Panel or Pius XII Wants More Documentation

Panel on Pius XII Wants More Documentation - Expresses Confidence That Vatican Will Respond Positively

ROME, OCT. 26, 2000 (ZENIT.org).- The commission of Jewish and Catholic scholars studying the role of Pius XII during World War II has asked the Vatican for access to more documents.

The International Catholic-Jewish Commission was formed 11 months ago by the Vatican and Jewish groups to study claims that Pius XII did not speak out forcefully enough against the Nazis.

The panel, made up of three Catholic and three Jewish historians, presented its preliminary report during a press conference today, prompted in part by a news leak a day earlier by the French newspaper Le Monde.

One of the panel's coordinators, Seymour Reich, of the International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultations, said, "Obviously ... the Vatican will have to analyze our report and know how to respond, and this is something that cannot be done in a day."

The historians in general said they are confident that the Vatican will respond positively to their request.

Another Jewish member of the commission, Bernard Suchecky, research director at the Free University of Brussels, Belgium, was quoted by Le Monde as expressing satisfaction with the cooperation established among the six historians.

He commented to the newspaper on how "Pius XII was especially concerned about the fate of German Catholics, a posture nourished by his personal historical appreciation, according to which there was a communism that had to be ended, and a Nazism that was considered a passing trial."

Le Monde said the commission is interested in finding more papal documentation regarding the anti-Semitic laws of the Vichy Republic, the crimes committed by Ante Pavelic in Croatia, and the deadly "Kristallnacht" of November 1938.

A Catholic member of the panel, Eva Fleischner, volunteered her opinion on Pius XII: "The expectations on the role he could play against Nazism are very high, higher than for any other leader. In addition, Pope Pacelli believed in the role of diplomacy, which also has its rules and limitations."

"Perhaps he did not understand that to stop the lethal destructive machine of Nazism something more was needed in addition to prayer and diplomacy," she added. "In this connection I maintain that he was more of a diplomat than a prophet."

Suchecky observed that "anachronism is a great enemy of history: We cannot apply to the Holy See of that time the vision of the world we have today, when Catholic anti-Judaism has been questioned by Vatican Council II."

Jewish member Michael Marrus, an expert in Holocaust studies, called for a distinction between "information and conscience: the news on the Nazi crimes was in the possession of the Vatican as it was in that of other governments, but conscience needs more time."

Following meetings with Church officials over the past days, the commission members have no doubts about being able to continue their research.

"We know that the Vatican respects the freedom of studies and is giving that example on all occasions," said coordinator Eugene Fisher, of the Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs Committee of the U.S. bishops' conference.

In response to the Le Monde report, Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said Wednesday that the "commission's report expresses positive appreciation for the documentation that has been made available by the archives and indicates, succinctly, the lines on which future research will be based. The report also contains a series of questions that, according to the experts of the group, would need further documentation for more profound study."

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ZEN - Zenit
26. oktober 2000