- Adolf Hitler converses with the Papal Nuncio, Archbishop Cesare Orsenigo, at a New Year's reception in Berlin. (January 1, 1935)
- [Photo source, US Holocaust Museum]
"On February 10,
1939, Pius XI died, at the age of 81. [Vatican Secretary of State
Eugenio] Pacelli, then 63, was elected Pope by the College of
Cardinals in just three ballots, on March 2. He was crowned on March
12, on the eve of Hitler's march into Prague. Between his election and
his coronation he held a crucial meeting with the German cardinals.
Keen to affirm Hitler publicly, he showed them a letter of good wishes
which began, "To the Illustrious Herr Adolf Hitler." Should he, he
asked them, style the Führer "Most Illustrious"? He decided that that
might be going too far. He told the cardinals that Pius XI had said
that keeping a papal nuncio in Berlin "conflicts with our honor." But
his predecessor, he said, had been mistaken. He was going to maintain
normal diplomatic relations with Hitler. The following month, at
Pacelli's express wish, Archbishop Cesare Orsenigo, the Berlin nuncio,
hosted a gala reception in honor of Hitler's 50th birthday. A birthday
greeting to the Führer from the bishops of Germany would become an
annual tradition until the war's end."
--- From text excerpted from
John Cornwell's "Hitler's Pope" and posted at
http://emperors-clothes.com/vatican/hitlers.htm
Cornwell reports that he was given access to secret Vatican archives with the
understanding that he would write a defense of Pius XII but changed his mind
after studying the record.
Forced conversion of Serbs to Catholicism
The Nazi-like Croatian Ustashi state, set up immediately after the Nazi German invasion of Yugoslavia, was based on fanatical Catholicism. Orthodox Christian Serbs who refused to convert were butchered in their villages, or at the Jasenovac death camp, or thrown into mountain crevaces. Hitler referred to the Ustashi as "Our Nazis."
The Catholic Center Party's support for the Enabling act, which gave Hitler dictatorial powers; the Center Party's subsequent decision to dissolve itself; and the signing of the Nazi-Vatican Concordat two weeks later - these actions told Catholics it was OK to work with Nazis or even to be a Nazi. This was a big boost for Nazi forces, not only in Germany but worldwide. Case in point: the Croatian Ustashi. When the German Nazis invaded Yugoslavia in 1941, the Ustashi terrorist organization set up the so-called 'Independent State of Croatia.' The Ustashi attempted to wipe out Yugoslavia's Jewish population and made a full-scale attack on the Serbs, who were members of the Serbian Orthodox Church, bitterly opposed by the Catholic hierarchy that was the mainstay of the Ustashi. The Ustashi state went to war against the Serbs:
[Quote from "Encyclopedia of the Nations" starts here]
"Slavko Kvaternik explained [in a radio program on April 10, 1941, the day the 'Independent State of Croatia' was formed] how a pure Croatia should be built - by forcing one third of the Serbs to leave Croatia, one third to convert to Catholicism, and one third to be exterminated. Soon Ustasha bands initiated a bloody orgy of mass murder of Serbs unfortunate enough not to have converted or left Croatia on time.
"The enormity of such criminal behavior shocked even the conscience of German commanders, but Pavelic had Hitler's personal support for such actions which resulted in the loss of the lives of hundreds of thousands of Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.In addition, the Ustasa regime organized extermination camps, the most notorious one at Jasenovac where Serbs, Jews, Gypsies, and other opponents were massacred in large numbers."
[Quote from "Encyclopedia of the Nations" ends here]
-- 'Worldmark Encyclopedia of the Nations,' (Europe, 1995) 91
The above-quoted report describes German commanders as being shocked by Croatian Ustashi barbarity. However, the Germans used equally brutal methods to destroy Jewish villages in the Soviet Union after the German Nazi invasion. Perhaps the Germans were shocked because the people being slaughtered were perceived as human, that is, they were not Jews...
The forced conversion of tens of thousands of Serbs to Catholicism by the Ustashi regime proves its fanatically Catholic character; hence the 'Independent State of Croatia' is commonly referred to as a 'Clerical-Fascist' state. Since the Vatican controlled the Catholic hierarchy worldwide, and since the Croatian Catholic hierarchy accepted papal infallibility and organizational direction, how can we explain the Ustashi's Catholic violence except as an expression of the policies of the Church under Pope Pius XII?
