Francis searches for secrets of Holocaust pope

[onehandle]

Source: The Sunday Times

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POPE FRANCIS wants to open the Vatican’s secret archives on Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust before deciding on sainthood for the controversial wartime pontiff, accused by critics of having turned a blind eye to the extermination of 6m Jews.

Abraham Skorka, an Argentinian rabbi and friend of Francis, said he discussed Pius XII with the Pope during a week he spent in September at St Martha’s House, the papal residence. It was the first time a pope and a rabbi have lived under the same roof in the Vatican.

Asked whether Francis would open the wartime archives, as Jewish leaders have long demanded, Skorka, 63, told The Sunday Times: “The Pope is consistent with all he said as a cardinal, and as pope he will undoubtedly make happen what he said he would do when he was a cardinal.

Read more: http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/world_news/Europe/article1364797.ece

[JustAnotherGen]

1. I hope he lives a long time

And that he Corrects wrongs, provides justice to those abused by the church, and includes everyone. He has a long hard road to hoe, and is going to have to transform from within (especially in regard to women and the GLBT community) but every move he makes seems to be leading to a Catholic Church seeking redemption for past sins and treatment of people.

Says the UU on her way to Church . . .

[yurbud]

26. I agree with your hope, but thought the opposite was more likely

he would suddenly die in his sleep of a previous undiagnosed illness like JP I.

[madrchsod]

2. there`s a lot of blood in the 2000yrs of archives

reforming the world`s oldest criminal organization won't happen overnight. maybe this guy can open up those archives

[AngryOldDem]

3. Long time coming.

I think a lot of revisionist history has been going on in regard to Pius XII and the question of his collaboration with the Nazis is an important one that needs to be definitively settled one way or another.

Pope Francis has literally been a godsend to the Church. He is truly the open window and fresh air that was promised with John XXIII 50 years ago, Long may he serve.

[Ghost Dog]

6. Francis is the first Jesuit Pope ever. n/t

[UTUSN]

4. "Holocaust pope" - really?!1 As a lapsed Catholic, I have him as the template of what

a pope looked like until I was 11 yrs old. Whatever lingering nostalgia I have left is wrapped in that image and I carry a key fob of the "Liberal" John XXIII, these two retaining whatever reverence is possible for clay-feet humans. There are limits to what somebody can do under besieged conditions in the middle of the maelstrom, besides that the pre-XXIII church dogma was even more ilLiberal than it is now and we complain about how it is now. There are stories that he saved refugees. Unless he was supposed to put an end to the madness single-handedly, it is nasty to label him "the Holocaust pope." Perhaps the current officeholder's positive p.r. status will serve to lay that label to rest.

[niyad]

7. holocaust pope? really? yes, really:

. . .


As soon as he was appointed Pope, Pacelli did speak out against the 1938 Italian racial laws that dealt with mixed marriages and children of mixed marriages.(3) However, he issued no such condemnation of Kristallnacht (the night of broken glass) which occurred in November 1938, and which recent evidence shows he was informed of by Berlin's papal nuncio. As the security of the Jewish population became more precarious, Pius XII did intervene the month he was elected Pope, March 1939, and obtained 3,000 visas to enter Brazil for European Jews who had been baptized and converted to Catholicism. Two-thirds of these were later revoked, however, because of "improper conduct," probably meaning that the Jews started practicing Judaism once in Brazil. At that time, the Pope did nothing to save practicing Jews.(4)

Cries for Help

Throughout the Holocaust, Pius XII was consistently besieged with pleas for help on behalf of the Jews.

In the spring of 1940, the Chief Rabbi of Palestine, Isaac Herzog, asked the papal Secretary of State, Cardinal Luigi Maglione to intercede to keep Jews in Spain from being deported to Germany. He later made a similar request for Jews in Lithuania. The papacy did nothing.(5)

Within the Pope's own church, Cardinal Theodor Innitzer of Vienna told Pius XII about Jewish deportations in 1941. In 1942, the Slovakian charge d'affaires, a position under the supervision of the Pope, reported to Rome that Slovakian Jews were being systematically deported and sent to death camps.(6)

In October 1941, the Assistant Chief of the U.S. delegation to the Vatican, Harold Tittman, asked the Pope to condemn the atrocities. The response came that the Holy See wanted to remain "neutral," and that condemning the atrocities would have a negative influence on Catholics in German-held lands.(7)

