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Pope defends WWII pontiff's role

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Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:05:42 PM
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---------------Pope defends WWII pontiff's role
Pope Pius XII, who died in 1958
Benedict said Pius showed "courageous and paternal dedication"

Pope Benedict XVI has defended the actions of predecessor Pius XII during World War II, saying the pontiff spared no effort to try to save Jews.

Pius XII has long been accused by Jewish groups and scholars of turning a blind eye to the fate of the Jews.

Pope Benedict said that Pius had intervened directly and indirectly but often had to be "secret and silent" given the circumstances.

Pope Benedict said he wanted prejudice against Pius to be overcome.

Analysts say this was one of the strongest Vatican defences yet of Pius's role.

Beatification

Pope Benedict was speaking at a meeting with the US-based interfaith group, the Pave the Way Foundation, at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo.

He said Pius showed "courageous and paternal dedication" in trying to save Jews.

Pope Benedict said: "Wherever possible he spared no effort in intervening in their favour either directly or through instructions given to other individuals or to institutions of the Catholic Church.

Pope Benedict said the interventions were "made secretly and silently, precisely because, given the concrete situation of that difficult historical moment, only in this way was it possible to avoid the worst and save the greatest number of Jews".

Pius was the pontiff from 1939 to 1958 and the Vatican has begun his beatification process.

Many Jewish groups criticised him for not speaking out against the Nazis, who killed six million Jews.

Material at the Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, talks of Pius's "neutral" position.


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:07:43 PM
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O MY LORD JAH HOW LONG?

BLASPHEMY BLASPHEMY WHY NOT CANONIZE MUSSOLINI


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:13:10 PM
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Adolf Hitler, son of the Catholic Church, died while defending Christianity. It is therefore understandable that words cannot be found to lament over his death, when so many were found to exalt his life. Over his mortal remains stands his victorious moral figure. With the palm of the martyr, God gives Hitler the laurels of Victory". -Spanish dictator (Francisco Franco, Knight of the Order of Christ) published on the 3rd of May 1945, the day of Hitler's death. ("Reforme", 21st of July 1945.)


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:14:12 PM
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"At a time when the heads of the major nations in the world faced the new Germany with cool reserve and considerable suspicion, the Catholic Church, the greatest moral power on earth, through the Concordat expressed its confidence in the new German government."

- Guenter Lewy, The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:14:53 PM
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Another well informed person, the mainspring of the pact between the Holy See and Berlin and the pope's secret chamberlain, Franz von Papen, was even more explicit: "The Third Reich is the first world power which not only acknowledges but also puts into practice the high principles of the papacy". (Robert d'Harcourt of the French Academy: "Franz von Papen, l'homme a tout faire" L'Aube, 3rd of October 1946).

To this, we will add the result of this "putting into practice": 25 million victims of the concentration camps—the official figure issued by the United Nations Organisation. Secret history of the jesuits Page 164


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:16:51 PM
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Georg Ratzinger (the Pope's brother)



In summer 1942 Georg Ratzinger was drafted to the Reichsarbeitsdienst, and the same autumn to the German Wehrmacht. In 1944 he was wounded in battle in Italy. At the end of World War II, he was a POW of the U.S. Army in the vicinity of Naples, but was released, and arrived at home in July of 1945.


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:17:29 PM
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Hitler, Goebbels, Himmler and most members of the party's "old guard" were Catholics", wrote M. Frederic Hoffet. "It was not by accident that, because of its chiefs' religion, the National-socialist government was the most Catholic Germany ever had... This kinship between National-socialism and Catholicism is most striking if we study closely the propaganda methods and the interior organisation of the party. On that subject, nothing is more instructive than Joseph Goebbel's works. He had been brought up in a Jesuit college and was a seminarist before devoting himself to literature and politics... Every page, every line of his writings recall the teaching of his masters; so he stresses obedience... the contempt for truth... "Some lies are as useful as bread!" he proclaimed by virtue of a moral relativism extracted from Ignatius of Loyola's writings..." Frederic Hoffet: "L'lmperialisme protestant" (Flammarion, Paris 1948, pp.172 ss).