The Germans invaded Yugoslavia on April 10, 1941. According to the following report from the Yugoslav Embassy in Washington, Croatian Catholic Archbishop Stepinac helped the Ustashi terrorists create their pro-Nazi state. As in Germany, the stance taken by the Church hierarchy guided lower clergy and lay Catholics:
[Excerpt from Yugoslav Embassy report starts here]
[On April 10, the day of the Nazi invasion, Croatian Ustashi leader Ante Pavelic was in Italy.] On that very same day Pavelic's [lieutenant], Slavko Kvaternik, leader of the illegal Ustashi movement, proclaimed the Independent State of Croatia and formed the first Ustashi government. [Croatian Catholic] Archbishop Stepinac at once sided with the Ustashi traitors and helped them take over the government. On April 12, 1941, while fighting between the Germans and the Yugoslav Army was still going on in the Bosnian mountains -- while millions of patriotic Yugoslavs were still determined to resist the invaders -- Archbishop Stepinac openly called on Kvaternik and congratulated him on his success.
The day before Easter, Slavko Kvaternik visited Archbishop Stepinac. The official organ of the Archbishopric, Katolicki List, reported that the Archbishop had expressed his highest satisfaction to Kvaternik. The Ustashi newspaper Krvatske Novosti, in its Easter issue, underlined the significance of this interchange of visits and pointed out the cordiality with which the Archbishop of Zagreb had greeted the deputy of Dr. Pavelic. This newspaper drew the conclusion that the foundation was laid for intimate cooperation between the Ustashi movement and the highest representative of the Roman Catholic Church in the Croatian State.
What other conclusion could the lower clergy reach, despite the knowledge that both Kvaternik and Pavelic had been sentenced to death in absentia for their roles in the murder of King Alexander and French Foreign Minister Barthou?On April 13, 1941, Ante Pavelic reached Zagreb from Italy. On the very next day -- the Royal Yugoslav Army was still fighting -- Archbishop Stepinac paid him a visit, to greet him and voice his congratulations.
Two weeks later, on April 28, 1941, Archbishop Stepinac issued a pastoral letter asking the clergy to respond without hesitation to his call that they take part in the exalted work of defending and improving the Independent State of Croatia. He emphasized his deep conviction that the efforts of the Poglavnik [i.e., the leader of the Croatian Ustashi state, Ante Pavelic - J.I.] would meet with complete understanding and support, basing this confidence on his acquaintance with the men now directing the destiny of the Croatian people. He believed and hoped, his letter said, that in the resurrected Croatian State the Church would be able in complete freedom to preach "the invincible principles of eternal truth and justice." The pastoral letter, which was also published in Nedelja and Katolicki List on April 28, 1941, declared:"Honorable brethren, there is not one among you who did not recently witness the most significant event in the life of the Croatian people among whom we act as herald of Christ's word. These are events that fulfilled the long-dreamed of and desired ideal of our people.... You should therefore readily answer my call to do elevated work for the safeguarding and the progress of the Independent State of Croatia.... Prove yourselves, honorable brethren, and fulfill now your duty toward the young Independent State of Croatia."
The Ustashi section of the clergy, which had been active in terrorism even before the war, did not need this circular to tell them how to act. But a great part of the Catholic clergy, not earlier involved in the Ustashi movement, accepted the circular as a directive, an order from their most responsible chief; and in accordance with its exhortations placed themselves at the disposal of the Ustashi. Answering the call of the Primate of the church, many priests then engaged actively in supporting the Ustashi regime. [My emphasis - J.I.]
http://emperors-clothes.com/croatia/stepinac1.htm
[Excerpt from Yugoslav Embassy report ends here]
Croatian Ustashi fuehrer
Ante Pavelic giving Nazi salute (far left) with Archbishop Alojzije Stepinac
(far right) and other Catholic Church leaders
A Cardinal marches with the German Nazis
A religious leader, apparently Cardinal Michael Faulhaber, marches between rows of SA men at a Nazi rally in Munich.
