Defamation of Pius XII

By Ralph McInerny

Book Overview

Eugenio Pacelli, Pius XII, was one of the few unalloyed heroes of World War II. At great personal risk, he saved some 800,000 Jews from extermination by the Nazis. Jewish refugees were given asylum in... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1890318663
• ISBN13: 9781890318666
• Release Date: February 2001
• Publisher: St. Augustine's Press
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 1.53 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.8" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

Defamation of Pius XII

Defamation of Pius XII is an excellent source and rebuke to all the historically flawed and biased sources. For all the Anti-Catholics and fanatics out there who word verbatim take anything that is written bad of the one true faith and Church. Whether Catholic,Agnostic,Jewish,Protestant or Deist you need to read the book to clear the misconceptions.

The Failed Defamation of an Authenic Hero

Ralph McInerny's book titled THE DEFAMATION OF PIUS XII is yet another refutation of the attempts to smear Pope Pius XII as an agent of Hitler and the German National Socialists. McInerny's book gives a surprisingly detailed account of Pope Pius XII's valient efforts to help refugees and those who were persecuted by the Germans prior to and during W.W. II. For the uniniated the controversy started that erupted when those hostile to the Catholic Church tired to smear Pope Pius XII. The book begins with a brief summary of Eugenio Pacelli (1876-1958) who was to become Pope Pius XII in 1939. Pacelli had close Jewish friends during his childhood. He was an excellent student and mastered Classical studies as well as the sciences and mathematics. His intense studies revealed a brilliant man, and anecdotes of his friends stated he was a kind, compassionate individual which was exhibited early in life. McInerny's next section dealt with Pacelli's rapid rise in the Catholic Church. He helped with the publication of THE 1917 PIO-BENEDICTINE CODE OF CANON LAW edited by Dr. Edward Peters. Pacelli showed intellectual and diplomatic promise early in his career and was confirmed as a papal representative to Germany just after W.W. I. During this time, as McInerny detailed, Pacelli showed rare courage. Pacelli attempted to deliver aid to defeated Germans when the Communists temporarily got control of Munich. Pacelli stood firm when threatened by a communist thug who threatened to shot Pacelli. One can imagine that the gunman made have had pangs of conscience in threatening an unarmed man of peace and compassion whose only mission was to relieve hardship and suffering. One should also note that Hitler and the National Socialists were making their political rise to power, and as early as 1926, Pacelli wrote an ominous warning about the inherent dangers of National Socialism and their "pagan" ideology. Eugenio Pacelli was elected Pope in 1939 after a distingushed career as diplomat, cardinal, etc. Just before his election the German Kristalnacht occured in October, 1938. Prior to this horrendous event, Pacelli and other Catholic dignataries vigorously condemned German race hallucinations and offiically stated that "We Catholic Christians have no race religion." Pinchas Lapide the eminent Jewish historian confirmed Catholic opposition to Hitler's Germany, and he was clear that only the Catholic Church officially stood against the inhumanity of National Socialist Germany. Before W.W. II erupted, Catholic Church diplomats were the only offical authorities who diplomatically opposed the brutality of the National Socialists. No one else lodged official protests except the Catholic Church-no one except the Catholic Church as Lapide made very clear. The next sections of the book dealt with Pope Pius XII's efforts to mitigate suffering and rescue efforts throughout Europe (Eastern and Western Europe). When the Germans took control of Rome in 1943, Pope Pius XII was th

A blow to the enemies of the True Faith!

Congratulations are due Professor McInerny for a masterful rebuttal of all those vile, horrid, nasty, depraved, vicious, disgusting, cruel, evil, false, base, and not-nice rumors about the Church during the Second World War. He has undertaken a Herculean bout of cut-and-paste research, presenting the results with a winning literary style compounded of querulousness and bile. The good professor wisely avoided consulting unreliable works by secular academic historians such as Saul Friedlander, Guenter Lewy, and Walter Lacquer; (What should those names tell you?) not to mention libels from turncoats such as John Morley, Michael Phayer, and Susan Zuccotti. (It would have been the stake for them in the good old days!) This current campaign of defamation is, of course, a vast secret conspiracy masterminded by dissident Catholics, adherents of a certain non-Christian religion, Freemasons, liberals, and--worst of all--sodomites! The ranks of the Nazis, of course, were pervaded with sodomites so it should come as no surprise that there should be an attempt to shift the onus for their atrocities onto the One True Church. Why, only last night I saw perverts prancing about in Nazi-style garb at the local leather bar where I often repair to once my wife, six children, and grandchildren are all safely asleep. (I am studying sexual immorality in order to denounce it, I'll have you know!) There I sat, nursing my usual Shirley Temple while filthy and obscene acts unfolded before my fascinated gaze. Finally, overcome with longing--er, loathing--I abandoned my emission--uh, my mission--and fled the sordid scene for home. (Must remember: Aquinas says self-pollution more heinous than rape!) But I digress. Professor McInerny would surely agree that anyone raising the least question about any of our church's actions--past, present, or to come--is a dangerous degenerate who should be horsewhipped. But not just with any whip, mind you. No. It must be a new, freshly oiled leather whip, one of the sort with bits of metal woven into it; well laid on in clean, even strokes across their backs until they shriek for mercy, and the blood streams down their glistening bodies and (...) ADDENDUM: Any correspondence sent to Professor Hatteras pertaining to this review will be returned to the sender until he is again permitted to deal with his mail.--Madelyn Murray O'Harelip, Secretary to Professor Hatteras, Tomas de Torquemada Center, 714 Radcliffe Hall, Notre Dame, IN 46556-5629.

