A lighter story on the Secret Archives

This article comes from the Irish based blod "Clerical Whispers" and is a little bit of light relief in what is usually a far more serious topic.

Wednesday, June 02, 2010



The Vatican Archive: the Pope's private library

The man standing outside the Porta Santa Anna Gate of the Vatican wearing a blue Gap shirt and none-too-expertly pressed Muji trousers could easily pass as an academic, or the cultural correspondent of an obscure television channel.

In fact, he is neither of these things.

He is a man on a mission, a mission of the utmost delicacy.

Soon the man will pass beyond the gate and the Swiss guards with their navy blue uniforms with brown belts, white collars and black berets, designed by Commandant Jules Repond in 1914.

Overhead, a flock of starlings, ancient symbols of undying love, wheel in the morning air.

Under escort, he will be taken into the inner sanctum of the Vatican, through an enormous pair of brass doors upon which some of the gorier scenes of the Old Testament are picked out in bas-relief.

Passing through various security cordons, each one staffed by guards more suspicious than the last, he will mount a narrow winding staircase.

Up the staircase he goes, past barred windows and tiny panelled chambers in which black-soutaned figures sit reading by the light of hushed lamps, to the very top of the 73m-tall tower.

This is the Tower of the Winds, built by Ottavinao Mascherino between 1578 and 1580, a place to which mere members of the public are never normally admitted.

Here in the Hall of the Meridian, a room covered in frescoes depicting the four winds, is a tiny hole high up in one of the walls.

At midday, the sun, shining through the hole, falls along a white marble line set into the floor. On either side of this meridian line are various astrological and astronomical symbols, once used to try to calculate the effect of the wind upon the stars.

But this is not the real reason why this man with the shabby trousers, the oddly distinguished-looking grey hair and the abundance of irrelevant detail has come to the Vatican.

No, the real reason for this lies elsewhere in the Tower of Winds, in rooms lined with miles and miles of dark wooden shelves – more than 50 miles of them in fact.

Here, bound in cream vellum, are thousands upon thousands of volumes, some more than a foot thick.

This is the Vatican secret archive, possibly the most mysterious collection of documents in the world.

Here you can find accounts of the trial of the Knights Templar held at Chinon in August 1308; a threatening note from 1246 in which Ghengis Khan’s grandson demands that Pope Innocent IV travel to Asia to ‘pay service and homage; a letter from Lucretia Borgia to Pope Alexander VI; Papal Bulls excommunicating Martin Luther; correspondence between the Court of Henry VIII and Clement VII; and an exchange of letters between Michelangelo and Paul III.

There are also letters from Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, St Bernadette, Voltaire and Abraham Lincoln.

And here too – depending on how much faith you have in the novels of Dan Brown – lies proof that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and continued their own earthly line.

Once, Napoleon had the whole of the secret archive transported to Paris.

It was brought back, albeit with some key documents missing, in 1817 and has remained in the Vatican ever since – a constant source of myth and fascination.

But now the Vatican Secret Archive is secret no more.

This story begins two years ago when a Belgian publisher called Paul Van den Heuvel asked a friend of his who works in the Vatican if there was any hope of his being allowed to do a book about the secret archive.

This friend, says Van den Heuvel, is ‘very close’ to the Pope.

As he admits, Van den Heuvel is not a particularly ecclesiastical man. He’s not a particularly ecclesiastical publisher either.

An excitable, gap-toothed Belgian, his previous book was a lavishly illustrated coffee table volume on The Most Beautiful Wine Cellars in the World.

To his surprise he received word back that highly placed sources within the Vatican had been impressed with The Most Beautiful Wine Cellars in the World. As a result, he was told, his proposal might be given the go-ahead.

Just what the Vatican’s motivation was is none too clear. Scholars have been allowed in the archive since 2003, so long as they know exactly which document they’d like a look at – browsing is not allowed.

Certainly, they haven’t always looked kindly on book proposals about the secret archive.

Fifteen years ago, when a priest and former Vatican archivist called Filippo Tamburini published a book called Saints and Sinners about the clergy’s indiscretions, the full weight of the Vatican’s disapproval came down upon him.

He had, it was claimed, perpetrated ‘an abuse’ that was ‘strongly deplored’. But largely as a result of the Vatican’s intervention, Tamburini’s book sold far more copies than it would otherwise have done.

According to Monsignor Sergio Pagano, Prefect of the Archivio Segreto Vaticano: ‘A lot of hypotheses and stories about the archive have been going around. We want to show it as it really is.’

For three days Van den Heuvel was given the run of the archive with no restrictions placed on what he could inspect or photograph – or so he claims.

In fact, this turns out not to be quite the case: there was one extremely big restriction in place. He wasn’t allowed to look at any documents that dated from after 1939.

The reason given was that these include Papal annulments of marriages of people who might still be alive.

It’s at this point that the keen conspiracy theorist throws up his or her hands and exclaims ‘Ha!’.

What a coincidence that this should also cover the most sensitive periods in recent Vatican history: the Second World War and the continuing scandal of paedophile priests.

There may be something in this, of course.

Nine years ago, a joint plan by Jewish and Roman Catholic scholars ended amid acrimony with the Vatican refusing to allow the Jewish scholars further access to its archives – and the Jewish scholars protesting that the Vatican was plainly trying to cover something up.

This came after a report that said the documents examined ‘did not put to rest significant questions about the Holocaust’.

However, one should also remember that the Vatican has recently released a number of wartime documents, which, they say, help to prove that Pope Pius XII, far from being a Nazi-sympathising anti-Semite – as his detractors claim – was in fact working behind the scenes trying to help the Jews.

The present Pope, back in the days when he was plain Cardinal Ratzinger, authorised the opening of one section of the archive in 1998.

This dealt with the Spanish Inquisition. To great surprise in some quarters – and less surprise in others – these documents revealed that the Inquisition hadn’t really been such a bloody business after all.

