Not only would he face the challenge of leading the Church but also the horrors of the second World War And his response would be remembered for decades Eugenio Pacelli was born in Rome on March 2 he was ordained to the priesthood and began his work in what would become a long career at the Vatican Pacelli served as a clerk in the Secretariat of State where he brokered agreements between Bavaria and Prussia Pacelli was elected Pope and chose the name Pius XII World War II broke out six months after Pope Pius XII began his 19-year papacy He used his diplomatic background to respond to the violence and published his first encyclical “Summi Pontificatus,” which called for prayer to end the war This was just the beginning of his mission of peace during the world war said Pope Pius XII “did more to save Jews and to stop the killings than any politician or religious leader of his time.” Since 2009 Hesemann has studied the Vatican Archives and has refuted the idea the Pope had remained silent and uninvolved Pope Pius XII spoke about the treatment of the Jews in three public speeches he petitioned for 20,000 visas for German Jews to escape the Nazis but he only received less than 10,000 the Pope worked clandestinely to protect the Jewish people He understood that speaking out publicly against the Nazis could lead to greater violence and persecution “Every word that we addressed to the responsible authorities and every one of our public declarations,” he said “had to be seriously weighed and considered in the interest of the persecuted themselves in order not to make their situation unwittingly even more difficult and unbearable.” Pope Pius XII delivered almost 200 radio speeches in different languages to speak out against the violence and promote peace At a special audience at the Vatican on November 29 80 delegates from German concentration camps personally thanked Pope Pius XII for his words and actions taken during the Nazi regime Pope Francis opened an archive of documents relating to Pope Pius XII and his relations with the Jewish people during World War II the work of this “silent” pontiff was uncovered 16 million pages recount the difficult period of world history These documents reveal that more than 4,200 Jews were hidden in convents and monasteries and 160 in Vatican City Thanks to Pope Pius XII and other Church members 80% of the Jews in Rome survived the Nazi occupation—more than anywhere else Thank you for reading our article. 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Just click here When the Vatican opened the archives of Pope Pius XII’s pontificate in 2020 historians gained unprecedented access to documents from one of history’s most scrutinized papacies Among the scholars who got to work was historian Hubert Wolf He and his team at the University of Münster uncovered a staggering 10,000 pleas for help — letters sent to Pope Pius XII during World War II desperate appeals from Jewish individuals and others seeking refuge from Nazi persecution According to Stefanie Stahlhofen’s article for Vatican News Wolf and his team have made it their mission to transcribe and analyze these letters uncovering the fates of those who wrote them One such letter, Stahlhofen writes a Jewish man pleading for Vatican intervention to secure Swiss visas for his family these letters reveal raw human desperation: “These people lay out their lives before the Pope with astonishing openness.” The Cardinal Secretary of State acted swiftly instructing the papal nuncio in Switzerland to request visas on behalf of the Wachskerz family explicitly stating that the Holy Father wished for their protection However, the Swiss immigration police refused, citing an already overwhelming number of Jewish refugees. Stahlhofen reports that this case highlights a recurring theme in the Vatican’s wartime efforts: While the Curia sought to assist their success often depended on external governments and institutions For Wolf and his team, the work does not end with discovering the letters. They aim to trace the outcomes of these petitions, reconstructing personal histories that might otherwise have been lost. This effort requires combing through global archives, including those at Yad Vashem and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum Wolf has enlisted help from unexpected allies “A former detective cracked a case in three days that had stumped us,” he noted These collaborations breathe life into the research bringing closure to long-unanswered questions One of the most pressing questions concerns Pope Pius XII himself According to Stahlhofen’s article Wolf’s preliminary findings suggest that the Pope personally saw only about 10% of the petitions Many were handled by Vatican officials before they ever reached his desk he sometimes overruled his advisors to act Wolf urges a shift in perspective: Rather than focusing solely on “Pius XII and the Holocaust,” he argues and the Holocaust.” This broader approach acknowledges the Vatican’s complex bureaucracy and the limits of the Pope’s direct involvement only a fraction of the letters have been analyzed and only a dozen individuals’ fates have been fully reconstructed Wolf estimates that it will take another 25 years before a complete In the meantime, the University of Münster has launched an online resource, Asking the Pope for Help where visitors can access and even listen to these historic letters This digital archive ensures that the voices of those who sought the Pope’s aid will not be forgotten Articles like these are sponsored free for every Catholic through the support of generous readers just like you Please make a tax-deductible donation today Help us continue to bring the Gospel to people everywhere through uplifting Catholic news help me"— this desperate cry was not only whispered in prayer by those persecuted by the Nazis during World War II but also written down and sent as an appeal for help to Pope Pius XII the Vatican opened the archives of Pope Pius XII’s pontificate (1939–1958) to researchers historian Hubert Wolf and his team at Germany's University of Münster have uncovered at least 10,000 such petitions – scattered across 1,000 boxes and six different archives spanning approximately 17,400 pages and written in 17 languages The historians recently presented their research findings at the German Embassy to the Holy See where Professor Hubert Wolf spoke to Vatican News One of these 10,000 pleas for help uncovered by historian Hubert Wolf and his team comes from Martin Wachskerz "You can feel in these words," says Professor Wolf "how deeply moving and emotional these letters are—written in desperation These people lay out their lives before the Pope with astonishing openness." The historian knows the text of Martin Wachskerz's petition letter almost by heart He and his team at the University of Münster have made it their mission to give a voice to the people behind these letters—to decipher their research also seeks to answer a crucial question: How did Pope Pius XII and the Vatican respond “The Curia did attempt to help—but their efforts depended on the cooperation of third parties 1943," explains historian Hubert Wolf the Cardinal Secretary of State—the Vatican’s equivalent of a foreign minister—acted immediately This is one of those cases where Pope Pius XII was not directly involved." the Cardinal Secretary of State instructed the papal nuncio in Switzerland: These Jews are at risk of being deported to an extermination camp Please inform the Swiss immigration authorities that the Holy Father wishes for these four individuals to be granted visas for Switzerland "A relatively clear appeal," Wolf notes the head of the Swiss immigration police in Bern refused the request "This shows that the Curia did attempt to help—but their efforts depended on the cooperation of third parties They want to uncover what happened to the family after their plea was denied the search for answers—sparked by a single petition letter in the Vatican Archives—continues it’s not just about uncovering how Pope Pius XII and the Vatican responded Their mission goes further: to trace the fate of each individual who wrote a plea for help and make their stories accessible to the public This means painstaking work for every single letter researchers must dig through archives from various Vatican departments and Holocaust memorial institutions such as Yad Vashem or the U.S Professor Wolf and his team have sought support from a variety of sources “A retired detective inspector cracked it in three days” “We have a whole group of 'citizen scientists'—people who have retired and now contribute to historical research," Wolf explains I wrote to her saying: We have no further information on this individual I’ve conducted my own research but hit a dead end—can you help the researchers also aim to provide precise historical answers to key questions along with the other letters examined so far has led to at least one preliminary conclusion: Wolf and his team believe that the Pope personally learned of only about ten percent of the pleas for help “He was entirely dependent on what his staff selected and presented to him as important," Wolf explains he would make decisions—sometimes even deviating from their recommendations That’s why I argue we must move beyond the narrow focus on Pius XII and the Holocaust ““We have to get away from the narrow view of Pius XII and the Holocaust it will take at least another 25 years of analyzing and processing the more than 10,000 petition letters before solid conclusions can be drawn about the role of Pius XII—and his inner circle—during the Nazi era we won’t just be making qualitative assessments—we’ll also be able to present quantitative statistical findings,” says Professor Wolf “Then we’ll be able to say: Exactly this many letters requested visas for the U.S The Holy See supported this percentage of them The American government approved this percentage and rejected this many we’ll gain precise insight into the contexts in which things happened general observations—can still evolve as hypotheses are refined.” Even five years after the opening of the Vatican Archives covering the pontificate of Pope Pius XII (1939–1958) only a fraction of the at least 10,000 letters have been analyzed and the fates of their authors reconstructed this has been possible for about a dozen letters Professor Hubert Wolf and his team at the University of Münster have already made around 40 petition letters available to the public on a dedicated website: Asking the Pope for Help visitors can read and even listen to letters like Martin Wachskerz’s plea The site also offers educational materials making it a valuable resource for schools and researchers Father Peter Gumpel, S.J., PhD., was asked numerous times by Pope Pacelli to check his quotations for his sermons and addresses. His closeness to Father Gumpel soon made him an important collaborator of the Vatican. Father Peter Gumpel was known to be the leading expert world wide on matters concerning the Pope of World War II at the time. In 2019, Mr. Gary Krupp of Pave The Way Foundation made arrangements for me to meet and interview Father Gumpel twice (who was 95 years old at the time). I was eager to meet with the only Catholic scholar alive who personally knew Pius XII. I asked him if he was in Rome or Germany on October of 1943. He (Father Gumpel) said that he did not learn about the deportation of 16 Oct 1943 because he was not in Germany in that year, but in Nijmegen/Netherlands, visiting the Jesuit school there. Only after the war he was allowed to return to Germany. Gumpel wanted to make clear to me that Pius XII had saved many Jewish lives, including a number of Roman Jews, and the opening of the Vatican Archives in March of 2020 will confirm the existing data. In addition, Father Gumpell showed me a copy of Michael Hesemann’s (2009) book that he kept on his desk “Pio XII: Il papa he si oppose a Hitler,” in which he wrote the foreword. He immediately showed me an image of an important marble plaque that read: (English translation) The image of the plaque can be found in the picture part between pages 152 and 153 of Michael Hesemann’s book. I did not bother to mention this information in my earlier Independent Project essay because Father Gumpel mentioned that the plaque no longer exists. There is also an image of this plaque in Gary Krupp’s (2012) book “Pope Pius XII and World War II—The Documented Truth: A Compilation of International Evidence Revealing the Wartime Acts of the Vatican,” page 146. I searched to locate this marble plaque and have not yet been able to locate it anywhere in Rome. It was an exciting time for me to begin my independent research and begin to meet and interview renowned Vatican scholars regarding Pius XII and the Holocaust. This was at the precise time when scholars from all over the world were coming to Rome, waiting patiently for the Vatican Archives to open up on the morning of March 2, 2020. As these scholars prepared for months and months of research, the world stopped—Covid closed the doors of all archives world wide. Fast forward now to 2024, I have followed the advice of Father Gumpel, and I am now in a Doctorate of Science in Jewish Studies Program at the Spertus College in Chicago, Illinois. I am looking forward to renewed research and to interviewing both Jewish and Christian scholars on the topic of Pope Pius XII and the Jews of Rome. On the advice of Father Gumpel, I am honored to have Michael Hesseman answer some questions: Hesemann: 1. The Maglione-Protocol (reproduced in my book) proves that the German Ambassador to the Holy See, von Weizsäcker, was ordered into the Vatican in the morning of October 16 and that Secretary of State Cardinal Maglione told him that the Vatican would protest if the deportations would not stop immediately. Weizsäcker warned Maglione of the consequences and promised to do "something" to stop the deportations. Indeed, he did nothing. Pope Pius XII pictured working at his typewriter in January 1955, just three years before his death. Picture: Fred Ramage/Keystone/Getty Images As he was known before donning the papal tiara, Eugenio Pacelli had shepherded his flock through some of the darkest days of the war-torn 20th century. His illustrious reign saw the rise and fall of fascism, the horrors of the Holocaust, and the dawn of the Cold War. Yet, it was the spectacle of his death and its lurid aftermath that would provide a tragic footnote to his papacy. On October 9, 1958, after an extended decline, Pope Pius XII breathed his last at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence. The Washington Daily News, ever eager for a scoop, rushed to report the details of his passing and reflect on his 19-year tenure as the Supreme Pontiff. Pius XII had been a figure of dignified solemnity, his ascetic features and piercing eyes a constant presence in the minds of the faithful. Pius's ambiguous stance during WWII, marked by silence on fascism and the Holocaust, led to controversy and criticism, yet the Catholic Church's efforts saved many Jews from persecution. In death, however, he was about to become the unwitting star of a macabre spectacle that would have made even the most decadent Roman emperor blush with mortification. But Galeazzi-Lisi's outrageous betrayal didn't end there. Through a bizarre blend of arrogance and incompetence, he fancied himself an innovator in the field of embalming and decided to try out a new preservation technique on the papal corpse. This 'cutting-edge' method involved a liberal application of oils and resins wrapped in cellophane. I can only imagine Ballina's famed undertaker David McGowan shrieking in horror at this festering concoction. As can be imagined, things got a tad 'ripe'. Decomposition is the natural enemy of anatomy, and artful embalmers have been fighting this battle since ancient Egypt. But in this case, the battle was already lost and resembled more of a rout. The Pope's body was liquified faster than the wax candles surrounding the catafalque. The Vatican, that bastion of tradition and decorum, now found itself in an unprecedented pickle. The customary nine days of mourning in the Vatican, during which the faithful would pay their respects to the deceased pontiff, loomed ominously ahead. But how can you display a body that was, to put it delicately, past its best-before date and in urgent need of burial? In an audacious move that would have made Weekend at Bernie's look like an exercise in restraint, the Vatican decided to proceed with the public viewing. A wax mask was manufactured to cover the face, covering the sunken eyes, the detached nose, and the mouth stretched into a hideous Rictor grin. But the worst was yet to come. As the Pope's body was being transported to St Peter's Basilica for burial, the heat and gases produced by the rapid decomposition reached what can only be described as a critical juncture. In a moment that again occasioned fits of fainting and retching in those unfortunate to be in proximity, the papal corpse... exploded. The solemn procession of ages, all pomp and mournful glory, with incense wafting through the air, was punctured by a sound like a champagne cork popping at a New Year's Eve celebration. Pop went the Pope and down went several pallbearers. The Vatican, displaying the kind of crisis management skills that would make a modern PR firm weep with envy, undertook urgent treatment to rescue the putrid remains before publicly displaying them. The Pope was then hurriedly interred in the grotto beneath St Peter's Basilica, ending one of the most bizarre and explosive funerals in papal history. The fallout, however, was just beginning for Dr Galeazzi-Lisi, the architect of this fiasco, who found himself persona non grata in Vatican City. The scandal surrounding the "corrupt first doctor", who not only botched the embalming but also faced exile and disgrace for selling photos of the Pope after his death, highlighted the lack of accountability surrounding the pontiff's care. This whole affair, as grotesque as it was, serves as a stark reminder of the humanity that lies beneath even the most exalted offices. Pope Pius XII, a man who had guided the Church through unprecedented world wars and societal change, grappling with questions of faith and morality on a global scale, was, in the end, subject to the same indignities as any ordinary mortal. But it is also a testament to the papacy's power and the faithful Catholic's collective will to honour the Church that this incident didn't indelibly tarnish Pius XII's legacy. Indeed, in the intervening 66 years since his death, his legacy has been reassessed, and he is remembered for his saving of the Jews in Rome from the horrors of the Holocaust. The papacy has changed much since Pius XII's days. The pomp and circumstance greatly diminished after Vatican II, with a new emphasis on transparency and accessibility. One can't help but wonder what the regal Pius would make of Pope Francis's Twitter account. Ultimately, the tale of Pius XII's explosive exit reminds us that popes are mere flesh and blood beneath the robes and rings, the tiaras and titles. They live, die, and sometimes, embarrassingly, remind us of the absurdity of trying to cling to earthly glory through excessively ornate funeral rites. We can only hope that the opportunistic Dr Galeazzi-Lisi found a new calling, as embalming was clearly not his forte. I have a whole new appreciation for the skills of David McGowan, our celebrated embalmer. When Ballina residents pop their clogs, they have popped their last. In the grand scheme of things, the marvellous exploding pope incident is but a footnote in the long and storied history of the Catholic Church. But a footnote reminds us that human folly finds a way even in the highest echelons of spiritual power. And sometimes, that folly comes with a malodourous bang. This unprecedented funereal mess, this potpourri of incompetence and avarice, speaks volumes about the culture of secrecy and deception that permeated the Vatican. This culture allowed a charlatan like Galeazzi-Lisi to operate with impunity, prioritise appearance over substance, and ultimately fail to uphold the dignity of the office he was charged to protect. Of course, the papacy has evolved since 1960. The days of worldly papal states and temporal power are long gone, replaced by jet-setting pontiffs and impromptu interviews. In recent years, the Vatican has moved towards simplifying papal funeral rites, with Pope Francis arranging for a more modest ceremony for himself. This shift reflects a broader trend towards humility and accessibility in the modern papacy, a far cry from the pomp, trapped gas and theatrics that characterised Pius XII's era. Western news delivered directly to your inbox with its spring festivals and crownings of the Virgin August contains a number of Marian devotions that draw our mind to the Mother of God’s role in the Catholic tradition.  The most familiar of these bookend the octave between Aug 22 (the Queenship of Mary). The latter is particularly tied to the storied Latin hymn the “Salve Regina,” which is usually translated into English as “Hail Though not a particularly ancient universal feast (Pius XII established it in 1954) there are longstanding roots to recognizing the connection between the royal and maternal roles that the mother of Jesus inhabits for believers.  