- Some claim the religious figure in the photo is papal nuncio Archbishop Cesare Orsenigo, not Cardinal Faulhaber. Regardless, no one denies he is a high ranking representative of the Catholic Church.
- (Source: A Moral Reckoning: The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust and Its Unfulfilled Duty of Repair by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen - Posted on the Internet by Jim Walker; the text is my edited version of Mr. Walker's text - J.I.)
In the Vatican's much-praised, "We Remember: Reflections on the Holocaust," we read:
"The well-known Advent sermons of Cardinal Faulhaber in 1933, the very year in which National Socialism came to power, at which not just Catholics but also Protestants and Jews were present, clearly expressed rejection of the Nazi anti-Semitic propaganda."
http://tinyurl.com/bxszb
Could it be that the Jesuit scholars who wrote "We Remember" never read Cardinal Faulhaber's Advent Sermons? If so, please permit me to be of assistance. I have the full text of the 1933 Advent Sermons in front of me. The Cardinal's position was the exact opposite of what the Vatican claims. Faulhaber stated that:
"From the Church's point of view there is no objection whatsoever to racial research and race culture." (page 107)
What Faulhaber did oppose was the demand by some Nazis that Christians reject the Hebrew bible, which would in effect have negated the Catholic doctrine that Christianity was "the true Israel," i.e., the inheritor of the bible.
Consider this excerpt, reproduced exactly at it appears in the official translation of Faulhaber's Advent Sermons:
"By accepting these books, Christianity does not become a Jewish religion. These books were not composed by Jews; they are inspired by the Holy Ghost, and therefore they are the word of God, they are God's books. The writers of them were God's pencils, the psalm-singers were harps in the hand of God, the Prophets were announcers of God's revelation. It is for this reason that the scriptures of the Old Testament are worthy of credence and veneration for all time. Antagonism to the Jews of today must not be extended to the books of Pre-Christian Judaism." - p.14
[My emphasis - J.I.]- Faulhaber, Cardinal Michael von, "Judaism, Christianity, Germany." (New York, Macmillan: 1934)
* * *
Croatian Ustashi dictator Ante Pavelic with Franciscan monks. The
Franciscan order was active in the genocide against Serbs, Jews and Roma.
Catholic clergy and Nazi
officials, including Joseph Goebbels (far right) and Wilhelm Frick (second
from right), give the Nazi salute. Germany, date uncertain.
[Photo source,
Holocaust Encyclopedia,]
In 1933, under the leadership of its Cardinal Secretary of State, Eugenio Pacelli (who became Pope Pius XII), the Vatican negotiated a Concordat with Adolf Hitler. Catholic historian James Carroll writes:
"Even an indirect endorsement meant everything to Hitler as he sought to establish his legitimacy at home and abroad. In these early months of 1933, Catholic leaders went from being Hitler's staunch opponents to his latest allies. This transformation was dramatically symbolized by the fact that in 1932, the Fulda Episcopal Conference, representing the Catholic hierarchy of Germany, banned membership in the Nazi Party and forbade priests from offering communion to anyone wearing the swastika; then, on March 28, 1933, two weeks after Pacelli offered his overture to Hitler, the same Fulda conferees voted to lift the ban on Catholic membership in the Nazi Party. The bishops expressed, as they put it, 'a certain confidence in the new government, subject to reservations concerning some religious and moral lapses.' Swastika bearers would now be welcomed at the communion rail."
As part of its Concordat with the Nazi regime, the Vatican had the huge Center Party, the Catholic Party, which had previously opposed the Nazis, vote for the so-called 'Enabling Act,' which gave Hitler dictatorial powers, and then dissolve itself. Carroll writes:
"The Reichskonkordat effectively removed the Catholic Church from any continued role of opposition to Hitler. More than that, as Hitler told his cabinet on July 14, it established a context that would be 'especially significant in the urgent struggle against international Jewry.' The deep well of Catholic antisemitism would be tapped, to run as freely as any stream of hate in Germany. The positive side of the long-standing ambivalence, which had again and again been the source of impulses to protect Jews, would now be eliminated, allowing the negative side to metastasize."
