Scholars Decry Distortion of Pius XII Quotation

Explain Context of Pacelli's Words

ROME, SEPT. 21, 2010 (Zenit.org).- The latest attempt to discredit Pope Pius XII is based on a manufactured quote that distorts his words, assert two authors.

Ronald Rychlak, author of "Hitler, the War, and the Pope," stated this in an article written with William Doino, Jr., contributor to "The Pius War: Responses to the Critics of Pius XII."

Their article, "Pius XII and the Distorting Ellipsis," pointed out that "as charge after charge that Pope Pius XII failed to resist the Germans or even that he was indeed 'Hitler's Pope' has been refuted, the critics have advanced new and more remote accusations."

"First," it noted, "critics attacked him for what he said or did -- or failed to say or do -- during the war. When those accusations were proved to be without merit, they charged him with failures after the war."

"When those were refuted," the scholars said, "they shifted to the Pope's actions before he was Pope."

They explained, "The current charge claims that in a presentation Pius XII gave at an International Eucharistic Congress in Hungary in 1938 -- when he was still Eugenio Pacelli, Vatican secretary of state -- he referred to Jews as enemies of Christ and the Catholic Church."

Misquoted

The article reported: "The critics claim that on May 25, 1938, just after the Anschluss (the German annexation of Austria), but before the Shoah or even the outbreak of World War II, Pacelli said: 'Jesus conquers! He who so often was the recipient of the rage of his enemies, he who suffered the persecutions of those of whom he was one, he shall be triumphant in the future as well … As opposed to the foes of Jesus, who cried out to his face, 'Crucify him!' we sing him hymns of our loyalty and our love. We act in this fashion, not out of bitterness, not out of a sense of superiority, not out of arrogance toward those whose lips curse him and whose hearts reject him even today.'"

The scholars noted that "one major critic of Pius, Moshe Y. Herczl, claimed that Pacelli was clearly assailing Jews." This claim was echoed by critics Michael Phayer and John Cornwell.

However, the authors said, "there is reason to be suspicious of this quotation, and the anti-Semitic interpretation applied to it."

They continued: "First, no one at the time thought that Pacelli was speaking of Jews. He spoke of the 'military godless' and those who wanted to 'impose a new Christianity,' statements applicable only to the Communists and Nazis."

"Second, look at the quotation the papal critics use," the scholars pointed out. "One has to wonder what the ellipsis is replacing."

They added, "Despite the importance of this quotation to the argument of many Papal critics, it seems that none of them traced it back to its origin."

Original source

The scholars reported: "With the assistance of Vatican historian (and relator of Pope Pius XII's sainthood cause) Father Peter Gumpel, we reviewed the text of the speech as it was published in "Discorsi e Panegirici." The quote as given by the critics does not appear therein.

"The ellipsis was used to link very diverse passages from different pages of Pacelli's speech, producing a complete distortion of Pacelli's words. (To be certain that we were not overlooking anything, we reviewed transcripts from all seven of the talks he gave in Hungary)."

The article explained that "early in the talk, Pacelli spoke about biblical history. He recalled the Passion of Christ, and he mentioned the defiance of disciples, the solitude of Gethsemane, the crowning of thorns, the cynicism of Herod, and the opportunism of Pilate."

It noted that "he referred to the masses that called for the Crucifixion and said they had been 'deceived and excited by propaganda, lies, insults and imprecations at the foot of the Cross.'

The article affirmed: "Those identified as enemies of Christ included Pontius Pilate, Herod, the Roman soldiers, the Sanhedrin, and their followers. He did not call out 'all Jews' or 'the Jews.'"

"About two pages later in the manuscript," the scholars reported, "Pacelli referred to those who were persecuting the Church at that time by doing things like expelling religion and perverting Christianity."

Nazi persecution

"Jews were not doing this, but Nazi Germany certainly was," they asserted. "The future Pope was clearly equating the Nazis, not Jews, to those who persecuted the Church at earlier times."

The article continued: "Pacelli then returned to the theme of Christ's sufferings during the Passion which were being repeated against the Mystical Body of Christ in modern times, contrasting them with the Church's offering of love: 'Let us replace the cry of 'Crucify' made by Christ's enemies, with the 'Hosanna' of our fidelity and our love.'

"Pacelli was rebuking the totalitarians of his day, not the Jews of earlier times."

"Nowhere in the address did he mention or single out Jews as the specific, much less sole, enemies of Jesus Christ, past or present," it asserted. "There is no legitimate way to argue that Pacelli was blaming Jews when he spoke about the enemies of Christ."

The article asked, "Where did the distorted quotation come from?"

It added that "Herczl was not present at the speech and did not even look at Pacelli's script" or "even the Italian version that appeared in the Vatican newspaper."

The scholars noted that "in his book, he cited a Hungarian newspaper, Nemzeti Ujsag (National Journal), with a long and controversial history as a political outlet."

Anti-Semitic

They continued: "As its name implies and as numerous articles in the newspaper itself attest, Nemzeti Ujsag was a political journal, not a religious one.

"It was, at least in the relevant years, overtly anti-Semitic and truly despicable. Randolph L. Braham, a noted scholar in the field, called it a voice of National Socialism."

The authors posited: "It is likely that the newspaper manufactured the quotation to support its anti-Semitic position.

"Pacelli, after all, was criticizing the exact political position the paper held. Then as now, Vatican support was a very useful thing to claim."

"Herczl and those who followed him should have been skeptical of this source," they asserted. "Neither he nor anyone else would have accepted what that paper said about Jews, yet with several other reliable sources available, why did he turn to an unreliable source for this crucial information about Pacelli?"

"More importantly," the authors added, "why have critics like Phayer and Cornwell simply repeated the charge, relying upon this English translation of a Hebrew translation from a Hungarian translation of a speech originally made in French by a native Italian speaker?"

"The manufactured quotation blatantly distorted the words of the future Pope," the article stated.

It continued: "Inasmuch that quote was inconsistent with so much other evidence of Pacelli's character, it should have been strictly scrutinized.

"Instead it was readily accepted and insufficiently analyzed by critics eager to discredit the papacy and the Catholic Church. They should be ashamed."