The Catholic Church had executed a mere one per cent of the alleged heretics they put on trial. As for the others, they had been dealt with by ‘non-church tribunals’ – overenthusiastic freelancers.

A similar thing happened when a document about the Knights Templar was released three years ago.

According to the document, Pope Clement V was not the persecutor of the Templars as had previously been claimed. Far from it: he initially absolved the Templar leaders of heresy.

Only after he’d come under pressure from the French king, the far-from-appropriately-named Philip the Fair, did he reverse his decision. But even then, it seems, Clement’s intention was to reform the Templars, not drive them from the face of the Earth.

By the end of his three days, Van den Heuvel had whittled his choice of documents down to 125. The oldest document in the archive dates from the end of the eighth century.

Among the more recent is a letter written by Pope Pius XI to Hitler in December 1934. However, anyone hoping for something bullish in tone will be looking in vain.

The letter – in response to an earlier letter from Hitler asking Pius to try to improve relations between Germany and the Vatican – addresses Hitler as ‘Illustro and honorabili viro Adolpho Hitler’, which must have brought pleasure to the Führer.

However, as the text points out, the Pope markedly omits to offer Hitler his blessing at the end. Not exactly a brush-off, but a diplomatic snub just the same.

Here, too, is a letter written in 1530 by the Archbishop of Canterbury along with five other bishops and 22 mitred abbots to Clement VII complaining about the Pope’s ‘excessive delay’ in annulling Henry VIII’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon (there was also, some time later, an excessive delay in finding the document; it was discovered under a chair, in 1926).


Any refusal by the Pope to issue an annulment, they intimate, would result in them taking extreme measures for the good of the kingdom; request denied, Henry formed the Church of England.

Among the seals with which the letter is festooned – plus the red ribbons that inspired the phrase ‘red tape’ – is one belonging to Thomas Wolsey, ‘Cardinal and Archbishop of York’.

Fifty-six years later, Mary Queen of Scots wrote to Pope Sixtus V on the eve of her execution. Mary declares that she wishes to die in the grace of God and regrets that she does not have recourse to the sacraments.

As the letter goes on, it becomes steadily more plaintive, more poignant. She begs the Pope to take care of her son, James, and concludes with a postscript in which she warns him that there may be traitors among his cardinals.

Voltaire’s letter to Pope Benedict XIV, written in 1745, strikes a more sycophantic tone:

‘Allow me, Holy Father, to present my best wishes together with all of Christendom and to implore Heaven that Your Holiness might be most tardily received among those saints whose canonisations you have so laboriously and successfully investigated.’

Legend has always had it that an infuriated Napoleon snatched the crown from the hands of Pius VII and stuck it on his own head at his Coronation in December 1804.

In fact, as a document here makes plain, the Pope was eager to keep his own involvement in the whole affair to a minimum.

Napoleon, by contrast, didn’t think anyone else was worthy of crowning him and was more than happy to do the job himself.

One of the archive’s more fragile documents is a letter from a group of Christian Ojibwe American Indians, written on birch bark.

Dated ‘where there is much grass, in the month of the flowers’ (in other words, Grassy Lake, Ontario, in May), the letter is addressed to Pope Leo, or ‘the Great Master of Prayer, he who holds the place of Jesus’.

If there is anything among the tomes about Jesus getting hitched to Mary Magdalene or about St Paul making up the Resurrection you won’t find it here.

That, however, doesn’t necessarily mean it isn’t there. The truth is that no one really knows just what exactly is in the archive.

There are only 30 archivists – plus a small team charged with digitising their finds – and they have an awful lot of volumes to examine.

Three years ago, a Michelangelo drawing was found – ‘a partial plan for the radial column of the cupola dome of St Peter’s Basilica’.

Hardly the most exciting Michelangelo ever unearthed, but a Michelangelo none the less.

Perhaps more interesting is the note in which the artist complains that his payment for work on the dome is three months overdue.

For the time being Van den Heuvel’s The Vatican Secret Archives should keep the non-specialists satisfied.

Along with a main edition of 14,000, he is publishing 33 ‘unique collectors’ editions’ priced at just under £4,360 a throw – each ‘fully hand-bound in sheep parchment and hand-stitched with cotton thread’.


One of these unique collectors’ editions is being reserved for the Pope himself.

Soon, it will no doubt occupy an honoured place on his Holiness’s shelves – perhaps next to his copy of Great Wine Cellars of the World.

From today's Times online - Kasper on Pius XII and the Archives

Original article.

The Cardinal in charge of Christian unity at the Vatican has promised that the Vatican archives for the entire period of the Second World War, when the Church has been accused of failing to do enough to help the Jewish people, will be opened soon for scholarly research.

Cardinal Walter Kasper, head of the Council for Christian Unity, also warned that cutting itself off from its Jewish roots for centuries weakened the Church so badly that it could only offer a "feeble" resistance against persecution of the Jews.

He said that Israel without the Church was in danger of becoming "too particularistic and reclusive", but that the Church without Israel was "in danger of losing its historical grounding and becoming ahistorical and Gnostic."

He added: "Judaism and Christianity need each other and therefore are dependent on each other."

The Cardinal was speaking at Liverpool's Hope university in an address described by the Archbishop of Liverpool, the Most Rev Patrick Kelly as one that had prompted in him "a change in heart and mind."

Addressing one of the most sensitive and difficult aspects of Jewish-Christian relations, the papacy of Pius XII, described as "Hitler's Pope" by the influential British author and academic John Cornwell, Cardinal Kasper promised the full archives for the period covered by the Second World War would soon be opened to scholars at the Holy See in Rome. "We have nothing to hide," he said. "We do not need to fear the truth."

Describing the state-sponsored organized murder of six million European Jews as "the absolute low point" in the history of anti-Semitism he nevertheless said the Holocaust could not be attributed to Christianity as such, since it also had clear anti–Christian features.