-- J. Carroll, Constantine's Sword, (New York, 2002) 498-500
In the above-quoted excerpt, Mr. Carroll seems to suggest that it was the "long-standing ambivalence" of the Catholic Church as an organization that had been, prior to the Reichskonkordat, "again and again... the source of impulses to protect Jews." There are several problems with this.
First, the existence of a human impulse to decency, whether among Catholics or anyone else, is not proof of official policy. As a youthful participant in the US Civil Rights movement, I saw whites who objected to - and even took brave action to oppose - harsh treatment of black people. Such actions, while heartening, do not disprove the existence of an officially sanctioned system of abuse predicated on a theory (in this case, that blacks were supposedly less human). Similarly, of course many Catholics have been kind towards Jews and even drawn towards Jewish culture and thinking. But this does not contradict a 2,000 year policy of the Church hierarchy which has a) stigmatized Jews as "killers of Jesus," which belief has fed and justified antisemitism, including the Nazi variety and b) discriminated sharply and/or subtly against Jews (e.g., the ghettos in which Jews were forced to live in the papal states) and c) conducted brutal campaigns against Jews (the inquisition is only one example.)
Second, the seeming ambivalence of the official Church is rooted in a doctrinal contradiction: since Christianity is presented as the fulfillment of Jewish prophecy, the Church hierarchy needs to have some Jews around, but it has not wanted them to prosper, or at least not for long, because ordinary Catholics might see that as evidence that God had not rejected the Jews for failing to accept Jesus as divine. This policy was first enunciated by St. Augustine, who cited Psalm 59: "Slay them not, lest my people forget: scatter them by thy power; and bring them down, O Lord our shield."
In other words, don't wipe them out, or at least not all of them, because Catholic doctrine presents the Bible (i.e., Jewish scripture) as predicting the coming of Jesus. But scatter them (i.e., don't let them return to Judah, let alone have a state there) and bring them down (make sure they suffer) so that Christians will see what happened to the Jews because they rejected the doctrine that Jesus was divine. And, by all means, provide a steady stream of much-publicized Jewish converts as proof of the benevolence and divinity of Christianity, the acceptance of which constitutes, according to Church doctrine, the salvation of Jews.
Thus the Vatican is perfectly
capable of making statements against abuse of the Jews (who are presented as
constituting "our Abrahamic roots" which is not necessarily a statement of
brotherly affection, but can be one of religious self-justification!) even
as it encourages - sometimes in the same statements - abuse of Jews. I am in
the midst of writing a series on Pope John Paul II that deals in part with
the above-described phenomenon. Three articles are posted:
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/vatican/pope-1.htm and
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/vatican/pope-2.htm
http://emperors-clothes.com/vatican/pope-3.htm
Priests give Hitler salute at a Catholic youth rally in the Berlin-Neukolln stadium in August 1933.
[Source: A
Moral Reckoning: The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust
and Its Unfulfilled Duty of Repair by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen]
Adolf Hitler
greets his favorite, Ante Pavelic, leader of the Croatian Ustashi and soon
to be fuehrer of the Ustashi state, upon Pavelic's arrival
at the Berghof for a state visit. (June 9, 1941)
Hitler had reason to smile.
The Nazi German Army would invade Yugoslavia April 10; Pavelic's Ustashi
(Clerical-Fascist) forces would
immediately set up a dictatorship
based on
fanatical Catholicism and so-called "racial purity." By
April 28th Croatian Archbishop Stepinac would issue a pastoral letter
telling Catholics to support this Nazi-like dictatorship.
Croatian Catholic Cardinal Stepinac, front center, was a deputy in the Sabor,
the pseudo-legislature of the Nazi-like Croatian Ustashi dictatorship.
After WWII, Yugoslavia put Cardinal Stepinac on trial. The Catholic Church
fiercely defended Stepinac against the charge that he had helped the Ustashi
even as the Vatican secretly worked with US military intelligence to help Ustashi war criminals escape
from Europe, using a network known as the Ratline.
In 1991 the political heirs to the Ustashi took leadership of the
Yugoslav Republic of Croatia and led a secessionist rebellion. They
rehabilitated Ustashi leaders and renewed war against the Serbian people.
The title of an Emperor's Clothes article accurately describes the Western
response: "The
Media Suppressed the Truth about the Rebirth of Croatian Fascism."