ZE10092107 - 2010-09-21
Permalink: http://www.zenit.org/article-30442?l=english

The Introduction to Fr. Jean Bernard's Priestblock 25487: A Memoir of Dachau

The Introduction to Fr. Jean Bernard's Priestblock 25487: A Memoir of Dachau | Robert Royal | Ignatius Insight

http://ignatiusinsight.com/features2010/rroyal_intropriestblock_aug2010.asp

This story is both ordinary and extraordinary. It is ordinary because Catholic priests and religious were regularly rounded up and sent to concentration camps in large numbers during the nightmare of Nazism in Europe. It is extraordinary, as all such accounts are, because they give us vivid and unforgettable indications of both the depths of depravity and heights of sanctity to which the human race is capable. Father Jean Bernard offers a straightforward picture of how Good and Evil played out around him in his imprisonment in the Nazi concentration camp at Dachau. He takes great pains to be accurate about the ever shifting conditions as he witnessed them personally. His strict regard for truth, even in such circumstances, is itself an implicit rejection of the violence built on lies that the Third Reich inflicted everywhere it could. If there is any truth missing in this moving story, it is Father Bernard's own quiet heroism and holiness, which he is too humble to include, but which we may intuit in his primary ­emphasis on the plight of his fellow inmates.

People who have not looked carefully at the position of the Catholic Church under the Third Reich may be particularly surprised by this story. The Nazis did not want to exterminate all Catholics, but they most ­certainly did want to exterminate all Jews, and they nearly succeeded. So the Shoah cannot and should not be described as if the Nazis did as much harm to Catholics as they did to Jews. Yet it is a fact of ­history that millions of Catholics were murdered in the Nazi camps, and that is something we must never forget.

During and right after World War II, it was commonly ­assumed that Christians as well as Jews suffered a great deal ­under Hitler. Jews were grateful to Catholics and ­others for such assistance as they were able to provide, and especially esteemed Pope Pius XII, who quite probably saved more Jews from the Nazis than any other single person. That was why Golda Meir, one of the founders and later Prime Minister of the newly ­created Jewish state of ­Israel, thanked the pope and honored him among the righteous gentiles: "When fearful martyrdom came to our people in the decade of Nazi terror, the voice of the pope was raised for the victims." Similarly, Moshe Sharett, the second Prime Minister of Israel, remarked after meeting with Pius: "I told him [the Pope] that my first duty was to thank him, and through him the Catholic Church, on behalf of the Jewish public for all they had done in the various countries to rescue Jews. We are deeply grateful to the Catholic Church."

But beginning in the 1960s, following a play entitled The Deputy by the Communist-­inspired revisionist, Rolf Hochuth, there has been a massive attempt to deny these facts and paint the Church as all but a Nazi ­accomplice and Pius as "Hitler's pope."

One of the advantages of a memoir like this is its concrete evidence that the anti-Catholic smears are false. Pius was aware not only of the threats to Jews but the widespread persecution of his own priests by the ­Nazis. Careful study of the records in recent years has even given us some concrete numbers that were not available to the pope at the time. In 1932, for instance, just before the Nazis came to power, there were about twenty-one thousand priests in ­Germany. By the time Nazism was defeated a decade later, more than eight thousand of these men had ­either been threatened, beaten, imprisoned, or killed by the regime. In other words, well over one-third of Germany's priests came into open conflict with the Third Reich. We can be morally certain that the number who, seeing the treatment of their fellows, opposed Nazism in more subtle or quiet ways was even higher.

Father Bernard was not a German. He came from Luxembourg and joined the 2,670 priests who have been documented to have passed through Dachau, some 600 to their death, from Albania, Belgium, Croatia, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Greece, Holland, Italy, Norway, Poland, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, Yugoslavia, and other nations. Priests were sent to every camp that Nazis had created, either because they had expressed dislike for Nazism or because Nazism disliked them. (Bogus charges of financial misdealing or sexual impropriety were often trumped up, but many priests, like Father Bernard, never knew what, exactly, they had been arrested for.) For some reason, however, the Gestapo particularly favored Dachau as a destination for priests and Protestant clergy, perhaps as a way of keeping them together and thereby preventing them from ­"infecting" other prison populations with Christianity.

Because in the end the Nazi hatred of the Church and of what they called "negative" Christianity is a spiritual orientation. Both Hitler and Mussolini shared that spirit, but the Italian convinced the German that a direct attack on the Church had historically always led to failure. The case called for delicacy, tact, indirect and subtle means that would not make anyone a conspicuous Christian martyr, but would eventually result in, as Hitler put it, the chance to "crush the Church like a toad." Anyone who looks over these pages will not encounter Nazi subtlety. Camp administrators preferred the most outrageous brutality. Clever attempts at manipulating public opinion, in Germany and around the world, took place at a much more public level. But what we see here is the brutal and sadistic reality behind the misinformation and propaganda.

We lost a lot of what we knew about this history in the last quarter of the twentieth century. In the 1970s Jewish historians were quite energetic and successful in reminding the world about the Shoah, the attempted genocide of Europe's Jews during World War II. For reasons that are not entirely clear, Catholics and other Christians virtually forgot their own heroic witnesses and even had a hard time in keeping before the eyes of world opinion ongoing persecutions and martyrdoms of Christians by the thousands in places like China, Cuba, Vietnam, and the Soviet Bloc. That was why Pope John Paul II made it a part of the program for the Third Millennium, which was celebrated in 2000 in Rome and around the world, to remember the modern Christian martyrs (Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant). As he writes in Tertio Millennio Adveniente, "their witness must not be ­forgotten."

His words continue to hold a lesson for us today. This little book works against one temptation that those of us who have never had a similar experience may never have felt, but which we may become complicit in by a failure of truthfulness on the order of the author's. Anyone who suffers a trauma of this magnitude or who has come upon such horrors will be tempted to turn away. But to do so always has repercussions, not only for our understanding of the past, but for our very lives in the present and the future. As Father Bernard writes, "Wanting to forget would also be a weakness on the part of those who suffered... it would be turning a blind eye to similar events taking place today, in full view, in many other parts of the world... Forgetting would be cowardice on the part of the people against whom all these crimes were committed."

The anti-Christian currents in Nazism and Fascism and Communism did not entirely disappear from our world with the fall of the regimes associated with those ideologies in the twentieth century. They are still among us today in disguised cultural forms that demand our constant vigilance.

This republication of Priestblock 25487 is a valuable reminder of the price of failing to be vigilant both for the Church and for the world, because the persecution of Catholics in the twentieth century is not merely a part of religious ­history. It is an important but widely neglected part of the secular record of our time as well.

Pius XII's Efforts to Save Jewish Culture Revealed

Mobilized Church Leaders to Defend Synagogues

NEW YORK, JULY 1, 2010 (Zenit.org).- The recently opened sections of the Vatican Secret Archives have revealed that Pope Pius XII not only helped save thousands of Jews, but also their patrimony, from the Nazis.

