New evidence of Pope Pius XII’s shameful silence in the face of Nazi brutality

A Vatican scholar’s new book, based on previously sealed documents, provides damning evidence of the wartime pope’s moral failure and complicity.

Historian Istvan Deak wrote of Eugenio Pacelli, known to history as Pope Pius XII: “Fearful of Hitler’s wrath, the Pope barely raised his voice against Nazi racism … and spoke even less against Nazi antisemitism.”

Other observers noted that the pope remained silent while more than 1000 Jews were arrested in Rome on October 16, 1943, to be deported to their certain deaths at Auschwitz, and also when 335 civilians were executed in caves outside Rome known as the Fosse Ardeatine. In fact, he never specifically condemned Nazi atrocities.

“Despite claims by the pope’s defenders that a behind-the-scenes protest on his part led to an end to the round-up of Rome’s Jews following October 16, the action of the capture of the Jews did not suffer any pause,” wrote one commentator. “On the contrary, it continued by the Germans in an undisturbed manner.”

And then there is this unforgiving verdict: “As a moral leader, Pius XII must be judged a failure. He had no love for Hitler, but he was intimidated by him, as he was by Italy’s dictator … Pius XII clung to his determination to do nothing to antagonise either man. In fulfilling this aim, the pope was remarkably successful.”

These and other judgments are included in The Pope At War by David I. Kertzer, an American professor and scholar of the Vatican who has written 13 books. This recently published 621-page volume, which includes 100 pages of archival sources and references, is based on thousands of documents which were opened in 2020 after being sealed on Pius XII’s death in 1958 and stored in Germany, France, Britain, the US, Italy and the Vatican.

Kertzer explores what he describes as myths and falsehoods regarding one of history’s most controversial popes and the extent to which he spoke out - or didn’t - against the genocide of the Jewish people that was perpetrated on his watch.