In Defense of the Church

I was raised a Catholic, and its often said that 'once a Catholic, always a Catholic', even with a lapsed one like me.

For me, the final break with the Church was during the great child sex scandals of the 1990s and beyond.  And it wasn't so much that priests were molesting little boys, which was horrible, but how the Church tried to cover it up.

I felt that the way the Church tried to use political power to shelter the accused priests, hide them, and keep them from prosecution was totally without honor.  It was the straw that broke the camel's back for me really.  The act, harkening back to medieval times when the Church and Pope could literally order kings and princes around, was so insensitive and out of touch with modern reality, that I still can't believe they did it.   Perhaps they felt that trying to keep a lid on it and stop more information from getting out was going to save them face, well it didn't.

Anyway, some years later, people really started speaking out more on the Church's involvement in World War II with the Nazis.  There was a well-known book called Hitler's Pope by John Cornwell which seemed to be more rooted in the ancient anti-Catholic feelings of the British than anything else.  

As an armchair amateur historian of the period, I have read quite a bit about the Nazis, and their involvement with the Catholic Church.  Even though I am disgusted by how they handled the child molestation crisis, I cannot agree that Pius XII was going around heiling Hitler and cheer-leading the Nazis.  

Its a bit more complicated than that, as it always is.  

"Even so, the notion that there might be some authoritarian, patriotic, anti-Marxist, residual 'good' in Naziism, that National Socialism, notwithstanding everything, might succeed some day in eliminating from its programme and its activities all that which conflicted in principle and practice with Catholicism."

"...the potential, too, for driving a wedge between 'the god fearing statesman' Hitler and the anti-Christian Party radicals, especially Rosenberg."

The Hitler Myth, Ian Kershaw, p.36-7


This pretty much sums up everything that I've read about the troubled and murky relationship between the Catholic Church and Nazis.   Basically, the Catholics thought they could "handle" Hitler.   The Church of the day feared communism/marxism much more than the up and coming Nazi movement and hoped to use it against the communists.  Also, they believed they could do a "Bene Gesserit" with the Nazis, to use a reference to Frank Herbert's Dune series of books.  They thought they would get into their minds, use them against each other, manipulate them.   The last quote really bears that out when they thought they could separate Hitler (who was still seen as vaguely moderate, had been raised as a Catholic himself, and was still claiming to believe in god) and more pagan members of the Nazi movement like Heinrich Himmler and Alfred Rosenburg (who wrote "The Myth of the 20th Century" advocating a new pagan religion and denigrating Christianity as an evil Jewish plot).

This last part alone indicates why any hope to "handle" the Nazis was doomed to failure.  Hitler was not a moderate believer in God (or even gods) but a master cynic and propagandist who said whatever words he had to to get people to follow him.  Hitler also supported his followers weird beliefs, such as Himmler, although he did break off with Rosenburg eventually when his pagan beliefs went a little too far even for Hitler.  

The main crime of the Church in this period was overlooking the Nazis' plans for the Jewish people.  Many have argued back and forth that while the Church didn't try to put its foot down and condemn what the Nazis were doing, that they did seem to try to save individual Jews.

Also, there is the times themselves.  Its easy to look back in hindsight and make judgements but in 1940, it really did look like Nazi Germany had won!  They had overrun France, Poland and several other countries in Europe.  Britain was purely on the defensive with few choices for offensive action.  And Germany had recently signed a deal with the Soviets (fully planning to reneg this deal and attack very soon).  

The Church was assuming that the Nazis were the new bullies on the block (they'd seen a lot of them come and go over the centuries) and were just getting themselves in a position to try and deal with them.  It was a mistake to try and think they could "handle" them though, mold them.  Nazi Germany was being led not even by megalomaniac dictators but by full on psychopaths and sociopaths who were totally out of touch with reality.  

There was also the fact that the Vatican was smack dab in the heart of fascist Italy and only a stone's throw from Germany.  Any true attempt to stand up against Hitler would probably have brought violent and total retribution.  In fact, Hitler did threaten at one point to send his forces into the Vatican and clear the place out.   

This is the point at which more moral and brave people would have stood up and been counted.  Oh, its easy for us, sitting comfortably behind our computers to say "Yeah, I would have stood up, even if I had been shot, people would have known which side I was on!"  Perhaps Pius XII and his followers were a little cowardly if they did fear provoking Hitler to invade the Vatican and drag them away.  After all, such an act would have turned Catholics worldwide against the Nazis.  Of course, it would have meant the end of Pius XII and his officials' lives, and I suppose Pius XII wasn't ready for that level of martyrdom.  

In conclusion, I do not think Pius XII and the Vatican were Nazi sympathizers.  Scared for their own skin, yes.  Arrogantly and naively thinking they could somehow get some control over a bunch of frothing and foaming psychopaths, yes.   All these accusations and others can be made against them.

And like with the modern scandal, it would have been so much better for the Church to have stood up and been counted.  Even at danger of their own lives.  It would have been so much better for the Church to say "Yes, here's these sicko priests, take them away and prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law!"  It would also have been better for the Vatican to have told Hitler to shove his kampf up his stupid butt, even if it meant getting on his shit list.  Lots of cool people and innocents got on his shit list and Pius XII would have been in good company.