Pave the Way Foundation reported Tuesday that its researchers found documents of "great importance."

Michael Hesemann, a historian and foundation representative from Germany, has been researching documents in the Vatican archives and he found a letter sent by Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, who would later become Pius XII, on Nov. 30, 1938, only three weeks after the Kristallnacht.

In this letter, which was sent to the nunciatures and apostolic delegations as well as 61 bishops, the cardinal requested 200,000 visas for "non-Aryan Catholics." Just over a month later, on Jan. 9, 1939, he sent three additional letters.

Hesemann explained that this language, in which Cardinal Pacelli speaks about "converted Jews" and "non-Aryan Catholics," is most likely a cover to hide the real scheme from the Nazis.

At that time, under the concordat of 1933, Germany allowed the Holy See to aid those considered "non-Aryan Catholics."

The foundation added that Cardinal Pacelli specifically requested in his letter: "Care should be taken that sanctuaries are provided to safeguard their spiritual welfare and to protect their religious cult, customs and traditions."

Persecuted

The communiqué explained that this seems to refer to a group other than converted Jews, who, upon their baptisms, "just became normal Catholics" without any "sanctuaries, customs, or traditions on their own."

Furthermore, many of the bishops responded to the cardinal's request, and documents show that they referred to aiding the "persecuted Jews" rather than the "converted Jews" or "non-Aryan Catholics."

Matteo Luigi Napolitano, political science professor at the University of Urbino, Italy, told ZENIT that one of the Jan. 9, 1939, letters was even more explicit.

It too was sent to over 60 prelates, and the instructions, written in Latin, "leave no room for doubt about the intentions of the Holy See and about Eugenio Pacelli's thoughts," the scholar said.

The letter, he reported, reads, "Do not engage in saving only Jewish people but also synagogues, cultural centers and everything that pertains to their faith: the Torah scrolls, libraries, cultural centers, etc.)."

The foundation explained that this point is important, because many historians have only acknowledged the efforts of Pius XII to save converted Jews, but the evidence seems to paint a different picture.

It continued: "Since many of the critics of this papacy have not yet accepted the proven Nazi threat against the Vatican State and the life of Pope Pius XII directly, they seem not to understand that there was a need for deception sending only encrypted or verbal directives.

"In many cases the historians are ignorant of the unique Vatican language sometimes using ancient Latin to express the hidden meaning of these requests."

It added that "the terms non-Aryan Catholics, non-Aryans, and Catholic Jews all indeed meant Jews," thus coded so that "if documents were intercepted, this deception would not raise a red flag since the concordat signed in 1933 specifically provided protection for Jews who converted to Christianity."

Eliminate obstacles

The foundation's president, Gary Krupp, underlined the mission "to identify and eliminate non-theological obstacles between religions," such as the discrepancies regarding the World War II papacy of Pius XII.

In this light, he said, the foundation undertook a "document retrieval project of the war time era to publicly post as many documents and eye witness testimonies as possible to bring the truth to light."

Elliot Hershberg, the foundation's chairman, stated that the organization "will continue to reveal as many documents as possible since everything we have found thus far seems to indicate the known negative perception of Pope Pius XII is wrong."

The foundation has over 40,000 pages of documents on its Web site, along with eyewitness videos available for public perusal.

Hershberg affirmed, "We also believe that many Jews who were successful in leaving Europe may not have had any idea that their visas and travel documents were obtained through these Vatican efforts."

Ronald Rychlak, author of "Hitler, the War and the Pope," acknowledged that this discovery by the foundation is "another confirmation" of the "good works of Pope Pius XII and the Catholic Church."

He stated, "The important aspect of this document is that it shows what many of us have been saying all along: Efforts that appear to have been directed to protect only converted Jews actually protected Jews regardless of whether they had converted."

[With the contribution of Jesús Colina]

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On the Net:

Pave the Way Foundation: http://www.ptwf.org

ZE10070105 - 2010-07-01
Permalink: http://www.zenit.org/article-29766?l=english

Personal Memories of Pius XII

Interview With Sister Margherita Marchione

ZE10060711 - 2010-06-07
Permalink: http://www.zenit.org/article-29521?l=english


By Carmen Elena Villa

ROME, JUNE 7, 2010 (Zenit.org).- The future Pope Pius XII enjoyed spending his summer vacations at the beach of Santa Marinella.

Last Saturday, a bronze bust of him was placed at that beach, to honor the World War II Pope and all the "righteous of the world."

Before being placed at the site, the bust was presented to Benedict XVI. The honor of this task was held by Sister Margherita Marchione, of the community of Religious Teachers Filippini. She is one of the world's principal biographers of Pius XII.

"So many pictures were taken of me in a few seconds," Sister Marchione recounted to ZENIT while she looked at the images of her brief meeting with the Pontiff.

This nun, born the daughter of Italian immigrants in New Jersey in 1922, has a doctorate in philosophy from Columbia University. In the last 15 years, she has published 10 book in English and Italian on Pius XII.

ZENIT: You met Pius XII. What was this experience like?

Sister Marchione: I met him in fact in St. Peter's Basilica in 1957; I came to Rome with his niece Elena Rossignani Pacelli. He approached us. We were in the first row. I held his hands in mine and kissed them, and spoke with him. He asked me questions. He wanted to know what I was doing in Rome. I was already a sister, but young, in a certain sense. I explained to him that I traveled and did research. I was writing my thesis on the poet Clemente Rebora. He asked me about the family. He gave me his blessing. It was such an impressive occasion for me that I can still see it again. He spoke to me as if we were friends of many years. I was struck by his kindness, his smile. The emotion I experienced, the impressions I have from this meeting are precious, indelible memories, which I have had my whole life. In fact, he exuded holiness.

ZENIT: Why did you decide to become Pius XII's principal biographer?

Sister Marchione: In 1995, almost 40 years after my meeting with Pius XII, I was here in Rome for a general chapter and I learned that our sisters, the Religious Teachers Filippini, saved 114 Jews in three convents of Rome. I was amazed and I said: How come? These are things that no one speaks about, that no one writes about. I learned this by chance. I became interested in Pius XII. I spoke with the sisters [involved] who were still alive and I was impressed by the work they -- as so many other Italians -- had done to hide the Jews. On my return to America, I began to be interested in the issue, I interviewed Jews who had been our guests and I wrote a first book. I have [now] written 10. I was able to interview some persons who had suffered, who were here in Rome during that period. I abandoned all my other interests and I began to write only about Pius XII.