But he added: "However, centuries–old Christian theological anti–Judaism contributed as well, encouraging a widespread antipathy for Jews, so that ideologically and racially motivated anti–Semitism could prevail in this terrible way, and the resistance against the outrageous inhuman brutality did not achieve the breadth and clarity that one should have expected."

Defending the record of Pius XII, a candidate for canonisation who was Pope from 1938 to 1958, while Rome was under the heel of Mussolini and later occupied by Germany, he said the contemporary assessment of his Pontificate was rather positive.

"The New York Times, which is not known as a Church–oriented newspaper, had already in 1941 published an editorial where it spoke of the Pope as the only voice in the silence and in the dark with the courage to raise his voice," the Cardinal said. "After the deportation of more than 1000 Jews from Rome - only 15 survived - in October 1943 he ordered a general Church asylum in all convents and ecclesiastical houses, including the Vatican and Castel Gandolfo. According to authoritative estimates, about 4500 Jews were hidden."

He said there were still Jews today who defended Pius as well as Catholic authors who criticised him and acknowledged that the main problem was access to the sources.

He promised that the archives for Pius XII's papacy would be online within six years. Since 2003 access has been available up until the end of the Pontificate of Pius XI in 1939, a period in which the future Pius XII was Secretary of State.

"The material which is already accessible now proves that Pius XII was at no time Hitler’s Pope. On the contrary, he was the closest cooperator of Pope Pius XI in the publication of the encyclical Mit brennender Sorge (“With burning anxiety", 1937), which was a fervent condemnation of Nazi race ideology.

"The Archives are now working under intense pressure on the project to prepare access to the Pontificate of Pius XII, but the registration and preparation of millions of documents in a due professional way needs time and will be completed in about five or six years, after which general access for scholars will be granted."

Eleven volumes with documents of the Holy See have already been made public and recently many other sources have become available.

The Cardinal said: "Pius XII was not a man of prophetic gestures; he was a diplomat and decided not to be silent but to be moderated in his public statements because he knew that stronger words would improve absolutely nothing; on the contrary, they would provoke brutal revenge and worsen the situation. Therefore he decided not so much to act through words but to help practically as much he could. In this way alone in Rome he saved thousands of Jewish lives."

Acknowledging another area of difficulty, proselytism, he continued: "Unfortunately there has been a history of forced conversions of Jews." The Church no longer endorsed evangelism of the Jews, he said. "In contrast to some fundamentalist evangelical movements which undertake missionary work, the Catholic Church sponsors no specific institutional missionary work aimed at Jews."

Archbishop Kelly afterwards described the address as "a highly significant contribution" to relations between the two faiths. He said: "Cardinal Kasper's address prompted in me personally, a change in heart and mind. It demanded a new way of thinking and so, of acting."

Earlier this month, Cardinal Kasper, a theologian and linguist, was honoured in the US for "extraordinary" achievements in interfaith dialogue. The American Jewish committee presented him with the prestigious Isaiah Inter-religious Award at its annual meeting in Washington DC.

More on the Letter to Pope Benedict XVI on Pope Pius XII

This article appeared The Jewish Week (New York).  I am grateful to Steve Lipman for permission to reproduce the article here. 

Now towards the end of May there has been no word from Rome in response to the letter.  This is of itself, not a cause for surprise.  Rome often takes a long time to move on things and the response may come through any number of ways.  What I find encouraging about the letter and the debate it has caused is that the participants in the conversations about Pius XII cross all sorts of lines.  And the quality of the conversation, for the most part, is improving.  I doubt any serious historians or theologians believe discussion about Pius is motivated by a desire to do harm to the Catholic Church. It is, as it has been, a search for the truth.

Catholic Scholars To Pope: Slow Down On Pius Sainthood



Nineteen in letter voice ‘serious concerns’ about fast-tracking of Shoah-era pope’s canonization.


Thursday, February 25, 2010


Steve Lipman, Staff Writer


The largely Jewish effort to slow down the proposed canonization of the pope who headed the Catholic Church during World War II has taken a more ecumenical tone.


Nineteen prominent Catholic scholars and theologians last week sent a letter to Pope Benedict XVI, urging him to put aside plans to declare Pius XII, the controversial pontiff during the Holocaust, a saint until historians gain full access to the Vatican’s wartime archives. The letter, intended as an internal Church document, was leaked to Reuters in Rome and subsequently made public.


The “faithful, practicing Catholics, consecrated and lay” who signed the letter declared that “the movement to press forward at this time the process of beatification of Pius XII greatly troubles us.” Beatification is a preliminary step to the declaration of sainthood.


“In essence, Pius XII has become a century old symbol of Christian anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism,” the letter states. “It is challenging to separate Pius XII from this legacy.”


Pius XII, who received praise in Jewish circles immediately after World War II for his opposition to Nazism, became subject to wide criticism following Rolf Hochhuth’s 1963 play, “The Deputy,” which depicted the pope as a vacillating figure with little interest in the fate of endangered Jews. Critics say he turned his back on Jewish suffering; supporters say his behind-the-scenes role helped save thousands of Jewish lives.


German-born Pope Benedict XVI late last year decreed the “heroic virtues” of Pius XII, John Paul II and 15 other Catholics, a step on the road to canonization.


Pius’ record is subject to dispute, according to many scholars.


“It’s a record of too much timidity,” said Sister Mary Boys, professor of practical theology at Union Theological Seminary.


The letter raises the question “Is there really a need for haste?” said Philip Cunningham, director of the Institute of Jewish-Catholic Relations at Saint Joseph’s University. “It’s a plea for ‘let’s take our time.’” “The letter is a request for a continued hold on the canonization.”


It does not take a position on the possibility of eventual canonization at some point down the road, Rev. John Pawlikowski, professor of ethics at Catholic Theological Union and one of the organizers of the letter, told The Jewish Week in an e-mail interview.