Art all over the world has attested to these aspects of Mary for millennia The most powerful expression is probably found in the prayer known as the Magnificat where Luke communicates through his text of Mary many of the themes that dominate his account of Christ’s life mission and reign throughout his Gospel and the connected Acts of the Apostles Mary there exclaims: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord For he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.” Later Mary paints more vividly what exactly this favor looks like: “He has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things If there is one consistent theme running through this prayer and thus in many ways through Mary’s sovereign role as Queen of Heaven and Ruler of the World (Regina Mundi) it is the embodiment of what theologian Paul Lakeland once called “ecclesiological humility.” The root words for “humble” and “human” are connected or “earth.” It is the inverse of “hubris,” which is rather connected to the Greek word for “excessive pride,” and ultimately “violence” against the gods or one another The prayers and hymns coming from Mary’s own lips very often refer to her “lowliness,” which may seem a contradiction in terms with proclaiming her majesty and nobility in titles like Queen or even Lady/Madonna/Domina. However Mary holds authentic humility and royal dominion together in her personhood in much the same way that as the first and perfect believer she holds together the inward and outward impulses of mission (“out” of the community) and healthy internal structural reform (“within” the community).Being truly humble implies a willingness to be genuinely reciprocal. Mary’s queenship is not set over and against the pilgrim people of God but rather incorporated into their dynamic empowerment That is the reason the Psalms tell us: “the Lord crowns the humble with victory.” (Ps “For those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” (Mt 23:12) If we hold him at his word when we recognize Mary’s exalted status in Paradise then we somehow always simultaneously recognize her humility Mary’s humbleness and modesty do not manifest an empty vessel spirituality where she has nothing to offer or somehow submissively abandons any claim to her dignity and personhood. The fiat (or “Yes”) that changed human history enabled her to be not less in constant and unencumbered touch with the ground of divine being that is the origin and destiny of every human person. Not merely yielding and deferential the model for all real and legitimate revolutionaries the Assumption and coronation are in some aspect preludes to what we profess each week in the Creed will be raised body and soul into the life of the world to come and crowned with the imperishable garland of victory alongside she who is “super omnes speciosa” (“lovely beyond all others”) © All Rights Reserved | May 05, 2025 | Catholic Star Herald of the Diocese of Camden Add the Catholic Star Herald to your home screen For Android users(Chrome) tap the at the top right vertical 3 dots then tap “Add to Home Screen” For iPhone tap:at the bottom and then tap “Add to Home Screen” If you need assistance with submitting your subscription, please call Neal Cullen at 856-583-6139, or email Neal.Cullen@camdendiocese.org © All Rights Reserved | May 05, 2025 | Catholic Star Herald of the Diocese of Camden Pius XII was not an egregiously wicked man He neither enriched nor enlarged his family But he was – unremarkably so by the standards of his time and class – antisemitic He was also a contemporary of Adolf Hitler’s and one who occupied a position of considerable moral authority when that party might have been a bulwark against Hitler’s rise “The church loves history,” said Pope Francis The question is whether history will love his church The charge against Pius of active collaboration is certainly unfounded There were some parts of the Catholic church in eastern Europe which went along enthusiastically with the fascist programme as the church had also done in the Spanish civil war Christians believed they were defending themselves but he balked at the planned extermination of the Jewish people His defenders argue that he did what he could within the constraints of his powers As heads of a vast multinational organisation they must exercise their power in the world Pope Francis himself had to deal with the military dictatorship in Argentina His compromises in both situations can be criticised But great moral choices are always easier to make when seen from a safe distance Those who rush to condemn Pope Pius today might ask themselves how history will judge the British government which chooses to sell arms to Saudi Arabia in its murderous and unjustified war in Yemen Perhaps the civilian victims of that war seem as the Jews of Europe seemed to Pope Pius not really quite as human or as valuable as other people An attendant opens the section of the Vatican archive dedicated to Pope Pius XII on Thursday The March 2 unsealing of the archives of Pope Pius XII the controversial World War II-era pontiff whose papacy lasted from 1939 to 1958 has been awaited for decades by Jewish groups and historians After decades of pressure from historians and Jewish groups the Vatican on Monday began allowing scholars access to the archives of Pope Pius XII the controversial World War II-era pontiff Roman Catholic Church officials have always insisted that Pius did everything possible to save Jewish lives But he remained publicly silent while some 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust More than 150 scholars have applied to study documents covering his papacy the Vatican waits 70 years after the end of a pontificate to open its archives to scholars Speaking to reporters on Feb. 20, the Vatican's chief librarian, Cardinal José Tolentino Calaça de Mendonça "The church is not afraid of history," he said echoing Pope Francis' words when he announced his intention to open the Pius XII archives a year ago Roman Catholic Church officials have always insisted that Pope Pius XII did everything possible to save Jewish lives Jewish groups welcomed the opening of the archive "In inviting historians and scholars in to publicly access the Vatican's World War II archives Pope Francis is demonstrating a commitment to learning and airing the truth as well as to the significance of Holocaust memory," World Jewish Congress President Ronald S Johan Ickx says scholars will have easy access to the files "We have now passed 1 million and 300,000 documents that are digitalized and interfaced with an inventory for it to help the researchers to go quickly," he says Those researchers have been waiting a long time. A 1963 German play, The Deputy by Rolf Hochhuth sparked questions about Pius' wartime role and accused him of complicit silence in the Holocaust The Vatican's attempts to beatify him are stymied by still-vivid memories in Rome of his behavior toward the city's Jews during the Nazi occupation A plaque on the wall outside a military college in Rome recalls the roundup of 1,259 Jews It reads: "On 16 October 1943 entire Jewish Roman families ripped from their homes by the Nazis were brought here and then deported to extermination camps A plaque in Rome commemorates the roundup and deportation to death camps of Jewish families by the Nazis on Oct The location is just 800 yards from St. Peter's Square — "under the pope's very windows," as Ernst von Weizsacker then serving as Germany's ambassador to the Vatican Brown University's David Kertzer has written extensively about popes and Jews He won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for his book The Pope and Mussolini: The Secret History of Pius XI and the Rise of Fascism in Europe and has reserved a desk in the Vatican archives for the next four months Kertzer says a lot is known about what Pius XII did Much less is known about internal deliberations during the war years in the Vatican "We know [Pius XII] didn't take any public action," he says But who within the Vatican might have been urging him to do so That's the kind of thing I think we'll find out Like many church historians, Massimo Faggioli, who teaches theology at Villanova University is also curious about Pius' role after World War II did Vatican officials intervene in Italian elections in 1948 when there was a real possibility of a Communist Party victory Pope Pius XII's handwriting is seen on a rough draft of his speech in 1944 displayed during a guided tour for media of the Vatican library on Pope Pius XII on Feb "I would be curious to know so what kind of communication there was between the [Vatican] Secretariat of State and the CIA," he says "Pope Pius was certainly convinced that he had to defend a certain idea of the Christian civilization in Europe against communism." Kertzer is certain the Catholic Church was horrified by the Holocaust several thousand Jews found refuge in Catholic convents in Italy But what he hopes to understand better from the Pius files is the role played by the church in demonizing Jews "The main purveyors of vilification of Jews for many decades was not the state "And it was vilifying Jews right up through the '30s and right up to the beginning of the Holocaust is what the Vatican needs to come to terms with Become an NPR sponsor focusing on the recently deceased pope and supposedly cataloguing his failings during the Second World War To get to the truth, Pius XII’s successor, Pope Paul VI, tasked four Jesuit priests with culling through Vatican archives to find documents focusing on the Holy See and the war. They put together an eleven-volume set of books, known as the Actes et Documents du Saint Siège relatifs à la Seconde Guerre Mondiale (“Actes et Documents”) and funding to work in Rome that summer of 2020 but Covid-19 closed the archives and delayed my research plans Brown University’s David Kertzer’s timing was better. He and his team got in early, for just a short time prior to the closing, and he returned as soon as it was possible after the reopening. This archival research eventually produced his new book, The Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII, Mussolini, and Hitler Kertzer’s book is agenda-driven and makes several factual errors The author fails to take stock of recent scholarly contributions on Pius’s record and ends up misrepresenting or entirely omitting key information and all give positive reviews of Pius XII’s wartime leadership Only David Kertzer claims to have found damning evidence in the archives “we didn’t know about these until just now.” In fact he accuses the Jesuit editors of the Actes et Documents of having “systematically expunged all reference” to the talks acted frequently as an intermediary between Berlin and Rome” and noted that he “evidently had many secret audiences with Pius XII.” The Vatican published that first edition of the Actes et Documents in 1965. It also put the document and the explanatory footnote on the Vatican webpage in March 2010, along with the rest of the collection. In fact, the introduction to the second volume of the Actes et Documents (pages 20–21) highlights communications between Germany and the new pontiff including a note about a visit from the German ambassador just three days after Pius XII became pope That passage goes on to refer to a letter from the pope to Hitler Kertzer discusses that letter as though he were the first to discover it “After welcoming [German envoy] von Hessen the pope took out a copy of the letter he had sent Hitler shortly after his election as pope two months earlier then read Hitler’s reply.” Kertzer does not mention that the full letter was published in volume II of the Actes et Documents (page 420) or that it was put on the Vatican webpage in 2010 personally strengthened the encyclical’s language even changing the title from “With Great Concern,” to “With Burning Anxiety.” Kertzer repeats an old canard that Pius was racist because a British memorandum from after the liberation of Rome says the pope requested that “colored troops” not be used to garrison the Vatican This issue stems from a report Pius received about specific French Moroccan troops They were particularly brutal to Roman citizens The pope did not want those soldiers stationed in Rome (or anywhere else) He expressed his concerns to British envoy D’Arcy Osborne who broadened the statement in his cable back to London saying that the pope did not want “colored troops” stationed at the Vatican That the pope’s concern was about specific French Moroccan troops was made clear in a declassified confidential memorandum from the OSS an article that appeared in the Vatican newspaper and a message sent from the Vatican to its representative in France None of those documents made reference to race just the pope’s concern over those particular troops more accurate findings contradict Kertzer’s thesis Kertzer finds fault with Pius XII’s response to the Nazi roundup of Roman Jews on October 16 He argues that the deportations did not sufficiently concern the pope because he met with British envoy Osborne “on the day the Jews were being forced onto the train in Rome,” but he supposedly failed to mention the deportations when he received the American envoy Harrold Tittmann “the next day,” he again failed to mention the Jews British archives show that Osborne reported to his government on the Vatican’s response: “As soon as he heard of the arrests of Jews in Rome Cardinal Secretary of State sent for the German Ambassador and formulated some protest.” Slovakian representative Karol Sidor Jews and their entire families were hidden in every monastery.” It is true that Tittmann did not mention the roundup in his report As has been known for at least two decades (I first wrote about it in the 2000 edition of Hitler, the War, and the Pope), the October 19 date on the memo is wrong. Other records conclusively establish that the meeting took place on October 14 the pope could not have spoken about the October 16 roundup; it hadn’t taken place That attitude leads him to make truly unfair charges—for example suggesting that Pius XII’s effort to prevent the war was merely an ambition-driven effort to fulfill his “dream of playing peacemaker.” there is some new information in this book but the author is so unfair that one has a hard time distilling the truth from the bias is that he collaborated with those officers of the Wehrmacht who wanted to overthrow Hitler They approached the pope and asked him to negotiate an armistice with the Allies if they succeeded We also know that Pius informed the British about this conspiracy and that he notified the Allies in advance about Hitler’s planned invasion of the Netherlands We also know that he sent open telegrams commiserating with the overrun nations We know that he was regularly informed about plans to assassinate Hitler and that the conspirators used his blessing to gain new support for their efforts We also know of numerous tributes and offers of thanks that were given by Jewish individuals and groups to Pius both after the war and at the time of his death the Holy See helped Jews escape from Nazi-occupied territories These diplomatic efforts appear nowhere in The Pope at War Only with such omissions can Kertzer maintain the argument that Pius XII was indifferent to the fate of the Jews A historian looks at how one man sought to serve both truth and love The wounds of the Church cannot begin to heal until Pope… Are Pope Francis’s insights into our world’s social and economic situation perfect Reflecting on the reign of “the Servant of God Pius XII Pope Francis said that he “guided the Barque of Peter in one of the saddest and darkest moments of the twentieth century” “has already been investigated and studied” and widely discussed and even criticized – at times in a prejudiced or exaggerated manner the pontificate of Pius XII is being re-evaluated in the hopes that a more balanced historical judgement might emerge the Pope said that Vatican archival materials pertaining to Pius’ pontificate (1939-1958) will be accessible to scholars beginning on 2 March 2020 Pope Francis thanked the Vatican archivists for the hard work they have undertaken since 2006 to make a careful inventory of the materials on Pope Pius XII and to prepare to make them available for consultation “In a certain sense… it could be compared to the cultivation of a majestic tree but whose roots are solidly anchored in the earth” the archivists work to keep its historical roots alive so that “even the greenest and youngest branches can draw from them good sap for further growth” In announcing the opening of the archives for the pontificate of Pius XII Pope Francis said he made the decision “with a serene and confident soul certain that serious and objective historical research will be able to evaluate it in its proper light.” “The Church is not afraid of history,” Pope Francis said At an audience with managers and staff of the Vatican Archives Pope Francis announced the opening of the area of the archive relating to the pontificate of Pope Pius XII The opening of this section of the archives means that qualified researchers will be able to view a large volume of documents collected in the Vatican during the period from 2 March 1939 to 9 October 1958 The date of the opening in 2020 coincides with the anniversary of the election of Eugenio Pacelli as Pope Pius XII provides details of the initiative in an article published in the Monday edition of the Vatican newspaper and anticipated by the Press Office of the Holy See Bishop Pagano describes the long period of preparation that led to this moment: “Archivists of the Vatican Secret Archives and their colleagues from other Vatican archives carried out patient work of sorting annotating and inventorying the many fonds and documents" Pope Saint John Paul II made the extensive collection of the Vatican Office of Information for Prisoners of War (1939-1947) available to researchers 108 registers and 1,685 boxes of documentation which amounts to about 2 million and 100,000 records relating to military and civilian prisoners of whom information was being sought.  A fund immediately investigated and still very much in demand today by private scholars or relatives of the deceased prisoners" When the archive relating to the pontificate of Pope Pius XI (1922-1939) was opened in 2006 "work was already underway for the progressive preparation of the documentary material of Pius XII which many scholars demanded with ever greater insistence" Pope Francis has decided to open "the Vatican Secret Archives the Historical Archives of the Section for Relations with States of the Secretariat of State and the Historical Archives of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith" the Historical Archives of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples the Historical Archives of the Congregation for the Eastern Churches the Archives of the “Fabbrica” of St Peter’s and according to different modalities and forms of access other Historical Archives of Congregations all “at the discretion of their superiors” indexes and inventories relating to their documentation Describing the new sources of the Secret Archives that will be available to scholars Bishop Pagano cites about 151,000 positions (each of which consists of dozens of sheets) of the Secretariat of State Detailed computer descriptions of this documentation have been prepared and are available in paper format (68 volumes of indexes) Then there are the so-called "separate envelopes" which contain documentation regarding individual topics or institutions under the organization of the Secretariat of State of which there will be a precise descriptive list" From the same source come the “76 units now called the Pius XII Papers which contain manuscripts by Eugenio Pacelli before and during his pontificate as well as typescripts of his many speeches sometimes with handwritten corrections" There are also three other substantial "special" archival collections The first is that of the Relief Commission the second is simply called Pontifical Charity and the third is that of the Migration Office set up to deal with the problem of the repatriation of prisoners and refugees caused by the poverty experienced in certain European countries The documents of the pontifical representations will also be available: "For each pontifical representation an accurate Inventory has been prepared indispensable guides for researchers (about 81 Indexes for a total of more than 5,100 envelopes) These inventories can also be consulted on the Intranet of the Vatican Archives for the convenience of scholars and to facilitate their research in various fields" In order to face the challenge of cataloguing "twenty officials from the Vatican Archives dedicated themselves constantly and exclusively they were assisted by qualified graduates from the School of Palaeography Diplomacy and Archiving within the Archive itself" The same goes for the other historical archives of the Roman Curia that are now open for the pontificate of Pope Pius XII but "a struggle sustained by a certain enthusiasm both because we were aware that we were working for future historical research in relation to a crucial period for the Church and for the world and because the papers were everything but uninspiring to researchers and historians of an almost superhuman work of Christian "humanism" that was active in the stormy disorder of those events that in the mid-twentieth century seemed determined to annihilate the very notion of human civilization" The figure of Pope Pius XII has often been “too superficially judged and criticized for some aspects of his pontificate” thanks to the openness asked for by Pope Francis historians will be able to research the pontificate of Pope Pius XII “without prejudice in all the realistic scope and richness" of that pontificate Instructions for conducting research in the Vatican Secret Archives, are available on the website (http://asv.vatican.va/content/archiviosegretovaticano/en/consultazione/accesso-e-consultazione.html) Research in the Archivio Segreto Vaticano is free of charge and open to qualified scholars conducting scientific studies All researchers must have a university degree (five-year course) or an equivalent university diploma Clergymen must possess a licentiate degree or PhD A letter of request must be addressed to the Prefect This must be accompanied by a presentation letter from a recognized institute of scientific and historical research or a person qualified in the field of historical research (tenured university professors) is the wartime pope sometimes accused of turning a blind eye to Nazi atrocities Jewish and Catholic scholars gathered to consider the Holy See’s wartime actions in light of the new archives and work to strengthen Jewish–Catholic relations the meeting was “a rather one-sided selection of speakers,” favoring those who questioned the pope’s leadership those who carefully watched the proceedings should have noted a strong shift in favor of the wartime pontiff’s reputation seems to have missed the historic developments reporting instead on longstanding (and now largely debunked) criticisms of the pope One of the biggest developments to emerge from the conference is that the Vatican under Pope Francis, far from slackening its support of Pius XII, has actually increased it. This was exemplified by Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin’s opening address Cardinal Parolin pointed to the newly declassified documents and said they reveal an image of Pope Pius XII “that is much different from what is generally known.” Specifically Cardinal Parolin highlighted Pius XII’s vigorous condemnation of anti-Semitism in 1916 The Cardinal also referred to “scientific dishonesty among historians hostile to Pius,” a reference probably directed to some of those in attendance it has become “evident that the Pope followed both the path of diplomacy and that of undeclared resistance.” He went on to explain: “This decision was not apathetic and lacking in action,” but instead entailed significant risks for anyone involved in them Possessing or circulating them would have instantly condemned anyone found to have them in their possession “that he was aware and that he supported” Catholic rescue is “very clear,” since the cloistered religious communities had to be given permission to carry out this work She further explained that oral communication in the Church hierarchy “worked very well in Rome.” Every morning a priest from the Vatican or the Diocese of Rome visited each women’s religious house in order to celebrate Mass making it “very easy” to pass along information One of the current charges against Pius XII is that he protected only those Jews who were baptized into the Catholic Church Director of International Academic Programs at the U.S spoke of “overwhelming support for Catholics who fell under the racial laws.” David Kertzer author of the controversial book The Pope at War “The Vatican was only trying to save baptized Jews.” As the conference established the Vatican archives tell a different story the Wall Street Journal article barely mentioned Wolf it reported: “The Vatican gave priority to helping people of Jewish descent who were baptized Catholics”—precisely what Wolf and his team of archival researchers have since disproved The piece gave some attention to Vatican archivist and historian Dr. Johan Ickx, author of The Pope’s Cabinet: Pius XII’s Secret War for Saving Jews to explain that Ickx also once believed that the Vatican concentrated on baptized Jews—until he studied the new archives I discovered a regular structure that worked in secret and that gave aid to Jews in many ways through secret as well as official channels,” Ickx has explained This structure that he calls “the bureau” was active at the local as were nuncios in Nazi-occupied countries who tried to postpone deportations of Jews doing what they could to smuggle people out of dangerous countries to safer ones and to save as many Jews as possible from the Nazis’ grasp.” As Ickx further explained “This office for the Jews was unique—no other government offered practical help of this kind Many of the bishops and nuncios who worked on it were honored as ‘Righteous Among the Nations,’ as helpers of the Jews in the Holocaust but always on orders from the highest authority—from