ZENIT: How were the sisters of your community able to hide the Jews?

Sister Marchione: The sisters in all the convents were very courageous in hiding Jewish women. Even if bread was lacking for themselves, they gave half of what they had to these women. There were 60 Jewish women. If the Nazis had not believed the sister who said that no one was there, not only these women but also the sisters who were hosting them would all have been sent to Auschwitz. Hence, much courage was needed. I admired what they did and I wanted to make these facts known.

ZENIT: Other works of yours speak of Pius XII's silence.

Sister Marchione: Yes. Some Jews accuse him of silence, but it isn't true. His silence was prudent. He did everything possible to save the Jews, it could be said "behind the scenes." He could not start to fight America, England, Germany, the Russians. In the book "Architect of Peace" I reported important documents. Pius XII's charitable work was universal, magnanimous, assiduous and, above all, paternal in Christian terms, in the most profound sense of the term.

Pius XII maintained a diplomatic network in the Vatican during the whole war. He was personally interested in every human case made known to him. Young people and old went to him to receive help and to find dispersed relatives. Innumerable requests arrived daily from all countries worldwide, and all received his attention.

To make possible correspondence with prisoners' families, he instituted the Office of Information for Research, a unique archive that contained information on prisoners of war. The task of Holy See employees [there] was to inform the families on the state of prisoners.

ZENIT: What do you think of the negative judgments of Pius XII?

Sister Marchione: History must tell the truth, that the Catholic Church saved more than 5,000 Jews in Rome alone. It is a disgrace not to recognize it. For me it is necessary to tell the truth. In these books I have wished to make known Pius XII's virtues, the theological and cardinal virtues. I will give a few examples: He ate very little, he did not drink alcohol or mixed it with water during meals, he did not eat deserts, he was very mortified and had a strong character. He demonstrated he had faith, hope and charity.

ZENIT: Can you tell us about this Pope's personality?

Sister Marchione: He had the gifts of the Holy Spirit to a heroic degree, with all the virtues, theological and cardinal. He was prayerful -- a serene, tranquil person dedicated to every duty as Pontiff. By nature he was a timid person, and preferred tranquil environments. Gentleness as opposed to severity, persuasion as opposed to imposition. He was very humble and sincere, for him everyone was equal. I remember him as a saint, that's all.

[Translation by ZENIT]

How a Strategy of "Silence" Saved Thousands of Jews

Documents and Testimonies Point to Pius XII's Efforts

NEW YORK, May 25, 2010 (Zenit.org).- The Pave the Way Foundation has initiated a document retrieval project to reveal as much information and as many testimonies as possible regarding the papacy of Pope Pius XII, the World War II Pontiff, in order to break the academic "log jam" caused by the lack of publicly available information.

New findings have revealed documents and testimony, which clearly show that on Oct. 16, 1943, it was the intentional lack of a public denunciation by Pope Pius XII against the arrest of the Roman Jews, which saved their lives and enabled their rescue.

We have a signed 1972 deposition of General Karl Wolff, SS commander for Italy and deputy to Heinrich Himmler, which states that in September 1943 Adolf Hitler ordered him to develop a plan to invade the Vatican, kidnap the Pope, seize the Vatican assets, and kill the Roman Curia. This plan was to be carried out immediately.

General Wolff knew that if this invasion were executed, massive riots throughout Europe would ensue, resulting in a military disaster to the German war effort. General Wolff stated that he was successful in convincing Hitler to delay the invasion. This view of a potential military disaster was shared by the military governor of Rome, Major General Rainer Stahel, and German ambassador to the Holy See, Ernst von Weizsäcker.

Pius XII learned of the invasion plan, and likewise believed that the result would be massive riots potentially killing thousands of innocent people and that the Vatican’s neutrality would be breached, thereby enabling German forces to enter all Vatican properties. Handwritten minutes exist, which state that on Sept. 6, 1943, Pius XII secretly called the cardinals together to tell them the Vatican would be invaded and he would be taken to the north and probably killed. The cardinals were to be prepared to leave for a neutral country immediately, upon the invasion of Vatican territory.

He also signed a letter of resignation, and placed it in his desk. He instructed the cardinals to form a government in exile and to elect a new Pope once they were safe. We have a handwritten letter from the secretary of state ordering the Swiss Guard not to resist invading German forces with firepower, and numerous documents detailing how they were to protect the Vatican Library and museum contents.

Throughout this period, von Weizsäcker sent deceptive positive messages about the Pope to Berlin to calm Hitler, not to justify an order to invade. Some critics of Pius XII have erroneously based their theories of papal complicity and collaboration on these intentionally misleading cables -- what von Weizsäcker’s lieutenant, Albrecht von Kessel, later called "tactical lies."

We have additional testimony from Lieutenant Nikolaus Kunkel, a German officer from the headquarters of the military governor of Rome, which corroborates documented evidence and testimony of exactly how Pius XII directly saved the Roman Jewish community and that they were expecting the invasion order from Berlin any day.

When the early morning arrests began Oct. 16, 1943, Pius XII was alerted to this by Princess Enza Pignatelli Aragona Cortes. He immediately took multiple steps to force the Germans to stop the arrests. He summoned the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Maglione, and instructed him to launch a vehement protest against the arrests. Cardinal Maglione warned von Weizsacker that same morning, that the Pope could not remain silent as they arrested the Jews under his very windows, in his own diocese. Pius XII then sent his nephew, Carlo Pacelli, to meet with a German sympathizer, Bishop Alois Hudal, to instruct him to write a letter to his German contacts to immediately stop the arrests.

This too proved ineffective. Pius XII's last effort, the most successful, was to send his close confidant, Salvatorian Superior General Father Pankratius Pfeiffer, to meet directly with the military governor of Rome, General Stahel. Father Pfeiffer warned Stahel that the Pope was going to launch a loud and public protest against these arrests if they were not stopped. Fear that this public protest would result in Hitler's ordering the invasion of the Vatican prompted Stahel to act.

General Stahel immediately telephoned Heinrich Himmler, and fabricated military grounds to stop the arrests. Trusting Stahel's assessment, Himmler advised Hitler to stop the arrests. The order to stop the arrests was issued at noon on Oct. 16, resulting in its implementation by 2 p.m. on the day they began.

This sequence of events was independently confirmed by General Dietrich Beelitz, the liaison officer with Field Marshal Albert Kesselring’s office and Hitler’s command. Beelitz personally heard the Stahel-Himmler conversation. When Stahel’s deception later became known, Himmler punished General Stahel by sending him to the Eastern front.

