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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