At a Jewish time of reflection, thoughts on a pope and Catholicism

Passover is over and Shavuot is weeks away. It's a season when Jews traditionally take time for contemplation and reflection.

This year, I've been reflecting on Catholicism. Rather on the complicated interfaith nexuses between Catholics and Jews.

In large part, of course, this is because of the beatification May 1 of Pope John Paul II.

Critics have questioned the decision by Pope Benedict XVI to waive the usual five-year waiting period and fast-track John Paul's road to sainthood.

And JP2 had his faults -- his handling of the priest sex abuse scandals has come under particular recent scrutiny.

"There have been few times in the 2,000 years of Christian Jewish relations when Jews have shed genuine tears at the death of a Pope," the eminent Holocaust scholar Michael Berenbaum wrote in a recent column. "When Pope John Paul II died, I -- and many other Jews -- cried."

I don't recall actually shedding tears when John Paul died on April 2, 2005 at the age of 84. In fact, I was in the midst of celebrating my nephew's bar mitzvah.

But I did feel deeply touched by his passing -- I had reported on John Paul during most of his nearly 27-year papacy.

In a deliberate and demonstrative way, he had made bettering Catholic-Jewish relations and confronting the Holocaust and its legacy a hallmark of his reign, and I had chronicled milestone after milestone in this process.

There had been frictions and setbacks, to be sure. Key among them was the pope's support for the canonization of his controversial World War II predecessor, Pius XII, and his refusal to open secret Vatican archives to clarify Pius' role during the Holocaust.

He also hurt Jews by welcoming Austrian President Kurt Waldheim to the Vatican after Waldheim's World War II links to the Nazis had come to light. And he upset Jews with his meetings at the Vatican with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

These episodes, however, were far outweighed by positive steps. Some of them were truly groundbreaking measures that jettisoned -- or at least shook up -- centuries of ingrained Catholic teaching and changed Catholic dogma to reflect respect for Jews and the Jewish religion and apologize for the persecution of Jews by Catholics.

They ranged from his visit to Rome's main synagogue in 1986, to his frequent meetings with rabbis, Holocaust survivors and Jewish lay leaders, to his repeated condemnation of anti-Semitism, to the establishment of relations between the Vatican and Israel, to John Paul's own pilgrimage to the Jewish state in 2000, when he prayed at the Western Wall.

It was evident throughout that he was deeply influenced by his own personal history of having grown up with Jewish friends in pre-World War II Poland and then witnessing the destruction during the Shoah.

As Berenbaum put it, John Paul II was "directly touched by the Holocaust" and "assumed responsibility for its memory."

The program director of a Catholic-run interfaith and dialogue center near the Auschwitz death camp agreed.

"Auschwitz was not an abstract tragedy but it formed part of his life," the Rev. Manfred Deselaers told the Catholic news agency Zenit.org. "Auschwitz was the school of holiness of John Paul II."

Given this background, it seemed fitting that the Vatican chose to beatify John Paul on May 1 -- the eve of this year's Holocaust Remembrance Day, Yom Hashoah.

In the Catholic calendar, May 1 this year marked the Sunday after Easter, a feast called Divine Mercy Sunday. And John Paul II had died on the very eve of Divine Mercy Sunday in 2005.

Still, the timing sent out a powerful message. And it made me reflect on how very, very radically relations between Catholics and Jews have changed, even in just the past few decades.

Relations between Catholics and Jews are not perfect, of course, and they never will be. There are still anti-Semitic elements in the Church, and John Paul II's teachings have not trickled down to all the world's more than 1 billion Catholics. But we do live in a different world.

For centuries, the popes and the Vatican "worked hard to keep Jews in their subservient place -- barring them from owning property, from practicing professions, from attending university, from traveling freely," Brown University historian David Kertzer wrote in his 2001 book "The Popes Against the Jews." "And they did all this according to canon law and the centuries-old belief that in doing so they were upholding the most basic tenets of Christianity."

Here in Rome, the papal rulers kept Jews confined to a crowded ghetto until 1870. In many places Jews would stay indoors at Easter for fear of being caught up in a blood libel accusation or be accused of desecrating the Host.

Less dramatically, I still remember from childhood how Catholic kids in my suburban Philadelphia neighborhood were forbidden to enter synagogue to attend their friends' bar mitzvah services.

Formal dialogue began only in 1965, with the Vatican's Nostra Aetate declaration that repudiated the charge that Jews were collectively responsible for killing Jesus, stressed the religious bond between Jews and Catholics, and called for interfaith contacts.

Two decades later, in 1986, when John Paul became the first pope to visit a synagogue, he embraced Rome's chief rabbi, Elio Toaff, and declared that Jews were Christianity's "dearly beloved" and "elder brothers."

Toaff met frequently with John Paul, and the two established a warm rapport. In fact, Toaff and the pope's longtime secretary were the only two individuals named in John Paul's will. The rabbi called that inclusion "a significant and profound gesture for Jews" as well as "an indication to the Catholic world."