Pius XII.” Pius also managed to distribute 550 posters declaring houses to be “property of the Holy See” and forbidding German soldiers and SS men from entering them that the convents and monasteries became safe houses for Jewish refugees Pius XII published in the Vatican newspaper an urgent appeal to grant protection to all persecuted persons “regardless of race or religion”—an unmistakable reference to Jews Pius ordered convents and monasteries to shelter and care for Jews permitting more than 80 percent of Rome’s Jewish population to survive the German occupation Father Roberto Regoli of the Pontifical Gregorian University was portrayed in the WSJ article as a papal critic, but that is far from true. Regoli emphasized Pius XII’s close relations with FDR and the Allies and the pontiff’s active involvement in efforts to overthrow Hitler. In a separate interview Regoli spoke of a previously unknown Vatican document from early 1939 entitled “Measures Adopted by the Holy See in Favor of the Jews,” outlined just days before Pius XII was elected pope Pius XII led the Vatican’s humanitarian efforts on behalf of the endangered and persecuted “In the new Vatican documentation,” Regoli said “a worldwide network of support for Jews is discernible.” While misrepresenting Regoli, the WSJ accepted speaker Giovanni Coco’s dubious claims against Pius XII. Coco pointed to a letter dated December 14 informing the Vatican about “SS-furnaces” that were killing up to 6,000 Jews and Poles each day in German-occupied Poland this showed that the pope was “the head of state best informed about the Holocaust.” The evidence shows no such thing Moreover, on Christmas Eve, less than two weeks after the date on the letter (we don’t know when or even whether he actually received it), Pius issued his own 1942 Christmas address in which he spoke of “hundreds of thousands who sometimes only because of their nationality or race have been consigned to death or gradual extinction.” The New York Times editorialized “This Christmas more than ever he is a lonely voice crying out of the silence of a continent.” lest they “furnish a pretext for further persecution,” as one bishop explained Even the author of the December 14th letter urged the Holy See not to make public what it revealed lest his life and the lives of the others be jeopardized Perhaps the most egregious error in the WSJ article relates to Monsignor Angelo Dell’Acqua he complained that Vatican officials were too concerned with saving Jews at the cost of other matters The WSJ piece claims that Monsignor Dell’Acqua unduly influenced Pius XII Ickx ends his book discussing “Pope Paul VI’s historic visit to the Holy Land in 1964 lit six candles in memory of the six million Jews killed by the Nazis.” Those who write in this arena should understand that sinners can rise above their limitations and faults during times of crisis and even turn away from their sins Father Hubert Wolf explained: “In the Curia there were people well-disposed toward the Jews But they all had in mind the Church’s mission and duty to help people in need as quickly and as comprehensively as possible—regardless of their nationality or ethnicity This basic approach of Christian charity can be clearly recognized.” Such charity resounds in the words and deeds of Pope Pius XII and after the war—even if some reporters and writers cannot acknowledge it Public domain image from Wikimedia Commons The Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII Pope Pius XII exhorts the faithful to participate in daily Mass Please enable JS and disable any ad blocker The opening of the archives on the pontificate of Pope Pius XII has launched a new season of studies that will hopefully prove fruitful and stimulating Leading the way were Johan Ickx's volume on Pius XII and the Jews and Il Diario di un Cardinale edited by Sergio Pagano and dedicated to Pius XII's Secretary of State Cesare Catananti's study entitled Il Vaticano nella Tormenta offers a perspective on wartime events experienced by the Papal Gendarmerie "The Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII attempts to offer a further contribution to the still-meager historiography budding from the newly-opened Vatican archives Kertzer's study seeks to cover the events that enveloped the pontificate of Pius XII this book would be "the first full account with previously unknown materials and new revelations” on the choices Pius XII made between 1939 and 1945 the scholar does not quote the aforementioned volume by Ickx neither in the text nor in the bibliography Kertzer's "statement of intent" represents an extensive duty owed to readers He rightly warns the author that the Vatican archives must be compared to other sources And this makes his "moral contract" with readers all the more demanding Since we have already addressed some of the issues raised by Kertzer shortly after the opening of the archive on Pius XII (cf we will limit our analysis to those aspects of this new book that we feel deserve critical scrutiny One of the "novelties" in Kertzer's book would be a sort of "secret negotiation" with Hitler ardently desired by Pius XII carried out through highly confidential initiatives aimed at smoothing bilateral relations between the Holy See and Nazi Germany This attempt would have been carried out between the end of 1939 and March 1940 (when the German foreign minister visited the Vatican) The protagonists of this "secret mission" included: the Prince of Hessen a nobleman who had married Princess Mafalda of Savoy and who was a known emissary of Hitler to Mussolini; Cardinal Camerlengo Lorenzo Lauri; and the representative of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta in Berlin In the first volume of the official Vatican series Actes et Documents du Saint-Siège rélatifs à la Seconde Guerre Mondiale published as far back as 1965 (updated five years later) we read that "these secret negotiations did in fact exist; they were the preliminaries of Ribbentrop's visit to Italy." Further on in the same volume The audience has been secretly prepared for quite some time Through the Prince of Hessen (I think) and by means of X." The author of this note is Msgr Secretary for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs of the Secretariat of State X" is none other than Viscount Raffaele Travaglini di Santa Rita When the first volume of the Actes was published Travaglini was still living (he would die on February 9 Because of the delicacy of the high offices he held in the immediate postwar period Travaglini probably asked not to be mentioned in a volume that featured him in a negotiation with Nazi Germany We know his name from Tardini’s original note in which the Monsignor identifies the protagonists of the operation as the "Prince of Hesse (I think) and Travaglini (for sure)." But Travaglini is not unknown to historians "A protégé of Cardinal Lauri [...] Travaglini is an ambassador of the Order of the Knights of Malta and travels to Berlin about twice a year where he is also said to have negotiated repeatedly with Göring One of Travaglini's tasks was to improve relations between Italy Germany and the Vatican." This is the profile the Nazi security service made of him in a document opened to scholars a long time ago there is ample evidence of the secret negotiation that Kertzer believes was "erased from all the official papers of the Holy See" as early as 1965 at the release of the first volume of Vatican documents that Paul VI ordered to be published Kertzer believes he has overwhelming evidence of Pius XII's desire to come to an agreement with Hitler But what Kertzer sees as an embrassons-nous operation between Pius XII and Hitler is something very different the documents on the case are found in the dossier of Ribbentrop's visit to Rome thus in the ordinary papal diplomatic bureaucracy and not among Pius XII's most secret papers This is a clear sign that the "Travaglini-Hessen" operation was well known to the Pope's collaborators who ardently desired a new agreement in a broader sense than the 1933 Concordat And this agreement was nothing but the revision of the Concordat of 1933 to include Austria (German after the Anschluss) Bohemia and Moravia (German protectorates after March 15 That we talk only about a revision of the Reichskonkordat of 1933 emerges from the fact that Hitler proposed to involve in the operation the authorities of Baden and Bavaria (Länder with which the Vatican had negotiated separate concordats in the pre-Nazi era) But Pacelli (Pope Pius XII’s birth surname) who knew those concordats from having negotiated them was not the kind of man to give them up and therefore did not want to make any written commitments no negotiations would ever open before five papal conditions were accepted by Hitler These conditions (Aufzeichnungen) are faithfully recorded in the Vatican archives who added to them the necessity of having a papal envoy in occupied Poland The conditions set by Pius XII pertained to the inalienable freedom of the Church in Germany; conditions that Hitler was obviously not ready to accept On the German side it was also asked whether the papal note could "be considered a basis for an armistice" (a sign of a lingering "war" between the Third Reich and the Catholic Church); it also asked to "suppress for tactical and party reasons" the second part of the first point (concerning the withdrawal of publications particularly offensive to the Pope and the Church) Not only that; but the Prince of Hesse did not rule out adjusting "especially the fourth part" of the papal note ("to restore the freedom of the Church to defend itself openly against public attacks on Catholic doctrine and institutions") They were obviously unacceptable conditions for the Pope Hitler (busy on other fronts) had no concrete proposals of any kind forced the German delegation to remove swastikas from the motorcade admitted to the Vatican) was thus a failure and a disappointment A new concordat should have crowned the expectations of the Prince of Hessen and Travaglini; instead it was dismissed as one of many proposals for conciliation But if Hitler was thinking about a new Concordat this means that the 1933 Concordat did not satisfy him He writes that the Concordat of 1933 “was a great triumph for Hitler” Nazism now “could boast of recognition by the pope himself” Just because he had annexed more territories Nor does he explain why the 1933 Concordat going through political and ecclesial vicissitudes almost ninety years long governing the relations between the Federal Republic of Germany and the Holy See Kertzer's volume then presents some problems in source control One example concerns Pius XII's first encyclical Summi Pontificatus dedicated to the tragedy of Poland invaded by Germany and the USSR Kertzer dismisses the papal document as a set of pretty words harmless to Italy and Germany Summi Pontificatus even entered into the work of the League of Nations The encyclical was mentioned at the very session of the Council that decreed the expulsion of the USSR from the League of Nations for its unprovoked attack on Finland It was on that occasion that the Council chairman the text that I have now read is the excerpt from the Encyclical Summi Pontificatus." The reaction of those present at the Council’s session was of deepest emotion The French delegate to the League of Nations greatly appreciated "such just and moving words." The British delegate Butler joined in his French colleague's moved comments produced "a great impression not only in League of Nations circles but also outside." Positive indeed were the reactions in Paris and London As a journalist in Geneva ironically noted the Vatican entered the League of Nations on the same day the USSR was expelled from it But did Pius XII's encyclical Summi Pontificatus appeal to the Germans As much as the counselor of the German embassy in the Vatican said that in his country the encyclical had been "read in the churches and that the newspapers spoke of it with respect," the reality was quite different German archives tell us that the Berlin authorities forbade the printing and distribution of the Summi Pontificatus (according to a telegram from Ernst Woermann to von Bergen Vatican sources even reveal to us that the Nazi Governorate in Poland disseminated an adulterated version of the encyclical substituting the word "Germany" for the word "Poland," and altering the Pope's words of piety toward Poles to show that they were instead addressed to Germans A more correct use of sources then reveals the true German reactions to the Summi Pontificatus the German embassy counselor to the Vatican wrote that the Pope had explained "that his speeches were logically general in nature and that he had specially drafted them so that they could not be interpreted by Germany as directed against it." What Kertzer does not say is that Menshausen's direct superior did everything he could to present it as a harmless document "The relatively favorable judgment on the papal encyclical is not shared here - Woermann wrote to him from Berlin - Here one is of the opinion that with this encyclical which is essentially a condemnation of the principle of the totalitarian state the Pope has first and foremost kept in mind the Third Reich." Not differently commented Woermann's superior von Weizsäcker: "If the Vatican," he wrote to Bergen on Jan "asserts that these statements are of a general nature and not directed against anyone in particular this is in our opinion true only in a formal sense but it is quite clear that it alludes to particular cases." In the words of the head of the Reich’s High Security Office "the encyclical is directed solely against Germany on the ideological level as well as with regard to the German-Polish conflict." And he continued "I consider it superfluous to emphasize how dangerous it is both internally and in foreign relations." Nor can we overlook the words of the commander of the Gestapo Heinrich Müller: "I have orders not to prohibit the reading of the Encyclical especially by leaflets." These documents being coeval with the aforementioned "secret negotiations" between Germany and the Holy See The themes we have just recalled are not found in Kertzer's book This is why the volume seems to betray an inaccurate checking of sources many documents that Kertzer cites as his archival findings were published as early as the 1970s-1980s opinions of various diplomats are often taken as fool's gold when in fact they are nothing more than personal views if one compares the documents the right way Kertzer then holds to the worn-out view that Pius XII cared only about baptized Jews seems to us to have done justice to this fusty cliché But what we consider a truly serious omission concerns the October 16 Kertzer follows Cardinal Maglione's record when he narrates his conversation with the German ambassador But then he omits some decisive words addressed by the Cardinal to von Weizsäcker (new ambassador to the Vatican): "The Holy See must not be put in the need to protest on Divine Providence." In other words if the raid of the Roman Jews continued by Hitler's supreme order the Holy See would protest by accepting to suffer the appropriate consequences This omission on the part of Kertzer is no minor affair This omission is then compounded by a failure to compare with British sources Here follows the notes sent to London by British representative in the Vatican 1943: " As soon as he heard of the arrests of Jews in Rome Cardinal Secretary of State sent for the German Ambassador and formulated some [sort?] of protest” for the humanitarian aspects of that tragic "Black Saturday," the diary of the Slovak minister in the Vatican "On the Holy Father's orders," reads the document made known by scholars Róbert Letz and Peter Slepčan "more than a hundred Jews and Italian officials were hidden in the Generalate of the Jesuits Likewise in every convent Jews with their entire families are hidden." Still on the subject of "Black Saturday" in Rome Kertzer's volume presents further problems and even a rather serious error British minister Osborne was received in audience by Pius XII who expressed to him his concerns about food shortages and possible unrest in Rome The pope added that he had no reason to complain about the Germans who were respecting the Vatican's neutrality “Osborne makes only indirect reference to the roundup of Rome’s Jews in his report of his audience to London” 1943 Osborne sent the dispatch we mentioned above - and unknown to Kertzer The serious mistake made by the scholar concerns instead the American delegate to Pius XII the pope made no mention of what had happened to Rome’s Jews in his meetings with the two envoys it was regarded as too inconsequential for them to put in their reports” Kertzer places papal audience with Tittmann on October 19 not three days after the raid on the Rome Ghetto We are told this by the audience sheets for 1943 kept in Master of the Chamber’s files which do not record any audience granted by the Pope to Tittmann on October 19 The dating error we clarified long ago is due to the fact that Tittmann had no telegraph and cipher service and therefore had to rely on his English colleague Osborne 1943 is in fact that of the telegram with which Osborne "refiled" Tittmann's undated dispatch In the one preserved in the British archives Tittmann writes that he had not seen the Pope since the previous Monday (19th October was Tuesday – can Tittmann ever have had two audiences with Pius XII on two consecutive days) In the copy of the telegram preserved in American archives we read that he had not seen the Pope since the previous year There are evidently transmission errors due to the difficult passages Tittmann's dispatch underwent before reaching its destination via Algiers in a complicated interplay (Osborne's dispatch of October 19 1943 contains Tittmann's undated one; and a later Foreign Office dispatch for the British Embassy in Washington contains both) the Osservatore Romano gave timely notice of the papal audience with Tittmann Only by "creative historiography" could one therefore accuse Pius XII of keeping silent on October 14 about an event that occurred in the Rome Ghetto two days later Unsatisfactory use of sources and various other problems (omissions and a sometimes-inaccurate critical method) do not moreover written in fluent fictional prose the definitive Thule of research on Pius XII normal for the immense amount of documents which made accessible by the Vatican at the height of the pandemic will only now and gradually be the subject of hopefully more accomplished analysis Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. ROME (AP) — Newly discovered correspondence suggests that World War II-era Pope Pius XII had detailed information from a trusted German Jesuit that up to 6,000 Jews and Poles were being gassed each day in German-occupied Poland. The documentation undercuts the Holy See’s argument that it couldn’t verify diplomatic reports of Nazi atrocities to denounce them. The documentation from the Vatican archives, published this weekend in Italian daily Corriere della Sera, is likely to further fuel the debate about Pius’ legacy and his now-stalled beatification campaign. Historians have long been divided about Pius’ record, with supporters insisting he used quiet diplomacy to save Jewish lives while critics say he remained silent as the Holocaust raged. Corriere is reproducing a letter dated Dec. 14, 1942 from the German Jesuit priest to Pius’ secretary which is contained in an upcoming book about the newly opened files of Pius’ pontificate by Giovanni Coco, a researcher and archivist in the Vatican’s Apostolic Archives. Coco told Corriere that the letter was significant because it represented detailed correspondence about the Nazi extermination of Jews, including in ovens, from an informed church source in Germany who was part of the Catholic anti-Hitler resistance that was able to get otherwise secret information to the Vatican. The letter from the priest, the Rev. Lothar Koenig, to Pius’ secretary, a fellow German Jesuit named the Rev. Robert Leiber, is dated Dec. 14, 1942. Written in German, the letter addresses Leiber as “Dear friend,” and goes on to report that the Nazis were killing up to 6,000 Jews and Poles daily from Rava Ruska, a town in pre-war Poland that is today located in Ukraine, and transporting them to the Belzec death camp. According to the Belzec memorial which opened in 2004, a total of 500,000 Jews perished at the camp. The memorial’s website reports that as many as 3,500 Jews from Rava Ruska had already been sent to Belzec earlier in 1942 and that from Dec. 7-11, the city’s Jewish ghetto was liquidated. “About 3,000-5,000 people were shot on the spot and 2,000- 5,000 people were taken to Bełżec,” the website says. The date of Koenig’s letter is significant because it suggests the correspondence from a trusted fellow Jesuit arrived in Pius’ office in the days after the ghetto was emptied, and after Pius had received multiple diplomatic notes and visits from a variety of envoys of foreign governments from August 1942 onwards with reports that up to 1 million Jews had been killed so far in Poland. While it can’t be certain that Pius saw the letter, Leiber was Pius’ top aide and had served the pope when he was the Vatican’s ambassador to Germany during the 1920s, suggesting a close working relationship especially concerning matters related to Germany. “The novelty and importance of this document comes from this fact: that on the Holocaust, there is now the certainty that Pius XII was receiving from the German Catholic Church exact and detailed news about crimes being perpetrated against Jews,” Coco was quoted by Corriere as saying. However, Coco noted that Koenig also urged the Holy See to not make public what he was revealing because he feared for his own life and the lives of the resistance sources who had provided the intelligence. Pius’ supporters have long insisted that he couldn’t speak out strongly against the Nazis because of fears of reprisals. “When we started working there, it wasn’t a secret — although it took a while to figure out — what kinds of documents were missing,” Kertzer said, noting that documents from the Vatican’s office in Washington during the war years have still not yet been catalogued. The Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, is to open the Oct. 9-11 meeting that will feature scholars including Kertzer, Coco and Johan Ickx, the archivist at the Vatican secretariat of state whose own book on the archives, “Pius XII and the Jews” published in 2021, praised Pius and the Vatican’s efforts to care for Jews and people fleeing the war. Coco said Koenig’s letter actually was found in the Vatican’s secretariat of state archives and was turned over to the Vatican’s main Apostolic Archives only in 2019, because the secretariat of state’s papers were disorganized and scattered, with some of Pius’ documents kept in plastic containers in an attic storage space where heat and humidity were damaging them. Associated Press writer Vanessa Gera contributed from Warsaw, Poland. Additional reporting by Ludwig Burger in Frankfurt; Editing by Alex Richardson Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab , opens new tab Browse an unrivalled portfolio of real-time and historical market data and insights from worldwide sources and experts. , opens new tabScreen for heightened risk individual and entities globally to help uncover hidden risks in business relationships and human networks. © 2025 Reuters. All rights reserved Rome experienced a devastating attack when hundreds of Allied aircraft bombed the city for the first time Nearly 600 American planes dropped over 4,000 bombs causing extensive destruction and claiming the lives of approximately 3,000 Romans The primary targets were the San Lorenzo railway depot and the surrounding neighborhoods The attack occurred just days before the fall of fascism in Italy criticized for its failure to oppose Italy's entry into World War II a remarkable figure emerged as a source of comfort decided to take action and provide solace to those affected by the bombings the Pontiff ventured into the streets to offer his support demonstrating his commitment to his fellow citizens Accompanied by Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini Pius XII made his way to the San Lorenzo neighborhood while the air raid was still in progress the Holy Father witnessed the approaching planes and recognized the gravity of the situation It was on this day that Pius XII truly earned the title of "Defensor Civitatis" (Defender of the City) a distinction he would be recognized for later Italian historian Giulio Alfano reconstructed the events of that tragic day drawing from testimonies provided by the late Cardinal Fiorenzo Angelini Rigi vividly recalls the horrific scenes: lifeless bodies strewn across the streets Not even the Pacelli family tomb in the cemetery was spared from the destruction caused by the bombs Despite the ongoing bombings and the risks involved served as a somber reminder of the tragedy that befell Rome The Pontiff's spontaneous decision to be with his people demonstrated his empathy and pastoral care Pius XII's dedication to the people of Rome extended beyond this single instance He remained a constant presence during the German occupation defying Hitler's plans to abduct him as part of Operation Rabat The Pope's commitment to the city earned him the title of "defensor civitatis," as he refused to leave Rome and willingly risked deportation to Germany Pius XII visited the heavily affected area of San Giovanni to offer his support and prayers His actions portrayed a shepherd who stood in solidarity with his flock sharing their suffering and providing spiritual guidance during times of immense distress The heroic actions of Pope Pius XII did not go unnoticed praised the Pope for his selflessness and emphasized that during wartime all lives were precious and in need of saving and monasteries to provide shelter and protection for those affected by the conflict His efforts to protect the vulnerable during World War II including saving the lives of approximately 800,000 Jews exemplified his commitment to upholding human dignity and fulfilling his duty as the leader of the Catholic Church Pope Francis sent a letter in 2013 to express his admiration for Pius XII's response to the tragedy stood among his fellow citizens who were deeply affected by the bombings the Pontiff demonstrated himself as a caring shepherd ready to share the burdens and suffering of his people particularly during their most trying moments '#' : location.hash;window._cf_chl_opt.cOgUQuery = location.search === '' && location.href.slice(0 location.href.length - window._cf_chl_opt.cOgUHash.length).indexOf('?') !