Pope Pius XII
Pope Pius XII was elected on the 2nd of March 1939, which happened to be his 63rd birthday. The cardinals needed only one day and three ballots to choose him. According to rumour, he asked for one more ballot to be sure the result was valid. He went on to lead the Catholic Church for 19 years, a span covering a fifth of the 20th century. That span took in the Second World War, the founding of the United Nations, and the start of the Cold War and the nuclear arms race.
Few popes have been judged as sharply or defended as fiercely. The Vatican stayed officially neutral throughout the war, and what Pius said and did not say about the fate of Europe's Jews is still argued over. His defenders credit quiet diplomacy and discreet aid with saving thousands of lives. His critics point to a public voice that stayed cautious when the moment seemed to call for plain speech. How did a Roman priest who spent his career in Vatican offices come to hold the papacy at the edge of a world war? What did he build, teach and decide, and why does his memory remain divided?
The Pacelli family lived in the Parione district at the centre of Rome and moved to Via Vetrina in 1880. They belonged to the so-called Black Nobility, an upper-class circle of intense Catholic piety with long ties to the papacy. Eugenio's grandfather served Pope Pius IX from 1851 to 1870, first as Under-Secretary in the Papal Ministry of Finances and then as Secretary of the Interior. He also helped found the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano in 1861.
The next generation kept the family close to power. A cousin, Ernesto Pacelli, was a key financial advisor to Pope Leo XIII. Eugenio's father, Filippo, was dean of the Roman Rota. His brother Francesco became legal advisor to Pope Pius XI and negotiated the Lateran Treaty with Benito Mussolini in 1929, which ended the Roman Question. Eugenio grew up beside Francesco and two sisters, Giuseppina and Elisabetta.
At Chiesa Nuova, the family church, the children made their First Communion, and Eugenio served as an altar boy from 1886. His schooling began with French nuns in the Piazza Fiammetta and continued at the private school of Professor Giuseppe Marchi. In 1891 his father sent him to the Visconti Liceo Ginnasio, housed in the old Collegio Romano.
In 1894, at 18, he began theology at the Almo Collegio Capranica, while also enrolling at the Gregorian University and at La Sapienza, where he studied modern languages and history. By the summer of 1895 he had left both church institutions. His sister Elisabetta blamed the food at the Capranica. A special dispensation let him study from home, so he spent most of his seminary years as an external student. He earned a doctorate in Sacred Theology in 1899 through a short dissertation and an oral examination in Latin.
On Easter Sunday, the 2nd of April 1899, Pacelli was ordained alone in the private chapel of a family friend, Francesco di Paola Cassetta, the Vicegerent of Rome. Every other candidate from the Rome diocese was ordained at the Basilica of Saint John Lateran. His first post was as a curate at Chiesa Nuova.
In 1901 Pietro Gasparri, a newly appointed undersecretary, invited him into the Department of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs. Gasparri pitched it as the Vatican's equivalent of a foreign office, stressing the need to defend the Church from secularism and liberalism across Europe. Pacelli started as an apprendista. That same January, according to an official account, Pope Leo XIII chose him to carry the Vatican's condolences to King Edward VII after the death of Queen Victoria.
His thesis, finished by 1904, examined the nature of concordats and the role of canon law when a concordat lapses. He became a papal chamberlain that year and a domestic prelate in 1905. From 1904 until 1916 he helped Gasparri codify canon law. In 1908 he accompanied Rafael Merry del Val to the International Eucharistic Congress in London, where he met Winston Churchill. In 1911 he represented the Holy See at the coronation of George V and Mary.
He rose to under-secretary in 1911 and to secretary of the department in February 1914. On the 24th of June 1914, four days before Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo, he and Merry del Val represented the Vatican at the signing of the Serbian Concordat. After Pius X died on the 20th of August 1914, Benedict XV made Gasparri secretary of state, and Gasparri made Pacelli his undersecretary. Pacelli kept the Vatican's registry of prisoners of war. In 1915 he travelled to Vienna to help the nuncio Raffaele Scapinelli bargain with Emperor Franz Joseph over Italy.
Pacelli was consecrated titular Archbishop of Sardis in the Sistine Chapel on the 13th of May 1917, the same day as the first apparition at Fatima in Portugal. Benedict XV had named him nuncio to Bavaria on the 23rd of April. Since no nuncio served Prussia or Germany, he was in practice the Vatican's envoy to the whole German Empire.
In Munich he carried the pope's plan to end the war. He met King Ludwig III on the 29th of May, then Kaiser Wilhelm II and Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, who answered positively. Bethmann Hollweg was then forced to resign, and the German High Command, still hoping for victory, held back its reply until the 20th of September. Sister Pascalina Lehnert recalled that the nuncio was heartbroken at the Kaiser's deaf ear. Once, tracing the Rhine on a map, he said sadly, "No doubt this will be lost as well."
After the Armistice, Kurt Eisner formed the Free State of Bavaria, and Pacelli asked Benedict's leave to quit Munich for a while. He went to a quiet Swiss sanatorium at Rorschach, run by nuns. There he formed a rapport with a 24-year-old nun, Sister Pascalina Lehnert, and later arranged her transfer to Munich. She stayed with him as housekeeper, cook, friend and adviser for 41 years.