In late August 1942, after more than 200,000 Ukrainian Jews had been killed, Ukrainian Metropolitan Andrej Septyckyj wrote a long letter to the Pope, referring to the German government as a regime of terror and corruption, more diabolical than that of the Bolsheviks. The Pope replied by quoting verses from Psalms and advising Septyckyj to "bear adversity with serene patience.&quot 8)

On September 18, 1942, Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini, the future Pope Paul VI, wrote, "The massacres of the Jews reach frightening proportions and forms.&quot 9) Yet, that same month when Myron Taylor, U.S. representative to the Vatican, warned the Pope that his silence was endangering his moral prestige, the Secretary of State responded on the Pope's behalf that it was impossible to verify rumors about crimes committed against the Jews.(10)

Wladislaw Raczkiewicz, president of the Polish government-in-exile, appealed to the Pope in January 1943 to publicly denounce Nazi violence. Bishop Preysing of Berlin did the same, at least twice. Pius XII refused.(11)
. . .

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/pius.html

[WinkyDink]

12. Head, meet sand.

[UTUSN]

18. Just a note, you're addressing a Lib, secular humanist, lapsed Cath here. n/t

[WinkyDink]

24. So are you. ;-)

[UTUSN]

25. Yet with a difference of tone. n/t

[Demeter]

5. Hasn't been a Pope this smart and ethical in my lifetime

Wish we had such leadership in this country.

[marble falls]

8. Amazing change of tone in just a first years of a Pope. Bennidict did defrock 400 priests for ...

for crimes it seemed to want to bury and deny just a few years earlier.

[WinkyDink]

13. "Benedict." As in, benediction.

[johnfunk]

17. Or, "Benedict," as in…

"Benny, you dick!"

[WinkyDink]

20. Heh. Never cared for the German myself.

[Beacool]

23. You made me laugh........

[skepticscott]

9. Another well-crafted PR moment

Acknowledging only now, after 70 years, what people have known for a long time, despite the attempts by the church to cover up or deny it, shouldn't win the Vatican any points.

[bucolic_frolic]

10. The Vatican is one of the oldest political entities

and as such they control wealth and power

and have made many alliances, accomodations, treaties with
other nations and states over the centuries

I wonder if this shift in policy is simply because the world is no
longer in a Cold War, big issues having been decided

So the Vatican sees opportunity to popularize, cleanse, heal
what it can

All with an eye toward legitimacy and growing the flock of course

[Rozlee]

11. Hitler: "I am, as before, a Catholic and will always remain so."

Pope Pius XII never even set foot in Nazi Germany during the times of the Holocaust. I'm a lapsed Catholic and an atheist, but I've got to give the devil his due, I'll bet you anything that Francis would have demanded tours of the camps and wouldn't have been snowed by any Theresienstadt "The Fuehrer Gives the Jews A City" bullshit. Germany was a very devout country and a third of it trended Catholic; I'm sure Hitler would have had a hard time turning down a papal visit, although he might have brazen it out and done just that. By that time, most Germans, even Catholics, probably revered him more than the Pope anyway. But, Pius should have been more pro-active and tried to beard the lion in his den.

[jwirr]

14. He could do this without hurting the individuals mentioned in these files. Most are dead.

[Kelvin Mace]

15. If you can't answer the question with a simple "Yes"

then the question is still in doubt.

[hedgehog]

16. I think this is more speculation than fact - it's something

he talked about in the past.

As it is, I doubt anything in the archives will change any minds. Supporters will continue to point out certain speeches and the efforts by some Catholics to save lives. Accusers will continue to ask why the Pope didn't denounce Hitler more strongly.

I've heard the defense that the Pope had to be discrete lest he make Catholics and/or Catholic churchmen targets. I think the defense speaks for itself. The pope could have done more, but chose not to.

[Bluenorthwest]

19. Oddly the article does not actually quote Francis saying he is going to do this nor does it

indicate any way in which he is 'searching' for information. It is a regular feature of the Francis threads that the piece insinuates much and reports little to nothing. No statement of intention from Francis, no report of actions taken by him. This is speculation more than it is reporting.

[Scairp]

21. Sainthood?!!

They cannot be serious.

[Beacool]

22. Oh no, now he's got Jewish cooties.

"Abraham Skorka, an Argentinian rabbi and friend of Francis, said he discussed Pius XII with the Pope during a week he spent in September at St Martha’s House, the papal residence. It was the first time a pope and a rabbi have lived under the same roof in the Vatican."



Not only did he stay in the same residence, they have been friends for years. This Pope is a heretic!!!!