The pope who protected Jews and Hitler

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EZweber said:
I might note that Lapide was not a Catholic historian. He was Jewish.
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I might note that I know that, I’m Jewish as well, half German-Jewish, half Italian-Jewish.

I think you might have understood from my response that I think Pius XII was a pretty decent human being doing the best he could in impossible/intolerable situations - I don’t need the arguments against people trying to traduce his name to encourage me to say that, I consider it to be a fair assessment.

I do have to say that, if you want to believe in Lapide’s (back of an envelope in particular circumstances, yes, particular circumstances, investigate if you wish) calculations, I don’t really care. You won’t find a serious academic historian to agree with you but, if you find it important/comforting then, ok.

On the other hand, I think that the considerable evidence that Pius was a very decent human being would be enough in itself - if he failed, it was in circumstances where the chances of success were minimal. Why would the world need more than that?
 
Tis_Bearself said:
So how many do you think were saved, based on your research? Just curious.
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I didn’t get my Phd in the field of holocaust studies so I wouldn’t describe my readings on the subject as ‘research’.

On the other hand, I think that both the Lapide figure itself and why it took on a life on its own in the question of Pius and what he did or didn’t do is an interesting study for anybody interested in more than “Oh, Yes it is!/Oh No it isn’t!” discussions and whether Pius should be made a saint or not.

It isn’t a topic of real importance to me, if people wish to believe in the Lapide figure, ok, they’ll have real trouble finding a basis for it though.
 
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Over 5 million non jews were killed in the Holocaust, several thousand Priests amongs them

www.catholic.com

Catholic Martyrs of the Holocaust

Many thousands of Catholic men, women, and children died in concentration camps, SS and Gestapo torture chambers, or in fields and villages across Europe for the “crime” of proclaiming the truth to one of the most evil regimes in human history.
www.catholic.com www.catholic.com
 
Legitimate and necessary criticism of the Church and its leadership over the nature of its opposition to Hitler and the Nazis has been lost excuse of exaggerated and silly claims that the Church/Pope were active or enthusiastic supporters of Naziism. They were not.

But they were less than determined opponents. Catholic opposition brought the extermination of disabled people in Germany to a halt before the war. There was no similar intensity of campaign for the human rights of Jews, especially those who had not converted.

The Church supported genocidal regimes such as that in Croatia when its crimes warranted complete dissociation. It allowed the threat of communism to the Church (real enough) to allow it to go soft on Nazis because they were anti-communist. This was a pragmatic, not principled stand.

And a similar criticism can be made of the Church’s willingness to do deals with Mussolini and Franco in Spain.

These were difficult times for anyone to be good according to their own beliefs. But the Church emerged from the period with a damaged reputation.

A ‘truth and reconciliation’ process would be the best course.
 
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Fauken said:
Homes and Gardens apparently even did an article on his home, the Berghof:
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Time (or was it Life? ) had an article about this new leader of Germany.

It was the cover story for an issue from which I pulled an article in college.

I don’t recall much other than it mentions that he as an ascetic that shaved with cold water, and that he didn’t drink (noting that meant except for beer, which “germans don’t consider alcoholic.”) . . .
 
True, but those who showed admiration for him in the 30s had no excuse. He did not hide his extreme anti-Semitism. He did not hide his rebuilding the military at an alarming rate. He was clear about his plan to see Germany dominate Europe. He was clear that he intended to directly control all resources needed by Germany.

There was no excuse for admiring him.
 
I didn’t say there was any excuse for admiring him.

Much of the USA in the 1930s was anti-Semitic. Also anti-Catholic. Also anti-African American.
The three K’s in “KKK” were said to stand for all three. “Katholics”, a slur word for Jewish people, and a term used for African-Americans then which is considered not correct to use today. The KKK was a huge organization at that point, not confined to the South.

I am sure it was just as bad if not worse in Europe with respect to Jewish people. (It was better for Catholics and for African people then.)
 
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tafan2 said:
It allowed the threat of communism to the Church (real enough) to allow it to go soft on Nazis because they were anti-communist.
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Would you say the formal welcoming of the Anschluss by the bishops of Austria, signing their letter, Heil Hitler! was ‘hard’ on the Nazis?
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When someone represents one Archbishop’s actions as represent the Church, and then fails to include even a fraction of the story, just a one line description, about the most charitable I can be is to perhaps just use your words: exaggerated and silly.
Time reported that “the very powerful radio transmitter of the Papal State went on the air in German with a broadcast heard all over Greater Germany and taken by most listeners to be a condemnation of Cardinal Innitzer for having yielded to force, combined with an injunction to Catholics that in the plebiscite they should vote according to their consciences rather than Innitzer.” Vatican Radio denounced the “worthlessness and faithlessness” of “shepherds’ actions” that manifest “an exaggerated carefulness of tactics” and “a weak adaptation to established or foreseen facts … The damage is greatest when constituted guardians of sacred ethics are seized by the spirit of that false Catholicism and bow down before the mighty and successful of the day.”

Pope Pius XI summoned Cardinal Innitzer to Rome for an explanation, and on April 5 Cardinal Pacelli conducted a “very stormy” interview. Cardinal Innitzer then met with the heroic Munster Bishop Clemens August Count von Galen, whom Pope Benedict beatified in 2005, before having a two-hour meeting with the pope. At the end of the meeting, Cardinal Innitzer in essence retracted the bishops’ pastoral letter; in a statement published in L’Osservatore Romano but not in Austria, he declared that the letter “did not intend to be an approval of what was, or is, irreconcilable with the law of God and the freedom and rights of the Catholic Church.
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Source Library : Pope Benedict in Austria | Catholic Culture

Note: My quote also does not give the whole story, the Archbishop cannot be excused, but even then, he was swilling to standup to the Nazis before and after that serious mistake.
 
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