== -1 '?' : location.search;if (window.history && window.history.replaceState) {var ogU = location.pathname + window._cf_chl_opt.cOgUQuery + window._cf_chl_opt.cOgUHash;history.replaceState(null ogU);}}document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(cpo);}()); By Matteo Luigi Napolitano – Osservatore Romano Transgressing orders from superiors changes the ancient Latin adage into its opposite: Ubi minor maior cessat One paradoxical example of this can be found in newly-released Vatican documents was offered the position of State Councillor by the Slovak government asking the consent of Pope Pius XII only ex post facto This is just one of the episodes in the book “Pius XII and the Jews” (Milan in bookstores in Italian as of 12 January) written by Johan Ickx Director of the Historical Archives of the Section for Relations with States of the Vatican Secretariat of State The book opens a new era of studies on the pontificate of Pius XII with an insight into what Ickx calls Le Bureau (the title of the French edition of the book) The title refers to the first Section of the Secretariat of State responsible not only for international relations but also A first fact is evident from the papers: conversion to Catholicism for Hitler and his followers did not change a Jewish person’s blood; converting to be considered “non-Aryan” was not a guarantee of survival The Bureau knew these facts and knew that Germany boasted numerous imitations had chosen a totalitarian path: “Baptized or not,” said Minister Mach “all Jews will have to leave.” German pressure then induced the Hungarians to hand over to the Germans those Jews who tried to cross the border from Slovakia The Slovakian bishops wrote a collective denunciation fully supported by the Pope the opposite of the old adage was true: “The trouble is that the president of Slovakia is a priest,” wrote Msgr “Everyone understands that the Holy See cannot keep Hitler in line who can understand that?” Ubi minor maior cessat These were very serious situations in which “there was very little that the members of the Bureau could do to punish the guilty.” This fact can be seen in the dispatches of Msgr regarding his conversations with Prime Minister Tuka: “Is it worthwhile for me to continue to report to Your Eminence the continuation of my conversation with a demented person?” The stories told in this book must therefore be understood as stories of people fleeing made with human strength and human limitations put to rest allegations of anti-Semitism of the Curia under Pius XII “The Jews” is the name of the series of documents enclosed in 170 alphabetically-ordered entries “Cardinal Maglione had the general command of both sections It cannot be excluded that the other section had its own register or filing system which would mean that other archives of the Holy See kept similar material concerning the Jews.” is “tangible proof of the interest shown in people who whether they were Jews or baptized Jews.” It is not possible here to cite all the “Jewish cases” of which the Vatican was notified it can be said that the documents clearly show that the Vatican’s efforts were aimed at “saving every single human being regardless of colour or creed.” Two very significant episodes prove this among those enumerated by the book’s author The first is found in the chapter entitled “Brief History of a Pitiful Case” It regards the couple Oskar and Maria Gerda Ferenczy who emigrated from Austria after the Anschluss Maria Gerda wrote her first letter to Pius XII in which she confessed to having sold her Bible for a piece of bread and of her unsuccessful search for a passport to emigrate The documents inform us that Pius XII personally read the letter Monsignor Dell'Acqua was invested with this “most pitiful case” and the bishop of Fiume was asked to take an interest in the Ferenczys The situation worsened at the end of 1939 when the Ferenczys risked being handed over to the German authorities and deported to Poland Maria Gerda begged him to avert the danger and renewed her request for help to emigrate Dell'Acqua was invested with the matter and wrote a second time to Camozzo who mysteriously had not replied to the first letter he was ordered to ask the Italian authorities for an extended residence permit for the Ferenczys Maria Gerda wrote a third letter to the Pope “From the Historical Archives,” Ickx informs us “it emerges that the Bureau did not stop following her case.” The situation precipitated with the arrest of Oskar Ferenczy and his transfer to a prison in Fiume the Vatican instructed Dell'Acqua to prepare a letter for the Jesuit Tacchi Venturi a privileged interlocutor of the Italian authorities Ferenczy learned from the Superior of the Sisters of Our Lady of Sion that visas for Brazil were perhaps available at the Vatican Maria Gerda then pleaded by letter to the Pope to obtain visas for her family The matter once more to Dell'Acqua's attention a subsidy of eight hundred liras was sent to the Ferenczy family But the Brazilian Embassy to the Holy See had the final say on visas Cardinal Maglione was able to tell Maria Gerda Ferenczy that the visas had been granted was prevented from disembarking because his visa was deemed invalid It was the ship's chaplain who telegraphed the news to the Bureau The Holy See immediately sent a cable confirming the validity of the visas to the Brazilian authorities This case is an example “of how baptized Jews found themselves literally trapped and crushed between their two identities” since “the distinction between Jews and baptized Jews was lost.” Another symbolic episode is in the chapter entitled “Brief history of a common man and an eight-year-old girl” The ordinary man (according to his self-definition) was Mario Finzi who worked in the Bologna section of Delasem (Delegation for the Assistance of Jewish Emigrants) asking him to intervene with Christian charity “to save a poor eight-year-old creature threatened by the hatred and ferocity of men.” She was Maja Lang a little Yugoslavian girl who had a seventeen-year-old brother who was under house arrest in a villa owned by the real estate developer Alfonso Canova Wladimir had asked Finzi to save his little sister The family had been arrested in Croatia and the little girl with an expired permit to stay in Hungary with an aunt risked being taken back to the Croatian border Finzi devised a plan that he submitted directly to the Pope: to ensure that the child reached Italy to be reunited with her brother Wladimir the Holy See would have to interact directly with the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs which could have alerted its representative in Budapest I know that what I dare to ask of you is no small matter,” wrote Finzi to Pius XII “but to operate in a Christian manner in a world that in such a large part is the negation of Christ is not an easy task for ordinary men.” Having received the necessary instructions Father Tacchi Venturi succeeded in obtaining from the Italian Ministry of the Interior a residency permit allowing little Maja and her parents to stay in Sasso Marconi The order from the Italian authorities appeared in time to save the life of the entire family “her case sheds light on an interesting perspective.” Namely that “Dr Finzi of Bologna considered Pope Pius XII the only authority still capable of successfully intervening in such a complex and surprising humanitarian case.” Mario Finzi was arrested and deported to Auschwitz but was later liberated before dying an early death due to an illness contracted in the Lager eventually moving to Israel three years later “Together with the local heroes of Sasso Marconi whose memory is honoured by Yad Vashem [Alfonso Canova is amongst the “Righteous among the Nations” editor's note] that sweeps away former and current ideological prejudices and dismantles the idea that Pope Pius XII was unaware of—and not the head of—an aid network which helped Jews and refugees a network which was very complex but delineated by clear contours Ickx’s book represents a great step towards a “historiographic democracy” desired by many: “The List of Pius XII” The Pontifical Gregorian University held an international conference on Monday to shed new light on the historical-theological events related to Pope Pius XII and the Vatican during the Holocaust during World War II the conference recalled the outbreak of war in the Middle East following Hamas’ attack on Israel with a minute of silence for the victims in Israel and Palestine The two-day conference was entitled “New documents from the Pontificate of Pope Pius XII and their Meaning for Jewish-Christian Relations: A Dialogue Between Historians and Theologians” As recalled by Bishop Étienne Vető auxiliary bishop of Reims and former director of the Cardinal Bea Center for Judaic Studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University the conference required two years of preparation The first session was introduced by the Vatican Secretary of State after Pope Francis' decision in March 2019 to make the documents of the Vatican Secret Archive regarding the pontificate of Pius XII accessible and the publication of several studies "it has been of fundamental importance to establish historical truth" through historical-critical research means defending the truth over and above the parties involved "there are still cases of scientific dishonesty wherein documents are negligently or deliberately hidden." He offered the example of the 1916 response from the then Secretary of State and then in 1919 to the Ashkenazi Jews of Jerusalem He said these documents were only recently rediscovered and state how Catholics should perceive Jews "Jews are our brothers," Cardinal Parolin quoted the documents as saying "And the Jewish people should be considered brothers of any other people in the world." who at the time was Secretary of the Congregation for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs "had personally contributed to the drafting of these documents which show," explained Cardinal Parolin "an image of Pacelli very different from the one generally known." believed that Pope Pius XII's attitude toward them was friendly they turned to him during the Second World War to seek help." The Israeli President Isaac Herzog recalled this episode in a recent interview with L'Osservatore Romano as he spoke “about the cordial relations with Pius XII and his associates during the Second World War." The Cardinal Secretary of State explained that he wanted to remember these documents from 1916 and 1919 and Pope Pius XII’s friendship with Jewish people all over the world "to emphasize that the Holy See had already taken a position in favor of the Jewish people at the time of the First World War the Pope invited a considerable number of Catholics from religious institutes to defend Jews with all means as well as participating in the resistance against fascism and Nazism." Recent discoveries in the Vatican and in other archives "have made it easier for everyone to understand how many historical records have been manipulated in the period following the Second World War." "it became evident that the Pope followed both the path of diplomacy and that of undeclared resistance This decision was not apathetic and lacking in action" but instead entailed significant risks for anyone involved and participating Historians have years of work ahead of them hoping that "they will continue to shed light on one of the most discussed and delicate periods of Pius XII's pontificate." Chief Rabbi of the Jewish Community of Rome inviting everyone to "distinguish between emotion and history because a proper detachment is needed to examine the facts.” “There is a religious dimension which is different from the political one between the great events of history and the countless micro-stories,” he said “The course of events itself is different from the moral plane." He said that during the pontificate of Pius XII "the sufferings of the Jewish people were theologically justified But there is a difference between explaining dynamics and making a moral judgment." "of positions that have caused great suffering in history." the first session addressed Pope Pius XII's motivations and decisions in the face of fascism in an attempt to balance his roles as head of the Church and the Holy See and Misunderstandings in the Documents of Pius XII," Giovanni Coco archivist of the Vatican Apostolic Archive recalled that in November 1945 Pope Pius XII had an audience for the first time with a group of Jews They had survived concentration camps and had come to express their profound gratitude for the assistance received from the Catholic Church the Pope was understanding and mentioned the "racist passions" that had "swallowed countless innocent victims" because of their "race," but carefully avoided making any explicit reference to the word "extermination." is an historical controversy that has lasted for half a century The debate over the Pope's attitude has involved historians even though the complete Vatican papers were not directly available before except for the selection published in the Actes et Documents du Saint-Siège relatifs à la Seconde Guerre Mondiale "The recent opening of the Vatican Archive for Pius XII's Pontificate has finally allowed access to all the documents And now the documents will reveal," the archivist explained and silence formed in the minds of Pope Pacelli and the Church of the time." they were certainly influenced by the excessive caution of Monsignor Angelo Dell'Acqua who had been entrusted with the dossier on the Jews for whom the news of the Holocaust was "Jewish exaggerations." that the Holocaust passed without leaving an impact on Catholic teaching spoke of "massacres out of racial hatred" and "the horrors of concentration camps," but not of "extermination” remained "moved by concern for an unhealed wound" until the end one of the darkest periods of the 20th century Though praised by many for his efforts during the war he has been at the center of intense debate for over fifty years surrounding his perceived silence when it came to helping the Jews of Europe and condemning Nazi atrocities and how do we separate fact from fiction?        in an address to the Officials of the Vatican Apostolic Archive formerly known as the Vatican Secret Archive declared that he "decided that the opening of the Vatican Archives of the Pontificate of Pius XII [would] take place on March 2 The Holy Father's decision to open the archives of Pius XII generated great excitement and anticipation among scholars worldwide ushered in a new period of scholarship and brought up old narratives that the Pope was inactive regarding intervention for the Jews.      After more than three years since the archives were opened One expert who knows this material more intimately than anyone is Dr Director of the Vatican's Historical Archives of the Section for Relations with States of the Secretariat of State he published his book Pio XII e Gli Ebrei (Pius XII and the Jews) after reviewing more than 800,000 documents One series of particular interest to Ickx was the recently uncovered "Ebrei files" ("Jews").     in an interview with Matthew Santucci of EWTN Vatican explains the unique quality of the "Ebrei files" that they represent an archival series that is "very strange" because normally series are entitled according to "nations with which [the Vatican has] regular bilateral agreements and bilateral diplomatic activity." What makes the "Ebrei files" unique is that the Vatican did not have regular bilateral diplomatic activity with the Jews "All of a sudden in '39," a series emerges Ickx notes that this formerly unknown series is filled with "thousands of letters that were sent from the whole of Europe to the Pope himself," looking for help and sustenance in some way under the threat of Nazism.     The "Ebrei files" provide much information contradicting the idea that the Pope was not intervening in the threatened wartime world and he didn't do anything." Ickx describes the contrary Pope Pius XII constituted within the Secretary of State not one two sections: the General Affairs of the Church and the Archives of Foreign Affairs to help those Jews where they could because it was very difficult."    Since the opening of the archives and the publication of Ickx's book there has been a renewed interest in Pius XII's diplomacy and humanitarian efforts during the war which could carry significant implications for a renewed evaluation of Pius XII's legacy there was the revelation of a document claiming that Pius XII knew about the concentration camps as early as 1942 which caused a media firestorm and revived the old storylines.      Director of International Academic Programs for the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C. explains that this document helps to understand the complexity of the role of the papacy in an exceptionally challenging and delicate time of history "This document that's been discussed in the press there is an earlier document from the Fall of 1941 that was published by the Vatican itself in 1974 It was the case of a Slovakian priest who gave the first report and his officers received regular reports and were among the best informed about the Holocaust "I think what we can see now from the archives it's not a question that Pope Pius XII knew about the suffering of Jews and the murder of Jews in massacres." But "now we can see all the different considerations that he had to weigh as the head of a city-state but also the moral leader of the entire Roman Catholic Church."     Currently underway in Rome is a three-day conference where scholars and theologians are meeting to discuss their findings further and to understand how to better contextualize Pius XII's efforts and diplomacy within the broader context of the time Brown-Fleming intimates that the study of the intervention of Pius XII will not be fully grasped overnight "It's the first international conference where dicasteries of the Roman Catholic Church and the Vatican archives as well as Jewish communities have come together to organize an event to try to understand this history better And it will take many years to really understand the figure of the Pope and the decisions that he faced."    "There were many Jews that were also in camps already but they did it exactly while their fellow Jews said to them and that is striking because it's exactly the opposite of what we hear."   