ISSUE 76
SPRING 2003
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The articles in this issue have been divided upinto the following categories

 

 

 

 

 

Books


The Beastifcation of Pope Pius XII

Book Review: Pius XII and the Holocaust, Understanding the Controversy
By Jose M. Sanchez, 2002
The Catholic Church of America


For his crimes against humanity in general and the Jews in particular, Pope Pius XII ranks second only to Hitler. Yet, the Catholic Church is drumming up the campaign to make him a saint, absolving him of all the misdeeds he committed.

Did Pope Pius XII know about what the Final Solution? If he knew, why did he not strongly condemn it and protest against it? What could he have done? These are the questions readers ask themselves before picking this book up. However, if anyone expects answers, they may be let down. One shouldn’t expect a fairly objective outlook on the subject in a book published by the Catholic Church.

The author, attempts to clear Archbishop Pacelli and later as Pius XII.
In 1918 Archbishop Pacelli was sent to Germany as an ambassador for the Vatican. He was to pursue a Reich Concordat, a treaty between the papacy and Germany as a whole, which would supersede all local agreements and become a model of Catholic church-state relations. His efforts to that end had failed until Hitler, who saw the potential in this treaty, came to power. Upon the signing of the concordat in 1935 the Catholic Church was drawn into complicity with the Nazis. The Jews were the major losers as a result, their rights trampled, while the privileged Catholics remained silent.


Another book “Hitler’s pope” Published in 1999 and written by British historian, John Cornwell, draws an entirely different picture. Cornwell, who was raised Catholic believed that a thorough examination of the matter would exonerate Pius. He was admitted into the Vatican’s archives (which very rarely happens) and what he found was quite the opposite of what he’d hoped for. “I was morally shocked”, in his own words. The evidence showed for the first time that Pius was patently, and by the proof of his own words, anti-Jewish. It revealed that he had helped Hitler to power and at the same time undermined potential Catholic resistance in Germany. It showed that he had implicitly denied and trivialised the Holocaust, despite having reliable knowledge of its true extent.

Friendly Christians believe that when the Messiah comes all Jews will become Christians. Christian anti-Semites put it differently. The Messiah would not come unless and until all Jews are converted to Christianity, and failing to convert them, the next best option is to kill them off.

Pius took the opportunity of the coming world conflict to approve the killing of as many Jews as possible, and the liquidation of 6 millions of European Jewry.


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