to save them:confused:
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Let’s hope they’re more effective than we were, at least.
 
bones_IV said:
But that doesn’t speak for all Catholic Poles does it?
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Perhaps not, but it is, unfortunately, a common Polish trait - antipathy towards the Jews, not hatred anymore.
Why would Pope John Paul II canonize somone for sharing antipathetic attitudes? Isn’t that the same thing as calling somenone at antisemite?
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Kolbe was canonized as a martyr, which makes no prior demands on the individual for a life of holiness. And there are more than a few saints who have not led entirely saintly lives.

The man, after all, was a child of his environment and times, and though he regarded the Jews as people who were prisoners of error, not as objects of hatred, sometimes his surroundings intruded…
 
Karin said:
I think we where pretty effective Penny Plain…
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Really? I suppose it depends on how you score it.

According to Wikipedia (I know, biased and anti-Catholic. Work with me.) In the 1920s there were about 3 million Jews in Catholic Poland. In 1930, there were about 15 million Jews worldwide, of whom about 4 million lived in the US.

After WWII, there were virtually no Jews left in Poland. The world population of 15 million had been reduced by 6 million; in other words, about 40 percent of all the Jews in the world were murdered. If you take into account the fact that 4 million were in the US and therefore out of Hitler’s reach, you could reasonably say that Hitler murdered 6 million out of the 11 million Jews he could reach, or about 55 percent. (Keep in mind also that many Jews fled Germany for the US or UK or, in a tragic exercise of bad judgment, Poland, after 1930 but before the war. Others lived in places like the Soviet Union – about 2 million there – and therefore may not have been vulnerable to Nazi occupation, but let’s not quibble.)

We can argue all we want about what Pius XII and St. Maximillian Kolbe believed and did. We can argue all we want about the role of Catholic Germans, Poles, and Italians in the Holocaust. Maybe they did the best they could; maybe they didn’t.

But to characterize their efforts as “effective” is laughable.
 
batteddy said:
I wish people, like the Jews and Chinese, would stay out of OUR INTERNAL AFFAIRS. .
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Not sure I understand your reference to the Chinese. But in Toronto, which is very multi-cultural, there are many Chinese Catholics, I suspect this is the case in other cities as well. Maybe you should have said non-Catholic Chinese.
 
A note about the Secret Archives. We always hear calls for opening them up for the Inquisition, the Crusades, Pius XII and what not and the call goes up, “What are they hiding?” The Church is in a no-win scenario because if they did open them up, the snarky would simply say, “Ok, where did you hide the incriminating documents?”

I recommend Robert Royal’s book, Catholic Martyrs of the Twentieth Century. The Church’s performance during this period of great evil was a wonderful testament and unmatched.

Scott
 
Penny_Plain said:
Really? I suppose it depends on how you score it.

According to Wikipedia (I know, biased and anti-Catholic. Work with me.) In the 1920s there were about 3 million Jews in Catholic Poland. In 1930, there were about 15 million Jews worldwide, of whom about 4 million lived in the US.

After WWII, there were virtually no Jews left in Poland. The world population of 15 million had been reduced by 6 million; in other words, about 40 percent of all the Jews in the world were murdered. If you take into account the fact that 4 million were in the US and therefore out of Hitler’s reach, you could reasonably say that Hitler murdered 6 million out of the 11 million Jews he could reach, or about 55 percent. (Keep in mind also that many Jews fled Germany for the US or UK or, in a tragic exercise of bad judgment, Poland, after 1930 but before the war. Others lived in places like the Soviet Union – about 2 million there – and therefore may not have been vulnerable to Nazi occupation, but let’s not quibble.)

We can argue all we want about what Pius XII and St. Maximillian Kolbe believed and did. We can argue all we want about the role of Catholic Germans, Poles, and Italians in the Holocaust. Maybe they did the best they could; maybe they didn’t.

But to characterize their efforts as “effective” is laughable.
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Oh please…did you expect Catholics to save all the Jews for what they did do to be considered “effective”?
 
Karin said:
Oh please…did you expect Catholics to save all the Jews for what they did do to be considered “effective”?
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Uh … wow.

I guess my thought is that “effective” would be something less than destruction of 40 percent of all the Jews in the world. I will confess that I hadn’t though in terms of how much less.

Saying “it could have been worse” doesn’t mean you were effective.
 
Penny_Plain said:
Uh … wow.

I guess my thought is that “effective” would be something less than destruction of 40 percent of all the Jews in the world. I will confess that I hadn’t though in terms of how much less.

Saying “it could have been worse” doesn’t mean you were effective.
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So is what you are saying … the Catholics did NOT DO ENOUGH to save the Jews? They did not save enough of them etc.?
 
Penny_Plain said:
Saying “it could have been worse” doesn’t mean you were effective.
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It also does not mean that they where ineffective either.

With no army to enforce its policies, the Vatican employed the only “weapon” it had— the obedience, compassion and bravery of its faithful.
abqjournal.com/opinion/guest_columns/301963opinion02-07-05.htm

Also as some throw blame at the CHurch for not doing enough to save the Jews…let us question WHY the US waited so long to enter the war…they knew what was going on and did nothing!
 
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