Understanding Pius XII's efforts to help the Jews of Europe will also help to understand the broader arc of papal diplomacy in this period shedding a new light on the man as well as the Church and her role in the world While more time will be needed to evaluate all of the documents in the archives there are signs that Pope Pius XII will be remembered as a pope of goodness Matthew Santucci has recently started in EWTN's Vatican bureau He grew up in Connecticut and has been living in Rome since 2020 in International Relations from Luiss Guido Carli The chief archivist of the Bundestag (German parliament) has been involved in historical research on Pope Pius XII for several years Feldkamp has published on topics such as the Cologne nunciature and papal diplomacy as well as articles on the relationship between the Catholic Church and National Socialism aimed to bring his complex research to a wider audience and was also intended as a response to John Cornwell's book “Pius XII - The Pope Who Remained Silent" Feldkamp collaborates with Vatican Archivist Johannes Icks you have been in the Vatican archives in the last few days and have seen some hitherto unknown documents on Pius XII and Eugenio Pacelli What do you think is new in the research on Pius XII that the general public does not know yet we in Germany are not the only ones doing research on Pius XII There are not only historians in this field but also journalists - whom we also need as propagators these leaders were in very close contact with Pius XII reporting to him daily on persecution and mass deportations as well as on the individual fates of the people who came to them And the exciting thing now is that we can estimate that Pius XII personally saved about 15,000 Jews through his own personal efforts: opening monasteries raising cloisters so that people could be hidden there The archival findings I have found now in the Vatican show me how accurately Pacelli was informed Q: You said that what Pius XII told them about the fate of the Jews but was not considered credible by the American side How did the Holy See and Pope Pius XII react Feldkamp: This is diplomatic correspondence only letters that they had received were confirmed repeatedly contacted Pius XII for information on individual cases.. Pope Pacelli's support for the Jews went so far that the Papal Palatine Guard a kind of bodyguard for the Pope - like today's Swiss Guard - was involved in fights with the Waffen-SS to hide Jews in the Roman Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore I am grateful that we have opened these archives in the Vatican we can now correct many of these vague assumptions or even accusations there is the accusation that Pius XII did nothing and remained silent considering that here he led people into hiding in covert operations He could not then draw further public attention to himself by organizing protests or writing protest letters he conducted negotiations with the German embassy and the Italian police force even with Mussolini and the Italian foreign minister and so on He always tried to get as much as possible through negotiations Q: How do you see today's historiography and its re-evaluation of the Pius XII files Are the results presented correctly and honestly or do you fear that there are some reservations Feldkamp: Today's reappraisal can help clarify that But I am also afraid that certain circles will still try to portray him negatively But it is certainly difficult to accuse or want to accuse anyone of this in detail I also see in my research and in publications here in Germany how difficult it is to convey these new findings as credible there are still people who say that they cannot imagine that for 70 years we have believed what was wrong is to keep in mind that the results and the dossiers are all written in French and especially in Italian who are historians and who also know a lot about World War II This means that they now depend on their colleagues to translate it or they depend on what I then present and translate and then I bring in the Italian quotes so that people can understand it again I think there is a lot that can be done in this area... We've already had stories where people have simply mistranslated or gone from one translation to another incorrectly alongside several other archives of the Holy See on the pontificate of Pius XII (1939 – 1958) have been opened to consultation by scholars First announced by Pope Francis on 4 March 2019 the opening is the result of more than fourteen years of preparation by the Historical Archives relating to the Vatican's Section for Relations with States The vast quantity of material available for consultation includes about 120 Series and Archives from the Secretariat of State A large portion of these resources is available in digital form according to a statement released on Monday by the Vatican Apostolic Archives The various archives of the Holy See can host about 120 researchers at a time which will exhibit documents from the pontificate of Pius XII Bookings began in October and those made so far have been distributed over the period of several months (until May – June) to ensure equal access to materials to scholars of Pope Pius XII’s pontificate Pope Pius XII’s pontificate spanned nearly 20 years and covered important events in the life of the Church and society during the Second World War.  The period also saw opposition between the Eastern and Western political blocs and the successive opening up of the Church to a less Eurocentric and more universal spirit Pope Pius XII met with many people including war criminals Archive material will tell about those encounters Only a Pope can grant access to the documents of his predecessors Leo XIII opened the Vatican Archives for the period up to 1815 Pope Benedict XVI made the documents of the pontificate of Pius XI accessible The goal of opening up the archives on Pius XII is to give scholars the possibility of accessing sources that were unavailable up until now Cardinal Pacelli was elected the 260th Supreme Pontiff of the Holy Roman Church on March 2 He headed the Catholic Church from 2 March 1976 to his death on 9 October 1958.  The cause of canonization of Pope Pius XII was opened on 18 November 1965 by Pope Paul VI during the final session of the Second Vatican Council He was declared Venerable by Pope Benedict XVI on 19 December 2009 the first step on the road to sainthood.  Letter from church source in anti-Hitler resistance reporting 6,000 daily killings undercuts Vatican’s claims of lack of knowledge Newly discovered correspondence suggests that the second world war-era Pope Pius XII had detailed information from a trusted German Jesuit that up to 6,000 Jews and Poles were being gassed each day in German-occupied Poland The documentation undercuts the Vatican’s argument that it couldn’t verify diplomatic reports of Nazi atrocities to denounce them The documentation from the Vatican archives published this weekend in Italian daily Corriere della Sera is likely to further fuel the debate about Pius’s legacy and his now-stalled beatification campaign Historians have long been divided about Pius’s record, with supporters insisting he used quiet diplomacy to save Jewish lives while critics say he remained silent as the Holocaust raged Corriere is reproducing a letter dated 14 December 1942 from the German Jesuit priest to Pius’s secretary which is contained in a forthcoming book about the newly opened files of Pius’s pontificate by Giovanni Coco a researcher and archivist in the Vatican’s apostolic archives Coco told Corriere that the letter was significant because it represented detailed correspondence about the Nazi extermination of Jews from an informed church source in Germany who was part of the Catholic anti-Hitler resistance that was able to get otherwise secret information to the Vatican a fellow German Jesuit named the Rev Robert Leiber the letter addresses Leiber as “Dear friend” and goes on to report that the Nazis were killing up to 6,000 Jews and Poles daily from Rava Ruska a town in prewar Poland that is today located in Ukraine and transporting them to the Belzec death camp According to the Belzec memorial which opened in 2004 a total of 500,000 Jews perished at the camp The memorial’s website reports that as many as 3,500 Jews from Rava Ruska had already been sent to Belzec earlier in 1942 and that from 7-11 December “About 3,000-5,000 people were shot on the spot and 2,000-5,000 people were taken to Bełżec,” the website says The date of Koenig’s letter is significant because it suggests the correspondence from a trusted fellow Jesuit arrived in Pius’s office in the days after the ghetto was emptied and after Pius had received multiple diplomatic notes and visits from a variety of envoys of foreign governments from August 1942 onwards with reports that up to 1 million Jews had been killed so far in Poland While it can’t be certain that Pius saw the letter Leiber was his top aide and had served the pope when he was the Vatican’s ambassador to Germany during the 1920s suggesting a close working relationship especially concerning matters related to Germany According to The Pope at War by Pulitzer prize-winning anthropologist David Kertzer told the British envoy to the Vatican in mid-December that the pope couldn’t speak out about Nazi atrocities because the Vatican hadn’t been able to verify the information Coco was quoted by Corriere as saying: “The novelty and importance of this document comes from this fact: that on the Holocaust there is now the certainty that Pius XII was receiving from the German Catholic church exact and detailed news about crimes being perpetrated against Jews.” Coco noted that Koenig also urged the Holy See to not make public what he was revealing because he feared for his own life and the lives of the resistance sources who had provided the intelligence Pius’s supporters have long insisted that he couldn’t speak out strongly against the Nazis because of fears of reprisals By Elisabeth Braw Engelsberg Ideas They always find themselves facing morons or cowards,’ Benito Mussolini told Clara Petacci David Kertzer’s The Pope at War (Oxford University Press out November 2022) is full of telling soundbites from the Italian dictator and many anguished comments by Pope Pius XII who faced the devilish task of navigating his tiny country-within-Italy through the Second World War – and to do the same for the globe-spanning Roman Catholic Church That the two goals were incompatible becomes painfully obvious in Kertzer’s book which is based on the Vatican’s recently opened archives from the period who had the misfortune of leading the Roman Catholic Church during the war failed to energetically stand up to Mussolini and Adolf Hitler has long been well-known even at the time there was no doubt that the Pope was pursuing a strategy of neutrality even as the Nazis’ (and the Italian Fascists’) crimes became obvious and that he did so because he thought that any more forceful action by him would imperil the many Catholics living under Nazi rule or occupation What the Vatican archives can reveal is how the Pope discussed the matter with his secretary of state and other Vatican officials and how the Vatican communicated its position – in letters and meetings – to the Axis powers and the Allies Kertzer is certainly an expert on this period of Italian history having won a Pulitzer Prize for a previous book on Pius XI’s combative coexistence with Mussolini’s Italy The Pope at War is a compelling historical account not least thanks to its melodramatic protagonists that unique hybrid of a sovereign country and the headquarters of the world’s largest religious denomination that combination is difficult enough to handle but the outbreak of the Second World War immediately posed an insoluble predicament for Pius XII: should he publicly condemn the Nazis’ invasion of Poland a country with a large and devout Catholic population or would doing so expose the Poles to retaliation by the Nazis the moment Hitler invaded Germany he observed to Petacci: ‘The poor Poles How can they fool themselves into believing in help from the French and the English?’ Monsignor Donemico Tardini labelled the Führer the ‘motorised Attila’ The war brought a steady stream of Nazi representatives to Rome where they could meet conveniently with representatives of two states – Italy and the Holy See used his first visit to inform the Pope that he – von Ribbentrop — didn’t believe in God and that every German supported Hitler who had spent his entire career in the Vatican’s service rather than in parish ministry and who resembled an academic more than a national leader constantly weighing in his mind what sort of action he could take without invoking the wrath of Hitler Pius XII suspected that Germany would win the war A future Europe would then be ruled by godless brutes his task was to make sure that Christians under Nazi rule were at least allowed the most basic rights to practise their religion caused the Vatican a constant stream of home-grown troubles After Mussolini decided that his struggling armed forces needed better weapons Italian authorities melted more than 13,600 bells belonging to Italian churches the churches were under the Pope’s ecclesiastical jurisdiction an uneducated but ambitious woman who unabashedly provided ‘Ben’ – as she called him – with political advice told the Duce that the Pope was in cahoots with Britain ‘anglo-priestly’ forces that must be defeated by Italy Even when news of the Nazis’ ‘Final Solution’ began appearing and even when Italy’s Fascists began seizing members of Italy’s tiny Jewish community His feisty secretary of state (foreign minister) while various priests and bishops sent the Vatican shocking updates from the frontlines dispatched angry messages to the Pope whenever Osservatore Romano – the Vatican’s newspaper – or any other Catholic publication criticised him The Pope thought he could make a contribution by pleading with Nazi and Fascist officials in private conversations and by holding proclamations on the radio and from the papal loggia neither the Nazis nor the Fascists were swayed by academic-sounding pleas urging morality and the public couldn’t make sense of the Pope’s convoluted speeches either The chaos continued when Italy’s Grand Council deposed Mussolini who managed to set up a new government in the north under German protection while Italy’s official government set itself up in the south Because the Pope couldn’t decide which was the legitimate government did their best to act morally by hiding draft dodgers and Jews in their churches with the constantly agonising Pope as the protagonist Mussolini makes frequent appearances: often irate frequently depressed but always delivering a television-worthy soundbite (It’s a good thing Mussolini died before television became omnipresent.) There’s a cadre of priestly Vatican officials all with different opinion of what needs to be done And looming in the background is Hitler himself Even though The Pope at War is written in a rather academic tone Pius XII during the Second World War is perfect material for a film or an opera German historian and author Michael Hesemann argues that Pope Pius XII deserves beatification for what he did to save as many Jews as possible during the Holocaust Editor’s note: This interview was first posted on October 26, 2018, and is reposted today in light of the news that the Vatican  will open its archives on the pontificate of Pope Pius XII Pius XII was never “Hitler’s Pope,” as some have argued says historian Michael Hesemann after 10 years of research in the Vatican Secret Archives “is not even beatified.” The results of Dr Hesemann’s studies have been published in German in the book The Papst und der Holocaust; an English edition is expected soon Hesemann says his intention with the book is “to kill the black legend of the Hitler’s Pope” and to further the cause for Pius XII’s beatification Catholic World Report recently spoke with Hesemann about his book and its subject CWR: Why you are so interested in Pius XII and why did you decide to write a book about him Most of his successors are already canonized; his “right hand,” Msgr has his canonization next Sunday [Editor’s note: Since this interview took place Pope Paul VI was canonized by Pope Francis on October 14] whose “heroic virtues” were promulgated by Benedict XVI in 2009 one of the greatest popes in Church history out of fear that Jewish groups might be upset and protest since no pope in history did what Pius XII did to save as many Jews as possible during the darkest hours of human history And this is what I prove in my book The Pope and the Holocaust CWR: What were your sources for The Pope and the Holocaust Hesemann: It is based on 10 years of research in the Vatican Secret Archives three weeks after the “Kristallnacht”—the pogrom night of November 9 would have been the biggest rescue operation in history He tried to get visas for 200,000 Jews when 230,000 were still living in Hitler’s Germany due to a lack of cooperation of the Catholic nations but over the next years at least 40,000 Jews were smuggled out of Nazi-occupied Central Europe with visas obtained by the Vatican false papers including forged baptism certificates Pius XII did everything he could to save as many Jews as possible CWR: What distinguishes your book on Pius XII from others on the same subject Hesemann: It is not a biography of Pius XII but a study on how the Pope and the Vatican reacted [to] the Holocaust It includes an overview [of] all the documents I discovered myself in the Vatican Archives dealing with the pontificate of his predecessor Pius XI and an evaluation of the nearly 8,000 pages of documents already released and published by the Vatican on order of Paul VI in an 11-volume-edition which was completed in 1981—and was I show the important role Pius XII played in a conspiracy of German generals to overthrow Hitler which eventually produced the “Valkyrie” coup d’etat of July 20 when Colonel von Stauffenberg tried to kill Hitler with a bomb placed underneath his desk CWR: What was the involvement of Pius XII in that operation Hesemann: The Pope blessed this plan and the conspirators since it was the fastest way to end the slaughter of six million innocent men and children and the most brutal war in history CWR: How does your new book help clear up incorrect perceptions of Pius XII Hesemann: It kills the “black legend” of “Hitler’s Pope,” of the Pope who was silent when six million Jews were slaughtered Before the Germans occupied Rome in September 1943 he protested three times against the deportations and killings of Jews When he realized that public protest would not help anybody but only caused more brutal counter-reactions by the Nazis he used diplomacy; we know of more than 40 diplomatic interventions trying to stop the deportations of the Jews not only in Germany where his nuncio met with no success at all facing Hitler’s fanatic hate but also in the vassal states of Nazi Germany where the representatives of the Pope had several successes delaying or ending the transports of Jews to the death camps of Auschwitz-Birkenau CWR: Do we know how many Jews survived the Holocaust thanks to an intervention of Pope Pius XII Hesemann: Indeed; [in my book] I show how 443,000 Jews were saved by delays or halts of deportations and that an additional 463,000 Jews were saved because Romania and Italy (until 1943) refused to hand over “their” Jews to the Nazis after a diplomatic intervention of the Holy See and its diplomats Hitler ordered the deportation of all 8,000 Roman Jews When he learned about it in the early morning of that day Pius XII immediately ordered the German Ambassador Von Weizsäcker to the Vatican threatened [Von Weizsäcker] with an open papal protest But the ambassador refused to report this to Berlin Hesemann: Knowing about Hitler’s order to occupy the Vatican and arrest the pope Pius XII had a “plan B.” He sent his nephew who had contacts [with] the German occupiers of Rome pointed to the consequences of a papal protest and convinced him to call Heinrich Himmler The “Reichsfuehrer” of the SS gave this order [to cease the arrests of Roman Jews] and 252 persons were released; “only” 1,007 the Pope opened more than 200 Roman monasteries hiding more than 4,300 people during the next seven months Since nobody in the Vatican knew that the 1,007 Roman Jews were sent to a death camp—the original order said they were to be sent as “hostages to Mauthausen,” a labor camp in Austria—for the next several months the Vatican tried to learn more about their whereabouts and to send food and warm clothes to them; [however] most of them were killed in the gas chambers the day they arrived in Auschwitz Hesemann:  It proves that Pius XII was never “Hitler’s Pope,” but [was] indeed Hitler’s strongest antagonist his most efficient enemy; that [Pius XII] was not silent at all and just did not wish to give reasons for even more severe measures and repercussions by the Nazis He realized that efficient help was more useful than public condemnations His priority was to save as many Jews as possible he collaborated with conspiracies against the Nazis as…with the Allies to end the war as soon as possible He even encouraged American Catholic soldiers to fight side by side with Stalin’s troops saying that the war was not about their atheist communist ideology but in defense of their Russian homeland occupied by the Nazis His “nihil obstat” broke all American resistance against an alliance with Stalin to defeat Hitler and the Nazis CWR: What does your book show that hasn’t been published before Hesemann: A great part of the documents I quote in my book were either never before published—like the ones I discovered myself in the Vatican Archives—or come from the abovementioned collection of nearly 8,000 pages of documents published by the Vatican on order of Pope Paul VI This is a rather absurd fact: although everybody blames the Vatican for “not opening the Archives,” it is widely ignored that the most important documents were already published Paul VI was a Francophile and had ordered Father Blet to edit and [include commentary for] this collection the Actes et documents du Saint Siege relatifs a la Seconde Guerre mondiale the most eminent Holocaust historians are mostly English but certainly many of them don’t read French The result was that a true treasure of historical documents was widely ignored I myself waited for 10 years to get access to the “closed section” of the archives I work with an American Jewish organization which greatly supported me during my research For several times we met with the Secretaries of State of the Holy See and were always assured that it was only a question of months until the archives would open those who know assured me that 90 percent of all relevant documents were already published in those eleven volumes I started to read and evaluate them and found out that they indeed deliver a coherent picture of what happened: we might not have all stones of the mosaic but 90 percent are enough to create a clear picture When one day the archives open [to the general public] I might add some details here and there—but the overall reconstruction of the events will still be valid Those documents show us a completely different Pius XII than the black legend which was created and promoted by the Soviet KGB to interfere into the papal elections Now we have all the facts together to clear his memory and to show the Pacelli-pope how he really was: a man who scrupulously tried everything to save as many human lives as possible during the greatest humanitarian crisis in history… That’s why I say clearly that the Church has nothing to fear The lies about Pius XII disturb the reconciliation of Catholics and Jews The truth about him can only bring them together CWR: Could this help with leading toward his canonization I had a long discussion with the Pope’s Jewish friend He thinks that Pius XII should have protested more loudly “was his prophetic duty.” “Even if that would have costed tens of thousands of human—of Jewish—lives?”,I objected The Jewish Talmud teaches us that he who saves one human live Pius XII saved nearly a million Jewish lives A public gesture would have destroyed all possibilities to help them To say it frankly: Pius XII did not want to buy the applause of the free world or future generations with the blood of innocent Jews or Catholics saving lives was his priority and highest moral duty CWR: Do you hope to see Pius XII beatified Hesemann: He deserves beatification and even canonization more than any pope of the 20th Century since his tiara had indeed turned into a crown of thorns convince all skeptics to change their opinion It is already documented what Pope Pius XII did to save nearly a million Jews not too many additional historians would even come and do research themselves after they would find out that 90 percent of all-important documents are already published But it is important as a symbolic act: To convince the world that the Vatican indeed has nothing to hide If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter Vatican to open WWII secret archives of Pope Pius XII Tennessee bishops oppose ‘Heartbeat Bill’ over legal concerns Renowned philosopher and author Peter Kreeft has written a new, four-volume history of philosophy entitled Socrates’ Children. The four volumes span thousands of years, from the ancient world through to today (the four volumes are: […] Father Daniel Utrecht, C.O., is a priest of the Oratory of St Philip Neri, Toronto. He is a graduate of the University of Dallas (B.A., Philosophy), and the University of Toronto (Ph.D., philosophy). He joined the […] Labor Day 2022 is upon us, and in the past, labor priests like Fathers Peter Yorke, John Ryan, Charles Own Rice, Andy Boss, SJ, Phillip Carey, SJ, John Corridan, SJ, Raymond McGowan, George Higgins, Jack […] In his book “Class: A Guide Through the American Status System” Paul Fussell points out that one of the great social divides is between those who read to be surprised and those who read to have their notions confirmed will consider all of the evidence regarding Pope Pius XII without preconceptions the man deserves nothing less than the best assessment that serious scholarship can provide This holy