Investigating the papacy of Pope Pius XII

The Pave the Way Foundation, in cooperation with the Vatican, is making an unprecedented effort to translate and make publicly available on the internet, all the documents relevant to the papacy of Pius XII and his wartime activities.

According to Gary Krupp, of the Pave the Way Foundation:

“Controversy abounds on whether he did enough to prevent the slaughter of Jews at the hands of the Nazis,” Krupp affirmed.

He continued: “Our research has revealed that five years after Pius XII’s death, the KGB hatched a plot to discredit their enemy, the Roman Catholic Church, called ‘Seat 12.’

“A dirty trick, which condemned Pope Pius XII for his ‘silence’ during the Holocaust in the form of Rolf Hochhuth’s fictitious 1963 play ‘The Deputy.’ The result was the worst character assassination of the twentieth century.”

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Group Gives New Proof of Pius XII’s Help for Jews

Says Pope Worked to Save Lives Before, During, After War
NEW YORK, FEB. 20, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Recently uncovered documents show gestures of friendship and protection that Pius XII showed to Jews before, during and after World War II.

The Pave the Way Foundation, which works to promote dialogue between religions, publicized this Thursday.

The discoveries were made by the German historian and advisor of the foundation Michael Hesemann, author of the books “The Pope Who Defied Hitler” and “The Truth About Pius XII.” Hesemann found a number of documents in the Vatican Secret Archives that certified Pope Pacelli’s numerous interventions in favor of Jews.

He noted that Archbishop Pacelli intervened in 1917 while papal nuncio in Bavaria, going through the German government to demand that Palestine Jews be protected from the Turkish Ottoman Empire.

Hesemann also shows that in 1917, the future Pius XII used his personal influence to enable the World Zionist Organization representative, Nachum Sokolov, to meet personally with Benedict XV to talk about a Jewish homeland in Palestine.

In 1926, Archbishop Pacelli urged German Catholics to support the Committee for Palestine, which supported Jewish settlements in the Holy Land.

The foundation’s president, Gary Krupp, added these findings to the evidence he already had complied for a Pius XII symposium last September in Rome. Since this event, 300 new pages of original documents have been uncovered.

These documents, available for downloading from the foundation’s Web site, include a nun’s manuscript from 1943, detailing the Pope’s order to hide Jews in Rome and a list of protected Jews.

Another document is a 1939 report on the “new Pope” by the U.S. Foreign Service, from the American consul in Cologne. The diplomat reported surprise at the “extreme dislike” of Pacelli toward Hitler and the Nazi regime, and his support to the German bishops in their opposition to Nazism, even at the cost of losing German Catholic youth.

The foundation also provides a 1938 document, signed by then Secretary of State Eugenio Pacelli, in which he opposes the Polish bill outlawing kosher slaughter because he understood that this law would be a “grave persecution” against the Jewish people.

During the war, Pius XII saved 80,000 lives by persuading the Hungarian regent to prevent the deportation of the Jews. He also requested the Brazilian government to receive 3,000 “non-Aryans.”

Click here for more, courtesy of Zenit News Agency

Submitted by Doria2

Investigation “directly contradicts the negative perception of the pope’s war time activities”.

 

Pope says Pius XII “spared no effort” to help Jews

By Philip Pullella

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Benedict on Thursday forcefully defended his wartime predecessor Pius XII against accusations he did not do enough to help the Jews, saying Pius “spared no effort” on their behalf during World War II.

The pope spoke to members of the U.S.-based Pave the Way Foundation, a mixed Jewish-Catholic group which held a symposium in Rome on the papacy of Pius, who reigned from 1939 to 1958.

The symposium prepared a 200-page compilation of documents, diplomatic cables and newspaper clippings from the period — some of them previously unpublished — showing Pius did much to help Jews during the war and was thanked by Jewish leaders.

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Submitted by Doria2

HOLOCAUST-SURVIVING JEWS THANK POPE

June 18, 2008

HOLOCAUST-SURVIVING JEWS THANK POPE

Today, Pope Benedict XVI is welcoming a group of Jewish Holocaust survivors. Arranged by the Pave the Way Foundation, the group will personally thank the pope for the Catholic Church’s intervention in saving their lives in Italy during World War II.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue addressed this event today:

“Despite attempts by embittered ex-priests and seminarians, and others, to discredit Pope Pius XII’s heroic efforts in rescuing Jews during the Holocaust (as many as 860,000 were saved), the evidence is mounting that Pius was a ‘Righteous Gentile.’ What is happening in the Vatican today is another reminder of just how great a man he was.

“October 9 marks the 50th anniversary of Pius’ death. To mark this important event, the Vatican announced yesterday that a convention will be held November 6-8 to honor his work; a photo exhibit will be on display in the colonnade of St. Peter’s Square from October 21-January 6. Millions of Catholics hope that eventually Pius will be beatified and then canonized. The Catholic League certainly supports this process.

“Those who disagree with this assessment have a lot of explaining to do. For example, the true test of the Catholic Church’s role in rescuing Jews was in Italy, and nowhere in Europe were more Jews saved-fully 85 percent-than in Italy. Also, the chief rabbi in Rome during the German occupation, Emilio Zolli, once said that ‘no hero in all of history was more militant, more fought against, none more heroic, than Pius XII.’ Indeed, Zolli was so moved by Pius’ work that he became a Catholic after the war, taking the pope’s name as his baptismal name.

“Finally, today’s meeting of Jewish Holocaust survivors thanking the pope for what the Church did to save their lives says it all. No amount of revisionism can change that.”

Link to the Catholic League

Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust