I routinely receive personal attacks - generally by those who remain anonymous - as a result of my efforts to focus on the moral bankruptcy of the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church. One recent commenter asked if I had no shame. It truth, it is not me who has no shame but rather Pope Benedict XVI who is now moving to push the canonization of Pope Pius XII - infamous for his failure to stand up to the fascism of Hitler and Mussolini. Pius XII appears to have put more stock in the Church's property and possessions than he did for the millions killed by the Nazi regime - a mindset all too similar to that which promoted the enabling and cover up of the sexual molestation of minors more recently. Benedict XVI apparently believes that Catholics are too stupid to do a little historical research on Pius XII and figure out that they are being fed a line of bull shit. Again, it's the Vatican that has no shame. Here are highlights from an article by James Carroll at the Daily Beast that looks at the shameless hypocrisy of promoting Pius XII for sainthood:*
Arbeit Macht Frei was an instance of the Big Lie, a promise of liberation to those who labored in the Nazi death camps. The iconic sign bearing those words arching over the entrance into the prisoners’ area of Auschwitz was stolen last week. Five men have been arrested, and the sign, cut into three pieces, has been recovered. But the event has lasting resonance. The theft was a mortal offense not just because of the death camp’s sacrosanct status, but because it amounts to a removal of evidence.
*
The day after the theft at Auschwitz, as it happens, the Vatican engaged in its version of tampering with Holocaust evidence. While Hitler’s Big Lie stands in a moral category apart, the Roman Catholic hierarchy sponsored a large deceit of its own when it finally and formally declared that Pius XII was a figure of “heroic virtue,” advancing him along the road to sainthood. Obviously, the Vatican has come to a firm conclusion, but its assessment of the wartime pope, from the evidence that exists and the records that have been made public, is factually untrue. Pope Benedict XVI, presiding over this recasting of history, brings his own special edge to it as a German inclined to minimize guilt, and as a defender of absolute papal authority.
*
The case against Pius XII is well established: He knew early on of Hitler’s plan for the Final Solution of the “Jewish problem,” and never raised his voice against it. . . . Pius XII is not to be held responsible in any way for the millions of Catholics, and other Christians, who, in the absence of his challenge to conscience, either actively participated in the genocide or did nothing to inhibit it. Neither is he charged, more perplexingly, with any responsibility for those senior Catholic officials who helped run the infamous post-war “rat line,” enabling the escape of Nazi war criminals (like Adolf Eichmann) to Latin America.
*
Records so far made public show a timid, if anguished, figure—a man who had come to loathe Hitler, but who restricted what opposition he could muster to inconsequential gestures behind the scenes. Heroic? It was one thing for Pius to have said nothing about the fate of innocents in distant countries, but, in October 1943, more than a thousand Jews were rounded up in the Roman Ghetto at the foot of Vatican hill, within sight of the pope’s windows, and still he did nothing. That is a fact. Those Jews died in Auschwitz.
*
But the actions, or lack of actions, that Pius took during the war leaves aside the even graver question of the moral and political consequences of his strong affirmation of Hitler in 1933 when, as Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli and the Vatican’s foreign minister, he negotiated the so-called Reichskonkordat, which made the Vatican the first government to enter into a bilateral treaty with Hitler. In addition to giving Hitler enormous prestige when other governments were wary of him, that treaty, not incidentally, protected the rights of the Catholic Church in Germany while explicitly (and secretly) indicating the church would have nothing to say about the fate of Jews (unless they had accepted baptism). Pius never renounced the treaty. That too is a fact.
*
Pope Pius XII’s infamous silence in the face of the Nazi onslaught against the Jewish people was not so much the crime, but the evidence—the evidence of a broad cultural failure, of something corrupt in the civilization that grew out of Christendom. . . . Pope Benedict’s action this week seeks to destroy the evidence, which is the point. If he were to have his declaration hoisted as a sign, it would say: “The Holocaust was the work of a few Nazis, period.” In fact, that has been a theme of his controversial papal statements on the subject.
*
One needn’t lay particular guilt at the feet of the young Joseph Ratzinger for his having joined the Hitler Youth or having served in the Wehrmacht. Teenage Germans were not operating as free agents during the Third Reich. It is the mature Ratzinger who prompts troubling questions with his determination to rewrite history—precisely to protect what he would call the “hierarchy of truth” over which he presides. . . . the failure of Pius XII to pass the decisive moral test of the 20th century undercuts this hierarchy, and any meaningful claim to papal infallibility—which is why his failure must be denied at all costs. The evidence must be destroyed. That is why Pope Benedict and his circle go beyond defending the ineffectual Pius XII. . .
