The pope who protected Jews and Hitler

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rosie11
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
The book was written by scholar Rabbi Dr. David Dalin, and in it he refutes the findings of “Hitler’s Pope,” by journalist and academic John Cornwell, who is critical of Pope Pius XII.
 
Last edited:
I recommend this book to learn about the Pope during Nazi occupation of Germany.

Church of Spies: The Pope’s Secret War Against Hitler – by Mark Riebling
 
I am sure his reasons were varied. As I said before, I read somewhere that he did not want Hitler removing the priests and bishops then in office and replacing them with Nazi appointees as he did in the Lutheran and Reformed Churches (the Confessing Church spilt from the Reichskirche over this and started underground seminaries). That is a pretty valid concern in my book.
 
Last edited:
Once Europe was at War, there were the Allies and the Axis powers. If the Vatican would have declared it sided with the Allies, Mussolini would have occupied the Vatican. By the summer of 43, Germany was in complete control of Italy, the Germans considered occupying the Vatican despite the neitrality
 
Do you have sources for that? Hitler became friends with Mussolini. The British ran a newspaper article saying Mussolini had been captured and was being held at some undisclosed location. Hitler sent in a commando group who found him, still in Italy, and who flew him out.

The Germans wouldn’t dare.
 
I actually think it is a miracle that Hitler didn’t kill the Pope given that the encyclical ‘Mit Brennender Sorge’ that denounced the Nazi regime was circulated and read in German churches at the time.
 
And Mussolini became a complete puppet of the German military operation until the end of the war.

From Wikipedia
For about a year and a half, Mussolini lived in Gargnano on Lake Garda in Lombardy. Although he insisted in public that he was in full control, he knew that he was merely a puppet ruler under the protection of his German liberators—for all intents and purposes, the Gauleiter of Lombardy.[170]Indeed, he lived under what amounted to house arrest by the SS, who restricted his communications and travel
 
Last edited:
The German Order Police was watching the German population. It didn’t matter who caused any trouble - Catholics or Protestants - appropriate measures were taken.
 
Was it taken before or after the world realized that Hitler was an evil man? It’s sort of customary for Popes to meet with world leaders.
 
Hitler was on the cover of Time magazine:

March 13, 1933
April 13, 1936
Named Man of the Year for 1938 (but not on cover)
 
Last edited:
Hitler during this time period was also discussed in Reader’s Digest in a very positive article on the great things he was doing for Germany. I have the actual issue containing this, as it was found in a deceased grandparent’s attic cleanout.

Many people thought he was quite an admirable guy, until he started wrecking Paris and London.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
Hitler during this time period was also discussed in Reader’s Digest in a very positive article on the great things he was doing for Germany. I have the actual issue containing this, as it was found in a deceased grandparent’s attic cleanout.

Many people thought he was quite an admirable guy, until he started wrecking Paris and London.
Click to expand...
Homes and Gardens apparently even did an article on his home, the Berghof:

en.m.wikipedia.org

Berghof (residence) - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org en.m.wikipedia.org
 
We’ve had many threads like this in my years on CAF (over 12 now) and they’re often full of mythologies on both sides - from Pius as Nazi fellow-traveller on the one hand to Lapide’s ridiculous 860,000 Jews ‘saved’ figure.

Partly it’s the Internet, where assertions get repeated and repeated but rarely checked and truth becomes a matter of how many times they appear on a Google search.

Pius was a human being between a rock and a hard place most of his time as Nuncio, Cardinal and then Pope - when he failed, probably nobody could have succeeded.
 
edwest211 said:
Hitler was on the cover of Time magazine:

March 13, 1933
April 13, 1936
Named Man of the Year for 1938 (but not on cover)
Click to expand...
And admired by both Henry Ford…

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
…as well as Charles Lindbergh.

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
 
More to the truth was “Hitler’s Mufti” since both were driven by a stark anti-Semitism.

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
 
Last edited:
Tis_Bearself said:
From what I understand the Nazis would have preferred to just kill the Pope and get him out of the way. They couldn’t do it without arousing the ire of millions of Catholics, so they didn’t. Pope Pius XII was certainly not going to give money to a regime that wanted to kill him and destroy the Church.
Click to expand...
yeah, but they still tried to figure out a way to covertly do it
 
Kaninchen said:
We’ve had many threads like this in my years on CAF (over 12 now) and they’re often full of mythologies on both sides - from Pius as Nazi fellow-traveller on the one hand to Lapide’s ridiculous 860,000 Jews ‘saved’ figure.
Click to expand...
I might note that Lapide was not a Catholic historian. He was Jewish. I see no reason why he would weight the statistics in favor of the Pope. When you consider the resources of the Catholic Church, and the fact that a single priest was responsible for saving 6,500 Allied soldiers and Jews (Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty, statistic taken from Wikipedia) suddenly that statistic doesn’t seem too far out there.
 
Last edited:
This is a great movie; the epilogue especially makes the story amazing.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top