Opinion Behind The Papal Appeasement Jerusalem E xactly 10 years ago, the Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission, established to investigate Pope Pius XII's response to the Holocaust, met for the first time in New York. I was the only Israeli his- torian among the six scholars (three Catholics and three Jews) designated by the Vatican and leading Jewish organiza- tions to study this hotly contested issue. A little under two years later, the project was abandoned as a result of the Holy See's unwillingness to release materials from its own archives that could help clarify issues that our team of schol- ars raised in our provisional report. Already at that time, in the last years of Pope John Paul's pontificate, there were moves afoot to place Pius XII Pope Pius XII on the fast track to sainthood, but they were probably slowed down by Israeli and Jewish pro- tests and a desire by Church authorities to prevent a serious rupture in Catholic- Jewish relations. At issue was the silence of Pius XII during the Holocaust and his indirect complicity in the Nazi mass mur- der of Jews. These allega- tions, which CI C. first emerged around 1964, had prompted the Pope Benedict XVI Vatican to pub- lish 11 volumes of its own documents (edited by four trusted Jesuit scholars), most of them appearing in the 1970s. It was these documents in Italian, German, French, Latin and English that we were originally asked to review. The million or so unpublished docu- ments from the pontificate of Pius XII (1939-1958), according to the Vatican's most recent estimate, will only be avail- able in about four years' time. It is in this context that we need to see the recent decree on the "heroic virtues" 24 January 7 • 2010 of Pius XII, just signed by or to represent the Christian Pope Benedict XVI. Most Jews conscience. have interpreted this act as yet Pius XII strikes me as a another signal that the Vatican polished diplomat far more is determined to beatify the worried about the Allied controversial wartime pope bombing of Rome than about — whom some even consider the thousand Roman Jews to have been anti-Semitic who were being deported by — regardless of what the his- the Germans to their deaths torical evidence may indicate. in Auschwitz, virtually under Robert The sharp response of the windows of the Holy See. Wistrich Jewish leaders to Benedict's True, other Roman Jews were Special decree prompted the Vatican's discreetly given sanctuary in Commentary Press Office director, Father ecclesiastical establishments Federico Lombardi, S.J., to in and around Rome after release a conciliatory note distinguish- October 1943, but it remains unclear ing between the historical judgment of if this was the result of a direct papal Pius XII's actions (still an open ques- instruction. tion) and the saintly Christian life he In some instances, we know that Pius XII did try to intervene against Nazi or apparently led. In particular, Father Lombardi was racist anti-Semitic legislation, but in concerned to disclaim any notion that general this was almost always on behalf this decree was of baptized Jews since they were "a hostile act towards the protected by the Church as Jewish people" or an obstacle to Catholics. Pius's rare Catholic-Jewish dialogue. In references to the light of the the mass mur- der of the Jews pope's forthcom- were invariably ing visit to the veiled and very Synagogue of Rome, this was a abstract, as if he found it dif- politically astute ficult to utter the and welcome word itself. Was reassurance. it fear of further Nevertheless, German repri- the decree on sals? A latent Pius XII still anti-Semitism? raises concern Was it his not only about visceral anti- the continuing drive to beatify Communism which also the wartime pontiff, but also about the present pope led him to hope for a Nazi victory in the east? Or perhaps the desire to and the state of relations between the spare German Catholics a conflict of Catholic Church and the Jewish people. conscience between their loyalty to Regarding Pius XII, I personally have Hitler, the fatherland, or their Church? never seen him either as "Hitler's Pope" Whatever the reasons, this was hardly (the theory of British historian John Cornwell — a "lapsed" Catholic), or as heroic conduct. So why has Benedict XVI chosen to take the "Righteous Gentile" evoked by Rabbi this step now? My own inclination is to David Dallin. My own provisional conclusion drawn think that the present pope regards Pius XII as a soulmate — both theologically from the study of thousands of docu- and politically. He shares with the wartime ments is that the mass murder of Jews was fairly low on his list of priorities. Of pontiff an authoritarian, centralist world- view and a deep distrust of liberalism, course, much the same could be said of Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin, but they modernity and the ravages of moral rela- tivism. He was 31 years old when Pius XII did not claim to be the "Vicar of Christ" Regarding Pius XII, I personally have never seen him either as "Hitler's Pope" or as a "Righteous Gentile." My provisional conclusion is that the mass murder of Jews was fairly low on his list of priorities. died in 1958 and already then regarded him as a venerated role model. Moreover, the German-born Benedict XVI certainly knew that Pius XII, an artistocratic Roman, was also a passionate Germanophile, surrounded by German aides during and after the war, fluent in the German language and a great admirer of the German Catholic Church. Not only that, but Benedict probably knows that Pius XII personally inter- vened after 1945 to commute the sen- tences of convicted German war crimi- nals. This solicitude for Nazi criminals contrasts sharply with Pius XII ignoring all entreaties to make a public statement against anti-Semitism even after the full horrors of the death camps had been revealed in 1945. In this context, it is profoundly unset- tling to think that the ultraconservative Benedict XVI and his entourage can identify so completely with Pius XII as a man of "heroic virtue." The present pope, no doubt, deplores anti-Semitism, though his statements on the subject have been noticeably less robust than those of his predecessor, John Paul II. At Yad Vashem last summer, he expressed no personal regret as a German for the unspeakable horrors of the Shoah, even though he had once been a member of the Hitler Youth. True, he had little choice in the matter. However, he was disturbingly vague about the truly monstrous German role in the Holocaust. Earlier this year, Benedict also showed remarkably poor judgment in reinstat- ing an unrepentant Holocaust-denying British bishop into the mainstream Catholic Church, an action he only retracted after worldwide Jewish and Catholic protests. These serious mistakes appear to fol- low a pattern and may even indicate a regression from the real progress in Catholic-Jewish relations under Benedict's predecessor. One can only hope they are not irrevers- ible since the stakes are high and no sane person can be interested in undermining the bridges across the abyss that have been so painstakingly constructed. ❑ Prof. Robert S. Wistrich is director of the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism at Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the author of "A Lethal Obsession: Anti-Semitism from Antiquity to the Global Jihad" (Random House, January 2010).