It was known that the Vatican was infiltrated with spies. The Pope could only send trusted priests and confidants throughout Rome and Italy with verbal and written papal orders to lift cloister, allowing men and women to enter Catholic convents and monasteries, and ordered all ecclesiastical institutions to hide the Jews wherever they could.

According to famed British historian Sir Martin Gilbert, the Vatican hid thousands of Jews in literally one day (See supporting documents here and here). Once hidden, the Vatican continued to feed and support their Jewish “guests” until Rome’s liberation on June 4, 1944.

Documents from Berlin and the Eichmann Trial in Israel also show that the 8,000 Roman Jews that were to be arrested were not supposed to go to Auschwitz, but were to be sent to the work camp at Mauthausen and held as hostages. This order was later countermanded by persons unknown and 1,007 Jews were sent to Auschwitz to their death. Sadly only 17 survived. While there are those who repeatedly criticize Pius XII for not saving the 1,007, they remain completely silent on his direct actions, which saved this 3,000 year old Jewish community of Rome.

It was recently discovered, in the American archives, that the allies had broken the German codes and knew almost a week in advance of the intended arrests of the Roman Jews. The allies decided not to warn the Romans since this might alert the Germans to this intelligence breach. This “military decision” left Pope Pius XII alone, without advance notice, to try to end the arrests.

When speaking of Pope Pius XII, the foremost Jewish scholars of the Holocaust in Hungary, Jeno Levai, stated that it was a "particularly regrettable irony that the one person in all of occupied Europe who did more than anyone else to halt the dreadful crime and alleviate its consequences is today made the scapegoat for the failures of others."

* * *

Gary Krupp is the founder of Pave the Way Foundation (PTWF), a non-sectarian organization whose mission is to identify and try to eliminate obstacles between religions and to initiate positive gestures in order to improve interreligious relations.

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On the Net:

For more information: www.ptwf.org

Expression of gratitude by the Italian Jewish communities (1946): www.pavethewayfoundation.org/Downloads/Italian%20Jewish%20Community%20Placard.pdf

Jewish praise for Pius XII: www.pavethewayfoundation.org/Downloads/Jewish%20Praise.pdf

Testimony of Jesuit Father Peter Gumpel (Video 9): www.barhama.com/PAVETHEWAY/INTERVISTA_A_GUMPEL/GUMPLE.html

Original Article: http://www.zenit.org/article-29380?l=english

Vatican Secret Archives Documents Going Online

Pave the Way Foundation Proposal Approved


By Jesús Colina

VATICAN CITY, FEB. 12, 2010 (Zenit.org).- The Holy See is planning to publish on the Internet, free of charge, several documents from the Vatican Secret Archives in relation to World War II.

The initiatives is partially in response to a petition from Pave the Way Foundation, an organization dedicated to bridging gaps between religions.

The foundation proposed making digital files of, and later publicizing, some 5125 descriptions and copies of documents from the closed section of the Vatican archives, from the period of March 1939 to May 1945.

Gary Krupp, the foundation's president and founder, told ZENIT that "the 'Actes et Documents du Saint Siège relatifs a la Seconde Guerre Mondiale [Acts and Documents of the Holy See relative to the Second World War],'" which were "previously published and mostly ignored," will "shortly be available for worldwide scrutiny and study online, free of charge."

He explained that these documents will be available on the Web site of his foundation as well as that of the Vatican.

This project is part of the mission of the foundation, a non-sectarian organization that works to remove obstacles between religions, foster cooperation and to end the misuse of religion for private agendas.

The organization's president, who is from New York but of Jewish decent, stated, "In the furtherance of our mission we have recognized the papacy of the war time Pope Pius XII (Eugenio Pacelli) as a source of friction impacting over one billion people."

A plot

"Controversy abounds on whether he did enough to prevent the slaughter of Jews at the hands of the Nazis," Krupp affirmed.

He continued: "Our research has revealed that five years after Pius XII's death, the KGB hatched a plot to discredit their enemy, the Roman Catholic Church, called 'Seat 12.'

"A dirty trick, which condemned Pope Pius XII for his 'silence' during the Holocaust in the form of Rolf Hochhuth's fictitious 1963 play 'The Deputy.' The result was the worst character assassination of the twentieth century."

Based on his foundation's research, Krupp stated that in 1964, Pope Paul VI asked a team of three Jesuit historians, Father Pierre Blet, Father Burkhart Schneider, and Father Angelo Martini, to "conduct intensive research to identify relevant documents from the war years from the closed section of the Vatican Secret Archives."

He added: "A few years later Father Robert Graham joined the group. The first volume was published in 1965, the last in 1981."

Krupp explained that in 1999, Cardinal Edward Cassidy, at that time the president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, called for a special commission of Jewish and Catholic scholars to come together to study these documents.

"This positive advance unfortunately ended July 21, 2001 in failure," he added, "partly because the scholars simply did not read the languages of the collection."

"They issued a list of 47 questions and demanded the opening of the yet un-catalogued archives" from the 1939-1958 period, the foundation president said.

He stated that his foundation "sought to gain permission to digitize this collection, making it broadly available for study" so as to further "our mission to publicly disclose as many documents as possible to help to move this obstacle between Jews and Catholics into the light of documented truth."

Black legend

Krupp explained that "this effort is simply to show clear evidence of Pope Pius XII's efforts to mitigate suffering during the war and that the 'black legend,' which besmirched his name, is simply not true."

He added that this initiative is "not meant to be a substitute for the full access" to the archives, "but will absolutely show the unique efforts of Pope Pius XII and the dangers he was forced to operate under a direct threat from the Nazi regime."

"Ironically," he said "the Vatican Secret Archives [from the period prior] to 1939 were opened over two years ago," and they showed that "65% of Pacelli's ministry has simply been ignored by the critics who call for the war years to be opened."

On behalf of the foundation, the president expressed gratitude to the Pope's Secretary of State and the Libreria Editrice Vaticana "for their confidence in us by allowing us this unprecedented privilege."

He continued: "We sincerely hope that international historians will carefully scrutinize these records. We expect the digitization process of over 9000 pages will take about four weeks to complete [at which time] we will announce their posting on Internet."

In the meantime, the foundation already has thousands of documents and eyewitness videos available on their Web site for study.

Krupp concluded by requesting that "French, Italian and German scholars consider helping us by translating documents into English and forward this work to Pave the Way Foundation so that we can make the information available to more scholars for research."