man’s heroism and virtues were universally acknowledged by all until the publication of Rolf Hochhuth’s wicked piece of propaganda is why the teaching of history must not be abandoned in the fashionable obsession with vocational training alone Until the publication of THE DEPUTY the whole world acknowledged the heroism of Pius XII The intellectual failings and moral cowardice of those who eagerly embraced Rolf Hochuth’s lies are appalling It’s been called the Holocaust for decades; it’s unlikely that people are going to start using a word that isn’t familiar to them It is iniquitous that Cornwell’s book was even published given that a very little research would have shown the publishers how inaccurate it is For many of the faithful we already reguard Pius XII as a Saint eventually the Church will catch up to the sense of the faithful The status of Pope Pius XII’s cause did not affect him during his earthly life and causes him no discomfort in the afterlife This is no crown of thorns; it is not even a kind of Purgatory the rush to canonize 20th century Popes is more troubling than the delay in canonizing Pius XII But what does the continuing lie do to the Church “The Deputy” offered the perfect opportunity for those on the left to condemn Pius XII for his opposition to communism That they were partially successful is a left handed tribute to their fellow travelers in the media and the anti-Catholicism of many “intellectuals” Although Hochuth and Cornwell may have received the approbation of the left in this world their efforts will no doubt be fully accounted for when saints and sinners are finally reckoned Pius XII was the greatest Pope of the 20th century cardinals and bishops in the axis countries should have been to publicly and privately advise Catholic men that they would be excommunicated and not receive Holy Communion if they supported these regimes in any way One problem with your reasoning: How well has this worked to eradicate abortion Has any pope or bishop going all the way back to Peter been able to do what you believe should have been done- for all the Catholic soldiers- in a country How does the abortion example compare to an ideological brainwash to varying degrees involving young men Should every German Catholic soldier be excommunicated or only those that actually killed an enemy combatant And those that killed because they would have been killed by their superiors…what then How do you apportion just penalties and to what degree depending on what the soldiers did and thou for a true Prince.” (Henry IV Soldier of Christ: The Life of Pope Pius XII by Robert A Ventresca is a good biography of the great pope The author has the highest regard for Pius XII but he also has no problem objectively considering mistakes that might have been made Pius XII should have been beatified instead of Pius XI and am grateful that author Michael Hesemen has written about this holy Pius XII I have no doubts that had Pope John XX111 been Pope he would have quickly and publicly and officially condemned Hitler The dedicated Nazis had little fear of God Bernard Lichtenberg acted bravely and saintly The problem is ” How many Jewish lives did Father Bernard Lichtenbergs actions save no disrespect intended to a very brave,saintly man who was murdered on the way to Dachau The bottom line to me is that only the Catholic Church can decide who is worthy of Catholic Sainthood All comments posted at Catholic World Report are moderated While vigorous debate is welcome and encouraged please note that in the interest of maintaining a civilized and helpful level of discussion comments containing obscene language or personal attacks—or those that are deemed by the editors to be needlessly combative or inflammatory—will not be published Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value" … otherwise you might be forced to take seriously the foolishness that seems to dominate the internet, the airwaves, and the supposedly serious, important newspapers of note. So, as something of a humor break (and, […] You can see how this popup was set up in our step-by-step guide: https://wppopupmaker.com/guides/auto-opening-announcement-popups/ Sign up to receive a weekly email with news, analysis, and commentary from a voice you can trust! (function($) {window.fnames = new Array(); window.ftypes = new Array();fnames[0]='EMAIL';ftypes[0]='email';fnames[3]='MMERGE3';ftypes[3]='text';fnames[1]='FNAME';ftypes[1]='text';fnames[2]='LNAME';ftypes[2]='text';fnames[4]='MMERGE4';ftypes[4]='text';fnames[5]='MMERGE5';ftypes[5]='text';fnames[6]='MMERGE6';ftypes[6]='number';fnames[7]='MMERGE7';ftypes[7]='radio';}(jQuery));var $mcj = jQuery.noConflict(true); Pius XII used a Nazi prince to negotiate with Adolf Hitler as he was finalizing plans for the invasion of Poland Adolf Hitler was also engaged in negotiations with Pope Pius XII so delicate that not even the German ambassador to the Holy See knew about them The existence of these talks was a secret the Vatican was eager to maintain long after Pius XII’s death—as it did for eight decades The 12-volume compilation of the Holy See’s documents on the Second World War which to date has constituted the official record of Vatican activity during that period Knowledge of them has only now come to light with the recent opening of the Pius XII archives at the Vatican are as hotly contested as Pius XII’s decision to avoid direct public criticism of Hitler or his regime and to remain publicly silent in the face of the Holocaust Many Church conservatives portray Pius as nonetheless a steadfast Others have harshly criticized him for failing to denounce the Nazi war of aggression and Hitler’s effort to exterminate all of Europe’s Jews Even when the Nazi SS rounded up more than 1,000 Jews in Rome itself Held for two days in a complex near the walls of the Vatican the Jews were then placed on a train bound for Auschwitz This article is excerpted from Kertzer’s forthcoming book.Pope John Paul II was reportedly preparing to beatify Pius XII in 2000 when opposition called for waiting until the Vatican’s archives for the war years were opened before making a final decision agree to proclaim Pius XII “venerable,” a step on the way to sainthood Pope Francis authorized the opening of the Pius XII archives which became available to scholars in 2020 no new finding has been as dramatic as the discovery that Pius XII entered into secret negotiations with Hitler The pope had become more and more incensed by Hitler’s whittling away at the influence of the Church in Germany replacing Catholic parochial schools with state schools and supplanting Christian teachings with Nazi doctrine Pius XI issued an encyclical that condemned the Nazi government for its persecution of the Church and its championing of a pagan ideology Pius XI abandoned the city for Castel Gandolfo In remarks that infuriated Benito Mussolini the pope said he could not abide the glorification of the swastika which he termed a “cross that is not the cross of Christ.” David I. Kertzer: What the Vatican’s secret archives are about to reveal Hitler summoned von Hessen to his headquarters Given the new pope’s evident eagerness to turn the page on the Vatican’s rocky relations with the National Socialist regime Hitler had decided to explore the possibility of a deal Von Hessen was told to see if he could schedule a secret meeting with the pope to begin discussions the talks between von Hessen and the pope had to be arranged through unofficial channels which would be used repeatedly over the next two years Italy’s future king and the brother of von Hessen’s wife Travaglini was a schemer and self-promoter And he was deeply enmeshed in a social network that reached into the Vatican Portrait of Philipp von Hessen (National Archives)On a Sunday in mid-April of 1939 barely a month after Pacelli had become pope von Hessen summoned Travaglini to the Italian royal residence in Rome There he explained that Hitler had asked him to initiate negotiations with the new pontiff outside normal diplomatic channels Travaglini immediately wrote to Cardinal Lorenzo Lauri asking for his help in arranging a meeting between von Hessen and Pius XII The pope met Hitler’s envoy for the first time on May 11 the pope took the highly unusual step of holding the meeting in the apartment of Cardinal Luigi Maglione having spent a dozen years as the papal nuncio in Germany The Vatican archives contain a German-language account of their conversation the pope had a German prelate concealed in such a way as to take down a full transcript of their conversations without apparently being observed by the Nazi prince the pope took out a copy of a letter he had sent Hitler expressing his appreciation for the führer’s well wishes on his election to the papacy and the Reich Chancellor’s reply was very kind But the situation has since deteriorated.” By way of example he cited the closing of Catholic schools and seminaries in the Third Reich the publication of books attacking the Church and the papacy and the slashing of state funds benefiting the Church in Austria He told the prince that he was eager to reach an agreement with Hitler and was ready to compromise insofar as his conscience allowed there must before anything else be a truce … I am certain that if peace between Church and state is restored The German people are united in their love for the Fatherland Von Hessen explained that the National Socialists were divided into pro-Church and anti-Church factions that were “bitterly opposed to each other.” If the Catholic clergy would agree to confine itself to Church matters and stay out of politics had no interest in involving itself in partisan politics Here too there is an authoritarian government And yet the Church can take care of the religious education of the young … No one here is anti-German We are pleased if Germany is great and powerful.” Von Hessen asked if the pope was willing to put the Church’s commitment to stay out of politics in writing was to be clear about what was meant by politics Von Hessen then brought up what had been another sore point in the Vatican’s relations with the Reich the much-publicized “morality” trials of German priests Hundreds had been charged with sexual crimes “Such errors happen everywhere,” the pope observed It is now clear that the Secretariat of State A folder in the Secretariat’s files from the previous year is labeled “Vienna: Order to burn all archival material concerning cases of immorality of monks and priests.” To date historians have largely dismissed police investigations of clerical sexual abuse in Nazi Germany as evidence of the National Socialist regime’s anti-Catholicism and homophobia But there were reasons the Church was so vulnerable to this variety of blackmail David I. Kerzter: The pope, the Jews, and the secrets in the archives von Hessen expressed his nervousness that word of it might be leaked “No one knows we’re having this conversation,” the pope assured him “Even my closest associates don’t know about it.” von Hessen traveled to Berlin to tell Hitler what the pope had said von Hessen again conveyed a message to Travaglini who relayed it by letter to Cardinal Lauri “was very satisfied with the secret discussion that the Prince had with His Holiness on the evening of May 11 1939 … Following that meeting various conversations took place in Berlin with the Führer and with [Hermann] Goering and [Joachim von] Ribbentrop”—the Reichsmarschall and the minister of foreign affairs a) The pope’s meeting with von Hessen had changed Ribbentrop’s attitude toward reaching an agreement between the Reich and the Vatican which he had previously opposed but now supported the German press was ordered to end its attacks on the Catholic religion and Catholic priests in Germany and on the contrary to speak well of them if good occasions should arise to do so c) Hitler called on various regional officials to send reports on the religious situation in their regions in order to be in a position to negotiate with the Vatican regarding its concerns d) The decision was made to send Prince Philipp to Rome with a message of homage and good wishes for the Holy Father to initiate official contacts via the respective diplomatic channels for the hoped-for accord Von Hessen’s message went on to stress the importance Hitler placed on keeping the negotiations secret until an agreement could be reached with the pope there was no benefit to letting word of his initiative get out he continued to use his back channel to entice the Vatican with the prospect of an agreement the pope received a new report from von Hessen via Cardinal Lauri von Hessen had asked Hitler whether the proposals for the pope were ready The prince reported that while the führer was “now predisposed to conciliation,” he “asked to be excused if given the current extremely delicate international situation he hadn’t been able up to now to adequately study the current complex problems of the Catholic Church in the Reich in order to be able to bring the Holy Father with devout and respectful sentiments of great esteem and sympathy Hitler was convinced that the much-desired religious peace could be achieved and he hoped soon to return to Rome to meet with the pope Read: Understanding Hitler’s anti-Semitism Von Hessen’s next secret meeting with Pius XII took place on August 26 A detailed account of this encounter comes in the form of a German-language record found in the newly opened Vatican Secretariat of State archives The meeting took place less than a week before Hitler sent German troops into Poland The German prince began by telling the pope that Hitler wanted to assure him of his “most fervent desire” to restore peace with the Church did not believe that any “big issues” divided them Seemingly oblivious to the apparent contradiction the prince then said that Hitler thought the “biggest issues” to be resolved were the “racial question”—referring here to the Nazi regime’s campaign of persecution and terror directed at Jews—and what Hitler saw as the clergy’s meddling in Germany’s domestic politics believed that the first of these obstacles the “racial question,” could be “avoided,” presumably by continuing the new pope’s policy of remaining silent about the issue was an understanding on the proper role of Germany’s Catholic clergy the pope first expressed his gratitude to Hitler for his warm greeting would like to see the Church reach an honorable agreement that would ensure religious peace in the Reich As for Hitler’s concerns about political activity by the German clergy there should be no grounds for worry because the Church had no reason to engage in partisan politics the pope never raised any concerns about the Nazis’ anti-Jewish campaign was convinced that their talks could well lead to a new “We will promote the achievement of an honorable religious peace with utmost vigor,” the pope said He hopes to see your Holiness when he comes back to Rome for official purposes.” Hitler had hoped by now to have provided the pope with a series of points to move the negotiations along “the Russian affair came up,” distracting him from the matter Von Hessen did not need to explain this reference The German-Russian nonaggression pact—which gave Hitler the guarantees he sought in order to launch his invasion of Poland—had been signed three days earlier in Moscow remained of the utmost interest to the führer they all realized that everything had to continue to be done in secret if they were to prevent “hostile interference” by those eager to prevent any agreement between Pius XII and Hitler Pope Pius XII (Illustration by Cristiana Couceiro Sources: Fototeca Gilardi / Getty; Adoc / Getty)The next meeting took place on October 24 With his brutal conquest of Poland now complete Hitler let the pope know that he was ready to resume their secret negotiations The quasi-transcript of the German-language conversation between the pope and Philipp von Hessen makes clear that even after the invasion and the start of the larger war the pope was eager to reach an understanding with Hitler the pope wanted Hitler to know that any agreement depended on a change of those German policies that had harmed the Church the considerable tensions notwithstanding,” the prince replied the Poles had brought disaster on themselves their stubborn refusal to recognize their defeat having had tragic consequences The Polish military command’s decision to continue the pointless resistance even the Germans had to recognize the bravery of the Polish soldiers the führer was very pleased with the military and political progress he had made in Poland But the people are optimistic.” The pope acknowledged that there did now seem to be calm on the military side but he saw signs that peace might now be returning to Europe following his previous meeting with the pope he had returned to Germany and discussed with the führer what the pope had told him about the importance of coming to an understanding “He was in complete agreement,” said the prince but he was then regrettably distracted by the many other urgent issues he had to address the news from Germany was not such as to encourage a rapprochement with the Church Even those who preferred an authoritarian regime were concerned about the way religious institutions were being treated the pope decided to bring up an argument he thought might appeal to Hitler Germany’s enemies were making ample use of the Reich’s poor treatment of the churches alluding to the pressures on him to speak out against Hitler’s anti-Church measures was making his own position and that of the Vatican difficult The Germans’ systematic attack on the Church had to stop If Hitler were to give a signal and the situation were to improve it would pave the way for productive negotiations “I understand other tasks require the Führer’s energy right now,” the pope said such a ‘Stop!,’ is possible and most important it might be best to begin by holding preliminary negotiations in Berlin the papal nuncio could preside over the talks “So many countries have joined the Reich,” von Hessen added that clearly a new concordat with the Vatican was needed Did the prince have in mind forming a committee to organize such talks What was important for any such talks to be fruitful was the creation of a propitious atmosphere by means of a signal from the führer “I have always desired peace between Church and State and continue to do so,” the pope said As Pius rose to bring their meeting to an end he told the prince how much he appreciated his visit and asked that he convey to Hitler his warm greetings Thinking that the time had come for discussions to move to the next level Hitler decided to send Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop to meet with the pope Von Hessen returned to Rome to discuss possible arrangements Travaglini took his written account of what von Hessen had told him to Cardinal Lauri with a cover letter urging the pope to quickly let him know how to respond A separate typed note on a plain sheet of paper found together with the cardinal’s letter in the Vatican’s Secretariat of State archive shows how quickly the pope agreed to the meeting and gives a flavor of its cloak-and-dagger nature: “January 3 The Most Eminent Cardinal Lauri informs us that ‘the noted person’ returned this morning in Rome and appropriately advised will come this evening at the agreed-upon time.” David I. Kertzer: The secrets that might be hiding in the Vatican’s archives He gave it to von Hessen when the prince appeared that evening at the Apostolic Palace The pope prefaced his five points by expressing his pleasure in seeing that “some of the propagandistic publications against the Church or Church organizations [in Germany] have been withdrawn.” However other signs were less encouraging; reports of anticlerical and anti-Christian propaganda in Germany kept coming in “We continue to perceive that there are those in the Party—especially in those circles that regard themselves as the foremost representatives of today’s Germany such as in the SS the Federation of German Girls—who seek to separate Catholics spiritually and one cannot advance in the SS without having discarded one’s membership in the Church.” To “detoxify the public atmosphere before any talks begin,” the pope suggested the German government would have to take certain measures von Hessen briefed von Ribbentrop by phone On his return to Germany not long afterward von Hessen also briefed Hitler and gave him the five-point memo that Pius XII had prepared Sent back to Rome early the next month to continue the negotiations von Hessen summoned Travaglini to convey a new message to the pontiff he had discussed next steps with von Ribbentrop and agreed in principle with the pope’s terms He had decided that his foreign minister’s upcoming meeting with the pope be an official one and not remain secret It should be billed as a discussion of the points of tension between the Reich and the Vatican in advising Pius on the planned meeting with von Ribbentrop von Hessen conveyed Hitler’s wish that the pope flatter his foreign minister as much as possible: “During the meeting that von Ribbentrop will have with the Holy Father—perhaps a decisive one for the relations between the Church and the Reich—the Führer would like the Holy Father to employ many many sweet words in regards to his Minister of Foreign Affairs as he is very susceptible to such expressions and as von Ribbentrop is the executor of future oversight in this area.” Hitler Although the pope was eager for the meeting with the Nazi foreign minister Hitler’s decision that the encounter should receive wide publicity made him nervous Ever since the Germans had invaded Poland the previous September anguished pleas from the overwhelmingly Catholic Poles had been coming in to the Vatican urging the pope to denounce the Nazi aggression The fact that large numbers of Polish Catholic clergy were targets of the German invaders made the pressure to speak out almost unbearable For the pope now to be seen in collegial conversation with von Ribbentrop could have unpleasant consequences for him the pope had a new note prepared for von Hessen: The news we have received up to the beginning of the current month on the Church’s situation in Germany does not indicate the beginning of a détente in line with the five mentioned points Under these circumstances His Holiness believes that it remains more beneficial to make the first encounter between him and the Reich Foreign Minister a confidential one to permit an open discussion without interference about the necessary … points for the agreement where Travaglini gave him the pope’s message Travaglini’s account of his subsequent conversation with von Hessen which Pius XII received via Cardinal Lauri featured Hitler’s latest enticements for the pope The führer and von Ribbentrop were “cautiously and discreetly applying the five points of [the pope’s] Note.” They planned to complete that task and potentially do even more to please the pope following von Ribbentrop’s visit while the foreign minister’s meeting could be considered “private,” it must be accompanied by all the ceremony appropriate for an event of such importance Von Hessen’s message for the pope ended optimistically: “After the visit and the Holy Father’s open a new era of pacification of Catholicism in Germany may dawn.” Sources: Süddeutsche Zeitung / Alamy; Giordano Cipriani / GettyOn Monday morning von Ribbentrop and his entourage were picked up by four black Vatican limousines flying Vatican and Nazi flags entering Vatican City through the Porta Sant’Anna The 46-year-old foreign minister—a “boundlessly vain arrogant and pompous former champagne salesman,” as the historian Ian Kershaw has described him—had become one of the führer’s closest confidants although he was looked on with contempt by most of the top Nazi leadership harlequin-striped Swiss