Vatican hopes secret files exonerate 'Hitler's pope'

[SamH]

There is a memoir / biography about Pope Pius XII’s housekeeper. It revealed how many thousands of Jewish refugees found sanctuary in the Vatican. Cardinal Spelman of New York used to smuggle money in using his diplomatic passport; he collected the money from the people of New York. The housekeeper used the money to buy food for the Jewish refugees. For some unknown reason, the Nazi’s respected official identification papers, so the Vatican forged fake identity papers saying the Jews were Catholics. The forger was a man named Roncali; he became Pope John XXIII. The Jews were then taken by train … Vatican Railways … to the nearby seaport … and then taken by ship to safety…

They repeat those stories - only with a few changes. Instead of Jews they claim the Vatican smuggled out Nazis.

 

[Limerickman]

Pope Pius does not need to be exonerated. The correct historical information has been out there for quite some time. The book titled Hitler’s Pope by John Cornwell is the source of much of the public misperception of Pius. The book has been almost universally discredited as dishonest. This includes the New York Times!! When the Times speaks against a critic of the Church, you know something is fishy. This includes an altered cover photograph that I believe the publisher was shamed into removing. The author himself was forced to publicly disavow his own research and conclusions.

If you want to read an exhaustively researched book on the issue here it is.

Hitler, the War, and the Pope: Ronald J. Rychlak:
amazon.com/Hitler-War-Pope-Ronald-Rychlak/dp/1592765653

This book rips Cornwell’s to shreds.

 

[Limerickman]

You could benefit from reading Ronald Rychlak’s book “Hitler, The War, and the Pope”. This story is much more complex than you are implying here. He goes into this issue in excruciating detail.

As a side issue, Hitler’s relationship with the Roman Catholic Church bears some scrutiny.

From everything I have read Hitler’s attitude was ambivalent rather than being openly hostile with regard to the Church.

Hitler was very weary of the power of the Roman Catholic Church and he would have been prepared if there was an opportunity to somehow incorporate the Church in to his sphere of influence.

Separately the Fuhrer was a baptised Roman Catholic

 

[Arizona_Mike]

As a side issue, Hitler’s relationship with the Roman Catholic Church bears some scrutiny.

From everything I have read Hitler’s attitude was ambivalent rather than being openly hostile with regard to the Church.

Hitler was very weary of the power of the Roman Catholic Church and he would have been prepared if there was an opportunity to somehow incorporate the Church in to his sphere of influence.

Separately the Fuhrer was a baptised Roman Catholic

Respectfully, Limerickman, I gotta disagree with you.

Hitler despised the Church, hated Catholicism, hated the Sacraments, and hated the Bishops and Pope who opposed him at every turn.

He was a baptized Catholic, but that just means he was considered a Catholic under canon law - he was an apostate and excommunicated himself by his own actions, and in practice was something of a pantheist who believed in reincarnation.

I posted about two pages worth of quotes from Hitler about his feelings on Catholicism, the Sacraments, the Bishops, Christianity, and God. As there were his statements to his underlings, he did not feel the need to prevaricate, so this are probably the best examples of his true feelings. You can read them on pages 4 and 5 of the thread.

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=759115&page=4

 

[Monte_RCMS]

They repeat those stories - only with a few changes. Instead of Jews they claim the Vatican smuggled out Nazis.

I dunno; I found this; how real is it?

La Popessa : The Controversial Biography of Sister Pascalina, the Most Powerful Woman in Vatican History [Hardcover]
Paul I. Murphy (Author), R. Rene Arlington (Author)
4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)

 

[Crescentinus]

Respectfully, Limerickman, I gotta disagree with you.

Hitler despised the Church, hated Catholicism, hated the Sacraments, and hated the Bishops and Pope who opposed him at every turn.

He was a baptized Catholic, but that just means he was considered a Catholic under canon law - he was an apostate and excommunicated himself by his own actions, and in practice was something of a pantheist who believed in reincarnation.

I posted about two pages worth of quotes from Hitler about his feelings on Catholicism, the Sacraments, the Bishops, Christianity, and God. As there were his statements to his underlings, he did not feel the need to prevaricate, so this are probably the best examples of his true feelings. You can read them on pages 4 and 5 of the thread.

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=759115&page=4

Thank you. This is the perfect debate weapon against those who use the logical fallacy reductio ad Hitlerum when it comes to Catholicism and the Pope Emeritus.

 

[Truth2Prevail]

History and the witness of the people of the time have always exonerated Pope Pius XII, and only a few uneducated still call him “Hitler’s pope”.