Just as the Catholic Church hierarchy helped to establish and lead the Ustashi 'Independent State of Croatia' during World War II, so the Church helped neo-Ustashi leaders create a new independent Croatia in the 1990s.When, in June 1991, neo-Ustashi extremists launched the Yugoslav wars of secession by attacking federal troops in Croatia, the Church hierarchy painted a sympathetic picture of the secessionists. A few days after the Croatians declared war, the Pope sent a letter to the Yugoslav government demanding it not suppress the rebellion. On June 29th, the Pope spoke to pilgrims in St. Peter's Square:
[Excerpt from United Press International starts here]
Pope calls on Yugoslav leaders to respect 'legitimate aspirations', United Press International, June 29, 1991, Saturday, BC cycle, International, 546 words, By Charles Ridley, Vatican City
[...]
''My thoughts today turn in particular to the dear peoples of Croatia and Slovenia,'' the pope said. ''I feel close to those who are grieving for their dead, to the wounded and to all those who are living in sorrow and fear.
''I repeat once again that one cannot and must not suffocate with force the rights and legitimate aspirations of the peoples,'' the pope said.
''I want in this way to encourage all those initiatives aimed at seeking just solutions, which alone can guarantee peace and fraternal coexistence among the peoples,'' he said.
John Paul called on ''the authorities of all the Yugoslav republics to show a constructive will for dialogue and long-sighted wisdom.''
The pope's appeals, and his repeated reference to ''legitimate rights'' appeared to support a declaration made by Yugoslav Catholic bishops Thursday which strongly defended the right of Slovenia and Croatia to declare their independence.
Vatican radio broadcast the full text of the declaration Saturday, around the same time the pope spoke in St. Peter's square. [My emphasis][...]
[Excerpt from United Press International starts here]
Over the next four years, independent Croatia drove about 600,000 Serbs from their homes, with never a word from the Pope protesting this "suffocat[ion] with force [of ] the rights and legitimate aspirations" of Serbs. About half the Serbs were expelled from Croatia proper and the other half from the neighboring territory of Krajina, claimed by Croatia; the overwhelmingly Serbian population of the Krajina had opposed the break-up of Yugoslavia.
The most explosive and violent act of ethnic cleansing occurred in August 1995, when the Croatian army, led by US forces, drove a quarter million Serbian residents from the Krajina.
The media talks endlessly about a supposed massacre in Srebrenica, the existence of which is contested, whereas the media very rarely mentions the liquidation of Serbian Krajina, the greatest act of genocide in Europe since World War II.
 |
|
The Trail of Tears. In August 1995 the Croatian Army's 'Operation Storm' drove 250,00 Serbs from their homes. Unknown numbers were slaughtered in the onslaught, which included armored and aerial bombardment of cities and towns, and subsequent house to house operations in Serbian villages, during which many more civilians were butchered. I have posted a (London) Guardian article, "Victorious Croats 'Burned Villages," which presents an understated description of what the Croats did after seizing the Krajina. http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/krajburn.htm |
Three years after the eradication of the Krajina, the Pope was in Croatia, kissing the soil and beatifying the notorious Cardinal Stepinac. At a time when hundreds of thousands of ethnic Serbs, recently driven from their homes by the Croatian leaders, were living in poverty in refugee camps in Serbia, with no effort at reconciliation - let alone compensation - by Croatia, the Pope blessed the neo-Ustashi leaders with his presence and his words:
"I greet the members of the Government and the other distinguished persons who honour this meeting with their presence." [5]
While beatifying Cardinal Stepinac, the Pope also beautified Croatian war crimes, speaking as if Croatia had not itself launched the wars of secession, and, in Orwellian fashion, praising Croatia for having a spirit of reconciliation:
"After the violent and brutal war in which it found itself involved, Croatia is finally experiencing a period of peace and freedom. Now all the population's energies are dedicated to the gradual healing of the deep wounds of the conflict, to a genuine reconciliation among all the nation's ethnic, religious and political groups, and to an ever greater democratisation of society." [5]
He had met a genocide, and he called it love.
To read the case against Cardinal Stepinac, the man Pope John Paul II
beatified in Croatia, go to
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/croatia/stepinac1.htm