Rev. Pawlikowski, like the 18 other signers, is a veteran of interfaith activities, in which the possible canonization of Pius XII has played a prominent role — particularly for Jewish participants — in recent years.


“We sent this letter because we feel that too often the issue of Pius XII is portrayed as one of Jewish concern,” Rev. Pawlikowski told the Catholic News Service. “We wanted to make it clear that some Catholics who have worked on Holocaust issues have serious concerns about advancing the cause of Pius XII at this time.”


“The Catholic scholars’ letter has strengthened the [interfaith] dialogue by demonstrating that our counterparts have the same fidelity to historic truth as we do,” said Elan Steinberg, vice president of the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and their Descendants.


The Vatican had not responded to the letter by early this week, and several representatives of Catholic organizations said there is no way to predict what effect, if any, such a letter may have on papal behavior.


The signers of the letter “are close to the sensitivities of the Jewish community,” but the letter “will not really have any impact,” said Gary Krupp, president of the Pave the Way Foundation, an independent organization that works to improve Jewish relations with the Vatican.


“Those of us who signed it hope that our considered scholarly opinions will be taken into consideration” by Benedict XVI, said Sister Carol Rittner, professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey. “My ‘biggest hope’ is that he will be given the letter so that he personally can read it.”


Rev. Pawlikowski said he and Rev. Kevin Spicer, associate professor of history at Stonehill College, drafted the letter “because we felt it was necessary for Vatican leaders to know that there was important Catholic opposition to fast-tracking Pius’ canonization and because we felt that the apparent ‘hold’ on his canonization was in danger of being lifted. We wanted to encourage the pope to continue the hold so that scholars, particularly Catholic scholars, could continue to do their necessary research without having the extra burden of critiquing an already canonized saint. We think out letter might just help keep the hold in place.”


Most Jewish opponent’s of the pope’s canonization have emphasized that the Catholic Church’s declaration of sainthood is a purely internal Catholic decision, but that a premature canonization of Pius XII is likely to harm Jewish-Catholic relations that improved following the Second Vatican Council’s inter-religious advances in the early 1960s, and during the papacy of John Paul II.


“It is an extremely good sign — that there are elements within the Catholic Church who ... do not wish to see that progress being rolled back,” said Menachem Rosensaft, vice president of the American Gathering organization.


Signers of the letter include Eugene Fisher, retired associate director of U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Secretariat for Ecumenical and Inter-religious Relations; Paul O’Shea, an Australian author who has written a balanced history of Pius’ wartime record; and Frank Coppa, professor of history at Saint John’s University who is writing a biography of Pius XII.


“History needs distance and perspective” to make a thorough examination of Pius’ papacy, the letter states. “Proceeding with the cause of Pope Pius XII, without an exhaustive study of his actions during the Holocaust, might harm Jewish-Catholic relations in a way that cannot be overcome in the foreseeable future.”


The signers of the letters reflect the views of a larger group of Catholics who are troubled by Pius’ canonization before the opening of Vatican archives, observers said.


“I regard it as not just 19 people, but 19 people speaking on behalf of many of us,” said Sister Boys.


Holocaust expert Michael Berenbaum said the signers of the letter, mostly veterans of interfaith work “who grew up in the shadow of the Holocaust” and of Vatican II, took to heart the Church’s increasing openness to ecumenism over recent decades.


Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League and a hidden child in Poland during the Holocaust, called the letter a “very significant, important gesture. The views of Catholics resonate a lot more seriously” in the Vatican than those of outsiders.


The Catholic News Service report on the letter brought a mixed response from readers. “I see a lot of signatures, but none from anyone whose opinion matters,” one reader wrote. “These are very important voices,” wrote another.


Copies of the letter were also sent to Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Holy See’s Commission for Religious Relations with Jews, and New York’s Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Episcopal Moderator for Catholic-Jewish Relations for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.


What effect will the leaking of the private document have on the Vatican’s decision-making process?


Philip Cunningham of Saint Joseph’s University said a mixed reaction is likely. “It will annoy those in the Vatican hierarchy who wish to see Pius canonized.” On the other hand, he said, “It might give people pause who are not necessarily ready to have that happen right away.”

Revisiting the October 2000 International Commission Report on Pius XII

In an earlier entry I referred to the recent conference organised by Pave The Way Organisation in Rome that met to discuss the 47 questions raised by the International Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission.  The ICJHC was formed in 1999, met until October 2000 and was disbanded in 2001.  The report was presented to the world by the ICJHC when further progress with the Vatican was effectively ruled out.  The circumstances of the break-down in communication have been the subject of some controversy made more so by some rather intemperate remarks of Peter Gumpel SJ, the relator of the cause of Pius XII. (See comments below)

The report is available online, and deserves close reading.  The questions asked are valid and well thought out.  A comprehensive list of footnotes follows the text with references to Acts and Documents.

Articles on the Commission's work have generally focused on the perceived reasons for its "failure" rather than the opportunity to explore in detail the issues raised in the questions.  Dimitri Cavalli's article in the New Oxford Review and published in EWTN's archive source is one such example.  Carping on the ability or lack thereof among the scholar's command of Italian becomes churlish when one looks at the academic credentials of each individual.  And the commission was provided with translators.  Although Cavalli leans towards exonerating Pius, he does, at least, recognise the need for more study.

I wrote a final chapter in my PhD on the work of the commission which was not included in A Cross Too Heavy.  At the risk of wearing the reader, I present the unpublished chapter.  The writing was completed in 2003, just over a year before the death of Pope John Paul II.  I crave the reader's indulgence for the use of the present tense when writing of the Pope.

