NEWLY AVAILABLE SOURCES ON CHURCH HISTORY
Vatican Secret Archive holdings for the reign of Pius XI (1922-1939), made accessible in 2003-06;
Personal papers of the American Vatican diplomat, Bishop Joseph Hurley;
Personal papers of the American Vatican diplomat, Bishop Aloysius Muench;
Personal papers of Bishop Clemens August Graf von Galen;
Wartime and postwar records of the OSS and other government records from France, Italy, Great Britain, and the USA.
Pope Pius XII(1939-58):
Born in 1876 into an aristocratic Roman family,
ordained in 1899, a highly trained
canon lawyer and diplomat.
The young Nuncio Pacelli conveys the peace proposals of
Benedict XV to Imperial German headquarters in 1917. The dismal failure of this mission left him
pessimistic about the Vatican’s scope for action in time of war….
Young Nuncio Pacelli’s residence in Munich,
which was invaded by Red Guards in March 1919, and his Benz
limousine, which was requisitioned by them
Abbot Benedikt Gariador, whose “Friends of Israel” included 3,000 priests, 19 cardinals, and 287 bishops
in January 1928
Abbot Ildefons Schuster of the Congregation of Rites, who supported the petition to reform the Good Friday liturgy, and Cardinal Raffael Merry del Val, head of the Holy Office, who forced him to renounce his “errors”
Pius XI (1922-39)
inaugurates the Vatican Radio in
1931 with his Cardinal
Secretary of State,
Eugenio Pacelli
The Vatican found Mussolini’s bark to be much worse than his
bite and hoped at first that the same was true
of Hitler….
But Vatican City covers less than ¼ of a square mile and depends on Rome for water and
power….
“The Final Blow!” (Nazi campaign
poster from July 1932 to
denounce the alliance of
Catholic clergy and Social Democratic labor bosses that allegedly controlled the
Weimar Republic)
Edith Stein, the Carmelite nun who
wrote Pius XI in April 1933 “as a child of
the Jewish people” to implore him to speak
out against the persecution of Jews
Pacelli’s notes on his conference with Pius XI on
1 April 1933:“Write the Berlin Nuncio
that more Jewish dignitaries have reported to the Holy Father on the
danger of anti-Semitic excesses in Germany, and
it is said that they have occurred in many places. He should inquire whether and how something can be done. [There could come a time in which one must be
able to say that one did something about this
matter. Such action also counts among the good
traditions of the Holy See.]”
Papal Nuncio Cesare Orsenigo is greeted by Foreign Minister Ribbentrop and Adolf Hitler at the New Year’s Reception in the Reich Chancellery, 12
January 1939
Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli is flanked by the German officials Franz von Papen and Rudolf Buttmann at the signing of the Reich Concordat, July 20, 1933
“A solemn moment at the ground-breaking for the House of German Art.
The Papal Nuncio Vasallo di Torregrossa has just
said to the Führer:‘For a long time I did not understand you. I have tried to for a
long time. Today I do understand
you.’Today every German Catholic understands
Adolf Hitler as well and will therefore vote ‘YES!’
on November 12”(referendum campaign
poster, fall 1933)
Father Charles E. Coughlin,Detroit’s “Radio Priest” and
founder of the “Christian Front”
“Pacelli Lunches with Roosevelt,” New York Times, November 6, 1936
Cardinal Adolf Bertram, Prince-Bishop of Breslau (b. 1859), who demanded respect for Hitler as the lawful
head of state
Clemens August Graf von Galen,
born 1878, Bishop of
Münster (1933-1946),
who delivered three public
sermons in 1941 to condemn the Third Reich for
murder
“This congenitally ill
patient will cost the National Community
60,000 marks in his lifetime.
Comrades, this too is Your
Money”(Nazi poster
from 1937): This campaign
climaxed with the mass
“euthanasia” action of 1940/41
Konrad von Preysing became Bishop of Berlin in 1935and led the movement to denounce abuses of human
rights
German paratroopers occupy Rome
on 10 September
1943 (near the
Castello San Angelo)
Hitler wanted to bring the Pope to Berlin in a cage, but Ambassador Ernst von Weizsäcker and SS General Karl Wolff agreed on the need to avoid
conflict with the Vatican
General Mark Clark and the
U.S. Army enter Rome on June 4,
1944.Soon
thereafter Pius XII publicly
denounced the
deportation of Jews from
Hungary
Pius XII as depicted in Rolf Hochhuth’s The
Deputy(Berlin premier in
1963)