Letters

23 May 2009

Spectator readers respond to recent articles

Pius XII and the Jews

Sir: Simon Caldwell provides a somewhat one-sided view of Pius XII and his attitude to the Jews (‘Time to reprieve Pius XII’, 16 May). To investigate Pius XII’s true position, the Holy See set up the International Catholic–Jewish Historical Commission (ICJHC) in 2000. A number of serious criticisms were made but the ICJHC was forced to stop its investigation when the Vatican, having seen a draft, refused them access to non-published archival documents from after 1923, making any further work impossible.
Among their initial findings was the fact that Pius XII was clearly aware of the seriousness of the situation of European Jewry from as early as 1941, when he received details from the Bishop of Berlin, who asked for papal assistance. Another archbishop wrote in 1941 asking him to draw attention to the mass murder of the Jews in Lvov, which he refused to do. Giuseppe Roncalli, who later became Pope John XXIII, expressed criticism of the Vatican’s silence when Pius XII ignored the details he had forwarded detailing the exterminations at Auschwitz.

In 1941 the assistant chief of the US delegation to the Vatican asked the Pope to condemn the Nazi atrocities. He was told that the Holy See wanted to remain ‘neutral’. There is evidence that this was not so. For example, the Pope was happy to denounce abuses committed by the Soviet army against Germans living in Russia.

There is much evidence of assistance being given to Jews during the war by the Catholic Church, but Simon Caldwell should give no credit for this to Pius XII.

Jeffrey Pike
Via email