Pacelli’s Ghost

Rome

and the

International Catholic Jewish Historical Commission

1999-2002

In 1998, Pope John Paul II authorised the publication of We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah.  This document was timed for release shortly before Passover and Easter. It was the first Vatican statement which addressed the Holocaust by name.  The Pope’s intention was to “help to heal the wounds of past misunderstandings and injustices.” (We Remember Introduction) 

No other pope in Catholic history has done as much as John Paul to build bridges between Catholicism and Judaism.  His visit to Auschwitz in 1979 was as much an act of homage to the Jews who died there as it was a commemoration of the Christians who also perished. In 1986, he made a very public visit to the Rome Synagogue; the first pope to ever visit the oldest schule in Western Europe, describing the Jews as the “beloved elder brothers” of Christians.  What drove the Polish-born Pontiff to order We Remember came directly from his own wartime experiences of Nazism and the “Final Solution”.  The document did not resolve the questions surrounding Pius XII.  In fact, the questions appeared to have been made more complex.

The chief points of contention lay in the distinction made between Christian anti-Judaism and antisemitism and the comments on the wartime role of Pius XII. While the document recognised the failure of individual Christians, it did not acknowledge or suggest a failure on the part of the teaching authority of the Church.  “Despite the Christian preaching of love for all, even for one’s enemies, the prevailing mentality down the centuries penalized minorities and those who were in any way ‘different.’” (We Remember  3)  The blame for antisemitism was pushed away from the Magesterium. In fact, the language of this part of the document was dangerously close to echoing the bald and historically insupportable generalised claim made by one of Pacelli’s earlier biographers: “The Church has always come to the defense of the Jews in the past when they were persecuted". (Joseph Dinnen 1939, Pius XII: Pope of Peace, p 196)

Of greater concern was the assertion that followed the distinction made above. Not only were anti-Judaism and antisemitism two different ideologies; the later did not draw from the former. The document stated:

The Shoah was the work of a thoroughly modern neo-pagan regime. Its antisemitism had its roots outside Christianity and, in pursuing its aims, it did not hesitate to oppose the Church and persecute her members also. (We Remember 4)

On this point there has been loud and vigorous argument. It is a statement that does not bear the weight of historical evidence and makes the tenor of the whole document weaker. In fact this statement is what I call a type of “Catholic denialism”, an unwillingness to “own” the truth about the Church’s role during the Holocaust. The historical data proves beyond reasonable doubt that such a distinction is as impossible as it is false. Much of Nazism grew in the fertile soil of traditional Christian antisemitism and anti-Judaism.

Partly out of response to the criticism launched by We Remember, the Vatican announced a new historical commission in late 1999 to re-examine the twelve volumes of Actes et Documents.  Actes et Documents du Saint-Siège relatifs à la Seconde Guerre mondiale came into being as a direct result of Hocchuth’s play The Deputy and the growth of academic and religious unrest over the role of Pius XII during the Holocaust.  Pope Paul VI ordered a team of Vatican appointed scholars to sift through the documents of the Secretariat of State and collate evidence to show that charges of papal inaction were untrue.  The work lasted from 1965 until 1981.  The volumes are an impressive undertaking and do show the Church’s highest officials, among whom was Giovanni Battista Montini – the future Paul VI – active in work to alleviate the plight of many different victim groups.   Curiously, there appeared to be some serious gaps in the records.  This was a point the Commission was to note in 2000.


The International Catholic Jewish Historical Commission (ICJHC) was made up equally of Catholic and Jewish historians.  Catholic members were Eva Fleischner, Gerald Fogarty and John Morley, from the United States.  The Jewish members were Belgian Bernard Suchecky, Israeli Robert Wistrich and Canadian Michael Marrus.  

In October 2000, the commission presented a preliminary report.  The commission raised 47 questions concerning Pius, drawn from a study of Actes et Documents.  Cardinal Walter Kasper, secretary of the Pontifical Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, commented in June 2001 that the Commission had not achieved what it set out to do, and that a second attempt needed to be made. (Cf Inside the Vatican  June 2001)  Rather than bring an air of academic harmony over Pius, the exact opposite happened.  The questions still remained unanswered. Historians hoped that John Paul would accept the report and allow greater access to the Vatican archives and personal papers of Pius – if they exist.

A lengthy introduction was necessary in order to place the International Commission within its context.  The mandate of ICJHC was limited only to the published Actes et Documents (1965-1981).  When pressed on whether the commission would have access to unpublished material, Cardinal Edward Cassidy, the then president of the Vatican’s Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, answered “absolutely no.” (Cf The Tablet (London) 30.11.1999)  (This, of itself, was not surprising.  The announcement of the limited opening of the ASV Germany files was not made until February 2003) 



Members of the Commission undertook the reading and researching of the published texts. However, eleven months into their investigation it was clear that the published record was inadequate.  There is evidence to suggest that members of the panel were becoming increasingly frustrated by Vatican intransigence over access to archives.  On 25 October 2000, the Paris daily Le Monde published an article claiming the ICJHC had reached the conclusion that Pius XII did not speak out clearly in defence of the Jews of Europe.  Seeking to avoid a direct “showdown” with Rome, the ICJHC called a press meeting the following day to present its Preliminary Report and the accompanying list of 47 questions drawn from the Actes et Documents.  Both Commission and Vatican officials expressed positive sentiments that the material studied would help shed light on Pacelli’s role.  For the moment, things seemed to be back on course.

Central to the ICJHC’s critique of the published documents was the inadequacy of relying on them alone. In its article on the presentation of the Preliminary Report The Tablet remarked:

Not everyone was happy with the press conference. Jesuit priest Peter Gumpel, the postulator, or official promoter of the beatification, of Pius XII, declared the conduct of the ICJHC as “disloyal to the Holy See, academically unacceptable and incorrect.” (Zenit 27.10.2000) Gumpel went on to ask if the ICJHC was intent on defaming the memory of Pius XII. Emphasising the preliminary nature of the report, Gumpel said it would have to be studied carefully by Vatican historians.  What irked the German-born Jesuit was the release of the report on the internet and to the press. “With what right have they circulated the Preliminary Report, which includes harsh accusations against Pius XII and the Church, without having even heard the answers to the questions posed?” (Zenit, ibid.)