When Eisner was assassinated by Count Anton von Arco auf Valley, power passed to a trio of revolutionaries. Pacelli reported to Gasparri a scene of chaos at the former royal palace, using an eyewitness account from his aide Schioppa. The biographer John Cornwell argues that the report's epithets and its constant stress on the revolutionaries' Jewishness reveal an antisemitic impression. Lehnert recalled that emissaries of the Bavarian Soviet Republic threatened the nuncio, and that its government tried to seize the nunciature's car at gunpoint. Pacelli refused to leave his post.
He became Apostolic Nuncio to Germany on the 23rd of June 1920. Once a Bavarian Concordat was completed in 1924, the nunciature moved to Berlin in August 1925. Several Munich staff followed him, including his adviser Robert Leiber. In the Tiergarten quarter he threw parties for the diplomatic elite, with Paul von Hindenburg and Gustav Stresemann among the regular guests. He also leaned on the priest Ludwig Kaas, a Church-state expert who led the Catholic Centre Party from October 1928.
Pacelli travelled to every German region, attended the national Katholikentag gatherings and gave about 50 sermons and speeches. Meanwhile he worked on talks with the Soviet Union. He negotiated food shipments for Russia, where the Church was persecuted, and met Foreign Minister Georgi Chicherin, who offered agreements stripped of everything the Vatican considered vital. Pius XI ordered the secret talks stopped in 1927.
He also blocked French attempts to split the Saar region off from German church administration. A Prussian Concordat followed on the 14th of June 1929. A telegram reached him at Rorschach calling him back to Rome, and he left Berlin on the 10th of December 1929. David G. Dalin later wrote that of Pacelli's forty-four speeches in Germany between 1917 and 1929, forty denounced some aspect of the emerging Nazi ideology.
On the 16th of December 1929, Pius XI made Pacelli a cardinal, and on the 7th of February 1930 named him Cardinal Secretary of State, responsible for foreign policy worldwide. Five years later he also became Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church. Treaties were his craft. A Baden Concordat, negotiated with Ludwig Kaas, was signed in August 1932. Austria followed in 1933, Germany that same year, Yugoslavia in 1935 and Portugal in 1940.
The state-level German agreements existed because the federalist Weimar constitution gave the states authority over education and culture. The Vatican saw that as a threat to the Church's standing. Concordats let the Church run youth groups, schools, hospitals and charities, and make its own appointments. Pacelli wanted the Catholic Bavarian deal of 1924 to be the model, but the Prussian terms of 1929 came out less favourable and left out education.
A national treaty eluded him for years. Between 1930 and 1933 he tried to open talks with successive German governments, but Protestant and Socialist opposition, shaky coalitions and the states' guarding of their autonomy blocked him. Disputes over denominational schools and military chaplains stalled even the winter talks of 1932. In summer 1931 he clashed with the Catholic Chancellor Heinrich Brüning, who told him bluntly that he misunderstood the real character of the Nazis.
Adolf Hitler became Chancellor on the 30th of January 1933 and wanted international respectability and quiet from Catholic opposition. He sent his vice chancellor Franz von Papen to Rome with an offer of a Reichskonkordat. Kaas, the outgoing Centre Party chairman, negotiated first drafts for Pacelli. Pacelli and von Papen signed the treaty on the 20th of July 1933, and it was ratified on the 10th of September.
Its text, which remains valid today, is rarely the target of criticism. The argument is over timing. Bishop Konrad von Preysing had warned against compromise with those who thought Nazi persecution of the Church was an aberration Hitler would correct. Between 1933 and 1939, Pacelli issued 55 protests against violations of the treaty.
The sharpest came in early 1937. Pacelli asked several German cardinals, including Michael von Faulhaber, to help draft a protest that became Pius XI's encyclical Mit brennender Sorge, meaning "With deep anxiety." It was written in German rather than the usual Latin. Motorcyclists distributed it in secret, and it was read from every German Catholic pulpit on Palm Sunday. The Nazis closed the presses involved and staged a long series of immorality trials of Catholic clergy.
As pope, Pacelli reflected on the whole experience in a June 1941 letter to the Bishop of Passau. He wrote that the other side lacked the most basic prerequisites for accepting even minimal freedoms for the Church, whatever the formal agreements said.
In 1935 Pacelli wrote to Karl Joseph Schulte, archbishop of Cologne, calling the Nazis "false prophets with the pride of Lucifer." Two years later, at Notre Dame de Paris, he described Germany as a noble nation that "bad shepherds" would lead astray into an ideology of race. According to Joseph Bottum, he also told the American diplomat A. W. Klieforth in 1937 that Hitler was untrustworthy and fundamentally wicked. A report written for President Franklin D. Roosevelt a year later called compromise with the Third Reich out of the question.
That 1936 trip to the United States, where he met Roosevelt, had lasting consequences. Roosevelt later named a personal envoy to the Holy See in December 1939, reviving a diplomatic tradition broken since the pope lost temporal power in 1870.
