Praise for Hitler's Pope "A devastating indictment of Pius as guilty of moral treachery so grave that it defames his papacy and should deny his elevation to sainthood. ... Cornwell, a Cambridge University scholar and prominent British journalist, gives us an account that is unsparing, though temperate and largely dispassionate. He has fresh sources, including the records of Archbishop Pacelli during his long tenure from 1917 to 1929 as Pope Pius XI’s ambassador to Germany; correspondence from the British envoy to the Vatican; and key Jesuit archives." —The Philadelphia Inquirer "As Cornwell brilliantly demonstrates, Pius XII brought the authoritarianism and the centralization of his predecessors to their most extreme stage ... Nowadays we may not know what a saint should be, but we do know what a saint should not be—a man of narrow spirit and heart, a man who could not find at the very least a 'candid word* when millions of human beings from all corners of Europe, some of them from under his own windows, were led to their systematic extermination." —Saul Friedlander, Los Angeles Times "Scathing ... It illuminates the previously neglected episodes in the life of this prospective saint, and it alerts us to flaws in the received version." —Time "A groundbreaking narrative ... it is hard to imagine a more timely book, in light of Pope John Paul Us reaching out to the Jewish community ... The author exposes a moral myopia in Pacelli that permeated his blundering diplomacy with Hitler . The chapter on the roundup and deportation of the Jews of Rome is particularly heart-rending." —Jason Berry, Chicago Tribune "Hitler's Pope reads like a thriller as it takes us through the high-powered negotiations and international crises from an unusual perspective . Given the campaign to beatify Pius XII, this meticulous, persuasive and impassioned book is disturbing in its presentation of a profoundly flawed man obsessed with absolute papal authority no matter what the consequences for others." —Detroit Free Press "[Writing] with academic excellence and literary clarity, Cornwell does more than provide evidence of how Pius cooperated with Hitler. He reveals the internal political machinations of one of the most powerful religious organizations on the planet, as well as depicting Hitlers 'brilliance' in understanding the dynamics of power.” —Jewish Herald Voice "A devastating refutation of the claim that this Popes diplomacy can in any way be characterized as wisdom. Instead of a portrait of a man worthy of sainthood, Cornwell lays out the story of a narcissistic, power-hungry manipulator who was prepared to lie, to appease, and to collaborate in order to accomplish his ecclesiastical purpose—which was not to save lives or even to protect the Catholic Church but, more narrowly, to protect and advance the power of the papacy." —James Carroll, Atlantic Monthly "A brilliant and serious work of major historical weight. It is certain to cause shock and outrage, rationalization and denial." —New York Post "Scathing ... Is the indictment persuasive? Sadly, it is, coming not in the form of a court record but rather as a skilled biography. The books middle chapters are a superb lesson in Catholic Church politics ... Pacellis subsequent election as pope and the disastrous afermath for European Jews are thoroughly documented and smoothly written. As Catholic and Jewish leaders work to build better understanding, knowledge about how and why Pope Pius IXX acted as he did may ease their dialogue." —San Francisco Chronicle "Hitler's Pope accurately reflects the decline, inside and outside the Catholic Church, of the reputation of Eugenio Pacelli . Cornwell s arguments, his detailed grasp of Roman Catholic history and politics and his lucid prose will persuade many readers of the merits of his indictment of Pius XII." —Houston Chronicle "John Cornwell, a meticulous Catholic historian and journalist, has had access to previously unpublished Vatican documents ... [he makes] a sophisticated and surprising argument, but one that does help* make sense of some of Pius XIIs behavior." —The Wall Street Journal "A book that cannot, and should not, be ignored. Every point that Cornwell raises—whether it is Pacelli's early career, his concordat negotiations, his spirituality and approach to the world, his refusal to ever explicitly criticize Nazi Germany, and his reaction to the Holocaust— is a matter of crucial concern to Catholics. Cornwell s final words are judgmental but also challenging and inviting. His frankness may antagonize some, but I detect in this book an honesty and an angst that should not be overlooked." —The Reverend John F. Morley, Commonweal "This fascinating book would be a lightening rod at any time [but] this bid for Pius XII s sainthood is