Worth the Read- one of the best

IN response to the recent trash novels about the role of the pope in WWII, this excellent book is a welcome arrival. The author shows with great accuracy how the pope saved directly or indirectly the lives of some 860,000 Jews. But why has Pius XII been so defamed? What has motivated the untruths? It has been the result, the author argues, of the Church's stance on sexuality. In fact, it can be easily argued and defended that as soon as the Church changes its teaching on sex and abortion, the "faith" would be welcomed with open arms by the left.

Just one tool in understanding the defamation of Pius XII

The Defamation of Pius XII by Notre Dame university philosophyprofessor Ralph McInerny is strong on evidence of Pius XII as a truehero in speaking out for Jews and leading a church in saving hundredsof thousands of Jewish lives during World War II - more than allthe other relief organizations combined. McInerny's 150 pages ofevidence is noticeably missing from books that allegedly defame PiusXII as anti-Semitic, a "Hitler's Pope", and a man who supposedlyturned his back on the Jews. An epilogue in Hitler's Pope (1999) byJohn Cornwell acknowledges that The Last Three Popes and the Jews(1967) by Pinchas Lapide (Israeli consul in Milan Italy) is "aformidable and scholarly riposte to those who would paint Pius XII andthe Holy See as villains." Cornwell adds that Lapide"ransacked" various Jewish archives "for details of Vaticanassistance to Jews during the war" and that Lapide "calculatedthat Pius XII, directly or indirectly, saved the lives of some 860,000Jews." Yet Lapide's details of the extensive and heroic Vaticanassistance to Jews are nowhere to be found in the chapters of Hitler'sPope. McInerny's book provides Lapide details and more. TheDefamation of Pius XII does not by itself demonstrate defamation foundin such works as Hitler's Pope. To sense a Cornwell genius ofspinning half-truths into defamation, one must read Hitler's Pope andreread portions while referring to McInerny's book and several otherworks ("McInerny et al."): (1)"Cornwell's Pope: A NastyCaricature of a Noble and Saintly Man"(ZENIT News Service, 9/16/99)by Father Peter Gumpel, arguably the world's leading expert on PiusXII. Gumpel's twelve-page critique, posted online, concludes,"Cornwell who is a rank amateur in the field of history, canon law,etc., has produced a shoddy, superficial and totally untrustworthybook which, to say the very least, is objectively biased, tendentiousand so unilateral and one-sided that one wonders what really promptedthis man to write this book." (2)HITLER THE WAR AND THE POPE (2000)by Ronald Rychlak, a non-Catholic attorney. The 27-page epiloguecritiques Hitler's Pope. Cornwell's account of Rome's Jews is basedin large part on Katz's book Black Sabbath (1969) which per Cornwell"remains the most authoritative account" and was the subject ofa defamation suit "lost" by the Pope's relatives who appealedwith judgment "inconclusive." Actually, per Rychlak, Katz was finedand received a suspended prison sentence for defaming Pius XII.(3)Pius XII and the Second World War According to the Vatican Archives(1997) by Pierre Blet, S.J. Whenever Cornwell cites Blet, one shouldread the few pages before and after the cite to see what Cornwellfailed to mention. (4)Before the Dawn (1954, reprinted as Why I Becamea Catholic), memoirs of Eugenio Zolli, Rome's chief rabbi in 1943 whenthe Nazis took over Rome. Zolli extols Pius XII as a great hero forthe Jews. Portions are quoted by McInerny and Rychlak, but additionalpassages aid in questioning Cornwell's choi