Budapest in May 1938 shows the other side of the record. While Hungary was drafting antisemitic laws, Pacelli spoke at the International Eucharistic Congress of Jews "whose lips curse Christ and whose hearts reject him even today." The source notes that this traditional adversarial language was later reversed by Nostra aetate at the Second Vatican Council.
Then came Kristallnacht in November 1938. The historian Walter Bussmann argued that Pacelli, then informing the ailing Pius XI of events, dissuaded him from condemning it. A separate document, a draft encyclical titled Humani generis unitas, "On the Unity of the Human Race," had been ready since September 1938. Its author, LaFarge, wrote it to condemn colonialism, racial persecution and antisemitism. The Jesuit General Wlodimir Ledóchowski never forwarded it to the Vatican.
On the 28th of January 1939, eleven days before Pius XI died, the Jesuit Gundlach wrote to LaFarge that it could not go on like this. The historians Passelecq and Suchecky argue that Pacelli learned of the draft only after Pius XI's death and chose not to promulgate it. He did borrow parts of it for his first encyclical as pope, Summi Pontificatus.
At his last consistory on the 15th of December 1937, Pius XI told the cardinals of his successor, "He is in your midst." He had also said that if the pope died, the Church would have another by morrow, but that losing Cardinal Pacelli would be a far bigger tragedy because there was only one.
Pacelli was crowned on the 12th of March 1939. He was the first cardinal Secretary of State chosen pope since Clement IX in 1667, and the second man elected directly after serving as Camerlengo, after Leo XIII. He explained his name with a quoted line: "I call myself Pius; my whole life was under Popes with this name, but especially as a sign of gratitude towards Pius XI." Only Italian popes had used the name before.
For his successor as Secretary of State he chose Luigi Maglione, a veteran diplomat who had spent twelve years as nuncio in Paris. After Maglione died in 1944, Pius left the post open. He named Domenico Tardini head of its foreign section and Giovanni Battista Montini head of the internal section. In 1953 he offered both men cardinals' hats, and both declined, so he gave them the title of Pro-Secretary instead. Montini went on to become archbishop of Milan, and later Pope Paul VI.
The pope slowly broke the Italian hold on the Curia. He used German and Dutch Jesuit advisers, namely Robert Leiber, Augustin Bea and Sebastian Tromp. He raised Americans such as Cardinal Francis Spellman to major roles. After the war he appointed more non-Italians than any pope before him, including Aloisius Joseph Muench as nuncio to Germany.
His red hats were rare. Pius XII held only two consistories, while Pius XI had held 17 in 17 years. He named no cardinals during the war, and their number shrank to 38, with Dennis Joseph Dougherty of Philadelphia the only living American. On the 18th of February 1946 he created a record 32 new cardinals, nearly half the College, bringing it to its limit of 70. They came from China, India, the Middle East and the Americas.
The second consistory, on the 12th of January 1953, ended the matter. Together the two consistories ended more than five hundred years of Italian majority in the College of Cardinals. Italian prelates mostly accepted the change, and no protest movement arose.
Pius XII issued his first encyclical, Summi Pontificatus, in October 1939 while Poland was being invaded. He admitted that the "dread tempest of war is already raging despite all Our efforts to avert it." The letter denounced antisemitism, totalitarianism and Nazi persecution of the Church, and quoted the line "there is neither Gentile nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision." It also lamented the deaths of noncombatants and singled out Poland for sympathy.
Yet it avoided naming Hitlerism or Stalinism. Pius wrote that a full statement of the doctrinal stand against the errors of the day could wait for another time. That impartial public tone became the heart of later controversy. He kept a strict policy of neutrality, as Benedict XV had in the previous war.
Behind that neutrality the Vatican became a hub of aid. At the pope's request, an information office for prisoners of war and refugees worked under Giovanni Battista Montini from 1939 to 1947. It received 9,891,497 inquiries about missing people and produced 11,293,511 answers. The historian McGoldrick concludes that Pius had affection for Germany but not its criminal element, and that his sympathies lay with the Allies. He had moved the Vatican's considerable assets into the American war economy.
Critics focus on Poland. Michael Phayer assesses Pius as refusing to censure the invasion and annexation, and reads his appointment of Hilarius Breitinger as apostolic administrator of the Wartheland in May 1942 as implicit recognition of Poland's breakup. In that same month the Polish ambassador Kazimierz Papée complained that Pius had not condemned the latest atrocities. When Cardinal Maglione said the Vatican could not document individual atrocities, Papée replied, "when something becomes notorious, proof is not required." Defenders note that on the 11th of March 1940 Pius used Polish reports to recite the date, place and details of Nazi crimes to Joachim von Ribbentrop. They also describe an episode in which Polish rabbis sought Church help, and Nazi retaliation led the Polish Church to turn to underground aid instead.