Long retired now, Toaff celebrated his 96th birthday on April 30 -- the day before John Paul's beatification.

The memory of John Paul "remains indelibly impressed in the collective memory of the Jewish people," Toaff said in a statement published after the beatification in the Vatican's official newspaper. "In the afflicted history of relations between the popes of Rome and the Jewish people, in the shadow of the ghetto in which they were closed for over three centuries in humiliating and depressing conditions, the figure of John Paul II emerges luminous in all of its exceptionality."

Document, please.

With pleasure.

The German Ambassador to the Holy See in 1943 was Ernst von Weizsäcker, a discreet anti-Nazi who did what he could to moderate the worst excesses of Nazi cruelty. In the late summer of 1943, the Germans had taken control of Rome. On Sept. 11 Weizsäcker summoned his chief attaché Albrecht von Kessel. They discussed how they could help the Jews of Rome, concluding they must get them out of Rome and into the countryside (whether this was practical is open to question; on their own it seems they concluded this best strategy.) Not trusting Italians to transmit message, or possibly wanting to preserve plausible deniability, they worked through Swiss Secretary of the Institute of International Private Law, one Alfred Fahrener, who knew many prominent Jews.

Kessel transmitted the warning to Fahrener, asking him to communicate it to the Jewish community. Shortly afterward, on Sept 26, representatives of the Jewish community were summoned to the Nazi police HQ, where SS Major Herbert Kappler demanded 50 kilos of gold in 36 hours. Most sources agree that the Jewish community was unable to raise the full amount necessary, and the Vatican guaranteed a loan on easy terms for the 15 kilo deficit (eventually raised either from the Jewish community or private Christians) Though disputed, the most detailed account is that of Israel Zolli.

On Oct 6, Major Kappler was ordered to prepare to seize the 8,000 Jews in Rome and deport them northward. He objected, as did General Rainer Stahel (German military commander in Rome) and Fieldmarshal Kesselring. On Oct. 9 Berlin sent a supplemental order to the Wehrmacht and German diplomats in Rome not to interfere with the Jewish persecutions by the SS. Kappler’s objections may have marked him as unreliable for the job, because a special detachment of 365 SS men was sent to effect the roundup. It began early on October 16.

The Princess Enza Pignatelli learned of the Jewish roundup very early on the morning of October 16, 1943. She was well known at the Vatican, and decided to bring the news to the Pope directly. Lacking transport of her own, this intrepid and resourceful woman therefore rang the German embassy. Karl Gustav Wollenweber, an attaché of Ambassador Weizsäcker, agreed to fetch her to the Vatican in a German embassy car.

Flying the Nazi flag, the car first detoured so that the princess should see the roundup with her own eyes. They then headed for the Vatican, entering by the diplomatic entrance. The princess demanded to see the pope at once. Though she was not unknown at the Vatican, one does not just drop in on the Pope, especially before the sun is fairly up. But her manner was not to be denied, so the Maestro di Camera installed her in the papal library. As soon as he finished his morning Mass, the pope entered, and the princess delivered her report. “But the Germans promised not to touch the Jews!”— proving he knew all about the gold deal and the Vatican guarantee.

“Let’s go make a few phone calls” was the immediate response of Pope Pius, as reported by Princess Pignatelli.

I can’t tell you exactly whom the pope telephoned that morning, but we can guess that The Cardinal Secretary of State Luigi Maglione called in Ambassador Weizsäcker immediately to lodge the official protest.. Having in his pocket a Vatican assurance that they would keep mum we know that Weizsäcker set to work. Meanwhile, news of the roundup was spreading through the Roman ecclesiastical and diplomatic community. Archbishop Alois Hudal, a German prelate with responsibility for the German church in Rome, had excellent relations with the German authorities. Perhaps on his own, perhaps in collaboration with Weizsäcker ’s attaché von Kessel and another German diplomat Gerhard Gumpert, assigned to Gen. Stahel, Hudal produced a letter urging the Germans to back down. This letter was delivered at once by hand of another priest popular in German circles, Fr. Pancratius Pfeiffer. For the sake of protocol, Gen. Stahel observed for the record that this was a police matter outside his jurisdiction, but he agreed to send the letter on the Berlin. Gumpert took a copy of the letter (which he himself had secretly helped draft) and sent it to the Foreign Ministry, with a prediction of the political disturbances sure to result. Almost simultaneously, Weizsäcker — who by all appearances already knew what his aide was up to—asked for a copy of the Hudal letter and Gumpert’s telegram , to make his own report. Pretending to know nothing of the letter’s origins, Weizsäcker’s goal was to persuade Berlin to re-think the wisdom of the arrests.

The following day Gen. Stahel informed Archbishop Hudal that having referred the matter to the Gestapo in Berlin, Himmler had decided that the arrests should stop, in consideration of the special character of Rome (this being a response to frenzied appeals from the Germans only, as Weizsäcker had done his utmost to convince the Vatican that an appeal from their corner would only make matters worse and possibly precipitate disaster on the Vatican itself.)