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:18:21 PM
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Another highly placed hitlerian, Walter Schellenberg, former chief of the German counter-espionage, completed this confidence from the Fuhrer, after the war:

"The S.S. organisation had been constituted, by Himmler, according to the principles of the Jesuits' Order. Their regulations and the Spiritual Exercises prescribed by Ignatius of Loyola were the model Himmler tried to copy exactly... The "Reichsfuhrer SS"—Himmler's title as supreme chief of the SS—was to be the equivalent of the Jesuits' "General" and the whole structure of the direction was a close imitation of the Catholic Church's hierarchical order. A mediaeval castle, near Paderborn in Westphalia, and called "Webelsbourg", was restored; it became what could be called a SS monastery".

"I can see Himmler as our Ignatius of Loyola" ~Adolf Hitler: "Libres propos" (Flammarion, Paris 1952, p.164).


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:20:26 PM
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The Reichskonkordat is the concordat between the Holy See and Germany. It was signed on July 20, 1933 by Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli and Franz von Papen on behalf of Pope Pius XI and President Paul von Hindenburg, respectively. It is still valid today in Germany.
Contents
[hide]

* 1 History
* 2 Terms and violations
* 3 Meaning of the Concordat
* 4 After World War II
* 5 See also
* 6 References
* 7 External links

[edit] History

A "concordat" is the equivalent of a treaty when the agreement is between the church and a state - "treaties," properly speaking, are between nations, while the church here is treated as an institution but not a country. Concordats have been used to create binding agreements to safeguard church interests and its freedom to act, particularly in countries that do not have strong jurisprudence guaranteeing government non-interference in religious matters or in countries where the church seeks a privileged position under government patronage.

The Bavarian region, the Rhineland and Westphalia as well as parts in the South West were predominantly Catholic, and the church had previously enjoyed a degree of privilege there. North Germany was heavily Protestant, and Catholics had suffered some discrimination. In the late 1800s, Bismarck's Kulturkampf had been an attempt to almost eliminate Catholic institutions in Germany, or at least their strong connections outside of Germany. With this background, Catholic officials wanted a concordat strongly guaranteeing the church's freedoms. Once Hitler came to power, and started enacting laws restricting movement of funds (making it impossible for German Catholics to send money to missionaries, for instance), restricting religious institutions and education, and mandating attendance at Hitler Youth functions (held on Sunday mornings to interfere with Church attendance), the need for a concordat seemed even more urgent to church officials.

The revolution of 1918 and the Weimar constitution of 1919 had thoroughly reformed the former relationship between state and churches. Therefore, the Holy See—represented in Germany by Nuncio Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, made unsuccessful attempts to obtain German agreement for such a treaty, and between 1930 and 1933 he attempted to initiate negotiations with representatives of successive German governments.[1] Catholic politicians from the Centre Party repeatedly pushed for a concordat with the new German Republic. In February 1930 Pacelli became the Vatican's Secretary of State, and thus responsible for the Church's foreign policy, and in this position continued to work towards this 'great goal'. [2]
Signature of the Reichskonkordat
Signature of the Reichskonkordat on 20 July 1933.
From left to right: German Vice-Chancellor Franz von Papen, representing Germany, Giuseppe Pizzardo, Cardinal Pacelli, Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani, German ambassador Rudolf Buttmann

On the level of the states, concordats were achieved with Bavaria (1924), Prussia (1929) and Baden (1932). On the national level, however, negotiations failed for several reasons: the fragility of the national government; opposition from Socialist and Protestant deputies in the Reichstag; and discord among the German bishops and between them and the Holy See. In particular the questions of denominational schools and pastoral work in the armed forces prevented any agreement on the national level, despite talks in the winter of 1932.