In April 1941 Pius received Ante Pavelić, leader of the new Croatian state, in a private rather than diplomatic audience. A British Foreign Office memo, unattributed, called the pope "the greatest moral coward of our age." The Vatican never officially recognised Pavelić's regime, and on the 25th of January 1942 the Secretariat of State repudiated forced conversions in a memorandum. But Pius held a list of clergy who had joined in the slaughter and took no action, fearing schism in the Croatian church. In 1953 he made Aloysius Stepinac a cardinal, though Stepinac had been convicted of collaboration by Yugoslavia's Communist regime.
There were quieter channels too. In October 1939 a Munich lawyer named Joseph Muller travelled to Rome, and according to the Hitler biographer John Toland, Pius agreed to relay messages between German generals plotting against Hitler and the British. Toland also reports that Hitler said, after the November 1939 bomb plot of Johann Georg Elser, that the pope was no friend of his. Pius warned the Allies of the coming 1940 German invasion of the Low Countries, then sent sympathy telegrams to Queen Wilhelmina, King Leopold III and Grand Duchess Charlotte. Mussolini took the warnings as a personal affront and lodged a formal protest.
When Ribbentrop came to Rome in 1940 and asked why the pope sided with the Allies, Pius answered with a list of Nazi atrocities. The New York Times headlined its report "Jews Rights Defended." Ribbentrop offered a settlement if Pius would tell German bishops to stop political criticism. No agreement was reached. In November 1940, after the London Blitz began, Pius preached at a special Mass in Saint Peter's for the war's victims. In July 1943 he visited the wounded after Allied bombing of Rome on the 19th.
He reached beyond Europe as well. In March 1942 he established diplomatic relations with Japan and received ambassador Ken Harada. In June 1942 he did the same with Nationalist China. Its first minister, Hsieh Shou-kang, did not reach the Vatican until January 1943. Meanwhile Myron C. Taylor, Roosevelt's envoy, thanked the Holy See in 1942 for its indignation over the invasion of the Low Countries.
On the 1st of November 1950 in Munificentissimus Deus, Pius XII defined the dogma of the Assumption of Mary, the claim that she was taken body and soul into heavenly glory. It was the first use of papal infallibility since 1854 and, as of the source, the last. He had polled the bishops through the 1946 encyclical Deiparae Virginis Mariae. Devotion to Mary ran through his life. He consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in 1942, after requests from the Portuguese mystic Alexandrina of Balazar. He wished to be buried in the crypt of Saint Peter's on the feast of Our Lady of Fatima, the 13th of October 1958.
His written output was vast. He issued 41 encyclicals, more than all his successors over the past 50 years combined, plus almost a thousand messages and speeches. His papacy was the first to publish papal addresses systematically in vernacular languages, not only Latin. Mystici Corporis Christi described the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ. Mediator Dei addressed liturgy. In 1943 Divino afflante Spiritu freed biblical scholars to work from original Hebrew and Greek texts and asked bishops to start Bible study for lay people.
Science drew careful handling. In Humani generis in 1950 he allowed that evolution might explain the human body, while rejecting claims that it explains the origin of all things. The soul, he said, is created directly by God. Robert Leiber recalled that Pius did not want to close doors prematurely, and regretted what happened in Galileo's case. John Paul II later upheld the distinction.
His speeches to doctors, nurses and midwives reached into medical ethics. He judged that pain relief for the terminally ill is justified even if it may shorten life, as long as shortening life is not the aim. He accepted the rhythm method of family planning in limited circumstances. On the 14th of September 1952 he said that the State does not violate the right to life by executing a condemned criminal.
Politics met doctrine on the 1st of June 1946, the day before Italy's referendum on its monarchy. In Saint Peter's Square he asked whether Italians would entrust their future to a state with no religion, and the speech was widely read as backing King Umberto II. The monarchy was abolished anyway, and he privately told his envoy Myron Taylor that what was done was done.
Pius XII died on the 9th of October 1958, and John XXIII succeeded him. On the 18th of November 1965, during the final session of the Second Vatican Council, Paul VI opened his cause for canonization. He was titled Servant of God in 1990, when the beatification process opened. On the 19th of December 2009, Benedict XVI declared him venerable, the step that precedes beatification.
Updated
Common questions
When was Pope Pius XII elected pope?
Pope Pius XII was elected on the 2nd of March 1939, his 63rd birthday, after one day of deliberation and three ballots. His coronation took place on the 12th of March 1939.
What was the Reichskonkordat that Pope Pius XII signed?
The Reichskonkordat was a treaty between Germany and the Holy See, signed on the 20th of July 1933 by Cardinal Pacelli and Franz von Papen. It was ratified on the 10th of September 1933 and remains controversial because of its timing.
What was Mit brennender Sorge and how was Pope Pius XII involved?
Mit brennender Sorge was a 1937 encyclical of Pius XI that condemned the paganism of Nazi ideology. Cardinal Pacelli asked German cardinals to help draft it, and it was read from every German Catholic pulpit on Palm Sunday.
Why is Pope Pius XII controversial for his actions in the Second World War?
Pope Pius XII kept the Vatican officially neutral and avoided naming Hitler or Stalin in public. Critics cite public silence about the fate of Europe's Jews, while defenders say discreet aid and diplomacy saved thousands of lives.