He added, "We also would like to receive any comments, positive or negative, relative to the content of these documents."

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On the Net:

Pave the Way Foundation: http://www.ptwf.org

Nothing Novel Seen in New Pius XII Documents

Permalink: http://www.zenit.org/article-28224?l=english

L'Osservatore Romano Gives Context of Two Texts From 40s

VATICAN CITY, FEB. 1, 2010 (Zenit.org).- Two more documents regarding Pope Pius XII and his handling of the Third Reich and the Holocaust have resurfaced, refueling allegations that he was silent and bringing historians to his defense.

The Vatican's semi-official daily, L'Osservatore Romano, today took up the news generated by researcher Giuseppe Casarrubea, who has analyzed two documents found in an English archive.

The Italian press is reporting Casarrubea's presentation of a brief document from Oct. 19, 1943, and a letter of Nov. 10, 1944.

The first document reports on a meeting between Pius XII and U.S. diplomat Harold Tittmann. Though the meeting took place just three days after the deportation of Roman Jews, the document makes no mention of that tragedy.

It does speak about the Pope's concern to keep Rome in peace.

Cardinal Achille Silvestrini, retired prefect of the Congregation for Eastern Churches, who entered Pius XII's diplomatic service in 1953, told the Italian newspaper La Stampa today that although the Pope did not raise his voice in face of the deportation, he dedicated himself to concrete actions.

In the interview, cited by L'Osservatore Romano, the cardinal said the Holy Father's activity on behalf of the Jews would not have been possible should relations with the Germans have grown tense.

"In that tragic period, the Pope was concerned that the Germans leave Rome in peace and respect its sacred character," Cardinal Silvestrini explained.

"And this was not an option against the Jews. On the contrary. Precisely that attitude of prudence made it possible to act in an effective and concrete manner in favor of the Jews and many others who were persecuted. Every gesture of protest or rebellion with a lot of publicity would have been counterproductive," the L'Osservatore Romano article stated.

"At the same time the Pope mobilized so that Catholic churches and institutions would receive the greatest possible number of Jews," Cardinal Silvestrini said. "But an explicit protest would have caused more damages than advantages."

Cardinal Silvestrini recalled how Pius XII was no stranger to German affairs, having been nuncio in Munich and in Berlin from 1917 to 1929: "He knew what Nazism was."

A time to speak

The other document, a letter of Nov. 10, 1944, makes reference to a dialogue between British ambassador Francis D'Arcy Osborne and Pius XII on the massacres of Jews in Hungary. Osborne urged a public condemnation of the tragedy.

The Holy Father noted how the Apostolic See was receiving continual appeals to denounce the crimes of Stalin in the Baltic countries and in Poland.

In this regard, however, the ambassador suggested silence, to protect public opinion of the allies.

For both situations, Pius XII chose his customary prudence.

Cardinal Silvestrini explained that "Pius XII considered what happened to the Dutch bishops as a warning not to be repeated."

He observed: "Holland's episcopate wrote a letter condemning 'the cruel and unjust treatment of Jews.' That document was read in Dutch churches in July of 1942.

"The intentions were excellent, but the results were disastrous."

"Precisely in the country in which the priests had denounced the Jewish persecutions most harshly, there were more deportations than in any other state of Western Europe," Cardinal Silvestrini said. "In face of the Shoa the Allies kept silent as did all the others, but only Pius XII is called to account. The others are never up for discussion."

Much-maligned pontiff

By Dimitri Cavalli, Haaretz.com

Some things never go away. The controversy over Pope Pius XII's actions during World War II was recently reignited when Pope Benedict XVI signed a decree affirming that his predecessor displayed "heroic virtues" during his lifetime. When the pope visited the Great Synagogue of Rome on Sunday, Riccardo Pacifici, president of Rome's Jewish community, told him: "The silence of Pius XII before the Shoah still hurts because something should have been done."

This was not the first time the wartime pope, who is now a step closer to beatification, has been accused of keeping silent during the Holocaust, of doing little or nothing to help the Jews, and even of collaborating with the Nazis. To what extent, if any, does the evidence back up these allegations, which have been repeated since the early 1960s?

On April 4, 1933, Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli, the Vatican secretary of state, instructed the papal nuncio in Germany to see what he could do to oppose the Nazis' anti-Semitic policies.
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On behalf of Pope Pius XI, Cardinal Pacelli drafted an encyclical, entitled "Mit brennender Sorge" ("With Burning Anxiety"), that condemned Nazi doctrines and persecution of the Catholic Church. The encyclical was smuggled into Germany and read from Catholic pulpits on March 21, 1937.

Although many Vatican critics today dismiss the encyclical as a light slap on the wrist, the Germans saw it as a security threat. For example, on March 26, 1937, Hans Dieckhoff, an official in the German foreign ministry, wrote that the "encyclical contains attacks of the severest nature upon the German government, calls upon Catholic citizens to rebel against the authority of the state, and therefore signifies an attempt to endanger internal peace."

Both Great Britain and France should have interpreted the document as a warning that they should not trust Adolf Hitler or try to appease him.

After the death of Pius XI, Cardinal Pacelli was elected pope, on March 2, 1939. The Nazis were displeased with the new pontiff, who took the name Pius XII. On March 4, Joseph Goebbels, the German propaganda minister, wrote in his diary: "Midday with the Fuehrer. He is considering whether we should abrogate the concordat with Rome in light of Pacelli's election as pope."

During the war, the pope was far from silent: In numerous speeches and encyclicals, he championed human rights for all people and called on the belligerent nations to respect the rights of all civilians and prisoners of war. Unlike many of the pope's latter-day detractors, the Nazis understood him very well. After studying Pius XII's 1942 Christmas message, the Reich Central Security Office concluded: "In a manner never known before the pope has repudiated the National Socialist New European Order ... Here he is virtually accusing the German people of injustice toward the Jews and makes himself the mouthpiece of the Jewish war criminals." (Pick up any book that criticizes Pius XII, and you won't find any mention of this important report.)

In early 1940, the pope acted as an intermediary between a group of German generals who wanted to overthrow Hitler and the British government. Although the conspiracy never went forward, Pius XII kept in close contact with the German resistance and heard about two other plots against Hitler. In the fall of 1941, through diplomatic channels, the pope agreed with Franklin Delano Roosevelt that America's Catholics could support the president's plans to extend military aid to the Soviet Union after it was invaded by the Nazis. On behalf of the Vatican, John T. McNicholas, the archbishop of Cincinnati, Ohio, delivered a well-publicized address that explained that the extension of assistance to the Soviets could be morally justified because it helped the Russian people, who were the innocent victims of German aggression.