No serious historian’ could accept that the published, edited volumes were the last word on the matter … Absent from these volumes, the report says, are day-to-day records and internal communications – diaries, memoranda, briefing notes, appointment books and minutes of meetings – that would establish how Pius and members of his curia reached their decisions. (Tablet 04.11.2000)

At the end of 2001, the work of the commission remained suspended.  The Vatican adamantly claimed that the work of the ICJHC was sabotaged through slander and an agenda which was more directed at attacking the Catholic Church than searching for the truth.  The members of the commission begged to differ, standing by their July letter that unless that Vatican opened the archives for Pius XII to independent scrutiny, no successful resolution of the questions surrounding Pacelli’s wartime role would be possible. Cardinal Kapser’s continued assertion that access to post-1922 material was impossible because of the “sensitive, sacramental nature of some of the documents” rang hollow. (Catholic World News 24.08; 27.08.2001)

... this initiative which was intended to improve relations between the Catholic Church and the Jewish community, has failed, and this is the direct responsibility of those who, contravening the most elementary academic and human norms, have made themselves culpable of irresponsible behaviour. (Zenit  26.07.2001)

Vatican prevarication only served to foster the sense that there is something to hide, a fear Kapser appeared anxious to avoid.  At the end of August, in a gesture that could be interpreted as conciliatory, the Cardinal announced Rome’s intention of speeding up the classification of some three million pages of war time documentation.  Referring to the breakdown between the ICJHC and the Vatican, Kasper commented that the central issue was not access to documents, but the wording of the final report. This clearly contradicted the formal statement of the commission itself. (Zenit  29.08.2001)

Where does the historian go from here? At present, the only way forward is the continued combing through archival material from a wide range of sources.  Vatican letters, statements, opinions and directives were written and received all over Europe through the Nazi era.  Copies exist in diocesan archives, in the provincial houses of different religious orders and in private collections.  There is sufficient material drawn from diplomatic records, public archive sources and newspapers to allow the historian a fairly comprehensive picture of Pope Pius’ role during the war years.  Susan Zuccotti’s Beneath his Windows, examining the pope’s role during the persecution of Italy’s Jews, is an excellent example of research that works well without Vatican input.

I believe the stumbling block in all of this is the fading world view held by men such as Peter Gumpel.  He sincerely believes that Pius was a good and holy man, worthy of the “honours of the altar”, a statement he expressed to me earlier in 2001.  And he is not alone in thinking this way.  At the same time Fr Gumpel wrote to me, the Vatican was preparing to canonise the controversial founder of Opus Dei, Monsignor José Maria Escriva, a supporter of Francisco Franco. Escriva’s spirituality owed much to the vigorous Catholic, antisemitic fascism of the Generalissimo.


"The world” does not understand what moves the actions of great men such as Pius XII.  While we may not appreciate or understand the reasons behind action or non-action, we must always believe that they acted from the purest of motives, in obedience to their conscience and God.  To question the action or inaction of Pope Pius XII is tantamount to questioning the action of the Church.  The syllogism closes with the logical conclusion – since the pope is Christ’s vicar on earth, he acts as Christ.  And while he may be infallible in matters of faith and morals only, his pattern of life suggests a surety of God’s direction that should not be questioned by those who do not understand and who do not share the Catholic faith as shared in the halls of the Vatican.  The dispute over the commission could have more to do with the preservation of an historical illusion over papal power and prestige than with discovering the truth of Pacelli’s role during the war.

The great disappointment for men like Gumpel is the encroaching daily reality that their worldview is dying.  Most Catholics no longer accept this view of papal authority.  Indeed, most intelligent and critically aware Catholics question the secrecy that surrounds much of the day to day running of the Vatican, and find it increasingly out of step with the modern world.  Only with an open, honest and frank dialogue with all the material available can historians, regardless of faith background, hope to complete the work begun by the ICJHC.  Pope Leo XIII opened the Vatican archives in 1893 with the statement: “The Church has nothing to fear from the truth.” It remains to his successors to put that into practice.


Several days after I completed this segment, the Vatican announced it was opening the Secret Archives relating to Germany up to 1939.  Announcing the Pope’s decision on 15 February 2002, the Vatican Press Office, said that John Paul wanted to open the archives for historians and end “unjust and disagreeable speculations” over the role of his predecessor. (Zenit  15.02.2002)  While public opinion has not generally been a motivator in Vatican policy-making processes, it is, perhaps, significant that consistent criticism from both Catholic and Jewish scholars along with a growing sense of unease among many “ordinary” Christians and Jews, has been instrumental in forcing a change.  Historians are now waiting expectantly for the new material to emerge from the archives.  I doubt very much if a “smoking gun” will be found, but I am convinced that information that will help scholars understand the inner workings of the Vatican during the Holocaust will be found.  For this reason, if for no other, the work of the ICJHC can be judged to have been successful.



Father Gumpel’s next comment is telling for its subtext. “I wonder why they have done this.  Did they wish to influence public opinion against Pius XII and the Church?  This has happened precisely when we Catholics are making all kinds of efforts to improve relations with the Jewish world.”  Suspicions that a Jewish plot lurked near the surface of the ICJHC were all but named by Gumpel in July 2001.  Some, “not all”, Jewish members of the ICJHC “publicly spread the suspicion that the Holy See was trying to conceal documents that, in its judgement, would have been compromising.” (Zenit 02.07.2001)  Gumpel’s evident distrust of the Jewish historians, which pre-date the work of the Commission, appears to point towards a presupposition that they would be prejudiced against Pacelli.  At no point has Gumpel asked whether this is so, or why such a prejudice could be possible.  At the very least, it displays an unwillingness to address the central issue – access to archives and unsorted documents, and the possibility there might be more to learn about the war-time pope.