What was the Assumption dogma defined by Pope Pius XII?
On the 1st of November 1950 in Munificentissimus Deus, Pope Pius XII defined that Mary was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory. It was the first use of papal infallibility since 1854.
How did Pope Pius XII change the College of Cardinals?
Pope Pius XII named a record 32 cardinals on the 18th of February 1946 and held a second consistory on the 12th of January 1953. Together they ended more than five hundred years of Italian majority in the College.
Is Pope Pius XII a saint?
Pope Pius XII is not yet a saint. His cause was opened on the 18th of November 1965, he was titled Servant of God in 1990, and Benedict XVI declared him venerable on the 19th of December 2009.
All sources
367 references cited across the entry
- 1BookThe Pius War: Responses to the Critics of Pius XIIJoseph Bottum et al. — Lexington Books — 2004
- 3Pius XII: AssessmentFrank J. Coppa — 29 June 2006
- 4L'oro di Pio XII13 April 2013
- 5Roman Catholicism: the period of the world wars17 February 2016
- 6BookThe Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII, Mussolini, and HitlerDavid I. Kertzer — Random House — 2022
- 7Encyclopedia of Catholicism by Frank K. Flinn, J. Gordon Melton; , p. 267
- 8NewsPope John Paul II and Pope Pius XII move closer to sainthoodLaura Pitel — 19 December 2009
- 9Pollard, 2005, p. 70
- 10Marchione, 2004, p. 1
- 11Gerard Noel, Pius XII: The Hound of Hitler, p. 5
- 12O'Brien, p. 1
- 14Paul O'Shea, A Cross Too Heavy, 2011, p. 79
- 15O'Shea, p. 81
- 16BookHitler's Pope: The Secret History of Pius XIIJohn Cornwell — Viking — 1999
- 17Cornwell, p. 23
- 18O'Shea, p. 82
- 19Noel, p. 10
- 20Marchione, 2004, p. 9
- 21Marchione, 2000, p. 193
- 22Marchione, 2004, p. 10
- 23Cornwell, Hitler's Pope, p. 42
- 24Cornwell, p. 32
- 25Dalin, 2005, p. 47
- 26O'Shea, pp. 86, 88
- 27Levillain, 2002, p. 1211
- 28Fatoni, 1992, pp. 45–85
- 29Marchione, 2004, p. 11
- 30Rychlak, 2000, p. 6
- 31Lehnert (2014), 6–7.
- 32Cornwell, p. 73
- 33BookHitler's PopeJohn Cornwell
- 34BookHitler's PopeCornwell
- 35Lehnert (2014), pages 7–8.
- 36Volk, 1972; Cornwell, p. 96
- 37Kaas, 1930.
- 38Stehle, 1975, pp. 139–41
- 39Morsey, p. 121
- 40Cornwell, pp. 103–04
- 41The Pius War: Responses to the Critics of Pius XII, David G. Dalin, Joseph Bottum, Lexington Books, 2004, p. 17
- 42Controversial Concordats: The Vatican's Relations with Napoleon, Mussolini, and Hitler, Ed Frank J. Coppa, Catholic University of America Press, P. 173,
- 43Fahlbusch, Erwin (ed.). Bromiley, Geoffrey W. (trans.) (2005). The Encyclopedia of Christianity;
- 44Kent, 2002, p. 24
- 45Cornwell, p. 115
- 46Cornwell, p. 121
- 47Cornwell, p. 128. Pacelli, quoted in Scholder's The Churches and the Third Reich, p. 157
- 48Dalin, 2005, pp. 58–59
- 49Marchione, 2002, p. 22
- 50Christian responses to the Holocaust: moral and ethical issues: Religion, theology, and the Holocaust, Donald J. Dietrich, p. 92, Syracuse University Press, 2003;
- 52Phayer, 2000, p. 3
- 53Gutman, Israel, Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, p. 1136
- 54Passelecq, Suchecky pp. 113–137
- 56Passelecq, Suchecky. p. 121
- 57Humani generis unitas
- 59On 16 March four days after coronation, Gundlach informed LaFarge that the documents had been given to Pius XI shortly before his death, but that the new Pope had so far had no opportunity to learn ab
- 60Encyclical of Pope Pius on the unity of human society to our venerable brethren: The Patriarchs, Primates, Archbishops, Bishops, and other ordinaries in peace and the communion with the Apostolic see
- 61Ludwig Volk, Die Kirche in den deutschsprachigen Ländern in: Handbuch der Kirchengeschichte, Band VII, p. 539
- 62Donald J. Dietrich, p. 92, Syracuse University Press, 2003;
- 63They included: Latvia 1922, Bavaria 1924, Poland 1925, France I., 1926, France II. 1926, Lithuania 1927, Czechoslovakia 1928, Portugal I 1928, Italy I 1929, Italy II 1929, Portugal II 1929, Romania I
- 64Ludwig Volk, "Die Kirche in den deutschsprachigen Ländern" in: Handbuch der Kirchengeschichte, Band VII, pp. 546–547
- 65Ludwig Volk Das Reichskonkordat vom 20. Juli 1933, pp. 34f, 45–58
- 66Klaus Scholder The Churches and the Third Reich volume 1: especially Part 1, chapter 10; part 2, chapter 2
- 67Volk, pp. 98–101
- 68Feldkamp, pp. 88–93
- 69Volk, pp. 101, 105
- 70Volk, p. 254
- 72BookBerlin in Lights THE DIARIES OF COUNT HARRY KESSLER (1918-1937)Harry Kessler — 1999
- 73Krieg, Robert A., Catholic Theologians in Nazi Germany, p. 112
- 74Vidmar, pp. 327–31
- 75Pham, p. 45, quote: "When Pius XI was complimented on the publication, in 1937, of his encyclical denouncing Nazism, Mit brennender Sorge, his response was to point to his Secretary of State and say b
- 76Bokenkotter, pp. 389–92, quote "And when Hitler showed increasing belligerance toward the Church, Pius met the challenge with a decisiveness that astonished the world. His encyclical Mit brennender So
- 7774.A l'Eveque de Passau, in "Lettres de Pie XII aux Eveques Allemands 1939–1944, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1967, p. 416
- 78Tardini, Pio XII roma 1960
- 79Michael F. Feldkamp. Pius XII und Deutschland; .