Throughout the war, the pope's deputies frequently ordered the Vatican's diplomatic representatives in many Nazi-occupied and Axis countries to intervene on behalf of endangered Jews. Up until Pius XII's death in 1958, many Jewish organizations, newspapers and leaders lauded his efforts. To cite one of many examples, in his April 7, 1944, letter to the papal nuncio in Romania, Alexander Shafran, chief rabbi of Bucharest, wrote: "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."

The campaign against Pope Pius XII is doomed to failure because his detractors cannot sustain their main charges against him - that he was silent, pro-Nazi, and did little or nothing to help the Jews - with evidence. Perhaps only in a backward world such as ours would the one man who did more than any other wartime leader to help Jews and other Nazi victims, receive the greatest condemnation.

Dimitri Cavalli is an editor and writer in New York City. He is working on books on both Pope Pius XII and Joe McCarthy, the late manager of the New York Yankees.

Pius XII and objectivity

Carl Olson | Ignatius Insight | Friday, January 22, 2010

I was reading a couple of articles this morning about responses to Pope Benedict's recent visit to the Great Synagogue in Rome, and was struck by this, from The Catholic Herald:

Although Rabbi Rosen was critical of the way in which certain crisis situations had been dealt with by the Curia (and believes the Pope must take responsibility for this) he says it is unfair to perceive Pope Benedict's pontificate as a step backwards. He says, however, that it was easy to see how even educated people come to that conclusion, citing the beatification of Pius XII, the Lefebvrists and the liberation of the older form of the Latin Mass among other instances, but these would ultimately not affect the substance of the dialogue. He says that not one of these was an initiative put forward by Pope Benedict.

Really? That is a remarkable statement, one I have a very hard time believing is accurate. (It bears resemblance to the claims that a beleaguered Paul VI issued Humanae Vitae because of nefarious conservatives in the Vatican.) And then this:

Rabbi Rosen says the issue of Pius XII goes back many years. "We should ask ourselves why it has taken so many years for the Vatican to approve his status of heroic virtues - surely out of caution and sensitivity to the Jewish community. Pius XII belongs to the most traumatic period in the history of the Jewish people and it is inappropriate to expect Jews not to be upset about the issue, that anybody who did not lay down his life in protest could be considered a saint is almost anathema to Jews."

He says that while it caused angst for some people, "it is not something which would torpedo the process for both parties. And on this period in history, we shall have to learn to agree to disagree. It's unfair to expect Jews to be objective about that period of their history just as its unfair to expect Catholics to be objective about popes."

First, this remark: "... it is inappropriate to expect Jews not to be upset about the issue, that anybody who did not lay down his life in protest could be considered a saint is almost anathema to Jews." One question that comes to mind immediately: "Is it better to die dramatically but foolishly, or to quietly go about saving lives and then be damned as an anti-Semitic 'do-nothing' in years to come?" The more I read about the criticisms of the "silence" of Pope Pius XII, the more I am convinced that they are quite often driven by the modern, obsessive belief that dramatic symbolic gestures are morally superior to mundane, concrete action. Put another, we live in age in which style and image tends to trump—often shamelessly—prudent action and moral rectitude. I get the impression that even if there is irrefutable proof Pius XII saved, say, 700,000 to 800,000 Jews, that would mean almost nothing because it did not include the appropriate level of eye-catching public demonstration and dramatic symbolic gestures. Sure, he might have saved a lot of lives, but he did too quietly! But, as Dimitri Cavalli summarizes in a short piece, "Much-maligned pontiff," published today in the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz:

During the war, the pope was far from silent: In numerous speeches and encyclicals, he championed human rights for all people and called on the belligerent nations to respect the rights of all civilians and prisoners of war. Unlike many of the pope's latter-day detractors, the Nazis understood him very well. After studying Pius XII's 1942 Christmas message, the Reich Central Security Office concluded: "In a manner never known before the pope has repudiated the National Socialist New European Order ... Here he is virtually accusing the German people of injustice toward the Jews and makes himself the mouthpiece of the Jewish war criminals." (Pick up any book that criticizes Pius XII, and you won't find any mention of this important report.)

In early 1940, the pope acted as an intermediary between a group of German generals who wanted to overthrow Hitler and the British government. Although the conspiracy never went forward, Pius XII kept in close contact with the German resistance and heard about two other plots against Hitler. In the fall of 1941, through diplomatic channels, the pope agreed with Franklin Delano Roosevelt that America's Catholics could support the president's plans to extend military aid to the Soviet Union after it was invaded by the Nazis. On behalf of the Vatican, John T. McNicholas, the archbishop of Cincinnati, Ohio, delivered a well-publicized address that explained that the extension of assistance to the Soviets could be morally justified because it helped the Russian people, who were the innocent victims of German aggression.

Throughout the war, the pope's deputies frequently ordered the Vatican's diplomatic representatives in many Nazi-occupied and Axis countries to intervene on behalf of endangered Jews. Up until Pius XII's death in 1958, many Jewish organizations, newspapers and leaders lauded his efforts. To cite one of many examples, in his April 7, 1944, letter to the papal nuncio in Romania, Alexander Shafran, chief rabbi of Bucharest, wrote: "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."

In a much longer article published in the October 2000 edition of Inside the Vatican, in which he detailed Pius XII's opposition to the Third Reich's pogroms against the Jews, Cavalli wrote:

Many Catholics have been puzzled by the fact that many of the same Jewish organizations that condemn Pius XII today once never passed up an opportunity to praise him. What could have caused the vast shift in Jewish attitudes toward the late Pope?

Some Catholic writers point to the influence of Rolf Hochhuth's 1963 play, The Deputy, which presented the Pope as a cold-blooded Nazi collaborator who did nothing as six million Jews went to their death. However, allegations that the Vatican collaborated with the Nazis did not begin with Hochhuth. While Pius XII was still alive, anti-Catholic authors like Avro Manhattan (The Vatican in World Politics, 1949) and Paul Blanshard (American Freedom and Catholic Power, 1949) condemned his actions during World War II. Although Manhattan and Blanshard found isolated audiences in some Protestant and fundamentalist Christian circles, many Jews continued to have a favorable impression of the wartime Pope.

Other cultural shifts in society ensured that Hochhuth's demonic portrait would become accepted as conventional wisdom. Shortly after Hochhuth's play made its appearance, the movement known as the New Left marched across college campuses. The New Left was more than a political movement; it was also a cultural movement whose members seized influential positions in the universities, the media and the entertainment industry. The Catholic Church strongly opposed the New Left's social agenda of legal abortion, contraception and sexual promiscuity. Activists needed a weapon to undermine the Catholic Church's moral authority and influence. "The silence of Pius XII" provided such a powerful weapon, and it was used at every possible opportunity. What right would a Church that failed to oppose the mass murder of Jews have to teach morality to anyone? A few years ago, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops criticized US Surgeon General Dr. Jocelyn Elders for her pro-abortion views. Dr. Elders responded by noting the Catholic Church's indifference toward both slavery and the Holocaust.

Which brings me back to the other remark by Rabbi Rosen: "It's unfair to expect Jews to be objective about that period of their history just as its unfair to expect Catholics to be objective about popes." If by that he means this is an emotionally charged topic, I understand and agree. But if he is insinuating it is not really possible to honestly assess the facts available to us, he is shortchanging both Jews and Catholics who are interested in the truth. It is, in fact, quite possible for Catholic to be objective about the actions of popes, who are not sinless, perfect, or flawless when it comes to governing. It is, however, rather difficult to be objective about what might have resulted if Pius XII had jumped in front of trains deporting Jews (the advice of Ed Bradley on "60 Minutes") or issued endless public statements. (Am I the only one who finds it hard to believe that the Catholic-hating Nazi leadership would change course because of papal announcements? After all, consider how Paul VI was attacked and denounced—by many Catholic priests, theologians, and lay people!—when he issued Humanae Vitae.)

What frustrates Catholics such as myself is that Pius XII is repeatedly condemned for "failing" to do what this or that critic thinks he could have and should have done while the same critics ignore the evidence for what he did do: quietly saved hundreds of thousands of Jewish lives. As Robert Lockwood remarked in an essay, "Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust":

Pulitzer Prize winning historian John Toland, no friend of Pius XII, summed it up: "The Church, under the Pope’s guidance…saved the lives of more Jews than all other churches, religious institutions and rescue organizations combined…The British and the Americans, despite lofty pronouncements, had not only avoided taking any meaningful action but gave sanctuary to few persecuted Jews."

"Lofty pronouncements" saved no lives during the horror of the Holocaust. Action did so. Pinchas Lapide, Israeli consul in Italy, estimated that the actions of Pius II saved over 800,000 Jewish lives during World War II. If that were an exaggeration by half, it would record more Jewish lives saved than by any other entity at the time.

One can only hope Cavalli is correct: "The campaign against Pope Pius XII is doomed to failure because his detractors cannot sustain their main charges against him - that he was silent, pro-Nazi, and did little or nothing to help the Jews - with evidence. Perhaps only in a backward world such as ours would the one man who did more than any other wartime leader to help Jews and other Nazi victims, receive the greatest condemnation."

DVD Marks Pius XII's Role in "Great Rescue"

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 18, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Marking the anniversary of Pope Pius XII's death in October 1958, a new documentary looks into the Pontiff's role in saving Jews from the Nazis.

"Pius XII and the Holocaust: The Secret History of the Great Rescue" is being sold by the Vatican Television Center.

The 30-minute documentary highlights the story of a Holocaust survivor who tells how he was hid in a convent in Rome.

It also includes firsthand accounts of Pius XII's clandestine efforts on behalf of the Jews.

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On the Net:

"Pius XII and the Holocaust": www.hdhcommunications.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=128&products_id=244



Permalink: http://www.zenit.org/article-27250?l=english

"Be Proud to Be a Jew!" Pius XII Told Visitor in '41

There is some myth circulating that Pope Pius XII was an anti-semite, or a Nazi sympathizer... this myth continues to exist despite soooooo many facts to the contrary, including praise by both Albert Einstein and the New York Times that the pope was the only one on the continent actually standing up to Hitler. Anyway, here is some more news....



"Be Proud to Be a Jew!" Pius XII Told Visitor in '41

Incident Was Published in Palestine Post

ROME, DEC. 3, 2006 (Zenit.org).- An article published in 1944 by a young German Jew in the Palestine Post, the future Jerusalem Post, points up Pope Pius XII's appreciation for the "Chosen People."

The article was published April 28, 1944, on Page 6 and headlined "A Papal Audience in Wartime." It was signed by a "refugee"; a footnote states that the article's author arrived in Palestine on the ship Nyassa.

The writer recounts that in autumn of 1941 he was received in audience along with numerous other people by Pius XII.

When the young Jew approached the Pope, he revealed that he was born in Germany but was a Jew.

The Holy Father responded, "What can I do for you? Tell me, my son!"

The young Jew told Pius XII about a group of shipwrecked Jewish refugees, saved by Italian warships in the Aegean Sea, who were then starving in a prisoner of war camp on an island. The Pope listened carefully and showed concern about the physical and health conditions of the Jewish prisoners.

According to the article, Pius XII then said to him: "You have done well to come and tell me this. I have heard about it before. Come back tomorrow with a written report and give it to the secretary of state who is dealing with this question. But now for you, my son. You are a young Jew. I know what that means and I hope you will always be proud to be a Jew!"

Then, the author of the article wrote, the Pope raised his voice, so that everyone in the hall could hear it clearly: "My son, whether you are worthier than others only the Lord knows, but believe me, you are at least as worthy as every other human being that lives on our earth! And now, my Jewish friend, go with the protection of the Lord, and never forget, you must always be proud to be a Jew!"

Archival find

The author goes on to say that, after having uttered these words in a pleasant voice, Pius XII lifted his hands to give the usual blessing, but he stopped, smiled and touched the author's head with his fingers, and then lifted him from his kneeling position.

Pius XII uttered these words during an audience attended by cardinals, bishops -- and a group of German soldiers.

Details of this incident were discovered in an archive in Tel Aviv University by William Doino, contributor to the magazine Inside the Vatican, and author of an annotated bibliography on Pius XII, published in "The Pius War: Responses to the Critics of Pius XII" (Lexington Books, 2004).

According to Doino, "This testimony is significant because it shows the attention and great love with which the Pontiff regarded the Jews, in addition to reaffirming the rejection of the Nazi racial theories that pointed to the Jews as the last of the earth."

On this matter, Doino will publish a full-scale commentary in an upcoming issue of Inside the Vatican magazine, in which, among other things, he will evaluate the importance of this testimony for Pius XII studies.