Yad VaShem changes text on Pope Pius XII


The controversial text on Pope Pius XII in the Yad VaShem Museum in Jerusalem has been changed and will be unveiled today, Sunday, July 1, 2012.

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The text that is to be replaced had provoked protest from the Catholic Church and from many Catholics, who visited Yad VaShem. The outgoing Apostolic Nuncio to Israel, Archbishop Antonio Franco, had also protested strongly and his actions led to a joint commission of scholars from Yad VaShem and from the Catholic Church, who have been studying the question of Pope Pius XII’s words and actions during the dark years of the Shoah. The Saint James Vicariate for Hebrew Speaking Catholics also published a statement on this issue in December 2009 (see here).

The new text does not hide the harsh criticism that Yad VaShem levels against the Pope and the Holy See but does add some complexity to the text. See the HaAretz article on this issue here

The old text entitled “Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust,” read: “Pius XII’s reaction to the murder of the Jews during the Holocaust is a matter of controversy. In 1933, when he was Secretary of the Vatican State, he was active in obtaining a Concordat with the German regime to preserve the Church’s rights in Germany, even if this meant recognizing the Nazi racist regime. When he was elected Pope in 1939, he shelved a letter against racism and anti-Semitism that his predecessor had prepared. Even when reports about the murder of Jews reached the Vatican, the Pope did not protest either verbally or in writing.

“In December 1942, he abstained from signing the Allied declaration condemning the extermination of the Jews. When Jews were deported from Rome to Auschwitz, the Pope did not intervene. The Pope maintained his neutral position throughout the war, with the exception of appeals to the rulers of Hungary and Slovakia toward its end. His silence and the absence of guidelines obliged Churchmen throughout Europe to decide on their own how to react.”

The new text reads

The new wall text is headed: “The Vatican and the Holocaust.” It notes that it was Pius XII’s predecessor, Pius XI, who signed the Concordat with Nazi Germany. It reiterates the fact that Pius XII did not sign the Allied declaration but mentions that a few days later, during a Christmas radio broadcast, the Pope mentioned “the hundreds of thousands of persons who without any fault on their part, sometimes only because of their nationality or ethnic origin have been consigned to death or slow decline.” The wall text notes that Pius XII did not mention the Jews specifically.

The new wall text also mentions the Pope’s nonintervention during the deportation of the Jews of Rome to Auschwitz in contrast to his appeal for the Jews of Hungary and Slovakia, and uses the term “moral failure” ? which the previous wall text did not.

“The Pope’s critics claim that his decision to abstain from condemning the murder of the Jews by Nazi Germany constitutes a moral failure: the lack of clear guidance left room for many to collaborate with Nazi Germany, reassured by the thought that this did not contradict the Church’s moral teachings,” it reads.

“It also left the initiative to rescue Jews to individual clerics and laymen. His defenders maintain that this neutrality prevented harsher measures against the Vatican and the Church’s institutions throughout Europe, thus enabling a considerable number of secret rescue activities to take place at different levels of the Church.

Moreover, they point to cases in which the Pontiff offered encouragement to activities in which Jews were rescued. Until all relevant material is available to scholars, this topic will remain open to further inquiry,” the wall text concludes.

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