Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to Israel will undoubtedly revive the issue of a plaque in the Yad Vashem Museum concerning Pope Pius XII. The caption includes a blatantly false statement that attributes to the Pope “silence and the absence of guidelines” during the Holocaust. There is overwhelming evidence that he acted only after the most careful and penetrating analysis of every possibility for peace and after fervent prayer.
Unfortunately, as Jews and Catholics strive for brotherhood during this third millenium, world-wide media continues to denigrate Pope Pius XII. But how can critics deny that Pope Pius XII was an enemy of racism and totalitarianism?
Most historians offer a positive evaluation based on historical documents and testimonies of Holocaust survivors. Five thousand documents published from 1965 to 1981 in Actes et documents du Saint-Siège relatifs à la Seconde Guerre Mondiale have been available to enlighten Jews and Catholics about Pope Pius XII’s activities during the Holocaust. Few critics, if any, have ever consulted them.
In a letter to me dated April 25, 1995, Paul Oskar Kristeller, Woodbridge professor emeritus of philosophy at Columbia University, wrote: “Jews resided in episcopal palaces, monasteries, convents and in the Vatican itself. Pope Pius XII, whose major duty was to protect the numerous Catholics, including baptized Jews, against the Nazi persecution, concealed the Jews and did not allow the Nazis to find and arrest them. Pope Eugenio Pacelli has been unfairly criticized for his silence on the Jewish persecution.”
The only rays of light in the dark night of Nazism were offered by the Vatican Radio that reported many outspoken statements issued not only by Pope Pius XII, but also by archbishops and bishops denouncing the inhumanity of specific acts of Nazi persecution of the Jews. These statements were very significant.
Pope Pius XII may not appeal to modern sensibilities largely because he was always teaching the Gospel and Catholic doctrine to a world deafened by nationalism and the drums of war. He had the nearly unanimous praise of all his contemporaries, a fact mostly ignored by his detractors. Most importantly, not one of the charges against him holds up under careful analysis.
During and after World War II, the Italian Jewish community had great respect for Pope Pius XII. Among the many expressions of gratitude, His Holiness received the following message: “The delegates of the Congress of the Italian Jewish Communities, held in Rome for the first time after the Liberation, feel that it is imperative to extend reverent homage to Your Holiness, and to express the most profound gratitude that animates all Jews for your fraternal humanity toward them during the years of persecution when their lives were endangered by Nazi-Fascist barbarism. Many times priests suffered imprisonment and were sent to concentration camps, and offered their lives to assist Jews in every way. This demonstration of goodness and charity that still animates the just, has served to lessen the shame and torture and sadness that afflicted millions of human beings.” (L’Osservatore Romano, April 5, 1946).
Testimonials of survivors of the Holocaust also make it perfectly clear that the Pope was not anti-Semitic or indifferent to the fate of the Jews and that he did everything possible to help them.
In a letter to me, dated June 18, 1997, historian and Holocaust survivor, Michael Tagliacozzo, clearly expressed his sentiments: “In my study of the conditions of the Jews (See: The Roman Community during the Nightmare of the Swastika, November 1963), I pointed out the generous and vast activity of the Church in favor of the victims. I learned how great was Pope Pacelli’s paternal solicitude. No honest person can discount his merits …. Pacelli was the only one who intervened to impede the deportation of Jews on October 16, 1943, and he did very much to hide and save thousands of us. It was no small matter that he ordered the opening of cloistered convents. Without him, many of our own would not be alive.”
During the Second World War, the Vatican used its moral prestige, limited funds, and extraordinary network of contacts to work consistently for the protection of human life and human dignity.
After the war ended, despite the fact that so many historically Catholic countries were occupied by Soviet armies and subjected to tyrannical, aggressively anti-religious regimes, the Holy See did not allow itself to become a pawn in the Cold War, but continually spoke of peace and forgiveness as the essential qualities to be pursued in relations between the great powers.
By examining the concrete, practical steps Pope Pius XII took to aid the victims of World War II, one finds a far different image from that which depicts him to be a distant authoritarian figure indifferent to Nazi atrocities and to the sufferings of human beings everywhere. Such a study complements the saintly image of Pius XII found in contemporary books, magazines and newspapers.