- 80Dalin, 2005, pp. 69–70
- 82Pacelli’s assertion was factually incorrect. Pacelli, born in 1876, was elected Pope at the age of 63. For 33 of those 63 years, the Pope was not named Pius. Leo XIII was Pope from 1878 to 1903, inclu
- 83"Medius vestrum stetit quem vos nescetis. Everybody knew what the Pope meant". Domenico Cardinale Tardini, Pio XII, Tipografia Poliglotta Vaticana, 1960, p. 105
- 84Lehnert, Pascalina. Ich durfte Ihm Dienen, Erinnerungen an Papst Pius XII. Naumann, Würzburg, 1986, p. 57
- 85Congregation of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs and Congregation of Ordinary Affairs
- 86In the Secretariat of State he had actively supported "foreigners", for example Francis Spellman, the American monsignor, whom he consecrated himself as the first American bishop in the Vatican curia.
- 87Gannon, Robert I. The Cardinal Spellman Story, Doubleday Company, New York, 1962
- 88Oscar Halecki, James Murray, Jr. Pius XII, Eugenio Pacelli, Pope of Peace; p. 370
- 89Oscar Halecki, James Murray, Jr. Pius XII, Eugenio Pacelli, Pope of Peace, p. 371
- 90Levillain, 2002, p. 1136
- 91Pio XII, La Allocuzione nel concistorio Segreto del 12 Gennaio 1953 in Pio XII, Discorsi e Radiomessaggi di Sua Santità, Vatican City, 1953, p. 455
- 92Tardini later thanked him for not appointing him. The Pope replied with a smile. "Monsignore mio, you thank me, for not letting me do what I wanted to do". I replied "Yes Holy Father, I thank you for
- 93Tobin, Greg. (2003). Selecting the Pope: Uncovering the Mysteries of Papal Elections. Barnes & Noble Publishing; . pp. xv–xvi, 143.
- 94For example, Padellaro: "Church history will memorize with special letters the secret conclave of 1946, and the cosmopolitan Pius XII, who called men of all races into the Senate of the Church", Nazar
- 95AAS, 1947, Mediator Dei, p. 18
- 96AAS, 1947, Mediator Dei, p. 19
- 97AAS, 1947, Mediator Dei, p. 31
- 98MagazineReligion: Rebel in Rio23 July 1945
- 99NewsEx-Priest's 'Sainthood' Irks Catholics in BrazilMarvine Howe — 3 August 1973
- 103AAS, 1956, p. 354 ff
- 104AAS, 1956, p. 357
- 105AAS, 1950, p. 657
- 106AAS 1954 p. 313
- 107AAS 1957, p. 272
- 108Humani generis (1950) and Divino afflante Spiritu (1943), p. 305
- 109AAS, 1943, p. 297
- 110AAS, 1943, p. 305
- 111Pius XII, Humani generis, p. 21
- 112Humani generis, p. 21
- 113AAS, 1950, p. 753
- 114AAS 1953, p. 577
- 115AAS 1954, p. 625
- 116Pius XII, Enc. Mystici Corporis Christi, p. 110
- 117NewsIn history the violence of the arrogant takes its toll, but God does not leave us15 August 2017
- 118Pio XII, Discorsi Ai Medici compiles 700 pages of specific addresses.