Guards saluted the motorcade before it made its way into the San Damaso Courtyard Von Ribbentrop entered Pius XII’s private library who declined to kneel as was the custom in approaching Pius XII began the conversation by conveying Hitler’s greetings the pope spoke of his many years in Germany which he said had perhaps been the happiest of his life Von Ribbentrop said he hoped they could speak frankly Hitler believed that settling their differences “was quite possible” but depended on first ensuring “that the Catholic clergy in Germany abandon any kind of political activity”—that is wartime was not the moment for entering into any new formal agreements what mattered for the time being was to maintain the existing truce [between Church and state] and was doing his part in bringing this improvement about He had quashed no fewer than 7,000 indictments of Catholic clergymen charged with a variety of financial and sexual crimes and was continuing the National Socialist government’s policy of giving a large annual financial subsidy to the Catholic Church the pope had much to be thankful to Hitler for von Ribbentrop suggested; if the Church still existed in Europe which had eliminated the Bolshevist threat Here the German and Vatican accounts of the conversation begin to differ “the Pope showed complete understanding toward the Foreign Minister’s statements and admitted without qualifications that the concrete facts were as mentioned he attempted to turn the conversation toward certain special problems and complaints of the Curia The pope’s account of the conversation was prepared by Monsignor Domenico Tardini based on what the pope told him shortly after von Ribbentrop departed We also have further insight into the conversation thanks to a lengthy German-language memo prepared in advance of the meeting as a guide to what Pius XII intended to say offered a reminder of the five points the pope had sent to Hitler other important issues the pope hoped to bring up The list was long: “There have been cases of offices of high Church officials being searched … by the Gestapo.” Such actions violated the provisions of the concordat that had been negotiated with the German government shortly after Hitler had come to power Then there was the sensitive issue of Poland: The Holy See has the gravest concerns over the current situation of the Church in Poland especially because of the extreme restrictions imposed on the bishops and priests; the restrictions on Church activities that prevent priests and the faithful from executing the most necessary religious acts; and the closing of many religious institutes and Catholic private schools the pope remarked that von Ribbentrop had struck him as a rather vigorous young man but one who railed like a fanatic when he spoke Von Ribbentrop had told the pope that he had once been a wine merchant with little interest in politics In response to von Ribbentrop’s complaint that the pope’s predecessor had used strong words against Germany he had taken care not to offend the Germans his mention of the suffering of a “little people” had referred not to Poland Von Ribbentrop tried to impress the pope with the Germans’ certainty of winning the war before the year’s end “I had never seen a man of ice until I had met with von Ribbentrop,” Giuseppe Bastianini Mussolini’s undersecretary for foreign affairs and now the pope was seeing the famously warmongering Nazi in action Two months after the pope’s meeting with von Ribbentrop the German army began its rapid march westward while driving a British expeditionary force from the continent Yet the pope’s secret meetings with the Nazi prince continued; the last one took place in the spring of 1941 no formal agreement emerged from the meetings and so in a narrow sense they could be deemed a failure What the meetings did was string the pope along and help keep him silent Hitler never intended to restore the prerogatives of the Church in Germany but he knew how to dangle various enticements Pius XII and Adolf Hitler had no affection for each other Yet each man had his own reasons for initiating these talks The pope placed the highest priority on reaching a deal with the Nazi regime to end the persecution of the Roman Catholic Church in the Third Reich and in the lands that it conquered Hitler saw an opportunity to end the papal criticism that had become such an irritant under the previous pope Hitler saw only two potential impediments to reaching an understanding: “the racial question” and the involvement of Catholic clergy in German politics Priests and bishops should not be permitted to utter any criticism of Nazi policies There is no indication that the pope ever brought up the Nazis’ campaign against Europe’s Jews as an issue was the pope then expressing any opposition to Mussolini’s own “racial laws” as long as they affected only Italy’s Jews.) As for Hitler’s second concern the pope repeatedly denied that the Catholic clergy was involved in the political realm If the pope in fact thought it proper for the Catholic clergy to criticize any of the Nazi regime’s policies other than those that directly affected the Church As the head of a large international organization his overriding aim in negotiations with Hitler’s emissary was protecting the institutional resources and prerogatives of the Roman Catholic Church in the Third Reich If the only goal was to protect the welfare of the institutional Church his efforts could well be judged a success But for those who see the papacy as a position of great moral leadership the revelations of Pius XII’s secret negotiations with Hitler must come as a sharp disappointment Pius XII came under great pressure to denounce Hitler’s regime and its ongoing attempt to exterminate Europe’s Jews David Kertzer would like to thank Roberto Benedetti for his contribution to the archival work on which this article is based This article is excerpted from Kertzer’s forthcoming book, The Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII, Mussolini, and Hitler. 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The Pope At War - The Secret History Of Pius XII, Mussolini, And HitlerBy David I KertzerBuy Book​When you buy a book using a link on this page Professor David Kertzer and his research team delved into the controversial question of Pius XII during WW-II specifically tackling his failure to publicly condemn the Holocaust [Brown University] — Academics who study church-state relations in Italy often fall into two camps a Brown professor of social science and a preeminent expert on the history of Vatican relations with Italian politics The first camp — the church historians — pore over archives from the Roman Catholic church and tend not to work in civil archives conduct their research in state archives through a more distinctly political lens Kertzer’s research sits at the intersection of the two The overlapping space in the Venn diagram of church history and secular history is a site of rich and nuanced analysis The decision-making of church actors — namely the pope and his clergy — can’t be fully understood without consideration of their relationship to and communications with state actors Kertzer and his research team have most recently delved into the controversial question of Pius XII during World War II “My task is triangulating documents from different archives around the same events to better understand what actually is going on,” Kertzer said church archives or just base it on a set of state archives before they closed in response to Italy’s COVID-19 lockdown The archives have since reopened with limited visitation The barrier to securing access to documents Enabled by a generous research fund from Brown Kertzer has secured over 7,000 pages of archival documents “I’m not aware of any scholar who has been able to obtain nearly as much material from those archives,” he said are “explosive” — though he can’t share them publicly until the release of his book "The Pope at War.' [Editor's Note: This IMPACT magazine story was written before the book was published in June by Random House in the United States — it will be published by Garzanti in October in Italy.] Internal memos between Pius XII and trusted aides illuminating the pope’s own thoughts and reservations add texture to a debate that Kertzer says often glosses over complexities “He’s a great hero of conservatives in the church who portray him as a great antagonist of fascism and of Nazism and a great defender of Jews,” he said “His critics accuse him of cowardice and antisemitism.” “I thought a lot of these debates lacked nuance and they didn’t really give us an understanding of what was going through the pope’s mind during the war,” Kertzer said was how best to protect the church in the face of political turmoil “He had good reason to believe Hitler was going to win the war — most people thought Hitler was going to win the war in the early years,” he said “And so a lot of his actions had to do with this notion of protecting the institutional church in Europe that could well be ruled by Hitler and … Mussolini.” Memos reveal the antisemitism that surrounded Pius XII in his aides and trusted advisors But the Vatican archives alone don’t paint a full picture Anticipating that Pope Francis would eventually unseal Pius XII’s archives — the public pressure to do so has only grown since the 1960s — Kertzer has plumbed various state archives with respect to Pius XII’s papacy Germany and Britain laid the groundwork for his later research and propelled his book-writing process Such archives contain reports from those meeting regularly with the pope and his closest advisors in their capacity as state ambassadors or as envoys to the Vatican capturing candid impressions of his papacy absent from official church archives.  Kertzer maintains a 4,000-page indexed catalog of his research organized by date allowing him to access and cross-reference archival material from both state and Vatican archives all in one place In triangulating the distinct narratives contained in each archive Kertzer hopes to animate a character mired in controversy but often lacking sufficient dimension in portrayals of him — aiming not to excuse Pius XII’s silence amidst the Holocaust 1944: When Pius XII celebrated the liberation of RomePublic Domain Photo of Pope Pius XII meeting with members of the Canadian Royal 22nd Regiment in an audience after the liberation of Rome Peter's Square: the liberation of Rome by General Mark Wayne Clark's American troops But the story could have been quite different As the sole authority in Rome against the Nazi occupiers since the armistice signed by the Italians on September 8 Pius XII did his utmost to protect the city and its unique cultural and religious heritage he set up a veritable humanitarian organization coordinating the reception of thousands of refugees many of whom came from southern Lazio after the landing at Anzio in January 1944 In March 1944, after the Italian resistance carried out an attack against the occupying forces, Hitler demanded harsh reprisals. This culminated in the Adreatine Caves massacre: 335 civilians Tensions escalated further with the rout of Field Marshal Kesselring's armies in June during which time the Holy See worked actively — but discreetly — to convince the occupying forces and the Allies not to hand Rome over to war and destruction The Allied forces finally won the brutal conflict they were waging against the occupiers in the hills of Lazio putting an end to six months of hard fighting the Germans had mined all the bridges over the Tiber as well as all the capital's nerve centers There were fears of a bombardment of Rome by the American armies who had not hesitated to raze entire towns south of the capital in the previous months who had seen London crushed under the bombs saw no problem in sacrificing the Italian capital the Germans decided to leave the Eternal City as the first Allied units —Canadians — entered Pope Pius XII placed the city under the protection of the Virgin Mary Declared an “open city,” the ancient city was saved The complete liberation of the city was completed the following day Pope Pius XII decided to greet the large crowd of Romans who had gathered in Rome's St then thanked God and the Virgin Mary for having inspired both sides “with intentions of peace and not of affliction” to preserve Rome As the first purges had begun in the city and many other Italian localities the Pontiff asked the people to overcome “the impulses to internal and external discord with the spirit of fraternal and magnanimous love.” The aim was to avoid heavy repression by the German army which often carried out massacres in places it abandoned asking them to take care of those most in need who had tried to manipulate Pius XII during those perilous months would harbor a strong grudge against the Holy See with Nazi propaganda claiming in August 1944 that “the Church is interested in Jews and Communists would never forget Pius XII's protective action giving him the title of Defensor Civitatis — the defender of the city Habemus Papam!"  "I announce to you a great joy Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli was elected the 260th Supreme Pontiff of the Holy Roman Church The announcement of his election was interrupted four times by applause from the immense crowd of faithful gathered in St Peter's Square The same enthusiastic welcome would embrace him ten days later at his solemn coronation On June 23, 2022, Pope Francis requested that all the historical archives concerning Pope Pius XII’s pontificate and his relationship with the Jewish people be available in digital format. Eight months on, the work is now complete, the Archives of the Secretariat of State announced on February 21 The 170 volumes, containing almost 40,000 unique files, include the requests for help that Pope Pius XII received from Jews all across Europe, after the beginning of the Nazi and fascist persecution in the 1930s and 1940s. Around 70% of the material had already been made available through digital scans The digitization of the remaining 30% is now also on the Vatican’s website and is available in English and Italian expanded edition of the analytical inventory is also accessible and it includes all the names of the people who made more than 2,500 requests for help This "Jews" archive was made possible because Pius XII had entrusted an employee of the Secretariat of State with the task of processing the requests sent to him "with the aim of offering all possible help." requests were made for visas or passports to help people to be expatriated to obtain releases or transfers from one camp to another the Belgian historian asserted that the Pontiff intervened on behalf of the Jews on several occasions on the theme "Popes and Peace," he explained he was annoyed by the attention given to certain publications that question the actions of the Italian pope He said that these texts would contribute to making people's minds "foggy" as soon as Pius XII is mentioned Johan Ickx also criticized the media’s treatment of the Italian pontiff to say that Pius XII defended Jews is to be an apologist," he said according to which Pius XII only saved Jewish converts to Catholicism: "He saved both Historians can now pore over secret files from the papacy of Pius XII who has long faced accusations of being a Nazi sympathiser New light will be shed on one of the most controversial periods of Vatican history on Monday when the archives on Pope Pius XII – accused by critics of being a Nazi sympathiser – are unsealed A year after Pope Francis announced the move saying “the church isn’t afraid of history” which began in 1939 on the brink of the second world war and ended in 1958 Critics of Pius XII have accused him of remaining silent during the Holocaust never publicly condemning the persecution and genocide of Jews and others His defenders say that he quietly encouraged convents and other Catholic institutions to hide thousands of Jews and that public criticism of the Nazis would have risked the lives of priests and nuns “The opening of the archives is decisive for the contemporary history of the church and the world,” said Cardinal José Tolentino Calaça de Mendonça the Vatican’s archivist and librarian last week the prefect of the Vatican Apostolic Archive said scholars would have to make a “historical judgment” He added: “The good [that Pius did] was so great that it will dwarf the few shadows.” Evaluating the millions of pages in the archives would take several years More than 150 people have applied to access the archives, although only 60 can be accommodated in the offices at one time. Among the first to view the documents will be representatives of the Jewish community in Rome, and scholars from Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust museum, and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum an American expert on the relationship between the Catholic church and fascism who will begin examining the papers this week said there were “signs of nervousness” at the Vatican about what would emerge from the archives The Vatican archives would provide an “immense amount of fresh material from many millions of pages” it’s clear: Pius XII never publicly criticised the Nazis for the mass murder they were committing of the Jews of Europe – and he knew from the very beginning that mass murder was taking place Various clerics and others were pressing him to speak out “Although there is a lot of testimony showing that the church did protect Jews in Rome when more than 1,000 were rounded up on 16 October 1943 and held for two days adjacent to the Vatican [before deportation to the death camps] Pius decided not to publicly protest or even privately send a plea to Hitler not to send them to their deaths in Auschwitz what we’ll find from these archives is why he did what he did and what discussions were going on behind the walls of the Vatican.” professor of modern European history at Sheffield University said that much of the criticism of Pius Xll lacked nuance trying to steer a path through almost impossible circumstances He had clear views about what he saw as the threat of Soviet communism and his view of Italian fascism was quite a bit softer But categorising him as good or bad is not helpful – it’s about the decisions he took and the space he had to make those decisions.” Pius XII in 1951.Pius – whose birth name was Eugenio Pacelli – was Vatican secretary of state under his predecessor he negotiated a concordat between the Catholic church and Germany the Vatican maintained diplomatic relations with the Third Reich and the new pontiff declined to condemn the Nazi invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 Pius XII spoke out in general terms about the suffering of the Jews although he had known for several months about the Nazi extermination plans arguing that the church could not publicly condemn the Holocaust for fear of causing “greater evils” a controversial biography of Pius XII by British author John Cornwell claimed the pope was an antisemite who “failed to be gripped with moral outrage by the plight of the Jews” He was also narcissistic and determined to protect and advance the power of the papacy Pius XII was “the ideal pope for Hitler’s unspeakable plan Cornwell’s claims were challenged by some scholars and authors He later conceded that Pius XII had “so little scope of action that it is impossible to judge the motives for his silence during the war” although the pontiff had never explained his stance In 2012, Yad Vashem changed the wording on an exhibit on Pius XII’s papacy from he “did not intervene” to he “did not publicly protest” The new text acknowledged different assessments of the pope’s position and Yad Vashem said it “look[ed] forward to the day when the Vatican archives will be open to researchers so that a clearer understanding of the events can be arrived at” Francis said Pius XII had led the church during one of the “saddest and darkest periods of the 20th century” He added that he was confident that “serious and objective historical research will allow the evaluation [of Pius] in the correct light,” including “appropriate criticism” This is the archive of The Observer up until 21/04/2025 The Observer is now owned and operated by Tortoise Media revealing the part that he played in saving lives and opposing nazism was given access to previously unpublished Vatican documents and tracked down victims priests and others who had not told their stories before details how Pius gave his blessing to the establishment of safe houses in the Vatican and Europe's convents and monasteries He oversaw a secret operation with code names and fake documents for priests who risked their lives to shelter Jews some of whom were even made Vatican subjects that priests were instructed to issue baptism certificates to hundreds of Jews hidden in Genoa More than 2,000 Jews in Hungary were given fabricated Vatican documents identifying them as Catholics and a network saved German Jews by bringing them to Rome The pope appointed a priest with extensive funds with which to provide food More than 4,000 Jews were hidden in convents and monasteries across Italy Jewish leaders – such as Jerusalem's chief rabbi in 1944 – said the people of Israel would never forget what he and his delegates "are doing for our unfortunate brothers and sisters at the most tragic hour" Jewish newspapers in Britain and America echoed that praise and Hitler branded him "a Jew lover" thanks to Soviet antagonism towards the Vatican and a German play by Rolf Hochhuth accusing him of silence and inaction over the Jews It was a trend that intensified with the publication of Hitler's Pope as the Vatican's secretary of state before the war the future pope contributed to the damning 1937 encyclical of Pius XI as Pius XII he made condemnatory speeches that were widely interpreted at the time – including by Jewish leaders and newspapers – as clear condemnations of Hitler's racial policies Due to the Vatican's traditionally diplomatic language the accusation that Pius XII did not speak out has festered Asked why the Vatican had not made the new material available until now or, where stories were known, disseminated them more widely,Thomas said: "The church thinks across centuries. If there's a dispute for 50 years, so what?" The book also tells the story of Vittorio Sacerdoti, a young Jewish doctor who was able to work in a Vatican hospital, inventing a fictitious deadly disease that deterred Germans from entering. Dozens of fake patients were taught to cough convincingly. Thomas interviewed Sacerdoti's cousin, who recalled that as a child she was one of those patients – "feeling there was nothing wrong with her, yet having to cough regularly in the ward". The Vatican is so excited by The Pope's Jews that it is supporting a feature documentary film being planned by a British producer who has bought the rights to it. Allen Jewhurst, who has produced documentaries for BBC TV's Panorama, said that, with more than a billion Catholics worldwide, interest in the story is huge. After a meeting with two cardinals at the Vatican, he and Thomas now hope to get exclusive access to the archives. "This will, hopefully, be a definitive film," said Jewhurst. Thomas, who also wrote the book Voyage of the Damned, about Jewish refugees, recalled: "The Vatican people said, 'How wonderful, the truth out at last'." "The Pope's Jews: The Vatican's Secret Plan to Save Jews from the Nazis" is published by The Robson Press on 7 March This is the archive of The Observer up until 21/04/2025. The Observer is now owned and operated by Tortoise Media. Pope Francis has announced that he will open the records of Pius XII’s papacy to researchers—along with other restricted Church holdings 80 years after Pius XII’s election to the papacy Pope Francis announced that the archives of the