creating outrage in the Jewish community and among a large number of Catholics as well. Cornwell s meticulous and principled scholarship is a significant contribution to a painful debate." —Atlanta Journal-Constitution "If anything, given the hideous consequences of the Holocaust and the culpability of millions of people who did not fight against it, Cornwell is circumscribed and methodical... His tracing of the late nineteenth-and early twentieth-century political, ethnic, and ecclesiastical history in Europe and Rome is detailed, intricate, and fascinating. There is an argument for not caring; whats done is done and finished. Since history cannot be amended, it does not matter. That argument is unacceptable. Ignorance by choice is culpability with malice aforethought. Read this book." —Michael Pakenham, The Baltimore Sun PENGUIN BOOKS HITLER'S POPE John Cornwell is an award-winning journalist and author with a lifelong interest in Catholic and Vatican affairs. He has profiled Pope John Paul II for Vanity Fair and the London Sunday Times Magazine, and has written on Catholic issues for many publications, including the London Observer and the Tablet. His previous book on the Vatican, A Thief in the Night: The Death of Pope John Paul, a bestseller around the world, will be reissued by Penguin next year. In 1995 he won the Independent Television Authority award for services to religious journalism. From 1990 to 1996, John Cornwell was a research fellow at Jesus College, Cambridge, where he now directs the Science and Human Dimension Project. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1984. Hitler's Pope The Secret History of Pius XII by John Cornwell PENGUIN BOOKS PENGUIN BOOKS Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Putnam Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA. Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2 Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd. I82-I90 Wairau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England First published in the United States of America by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Putnam Inc. 1999 Published in Penguin Books 2000 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Copyright © John Cornwell, 1999 All rights reserved Care has been taken to trace the ownership and obtain permission, if necessary, for the photographs included in and on this book. If any errors or omissions have occurred, they will be corrected in subsequent printings, if notification is sent to the publisher. THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS HAS CATALOGED THE HARDCOVER EDITION AS FOLLOWS: Cornwell, John. Hitlers pope: the secret history of Pius XII/John Cornwell. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-670-88693-9 (he.) ISBN 0 14 02.9627 I (pbk.) I. Pius Xn, Pope, I876-I958. 2. World War, 1939-1945—Catholic Church. 3. Europe—Politics and government—1918—1945. I. Title. BXI378.C65 1999 99-283IL 282'.092—dc2I Printed in the United States of America Set in Centaur Designed by Betty Lew Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. “All successes [Pacelli believed] could only be attained by papal diplomacy. The system of concordats led him and the Vatican to despise democracy and the parliamentary system… Rigid governments, rigid centralization, and rigid treaties were supposed to introduce an era of stable order, an era of peace and quiet.” -- Heinrich Bruning, German chancellor 1930—32 "Pius XII and the Jews... The whole thing is too sad and too serious for bitterness ... a silence which is deeply and completely in complicity with all the forces which carry out oppression, injustice, aggression, exploitation, war -- Thomas Merton "The cause of the beatification and canonization of Pope Pius XII, who is rightly venerated by many millions of Catholics, will not be stopped or delayed by the unjustifiable and calumnious attacks against this great and saintly man.” -- Father Peter Gumpel, SJ., relator in the cause of Pius XII’s canonization Preface Several years ago I was at a dinner with a group of postgraduate students, some of whom were Catholics. The topic of the papacy was broached, and the party got contentious. A young woman asserted that she found it difficult to understand how any right-minded person today could be a Catholic, since the Church had sided with the most pernicious right-wing leaders of the century— Franco, Salazar, Mussolini, Hitler. Her father was Catalan; her paternal grandparents had suffered greatly at the hands of Franco during the civil war. Then the topic of Eugenio Pacelli—Pius XII, the wartime Pope — was raised, and how he had not done enough to save the Jews from the death camps In common with many Catholics of my generation, I was only too familiar with that allegation.