The newly appointed president of the Vatican’s Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, Cardinal Walter Kapser, requested a final presentation from the commission on 21 June 2001.  A month later the commission replied that “without a positive response to our respectful request” to study the unpublished material in the archives, the ICJHC’s conclusions would be invalid.  Therefore, on 20 July, the commission suspended its work.  The commission’s letter was later published by the World Jewish Congress and summarised by the BBC. Father Gumpel left no doubt as to where the blame lay for the collapse of the research:

Hubert Wolf "Why did the Pope keep quiet about the Holocaust?"

Newspapers whether in print or electronic form create "hooks" to grab and keep the reader's attention.  In this case, my attention was well and truly grabbed by this rather dramatic headline.  This article appeared in the latest online edition of the US magazine Foreign Policy.  According to Wikipedia, Foreign Policy  describes itself as “a daily web magazine that is a must-read for anyone who cares about international affairs, … indispensable, insightful and as diverse as the subjects it covers, … serious but never stuffy.”

The magazine certainly lives up to its claims in this article. 

Hubert Wolf (b 1959), is a priest of the diocese of Rottenberg-Stuggart and a published historian who since 1999 has been on the faculty of Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität in Münster.  He has also worked in the archives of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith (Holy Office / Inquisition) as well as in the Secret Archives (ASV).

In 2008 he published "Papst und Teufel"  which will be released in English later in May under the title "The Pope and the Devil: the Vatican's archives and the Third Reich".

This article has an odd title considering most of it centres on the famous bishop of Münster, Clemens August Graf von Galen (1876-1946). 

And while this is interesting, it is the claim in the opening paragraph that I find disturbing:

How much did the Catholic Church hierarchy know about the Holocaust as it was happening? And why didn't it speak up? With the opening of the Vatican archives from the World War II years, we can finally explore these heated questions -- and German historian Hubert Wolf has dug through the files to find damning evidence that Pope Pius XII, known to critics as "Hitler's pope," made a conscious decision to pass on the issue, leaving it up to his bishops in Germany to protect the Jews and Catholics who were being killed. Even when directly confronted with the growing enormity of the situation, as in this story of a German bishop who did stand up for his morals, the pope avoided public action.

Firstly, the "Vatican archives from the World War II years" are not opened and will not be for at least another three years.  Secondly, I find it hard to believe that a scholar of Wolf's standing would have "dug through the files to find damning evidence" that Pius XII "made a conscious decision to pass on the issue, leaving it up to his bishops in Germany to protect the Jews and Catholics who were being killed".  Thirdly, I suspect that the editors of Foreign Policy thought it in keeping with their mandate to never be "stuffy" to play loose with the historical record. The readers of Foreign Policy deserve better.

Whatever one's position on Pius XII it must be, at least, based on the historical record and intellectual honesty.  If Hubert Wolf did not know of the introductory paragraph the editors have a moral imperative to clarify the ambiguity.  As the article stands it is an interesting piece on the Lion of Münster, but none of the war references are new - they have been in the public domain for decades, including the published documents of Acts and Documents of the Holy See (ADSS).

One last comment.  The cover of the English translation features a photo of Eugenio Pacelli during his time as Nuncio to Germany (1917-1929) entering the Presidential residence in Berlin.  It is similar to the image used on the cover of John Cornwall's 1999 "Hitler's Pope".  This is a not-so-subtle form of mischief making.  As any Year 12 history student would be able to say, the Nazis did not come to power until January 1933 when Pacelli had been gone from Germany for over three years.  Why use an irrelevant picture if not to sensationalise?

Fortunately the editorial review found on Amazon gives a more hopeful synopsis of Wolf's book. I have ordered it and look forward to reading it.

Pius defenders gathered to answer questions about Pope Pius XII

This is the heading of an article about a gathering Rome.  I have taken it from Catholic News Service.  At this stage I know nothing of the proceedings and cannot make any comment on what was discussed.  I post this article because it is important to attempt to hear all the voices about Pius, even the ones I don't necessarily agree with.  When I learn more about the Rome meeting I will make some considered comments.

I met Andrea Tornielli and Matteo Luigi Napolitano.  Andrea is a delightful and articulate journalist with whom I dicussed a number of issues related to Pius at the Jerusalem symposium in March 2009.  Matteo is likewise very affable and keen to listen to other points of view.  While I do not agree with all their conclusions about Pius, I respect their work as historians. 

I have read Ronald Rychlak's book, "Hitler, the War and the Pope" (2000) and consider it more apologia than history along the lines of other "pro-Pius" writers.   I did not find much that had not been written before and little use of references outside the war years to help understand the mindset of the Vatican.


The article follows:

By Sarah Delaney - Catholic News Service


Wednesday, 28 April 2010


Defenders of Pope Pius XII gathered in Rome to answer a list of questions about his actions in the face of Nazi persecution of Jews in Europe during World War II, an organizer of the event said.

Gary Krupp, founder of the Pave the Way Foundation, a nondenominational organization that seeks to improve interfaith relations, said a panel of five experts on the wartime period met April 26-27. The object of the videotaped meeting was to answer 47 questions about the Catholic Church and World War II that had been posed but never officially answered by a Catholic-Jewish commission disbanded about 10 years ago.

Krupp said the experts enlisted were Jesuit Father Peter Gumpel, a top promoter of the canonization cause of Pope Pius; Ronald J. Rychlak, professor of law and associate dean at the University of Mississippi, and the author of two books on Pope Pius' wartime role; Matteo Luigi Napolitano, an Italian associate history professor at the University of Molise and a Pope Pius biographer; Andrea Tornielli, who covers the Vatican for an Italian daily and a Pope Pius biographer; and Michael Hesemann, a German author of several books about the church, including one defending Pope Pius' wartime record.