*
Sadly, the leadership of the Catholic Church lost sight of the truth not to mention the true Gospel message decades or even centuries ago. Its goal today is to protect its power, control and immense wealth. The Church hierarchy has become the modern day equivalent of the Pharisees so roundly condemned in the New Testament. The Church hierarchy and those they defend it, not me, are the ones without shame.
*
The day after the theft at Auschwitz, as it happens, the Vatican engaged in its version of tampering with Holocaust evidence. While Hitler’s Big Lie stands in a moral category apart, the Roman Catholic hierarchy sponsored a large deceit of its own when it finally and formally declared that Pius XII was a figure of “heroic virtue,” advancing him along the road to sainthood. Obviously, the Vatican has come to a firm conclusion, but its assessment of the wartime pope, from the evidence that exists and the records that have been made public, is factually untrue. Pope Benedict XVI, presiding over this recasting of history, brings his own special edge to it as a German inclined to minimize guilt, and as a defender of absolute papal authority.
*
The case against Pius XII is well established: He knew early on of Hitler’s plan for the Final Solution of the “Jewish problem,” and never raised his voice against it. . . . Pius XII is not to be held responsible in any way for the millions of Catholics, and other Christians, who, in the absence of his challenge to conscience, either actively participated in the genocide or did nothing to inhibit it. Neither is he charged, more perplexingly, with any responsibility for those senior Catholic officials who helped run the infamous post-war “rat line,” enabling the escape of Nazi war criminals (like Adolf Eichmann) to Latin America.
*
Records so far made public show a timid, if anguished, figure—a man who had come to loathe Hitler, but who restricted what opposition he could muster to inconsequential gestures behind the scenes. Heroic? It was one thing for Pius to have said nothing about the fate of innocents in distant countries, but, in October 1943, more than a thousand Jews were rounded up in the Roman Ghetto at the foot of Vatican hill, within sight of the pope’s windows, and still he did nothing. That is a fact. Those Jews died in Auschwitz.
*
But the actions, or lack of actions, that Pius took during the war leaves aside the even graver question of the moral and political consequences of his strong affirmation of Hitler in 1933 when, as Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli and the Vatican’s foreign minister, he negotiated the so-called Reichskonkordat, which made the Vatican the first government to enter into a bilateral treaty with Hitler. In addition to giving Hitler enormous prestige when other governments were wary of him, that treaty, not incidentally, protected the rights of the Catholic Church in Germany while explicitly (and secretly) indicating the church would have nothing to say about the fate of Jews (unless they had accepted baptism). Pius never renounced the treaty. That too is a fact.
*
Pope Pius XII’s infamous silence in the face of the Nazi onslaught against the Jewish people was not so much the crime, but the evidence—the evidence of a broad cultural failure, of something corrupt in the civilization that grew out of Christendom. . . . Pope Benedict’s action this week seeks to destroy the evidence, which is the point. If he were to have his declaration hoisted as a sign, it would say: “The Holocaust was the work of a few Nazis, period.” In fact, that has been a theme of his controversial papal statements on the subject.
*
One needn’t lay particular guilt at the feet of the young Joseph Ratzinger for his having joined the Hitler Youth or having served in the Wehrmacht. Teenage Germans were not operating as free agents during the Third Reich. It is the mature Ratzinger who prompts troubling questions with his determination to rewrite history—precisely to protect what he would call the “hierarchy of truth” over which he presides. . . . the failure of Pius XII to pass the decisive moral test of the 20th century undercuts this hierarchy, and any meaningful claim to papal infallibility—which is why his failure must be denied at all costs. The evidence must be destroyed. That is why Pope Benedict and his circle go beyond defending the ineffectual Pius XII. . .
*
Sadly, the leadership of the Catholic Church lost sight of the truth not to mention the true Gospel message decades or even centuries ago. Its goal today is to protect its power, control and immense wealth. The Church hierarchy has become the modern day equivalent of the Pharisees so roundly condemned in the New Testament. The Church hierarchy and those they defend it, not me, are the ones without shame.
1 comment:
If only this anti-semitic, homophobic, malechauvinist institutuion had been held responsible for its complicity in the Jewish (and Croatian) holocaust(s), maybe it would think twice before continuing its efforts to shower contempt on gays and women who don't submit to its male chauvinists.
See my
JesusWouldBeFurious.Org/RCscandal.
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