« on 16 October 1943 in Roma there were 12,428 Jews. The direct action of Pope Pius XII saved the lives of more than 11,400.» Gary Krupp, president of Pave the Way Foundation

« Wolff, at what stage is the project to capture the Pope? You must restart it immediately. Be ready to leave for Rome. I will occupy the Vatican shortly. » Hitler to general Wolff, head of the SS in Italy, 1943

« Only the Catholic Church fully blocks the road to the hitlerian campaign for the suppression of truth. Before now, I never had any particular interest for the Church, but now I experience great affection and admiration for her, for only the Church has had the courage and the perseverance to stand on the side of intellectual truth and moral freedom. I must therefore admit that what I before despised, now I appreciate, without any reservation.» Albert Einstein, 1940

« The Holy See is giving her powerful help wherever she can to soften the conditions of my persecuted brothers in the faith.» Chaim Weizmann, 1943

« The people of Israel will never forget the help given to their unfortunate brothers and sisters from His Holiness and His Eminent Delegates, in one of the saddest moments of our history.» Isaac Herzog, rabbi of Gerusalem, 1944

« the Jews have been saved inside the walls of the Vatican during the German occupation of Rome. » Jewish News, 1944

« During the decade of the Nazi terror, our people have suffered a terrible martyrdom. The voice of the Pope was raised to condemn the persecutors and to invoke piety for the victims.» Golda Meir, 1958

« The Italian clergy helped many Israelites and hid them in the monasteries, and the Pope personally intervened to help those already arrested by the Nazi.» Gideon Hausner, Israeli attorney general, in the process against Eichmann, 1961

If this - along with the witness of those whose lives were saved by the Church - does not suffice to “exonerate” Pope Pius XII, then no additional evidence will.

Reply:
Most people in pre-Hitler and pre-Stalin didn‘t have the foggiest idea of what was (really) happening to them. Only the Church discerned the dangers and spoke out bravely against “the dreadful cruelties of uncivilized tyranny”.
See statement by Albert Einstein himself:
Being a lover of freedom, when the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced.* Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they, like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks…
Only the Church - ONLY the Church - stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing truth.* I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom.* I am forced thus to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly.
(article published in Time magazine, p. 38 on 23 December 1940)
(Einstein’s statement was despite Einstein coming from an entirely irreligious Jewish background)

Many Jewish leaders actually praised Pope Pius XII unreservedly and regarded him as a true hero. Some examples:
“Pius XII and the Jews,” By historian and Rabbi David G. Dalin, which was published in The Weekly Standard Magazine:
"… Given the recent attacks, the time has come for a new defense of Pius—because, despite allegations to the contrary, the best historical evidence now confirms both that Pius XII was NOT silent and that almost no one at the time thought him so.
“In January 1940, for instance, the pope issued instructions for Vatican Radio to reveal “the dreadful cruelties of uncivilized tyranny” the Nazis were inflicting on Jewish and Catholic Poles … the Vatican had spoken, with authority that cannot be questioned …” “Meeting in 1935 with the heroic anti-Nazi Dietrich von Hildebrand, he declared, “There can be NO possible reconciliation” between Christianity and Nazi racism”.
In fact, “throughout the 1930s, Pacelli was widely lampooned in the Nazi press as Pius XI’s “Jew-loving” cardinal, because of the more than fifty-five protests he sent the Germans as the Vatican secretary of state”.

Former Israeli diplomat and now Orthodox Jewish Rabbi Pinchas Lapide stated that of the forty-four speeches which the Pacelli had made on German soil between 1917 and 1929, at least forty contained hard-hitting condemnations of the cruel neo-Paganism of Nazism or of Hitler’s doctrines which were based on (atheist) Friedrich Neitche’s views.

Rabbi Safran of Bucharest, Romania, sent a note of thanks to the Pacelli on April 7, 1944: “It is not easy for us to find the right words to express the warmth and consolation we experienced because of the concern of the supreme pontiff, who offered a large sum to relieve the sufferings of deported Jews. . . . The Jews of Romania will never forget these facts of historic importance.” [Lichten, 130]

The Chief Rabbi of Rome, Israel Zolli, also made a statement of thanks: “What the Vatican did will be indelibly and eternally engraved in our hearts. . . . Priests and even high prelates did things that will forever be an honor to Catholicism.” [American Jewish Yearbook 1944-1945, 233.]

Pope Pius XII is credited in saving at least 860,000 Jews and almost as many other nationalities and minorities, by hiding them in every available corner in convents, monastries, hospitals, etc.

 

[KathleenGee]

So true.

By the way, I contacted EWTN and the source where I heard about the AIDS epidemic in Russia, but have not to this day heard anything. With the election of Pope Francis, who is now being smeared by the media for standing up for government in regards to missing people…is at same time, being exposed as another lie against a pope.

The media here is quick to point out it is a smear. I found CNN very positive and respectful in their coverage.