Vatican Still Must Answer on Holocaust

By Earl Ofari Hutchinson, AlterNet. Posted February 20, 2002.

Jewish scholars and leaders were cautiously optimistic at the announcement this past week that in 2003 the Vatican would release more of its World War II-era files on Pope Pius XII. Jewish leaders have repeatedly pressed for full disclosure to determine what Pius XII did or didn't do to stop Hitler's slaughter of millions of Jews. This past July Jewish scholars and leaders publicly lambasted the church for releasing a skimpy 11 volumes of wartime documents that revealed almost nothing about the Vatican's dealings with Hitler. They demanded that the Vatican open all its books on that period. The Vatican foot dragged for six months before finally agreeing to release more documents.

It was virtually an article of faith during the decade I attended Catholic schools that Pius XII would one day be canonized a saint. The priests and nuns routinely punctuated their prayers with paeans in praise of the goodness and greatness of Pius XII. They urged us to pray for his continued health and well-being. In the decades since his death in 1959 Pius XII's march to sainthood has been wracked by fierce debate over his dealings with Hitler and his refusal to speak out on the Holocaust.

There was great hope that this would change when John Paul II took over the Vatican reins two decades ago. Over the years, he has raked Catholics over the coals for saying and doing nothing about colonialism, slavery, and the pillage of the lands of indigenous people. But his continuing unwillingness to confront the Vatican's complicity in Hitler's Holocaust is another matter.

Vatican defenders cloud Papal guilt in the Holocaust by incessantly reminding that the Nazis murdered thousands of Catholics in and outside of Germany who aided the Jews. They also remind critics that Pius XII poured millions into relief for war refugees, gave sanctuary to Jews inside the Vatican, and played a huge role in post war recovery efforts and the restoration of democracy in Western Europe.

In 1998, the church made a mild stab at public atonement for past injustices when it formally apologized for centuries of Catholic anti-Semitism and the failure to combat Nazi persecution of the Jews. But the Vatican made no mention of Pius XII's stone silence on Nazi atrocities. And it's this continuing blind spot that riles many Jewish and church scholars.

The Vatican continues to keep mute on its Holocaust involvement for a painful reason. Its silence was not due to the moral lapses of individual Catholics, or that the church was ignorant of, or duped by, Hitler's aims. It was a deliberate policy of appeasement crafted by church leaders. Before he ascended to the papacy in 1939, Pius XII was the Vatican's ambassador to Germany and secretary of state during the crucial period when Hitler rose to power, and knew full well what Hitler was up to.

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