- 121Discorsi E Radiomessaggi di sua Santita Pio XII, Vatican City, 1940, p. 407; Discorsi E Radiomessaggi di sua Santita Pio XII, Vatican City, 1942, p. 52; Discorsi E Radiomessaggi di sua Santita Pio XII
- 122Leiber, p. 411
- 123Pius XII, Enc. Humani generis, 36
- 125The Moral Limits of Medical Research Treatment: Address to the First International Congress on the Histopathology of the Nervous SystemHis Holiness Pope Pius XII — 14 September 1952
- 126The Legitimacy of Capital PunishmentJohn A. Hardon — 2017-10-13
- 127BookModern Italy's Founding Fathers: The Making of a Postwar RepublicWhite, Steven F. — Bloomsbury Publishing — 2020
- 128Giuseppe Mammarealla Italy After Fascism A Political History 1943–1965, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1966 p. 114
- 129BookThe Italian Monarchy, The State, The Church and the Holy ShroudBracaglia, Giorgio
- 130Univ of DaytonCampus.udayton.edu — 30 July 2009
- 131This Saint's for You by Thomas J. Craughwell 2007; ; p. 172
- 132Communication, Father Robert Graham, SJ, 10 November 1992
- 133Orientalis Ecclesiae, AAS, 1944, p. 129
- 134Orientales omnes Ecclesias, AAS, 1946, pp. 33–63.
- 135Sempiternus Rex, AAS, 1951, pp. 625–44.
- 136Orientales Ecclesias. AAS, 1953, pp. 5–15.
- 137Apostolic Letters to the bishops in the East. AAS, 1956, pp. 260–64.
- 138Fulgens corona, AAS, 1953, pp. 577–93
- 139Papal letter to the People of Russia, AAS, 1952, pp. 505–11.
- 140Daniela Treveri Gennari, Post-War Italian Cinema: American Intervention, Vatican Interests (New York and London: Routledge, 2009), 22.
- 141Helmuth Rolfes, "Inter Mirifica and What Followed: The Second Vatican Council as the Beginning of a New Era in the Relationship Between the Church and the Media", in Helmuth Rolfes and Angela Ann Zuko
- 142Joan Carroll Cruz (OCDS). Saintly Men of Modern Times. (2003);
- 143Dorothy Scallan. The Holy Man of Tours. (1990);
- 144Noel, p. 16
- 145Lehnert, Pascalina. Pius XII, Ich durfte ihm dienen, Würzburg, 1982, p. 163
- 147BookAnthony of Padua: Franciscan, Preacher, Teacher, SaintValentin Strappazzon — Catholic University of America Press — 2024
- 148BookThe Oxford Handbook of Holocaust StudiesPeter Hayes et al. — OUP Oxford — 2012
- 149O'Brien, p. 8
- 150Corrado Pallenberg, p. 71
- 151JournalNew Perspectives on Pius XII and Vatican Financial Transactions during the Second World WarPatricia M. McGoldrick — 2012
- 152Did Hitler Plan to Kidnap the Pope?Istvan Deak — 2008
- 153"SUMMI PONTIFICATUS" – Section 106Pius XII — Vatican.va — 11 December 1925
- 158108: "In the midst of this world which today presents such a sharp contrast to "The Peace of Christ in the Reign of Christ", the Church and her faithful are in times and in years of trial such as have
- 162Phayer, 2008, p. 6
- 163Phayer, 2008, p. 18
- 164Report by the Polish Ambassador to the Holy See on the Situation in German-occupied Poland, Memorandum No. 79, 29 May 1942, Myron Taylor's papers, NARA.
- 165Phayer, 2008, p. 8
- 166The Vatican & the Holocaust: A Question of Judgment – Pius XII & the Jews by Dr. Joseph L. Lichtenjewishvirtuallibrary.org
- 167Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum – "The Vatican Files"Docs.fdrlibrary.marist.edu
- 168Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum – "Letter from Pius XII to FDR, 7 January 1940"Docs.fdrlibrary.marist.edu — 27 May 2004
- 170John Toland; Hitler; Wordsworth Editions; 1997 Edn; p. 594
- 171Conway, Prof. John S., The Vatican, the Nazis and Pursuit of Justice.
- 172John Toland; Hitler; Wordsworth Editions; 1997 Edn; p. 760
- 175Dalin, David G. The Myth of Hitler's Pope: How Pope Pius XII Rescued Jews from the Nazis. Regnery Publishing: Washington, D.C. 2005; ; p. 76
- 176Hitler's Pope?Brit Hume — The American Spectator — 18 August 2006
- 178Harold Taylor 9/30/42Docs.fdrlibrary.marist.edu — 27 May 2004
- 180Minutes of 7 August 1941. British Public Records Office FO 371/30175 57760
- 181Mark Aarons and John Loftus. Unholy Trinity pp. 71–72
- 182Israel Gutman (ed.) Encyclopedia of the Holocaust vol 2, p. 739
- 183Rychlak, Ronald. Hitler, the War, and the Pope pp. 414–15, note 61.
- 184Phayer, 2008, pp. 9–16
- 185Phayer, 2008, pp. 10–15, 147, 150
- 186Phayer, 2008, p. 151
- 187Phayer, 2008, p. 152
- 188BookGenocide in Satellite Croatia 1941–1945Edmond Paris — King's — 1961
- 189MagazineReligion: Rising Sun at the Vatican6 April 1942
- 190NewsEnvoy to Vatican named; Tokyo Reports Choice of Harada Under De Facto Relations27 March 1942
- 191BookThe American Pope: The Life and Times of Francis Cardinal SpellmanJohn Cooney — Times Books — 1984
- 192A Lover of His Church and of His CountryChen Fang-Chung et al. — Hsstudyc.org.hk
- 193Phayer, 2008, p. 53
- 194Rittner and Roth, 2002, p. 4
- 196Phayer, 2008, p. xii
- 198Chadwick, 1988, pp. 256–257.