On 30 January 1933 Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor. On 23 March 1933 his government was given legislative powers through the Enabling Act and was passed by all Reichstag except the Social Democrats and Communists (whose deputies had already been arrested). Hitler had obtained the votes of the Centre Party, led by Prelate Ludwig Kaas, by issuing oral guarantees of the party's continued existence and the autonomy of the Church and her educational institutions. He also promised good relations with the Holy See, which some interpret as a hint on a future concordat.

In April, he sent his vice chancellor Franz von Papen, a Catholic nobleman and former member of the Centre Party, to Rome to offer negotiations about a Reichskonkordat. On behalf of Cardinal Pacelli, Ludwig Kaas, the out-going chairman of the Centre Party, negotiated the draft of the terms with Papen. The concordat was finally signed, by Pacelli for the Vatican and von Papen for Germany, on 20th July. One of Hitler's key conditions for agreeing to the concordat, in violation to earlier promises, had been the dissolution of the Centre Party, which occurred on July 6.[3]

The Reichskonkordat was ratified on September 10, 1933. In the Concordat, the German government achieved a complete proscription of all clerical interference in the political field (articles 16 and 32). It also ensured the bishops' loyalty to the state by an oath and required all priests to be Germans and subject to German superiors. Restrictions were also placed on the Catholic organisations.

Shortly before signing the Reichskonkordat, Germany signed similar agreements with the major Protestant churches in Germany.

[edit] Terms and violations

The main points of the concordat are

* The right to freedom of the Roman Catholic religion. (Article 1)
* The state concordats with Bavaria (1924), Prussia (1929), and Baden (1932) remain valid. (Article 2)
* Unhindered correspondence between the Holy See and German Catholics. (Article 4)
* The right of the church to collect church taxes. (Article 13)
* The oath of allegiance of the bishops: "(...) Ich schwöre und verspreche, die verfassungsmässig gebildete Regierung zu achten und von meinem Klerus achten zu lassen (...)" ("I swear and vow to honor the constitutional government and to make my clergy honor it") (Article 16)
* State services to the church can be abolished only in mutual agreement. (Article 18)
* Catholic religion is taught in school (article 21) and teachers for Catholic religion can be employed only with the approval of the bishop (article 22).
* Protection of Catholic organizations and freedom of religious practice. (Article 31)
* Clerics may not be members of or be active for political parties. (Article 32)

A secret annex relieved clerics from military duty in the case that mandatory military service should be reinstated. (Germany was not allowed to have mandatory military service by the Treaty of Versailles).

When the Nazi government violated the concordat (in particular article 31), bishops and the papacy protested against these violations. Protests culminated in the papal encyclical "Mit brennender Sorge" ("With Burning Concern") of 1937 of Pope Pius XI.

[edit] Meaning of the Concordat

Most historians consider the Reichskonkordat an important step toward the international acceptance of Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime.[4] Guenter Lewy, political scientist and author of The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany, wrote:

"There is general agreement that the Concordat increased substantially the prestige of Hitler's regime around the world. As Cardinal Faulhaber put it in a sermon delivered in 1937: "At a time when the heads of the major nations in the world faced the new Germany with cool reserve and considerable suspicion, the Catholic Church, the greatest moral power on earth, through the Concordat expressed its confidence in the new German government. This was a deed of immeasurable significance for the reputation of the new government abroad."

The Catholic Church was not alone in signing treaties with the Nazi regime at this point. The concordat was preceded by the Four-Power Pact Hitler had signed in June 1933.