controversial wartime pontiff would be opened to scholars next March The decision follows more than half a century of pressure who eagerly await his canonization as a saint while denounced by his detractors for failing to condemn the Nazis’ genocidal campaign against Europe’s Jews—might well be the most controversial pope in Church history Less noticed in initial accounts of the announcement is the fact that Francis’s opening of the Pius XII archives makes available not only the 17 million pages of documents in the central Vatican archives but many other materials in other Church archives Not least of these are the archives of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (formerly known as the Holy Office of the Inquisition) and the central archives of the Jesuit order are likely to have much that is new to tell us Demands that the Vatican open its archives for the war years began to be heard in 1963 following the premiere in Germany of Rolf Hochhuth’s play It portrayed a coldhearted Pius XII spurning all pleas to condemn the slaughter of the Jews concerned only with protecting the institutional interests of the Church the Holy See commissioned four Jesuits to plow through the archives and publish a selection of documents shedding light on the controversy was 12 thick volumes containing thousands of documents Although skeptics suspected the Jesuit editors of selecting out documents unflattering to the Church the volumes are far from a simple whitewash of this troubled history they show that following Mussolini’s overthrow in 1943 the pope’s Jesuit emissary urgently sought out the new government’s justice minister His plea: While the Vatican thought that the anti-Semitic racial laws the fascist government had enacted several years earlier had many good qualities and so should be retained the government should no longer subject baptized Jews to their draconian provisions Read: Why some Catholics defend the kidnapping of a Jewish boy The publication of John Cornwell’s best-seller Cornwell reported that he had gotten unauthorized access to portions of the Vatican archives helped Hitler end organized Catholic opposition to Nazism in Germany while Pacelli served as Vatican secretary of state not only did Pius do little after his elevation to the papacy to combat the Holocaust as it unfolded he shamelessly tried to take credit for having boldly spoken out against Nazism The same year that Cornwell’s book was published the Vatican announced the creation of an unusual interreligious historical commission composed of three Catholic and three Jewish scholars tasked with shedding light on the role played by the Vatican as the Holocaust unfolded After examining the 12 volumes of documents that had earlier been published its members concluded that they could not draw any adequate historical conclusions without access to the archives themselves When the Vatican refused to grant their request a decision that generated both embarrassment and polemics Far from being “Hitler’s pope,” they assert he played a key role in a plot to assassinate the führer partisans of Pius XII have even petitioned to have Yad Vashem Israel’s memorial to the victims of the Holocaust Read: Why does the Catholic Church keep failing on sexual abuse? Media coverage of the opening of the Pius XII archives has focused almost exclusively on the question of what we will learn about the role played by the pope and the Vatican during the war Yet many of the most historically significant documents soon to be made available relate not to the war years the Vatican was consumed with fears of Communism where there was good reason to believe that in the wake of Mussolini’s downfall Pius XII played a major behind-the-scenes role in these fateful years in turning Italians against the Communists we are likely to learn exactly how he went about it while maintaining a public stance of staying out of politics Pope Francis’s election in 2013 gave new hope to those eager to see the Pius XII archives opened Papal scholars eagerly weighed the latest rumors: How much faith should be placed in the early-2014 report by Rabbi Abraham Skorka that the pope wanted to open the archives soon Was the decision in 2015 to close the Vatican archives for three months for the summer break rather than the customary two made so that the millions of Pius XII documents could be processed more speedily generated earnest speculation among historians camped out in Rome Didn’t Francis have enough battles to fight with conservatives in the Church without stirring up the raw emotions surrounding Pius XII Francis has put an end to half a century of speculation But given the large quantity of documents that are to become available for the first time it will likely be several years before we fully know what revelations they will bring what has come to be dubbed the “Pius war”—Pius XII fed by sporadic reports trickling out from the Vatican’s newly opened archival treasure chest Founded jointly with the Wechsler Family Foundation while addressing 75 officials of the Vatican’s Secret Archive office Pope Francis declared that the Church “is not afraid of history.” On the contrary as God loves it.” Coinciding with the 80th Anniversary of Eugenio Pacelli’s election to the throne of Saint Peter Pope Francis announced that within a year the Vatican would open the secret files related to Pius XII’s pontificate to researchers “With the same confidence as my predecessors I open and entrust this documentary heritage to researchers,” he said historians have been asking the Vatican to open these archives To the extent that the Pope’s initiative will be complete–and not selectively edited in order to shed light exclusively on the positive aspects of the pontificate of Pius XII – this step taken by Francis deserves to be applauded and considered a historical turning point because Rome has been trying for several years to beatify Eugenio Pacelli to the chagrin of the world Jewish community and the community of Holocaust experts It should be noted that Pacelli’s successors – John XXIII (1958-1963) and John Paul II (1978-2005) – were already canonized published an article in L’Osservatore Romano the day the Pope made his announcement that might illustrate the Vatican’s intention: John Paul II beatified both John XXIII and Pius IX The Jewish community applauded the beatification of the former and lamented the beatification of the latter During his long pontificate (1846-1878) Pius IX confined the Jews to the ghetto of Rome publicly referred to them as “Hebrew dogs,” and approved the kidnapping of the Jewish boy Edgardo Mortara Pope Paul VI formed a team of priests from various countries with the purpose of selecting for publication diplomatic documents of the World War II period in possession of the Holy See The project was intended to counteract the accusations regarding the silence of the Pope during the War The result of this initiative was the publication of Actes et Documents du Saint Siège Relatifs à la Seconde Guerre Mondiale composed of 11 volumes of documents published in the original language In March 1998, the Vatican published Noi Ricordiamo: Una Riflessione Sulla Shoah, a long-awaited pronouncement on the Holocaust, in which it defended the policy of Pius XII between 1939-1945, claiming that he had saved hundreds of thousands of Jewish lives, either by personal intervention or by delegation of duties.6 the Holy See announced that from 2003 onward it would open portions of its archives relating to Germany from 1922 to 1939 Access to the period of World War II remained blocked Pope John Paul II visited Yad Vashem as part of his historic journey to Israel The Pope began his speech with a paragraph of four lines in which he mentioned the word “silence” four times But in light of the controversial past “silence” of Pius XII In this place of memories, the mind and heart and soul feel an extreme need for silence. Silence in which to remember. Silence in which to try to make some sense of the memories which come flooding back. Silence because there are no words strong enough to deplore the terrible tragedy of the Shoah.10 Prime Minister Ehud Barak said in response: “Your Holiness, mine is a nation that remembers. And the silence was not only from heaven.”11 In 2005 the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum was renovated in Israel under a photograph of Eugenio Pacelli and the title “Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust,” the inscription that was placed read in part: The controversy over the role of Pius XII during the Holocaust has already lasted longer than the duration of the war and his pontificate combined the Vatican’s efforts to beatify him aim at closing off any discussion about the Church’s past Endowing Pacelli’s limited efforts to assist the persecuted Jews of Europe with a halo of heroism will eventually lead to him being declared holy The opening of the Vatican archives concerning Pius XII’s pontificate will shed much-needed light on his role during World War II –as long as the opening will be absolute and access to historians – unrestricted who gained access to the Vatican Secret Archive on Pius XII more than any other lay scholar Eugenio Pacelli was not a monster; his case is far more complex, more tragic than that… His is not a portrait of evil, but of fatal moral dislocation – a separation of authority from Christian love. The consequences of that rupture were collusion with tyranny, and ultimately violence.21 the debate about Pius XII will reach new heights * Some of the quotes presented above have been taken from Spanish sources and were translated into English by the author 1 Address of his Holiness Pope Francis to Officials of the Vatican Secret Archive, March 4, 2019; http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/speeches/2019/march/documents/papafrancesco_20190304_archivio-segretovaticano.html 2 Sergio Centofanti, “Mons. Pagano: la apertura de los archivos mostrará a todos la grandeza de Pío XII”, Vatican News, Marzo 4, 2019 en https://www.vaticannews.va/es/papa/news/2019-03/mons-pagano-apertura-archivos-mostrara-todos-grandeza-pioxii.html 3 John Cornwell Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII 4 Peter Gumpel with Antonio Gasparri Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews (Houghton Mifflin Company 5 In Eugene Fischer y Leon Klenicki (eds.) Spiritual Pilgrimage: Texts on Jews and Judaism 1979-1995 (NY: Crossroad 6 “We Remember: A reflection on the Shoah”, March 16, 1998; http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/chrstuni/documents/rc_pc_chrstuni_doc_16031998_shoah_sp.html 7 Robert Wistrich Modern Judaism 21 (Oxford University Press: 2001) 8 Moshe Aumann Conflict & Connection: The Jewish-Christian-Israel Triangle (Israel: Gefen Publishing House 9 Ibid. 10 Speech of John Paul II, Visit to The Yad Vashem Museum, Jerusalem, March 23, 2000; http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/speeches/2000/jan-mar/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_20000323_yad-vashem-mausoleum.html 11 Cited in “The Visit of Pope John Paul II to Yad Vashem 12 “Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Softens Stance on Pius XII” 13 “El Papa insiste en beatificar a Pío XII” 14 “Pío XII 15 Isi Leibler “A corageous rabbi talks to the Catholic synod” 16 Visit to Yad Vashem Memorial, Address of His Holiness Benedict XVI, Jerusalem, May 11, 2009; http://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2009/may/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20090511_yad-vashem.html 17 “Juan Pablo II y Pío XII 18 “Pope Pius XII on way to beatification” 19 “Benedicto XVI pidió que se sanen las heridas del antisemitismo” 20  Visit to Yad Vashem Memorial, Address of Pope Francis, Jerusalem, May 26, 2014; http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/speeches/2014/may/documents/papa-francesco_20140526_terra-santa-memoriale-yad-vashem.html 21 John Cornwell The silent work of Vatican diplomacy to save hundreds of thousands of Jews from the Holocaust is consistent with the rejection of Nazism In view of the imminent declassification of documents In the Vatican archives regarding the Jewish persecution by Nazi Germany (the "holocaust") it is a good time to review Pius XII's responses to this pagan ideology: is it true that he is often reproached for having "kept silent" in the face of Nazi crimes When Eugenio Pacelli - elected Pope on March 2 as successor to Pius XI - died on October 9 there were many expressions of mourning and recognition Among these were the declarations of the then Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meier who lamented the loss of "a great friend of the people of Israel" It is also well known that when Israel Zolli - who had been the Chief Rabbi of Rome between 1939 and 1945 - was baptized in the Catholic Church on February 13 in gratitude for the efforts that Pius XII had made to save the Jews of Rome the Pope gave orders to open cloistered convents and even the Vatican itself and the Pope's summer residence at Castengandolfo to shelter Jews persecuted by the SS and the Gestapo: in 155 convents in Rome 4,238 Roman Jews were hidden.238 Roman Jews were hidden in 155 convents in Rome to which must be added the 477 others who were received in the Vatican and the approximately 3,000 who found refuge in Castengandolfo where the Pope's room sheltered pregnant Jewish women: in the papal bed about 40 children were born into the world This aid work due to the Pope's direct intervention was not confined exclusively to Rome; through "silent" Vatican diplomacy hundreds of thousands of lives were saved; in 2002 Ruth Lapide wife of the famous Jewish writer Pinchas Lapide confirmed that he put the number of Jews saved directly by Vatican diplomacy between 1939 and 1945 at some 800,000 people Vatican aid to persecuted Jews gave Pope Pius XII a reputation that was embodied in the Yad Vashem committee's recognition of the title "righteous among the nations" for Roman priests such as Cardinal Pietro Palazzini (1912-2000) who during the months of the German occupation of Rome was vice rector of the Roman seminary he referred to the person who had been behind all the Vatican aid: Pope Pius XII Germany also showed gratitude to Pius XII after the fall of Nazism; this was expressed in the official recognition of naming streets after him Another example of the prestige enjoyed by Pius XII during his lifetime is the cover devoted to him by the magazine Time in August 1943 in which he was recognized for his efforts on behalf of peace international public opinion took a 180-degree turn regarding the perception of Pius XII The black legend about the Pope begins with a play: The Vicar by Rolf Hochhuth the biased view of that work managed to gain widespread acceptance This interpretation has continued for decades; in one of the most controversial expressions John Cornwell went so far as to call him "Hitler's Pope": this was the title of his book that appeared in 1999 In an article for the newspaper Die WeltIn this regard journalist Sven Felix Kellerhoff said: "There is probably no other historical figure of worldwide stature who like Eugenio Pacelli - in such a short time after his death - has gone from being a widely respected role model to a person condemned by the majority This was mainly due to the play The Vicar by Rolf Hochhuth" In contrast to the species spread by The VicarThe facts speak a different language Apostolic Nuncio in Germany between 1917 and 1929 showed a clear rejection of National Socialism from the very moment he met it on the occasion of the coup d'état perpetrated by Ludendorff and Hitler with his march to the Feldherrnhalle in Munich on Friday In the report he sent to the Vatican on these disturbances the Nuncio described Hitler's movement as "fanatically anti-Catholic"; during the trial of Ludendorff Eugenio Pacelli referred to nationalism as the "most serious heresy of our time" when he was already Cardinal Secretary of State Eugenio Pacelli officially represented Pope Pius XI in Lourdes in a multitudinous act to pray for peace; in his speech Pacelli condemned the "superstition of blood and race" The clearest demonstration of his rejection of Nazism came with the encyclical Mit brennender Sorge it bears the mark of the then Secretary of State The encyclical was a response not only to the many attacks against representatives of the Church but more specifically to the German government's failure to respond to the protests against the violation of the Concordat between the Holy See and the German government: over the years Pacelli delivered to the German Ambassador to the Holy See more than 50 diplomatic notes of protest Eugenio Pacelli left his mark even on the title of the encyclical the first in history to be promulgated in a language other than Latin a further proof of the importance attached to it by the Holy See: the draft began with the words "Mit grosser Sorge" ("With great concern"); Eugenio Pacelli crossed out the word "grosser" in his own hand to replace it with "brennender"; thus the title of the Encyclical was fixed with which it would go down in history: "Mit brennender Sorge" ("With burning concern" or in the Vatican's official translation: "With lively concern") which described Nazi ideology as "pantheism" and criticized the tendencies of the National Socialist leadership to revive ancient Germanic religions expressed in unequivocal words the rejection of the National Socialist ideology of "race and people" and contrasted it with the Christian faith The encyclical Mit brennender Sorge was in fact the only major protest in the twelve years of Nazism It reached the approximately 11,500 parishes that existed in the Reich The Nazi leadership considered it a clear attack on their ideology One example is a conversation between Franz Xaver Eberle which was reported in writing to Rome by Cardinal Faulhaber on the express instructions of Cardinal Secretary of State Pacelli Hitler told Eberle that the Germans had only one Cardinal in the Vatican who understood them and "unfortunately Also interesting is Joseph Goebbels' opinion of Pacelli who mentions him in his diary more than a hundred times On the occasion of the election of Eugenio Pacelli as Pope the German Minister of Propaganda notes: "Pacelli a combative Pope who will act cunningly and skillfully Joseph Goebbels referred to the Pope's Christmas speech: "Full of very biting and hidden attacks against us Particularly significant is what he notes on January 9 1945: "Prawda is once again strongly attacking the Pope that the Pope is called a fascist and that he is in cahoots with us to save Germany from its plight." this was unfortunately the case: what Goebbels almost funny" - that Pius XII was considered favorable to Nazism - came about shortly after his death in view of these actions and condemnations of what the Nazis themselves thought about Pius XII the image of the "Pope who remains silent" or even of "Hitler's Pope" is still so widespread an expert on Pius XII and president of the Association Solidatium Internationale Pastor AngelicusIn response to this question he refers to the "power of fiction": "Fiction is very powerful and possesses a power of fascination that specialized literature and research do not have" The aforementioned journalist Sven Felix Kellerhoff offers another explanation in an article published on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the premiere of the film The VicarThe vision of the Pope given in this play "has nothing to do with reality; but it is more convenient to hold the alleged silence of a Pope responsible for the genocide than the collaboration of millions of 'Aryan' Germans often benefited from it and not rarely participated in it" for some time now this perception is beginning to change at least in specialized publications: coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the death of Pius XII several works appeared highlighting his quiet but effective activity A work that takes on even greater significance if one takes into account the fear that reigned in the Eternal City during the German domination who had been President of the Catholic Zentrum party and had moved to Rome at the beginning of April 1933 thought of destroying all the material he possessed from the time of the Weimar Republic because "it was to be expected that the SS would occupy the Vatican" referring to the question of whether Pius XII protested "sufficiently" against the Jewish genocide argues that those who accuse Pius XII of not having protested more explicitly against the Holocaust fail to take into account that his relief activities were possible precisely because the Pope did not openly protest: "If the SS had occupied the Vatican this extensive plan of salvation could not have been carried out and the certain death of at least 7,000 Jews would have occurred German occupation troops deported Jews from the Netherlands The consequence was that the Nazis sent to Auschwitz also Catholics of Jewish origin; the most famous victim was Edith Stein who had converted from Judaism to Christianity and subsequently entered the Carmelite Order Pius XII commented to his confidant Don Pirro Scavizzi: "A protest on my part would not only have been of no help to anyone but would have unleashed anger against the Jews and would have multiplied the atrocities Perhaps it would have aroused the praises of the civilized world but to the poor Jews it would only have produced a more atrocious persecution than the one they suffered" There has also been a recent effort to disseminate a more objective view of Pius XII in 2009 an exhibition on him was held in Berlin and Munich; it ended in a room entitled "Here you can hear the silence of the Pope"; indeed you could hear the radio message of Pius XII at Christmas 1942 in which Pope Pacelli spoke of "the hundreds of thousands of people who sometimes only for reasons of nationality or race are destined to death or to progressive annihilation" That Pius XII remained silent about the Holocaust as the writer Rolf Hochhuth had been claiming since 1963 trying to influence the public debate in Germany has just been definitively refuted by facts told me during the filming that "the Pope found himself in a tremendously difficult historical situation and had to weigh the various arguments in order to act correctly Our film tries to translate his reflections into images; for example due to the bishop's protests against the deportations of Jews a document he had already written into the kitchen stove" Rosenmüller commented on the biased versions of Pius XII that have been given for some time now: "The accusation of anti-Semitism made against Pacelli seems to me to be absolutely absurd; it is mere provocation We are presenting a Pope who was intellectually opposed to National Socialism and who because of certain events - such as the deportations in the Netherlands - did not find it easy to know what the right decision was Since he was also a diplomat to the marrow of his bones it is possible that this diplomacy made it somewhat difficult for him to act But we also strive to take into account the time in which he lived To demand of the Vatican and in particular of Eugenio Pacelli that they should have seen everything from the beginning with crystal clarity is an anachronism The "Hitler" phenomenon is also the phenomenon of his underestimation: for a long time English and French politicians underestimated the dimension of Nazism When Hochhuth claims that the whole world was against Hitler and only Pius XII turned a deaf ear to those who sought help Perhaps these fictional works may eventually reverse the distorted image that provided another work of fiction of a Pope who not only did not remain silent in the face of genocide but who made efforts to save as many as possible; 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