With the Jewish community in turmoil, the Vatican threw open the doors of all religious institutions. About 4,000 Jews, as well as other Italian dissidents, politicians, and soldiers fled to their sanctuary, posted as off-limits to Germans. To encourage those in need to seek this assistance, and to encourage those in a position to do so to render aid, on Oct 26 L’Osservatore Romano published an editorial called “The Charitable Work of the Pope”. This was not part of Weizsäcker’s plan. Fearing that its message would be incriminating, on Oct. 28 Weizsäcker composed a new wire to Berlin in which he downplayed the pope’s commitment to help the Jews.

It was easier to shelter Jews amongst the general public because of their greater assimilation than in Eastern Europe. But it was still a dangerous business for both the Jews and those protecting them. There were a few cases of police raids of religious establishments, but in almost all cases their extraterritorial nature, backed by official German off-limits notices and safe conduct passes issued liberally by Weizsäcker, ensured that most were left unmolested. This is especially noteworthy in light of the obvious fact that everyone knew the Jews were there. Jews and their protectors were still vulnerable to an out-and-out denunciation that the police were unable to officially ignore. These were desperate, hungry times and some sought to survive by preying on their fellow man. There were several cases of both Jews and gentiles acting as spies and informers. On more than one occasion, Weizsäcker was contacted by Italians offering information about hidden Jews. He had them thrown out. The Jews and other hidden refugees remained in hiding till June 4, 1944, when the City was liberated by American forces.

Support of these refugees required discretion and ingenuity. With so many Allied POWs on the loose in Italy after their release by the post-Mussolini government, British Ambassador Sir D’arcy Osborne cooperated with Irish Msgr Hugh O’Flaherty to provide them with food, money and disguises. O’Flaherty acquired a certain romantic reputation for his daring and resourcefulness, sometimes spoken of as the Scarlet Pimpernel of the Vatican. Osborne, like many Allied diplomats, was a prisoner of the Vatican along with the pope. To protect its extraterritorial status he had to keep Allied POWs from seeking sanctuary there, while naturally aiding them as well as he could. Fr. Pfeiffer meanwhile, made it his business to take the pulse of the German authorities, and to serve as an unofficial go-between.

The final act to this drama came Oct 30, when L’Osservatore Romano finally published the long-awaited payoff editorial, acknowledging its appreciation of the proper conduct of Wehrmacht troops in the City. This message came too late to help or hurt Gen. Stahel, who was relieved of his command the same day, probably having been judged unreliable and not a team player over his reluctance to cooperate in the persecution of the Jews.

Before the arrests could be stopped, an estimated 1,259 Jews were taken in. These were imprisoned at the Collegio Militare, where a priest from the Vatican Secretariat managed to get in. Perhaps owing to this man, or Weizsäcker, or both, about 250 Jews were released for various technicalities from those being held. The rest met with a very sorry fate—an agonizing, circuitous trip to Auschwitz, where all but 15 vanished. Fourteen men and one woman returned after the war. But thousands – the overwhelming majority of the Jewish community in Rome – escaped, thanks largely to the generosity and courage of Pope Pius and other Catholic figures in and around Rome.

"In an article for the New York Times, James Feron noted forty years ago that Jewish historian Pinchas Lapide, after two years of research, came to the conclusion that Pope Pius XII deserved a memorial forest in the Judean hills with 860,000 trees, the number of Jewish lives saved through papal efforts. He had obtained information from accounts of survivors in Israel, from privately published accounts and from the archives of Yad Vashem. Indeed, the Church was instrumental in saving more Jews than those saved by all other institutions and organizations combined.

"The Pope depended on the local clergy to thwart Hitler’s extermination policy. “The book dramatizes one point above all others,” Feron states, “that the Pope’s efforts were dependent on the strength and heroism of his churches in each country.” Lapide traces the efforts of Roman Catholics to save the Jews and quotes a variety of sources to indicate that Papal Nuncios had received messages from the Vatican to contest the deportation of Jews. Lapide tells how Pope Pius XII sent his Papal Nuncio in Berlin to visit Hitler in Berchtesgaden to plead for the Jews. That interview ended when Hitler smashed a glass at the Nuncio’s feet. From Hitler’s reaction the Pope was convinced that public pronouncements would have sealed the fate of many more Jews. After this incident, in retaliation, Hitler connived to kidnap Pope Pius XII."

- Margherita Marchione, "Did Pope Pius XII Help the Jews?"

If you don't like Lapide, and consider him prejudiced because he was an Israeli diplomat and angling for recognition of Israel by the Vatican (that's the attack I've heard), there's still Rabbi David Dalin to deal with. He took apart Cornwell's book in The Myth of Hitler's Pope. Cornwell, of course, has recanted much of what he said in that book.

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