Pacelli, in a two-page article in the Vatican-influenced L'Osservatore Romano on 26 July and 27 July, said that the purpose of the Reichskonkordat was:

"not only the official recognition (by the Reich) of the legislation of the Church (its Code of Canon Law), but the adoption of many provisions of this legislation and the protection of all Church legislation."[1]

Cardinal Faulhaber is reported to have said: "With the concordat we are hanged, without the concordat we are hanged, drawn and quartered." [2]

[edit] After World War II

When Lower Saxony adopted a new school law, the Holy See complained that it violated the terms of the concordat. The federal government called upon the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany (Bundesverfassungsgericht) for clarification. In its ruling from 26 March 1957, the court decided that the circumstances surrounding the conclusion of the concordat did not invalidate it. Declaring itself incompetent in matters of Public international law and considering the Basic Law grants authority in school matters to the Bundesländer, it ruled that the federal government has no authority to intervene. So while the federal government is obligated by the concordat, it cannot enforce its application as it lacks legal authority to do so.

Critics also allege that the concordat undermined the separation of church and state. The Weimar constitution (some of whose regulations, namely articles 136-139 and 141 have been included into today's Basic Law by article 140) does not speak of a "separation", but rather rules out any state religion while protecting religious freedom, religious holidays and leaving open the possibility of cooperation. However, there is an ongoing conflict between article 18 of the concordat and article 138 of the Weimar constitution.


Messenger: Eleazar1234 Sent: 9/18/2008 9:30:16 PM
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The Extermination Camps

At first, to accomplish the mass murder of Jews, Nazis used mobile killing squads called Einsatzgruppen, consisting of four units of between
500 and 900 men each. By fall of 1942, they had murdered approximately 1,500,000 Jews. But the death camps proved to be a better, faster, less personal method for killing Jews, one that spared the shooters, not the victims, emotional anguish.

The total figure for Jewish genocide, including shootings and the camps,
was between 5.2 and 5.8 million, roughly half of Europe’s Jewish population. About five million other victims perished at the hands of Nazi Germany. The estimated death tolls for the camps are as follows:

Auschwitz 1,000,000 Jews;

1,000,000 others

Treblinka 750,000 Jews

Belzec 550,000 Jews

Sobibór 200,000 Jews

Chelmno 150,000 Jews

Lublin 50,000 Jews •

-------------------------------------
A Call to Remembrance

On May 8, 1997, former German President Roman Herzog was presented with the International Charlemagne Prize for his efforts to unite Europe. In his acceptance speech, Dr. Herzog said, “For 1000 years the destiny of our continent has revolved round the choice between a cohesive or a fragmented Europe. Charlemagne, after whom our prize is named, made his own particular choice: the first unification of Europe. At such an hour
the truth must be told: only by wading through a sea of blood, sweat and tears did he reach his goal.”

Indeed, the history of European unification has been one of much blood.
And Germany has been Europe’s greatest perpetrator in instigating that
bloodshed.

Roman Herzog has long been one of Germany’s biggest promoters for European unification. He and many other European leaders frequently hearken back to Charlemagne as the inspiration behind modern-day unification.

Very soon now, ten nations, or groups of nations, in Europe will band together in a union influenced by a great church. Everything about the union will seem right. The religion, the prosperity, the military might. But the final fruits of this union will be horrifying. History bears this out. Conspiracy, betrayal, bloodshed, intolerance, execution. These words best describe the “Holy” Roman Empire of the Middle Ages.

Approximately 40 million people were butchered during the so-called Holy Inquisition—the papacy’s nightmarish vaccine for the “heresy” virus! The Roman and Spanish inquisitions virtually eliminated Protestantism in Italy and Spain! The world has probably never seen a more vile period than those dark and miserable years of the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries.

The historical fruits of this union between a powerful political beast and a great false church have not been holy—rather unholy. And when those rotten fruits are revealed one last time, the world will be shocked. How could something which seems so right—so religious—be so evil? That answer is found written upon thousands of pages of history. More importantly,


God prophesied it long ago in the pages of the book almost no one reads and studies—the Holy Bible. Perhaps it is time we grab that book from the shelf, blow off the dust and crack it open. You’ll be shocked at how accurately God predicts the future.



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