Anti-Jewish Prejudices, Antisemitism, Racism, and the Catholic Church's Attitudes during the Shoah
Author(s)
Date Issued
2024
Type
bookPart
Start Page
79
End Page
103
Abstract
This chapter is devoted to the presentation of some documents resulting from the new disclosed sources from the Pius XII’s period in which prejudice against Jews is manifested, as a preliminary contribution to the study of the topic. In most cases the prejudice emerges not so much in “official documents”, but rather in what we could define as "supra-texts": annotations, notes, memos and footnotes, plans, minutes or drafts of documents, comments in the margins of texts, internal reports and working copies of the same, etc., almost always in handwritten form. It is possible to group this particular typology of documents around some major themes of which an indicative selection is presented here: a) the definition and theological analysis of racism as a broad preliminary area connected to religious anti-Judaism; b) the racist and anti-Semitic laws introduced by some European countries and the attitude of the Catholic Church toward them; c) conversions; d) Zionism and Palestine. The analysis of all of these documents clearly shows: a) the presence and persistence within the Holy See and the entourage of Pius XII's collaborators of anti-Jewish prejudice, with the involvement also of Card. Pacelli, at least during the period when he was Secretary of State; b) the action of such prejudice by helping to shape decisions on the most varied issues then facing the central government of the Catholic Church; c) its interaction with other fundamental dimensions such as ecclesiastical, institutional and bureaucratic, political and diplomatic, as well as, of course, the sphere of canon law and that of the broad theological-doctrinal sphere in which it is nevertheless embedded; d) the contamination of anti-Jewish prejudice with and its transformation toward an open anti-Semitism compatible both with Catholic faith and doctrine and with the help and assistance provided primarily to converts but also to unconverted Jews in the name of the Catholic notion of charity and justice.
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