Krupp, an American Jew, has maintained that Pope Pius has been unfairly judged by Jewish groups and some historians who say that he did not speak out forcefully to try to stop Adolf Hitler's persecution of Jews. Krupp joins many Catholics who say the pope did all he could behind the scenes to try to save Jewish lives and that a direct confrontation would have provoked worse reprisals against Jews.

Krupp supports Pope Pius' sainthood cause. Pope Benedict XVI recently declared the wartime pope venerable, one of the first steps toward sainthood, a move that angered many Jewish groups who say that Pope Pius' role remains ambiguous and that it should be studied before the cause goes further.

The questions addressed by the panel originated with a joint commission of scholars formed in 1999 by the Vatican and the International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultation to study the issue of Pope Pius and the Jews during the war. After examining published materials for a year, the commission suspended its work amid controversy over access to still-closed Vatican archives from that period. I suggest the journalist could have done a better job with her homework and written a little more accurately about the International Catholic Jewish Historical Commission and their work.  The hyper-link takes you to the report on which this Rome meeting appears to be gathered to answer.  The IHCJC story is worth taking the time to read, if only to experience something of the difficulties confronting historians.

Krupp said he would make the nine hours of recorded material available on DVD and on his foundation's website.

He and four other Jewish figures who had been present during the taping of the panel's discussions spoke briefly with Pope Benedict at the end of the weekly papal audience in St. Peter's Square April 28.

They also met with German Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, Krupp said. They discussed an interfaith effort to promote a tradition of families eating together on Friday night, he said. They also expressed their fear of a nuclear Iran and Iran's hostile attitude toward Israel, Krupp said.

Arnold Ages "Vatican: Three steps forward, three steps backwards".

I am grateful to Norm Gordnor, Editor of the Jewish Tribune for permission to reprint this article. 

Arnold Ages is Distinguished Emeritus Professor of French Language and Literature, University of Waterloo (Ontario) and Scholar-in-Residence at the Beth Tzedec Congregation, Toronto.   His article is a balanced and thoughtful.  I think it is an excellent example of the great move forward Jews and Catholics have made over the last 50 years, that we can speak frankly with each other, and know the relationship / friendship will stand firm.




Vatican: Three steps forward, three steps backward



Written by Arnold Ages


Tuesday, 20 April 2010


One must be very discrete in criticizing the Vatican or the Pope. Catholics understandably, are as sensitive to ungainly criticism of the papacy as Jews are to unfair criticism of the state of Israel. Therefore, words must be carefully weighed before they are transformed into print.


First the good news. Since 1964 the Roman Catholic Church, through the agency of Vatican II and Pope John XXIII, has made heroic strides in reconfiguring the church’s unfortunate and ultimately damaging theological biases against Jews and Judaism. As a result of deliberations at the 1964 conclave, the deicide myth attached to Jews historically by the Catholic Church has been removed and replaced by a doctrine that cites humanity in general as responsible for the crucifixion. The church has gone a long way in its text books to also remove the “teaching of contempt” for Jews and Judaism that has been an integral part of Catholic teachings.


There have been two other significant positive developments in Catholic-Jewish relations since the period in question. One of the irritating obstacles to that relationship was the reference to “perfidious Jews” in the Good Friday Easter liturgy in the Catholic Church. The church tried originally to mute the criticism by explaining that “perfidious” in its Latin original simply meant “unbelieving.” Still, a prayer for the conversion of “unbelieving Jews” was offensive to the Jewish community at large. The Catholic Church eventually eliminated that liturgical curiosity.

The most important change of all occurred in the early 1990s when the Vatican, after protracted debate among the leaders of the church, decided to reverse two millennia of anti-Jewish doctrine concerning the link between the rise of Christianity and the expulsion of Jews from the Land of Israel by taking the extraordinary step of recognizing the state of Israel as a palpable and living expression of Jews and Judaism. True, the diplomatic channels have not always been amiable, but they remain an important conduit for both sides.

In the last several years, however, the Vatican has been stepping backwards through a series of thoughtless gestures. The reintegration of excommunicated Bishop Richard Williamson, a known Holocaust “minimizer” (“only 300,000 Jews died and none in the concentration camps,” he said), into the Catholic Church two years ago, was a painful episode for the Jewish community, which correctly sees Holocaust denial in any form as a recrudescence antisemitism. Bishop Williamson was recently found guilty in Regensburg, Germany of Holocaust denial and fined. Williams’s other statements about Jews as “the enemies of Christ,” and that the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion are authentic, makes one wonder how the Vatican could have welcomed such an individual once again into the bosom of the church.

The Vatican’s beatification exercise for two people – a first step to canonizing an individual as a saint in the Catholic Church – has been a misstep for most Jews because of the two candidates, Edith Stein, a converted Jewish thinker murdered by the Nazis, and Pope Pius XII, the Germanophile leader of the church during the Holocaust. While it might be incautious for Jews to render opinions about the inner religious mechanisms of another religion, the move to elevate a Jewish victim of Nazi barbarism and to transform her into a sacred personage is grating. As for Pope Pius XII, there is evidence that the Vatican did help many Jews during the Holocaust, but the same evidence suggests that Pius XII was uninvolved in those rescue attempts.

Finally, the current Pope’s spiritual adviser used the pages of the Osservatore Romano, the official Vatican newspaper, to offer what is undoubtedly a base example of foot-and-mouth disease when he suggested on Good Friday this year that criticism of Pope Benedict, regarding the sexual scandals among priests, was akin to antisemitism. The absurdity of the charge was immediately recognized by Vatican officials and the article was repudiated while its author apologized.

It is to be hoped that the backward steps recorded above are mere minor blips on the radar screen of Catholic-Jewish relations and that both communities can look forward to a renewed entente.

Reprinted with permission from the Jewish Tribune, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. © 2010 Jewish Tribune, all rights reserved.