- 199Alvarez and Graham, 1997, pp. 86–88.
- 200Kurzman, 2007, p. 12
- 201Did Hitler Plan to Kidnap the Pope?Istvan Deak — June 12, 2008
- 202BookBritain and the Vatican during the Second World WarChadwick
- 204Kent, 2002, pp. 87–100.
- 205News Release, 28 August 1944Trumanlibrary.org — 29 August 1944
- 206World War II and the Holocaust in Pius XIIFrank J. Coppa
- 207Paul O'Shea; A Cross Too Heavy; Rosenberg Publishing; 2008; p. 36
- 208JournalVatican Condemnation of Nazi War Crimes: Pope Pius XII’s Denunciation of Wartime AtrocitiesDonald H.J. Hermann — 2017
- 209Cornwell, John, Hitler's Pope, 1999.
- 210Encyclopædia Britannica: "Roman Catholicism – the period of the world wars".
- 211Dalin, 2005, p. 70
- 212McInerney, 2001, p. 47
- 214Lesser, Jeffrey. 1995. Welcoming the Undesirables: Brazil and the Jewish Question. University of California Press. pp. 151–68.
- 215Friedländer, Saul. Nazi Germany and the Jews: The Years of Persecution, 1997, New York: HarperCollins, p. 223
- 216McInerney, 2001, p. 49
- 218Dalin, 2005, p. 73
- 221BookSainthood on HoldEwers, Justin — U.S. News & World Report — 24 November 2008
- 222Gutman, 1990, p. 1137
- 223Perl, William, The Holocaust Conspiracy, p. 200
- 224Phayer, 2000, p. 5
- 225Michael R. Marrus and Robert O. Paxton, 1981, Vichy France and the Jews, New York: Basic Books, p. 202
- 226Delpech, Les Eglises et la Persécution raciale, p. 267
- 227Dalin, 2005, p. 74
- 228John F. Morley, 1980, Vatican Diplomacy and the Jews during the Holocaust, 1939–1943, New York: KTAV, p. 75
- 229Perl, William, The Holocaust Conspiracy, p. 206
- 230Lapide, 1980, p. 139
- 231Phayer, 2000, pp. 27–28.
- 234BookThe Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII, Mussolini, and HitlerDavid Kertzer — Random House — 2022
- 235NewsLetter suggests Pope Pius XII knew of mass gassings of Jews and Poles in 194216 September 2023
- 236Hilberg, Raul, The Destruction of the European Jews, p. 315
- 237Hilberg, Raul, The Destruction of the European Jews, (2003) 3rd edition, pp. 1204–05.
- 238NewsWartime Pope Pius XII likely knew about Nazi gas chambers in the Holocaust as early as 194217 September 2023
- 239NewsLetter showing Pope Pius XII had detailed information from German Jesuit about Nazi crimes revealedNicole Winfield — 16 September 2023
- 242Israel Pocket Library, Holocaust, p. 136
- 243Dalin, 2005, p. 75
- 244Actes et documents du Saint Siège relatifs à la Seconde Guerre mondiale/éd. par Pierre Blet, Angelo Martini, Burkhart Schneider and Robert Graham (7 April 1943).
- 245Israel Pocket Library, Holocaust, p. 134
- 246Zolli, Eugenio. Before the Dawn. Reissued in 1997 as Why I Became a Catholic.
- 247Israel Pocket Library, Holocaust, p. 133
- 248The role of the Roman Catholic Church in the Shoah (Nazi Holocaust)Religioustolerance.org
- 249Phayer, 2008, p. xiii
- 250Dalin, 2005, pp. 82–85
- 251Letter of Pius XII of 30 April 1943 to the Bischop of Berlin, Graf von Preysing, published in "Documentation catholique" of 2 February 1964.
- 252JournalNot Enough vs. Plenty: Which did Pius XII do?Berel Lang — Fall 2001
- 254Gutman, Israel, Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, p. 1138
- 255Dalin, 2005, pp. 87–89
- 256Lévai, Jenö. Zsidósors Európában, Budapest, 1948 (Hungarian)
- 257BookThe Man Who Stopped the Trains to Auschwitz: George Mantello, El Salvador and Switzerland's Finest HourDavid Kranzler — Syracuse University Press — 2000
- 258Gilbert, Martin, The Holocaust, p. 701
- 259BookThe Pope at WarKertzer
- 260Perl, William, The Holocaust Conspiracy, p. 176
- 262Jerusalem Report, (7 February 2005).
- 265NewsThe Pope, the Jews, and the Secrets in the ArchivesStory by David I. Kertzer
- 266Audience for the directors of mission activities in 1944 A.A.S., 1944, p. 208
- 267Evangelii praecones. p. 56
- 268Robert Ventresca, Soldier of Christ, pp. 282–283.
- 269Robert Ventresca, Soldier of Christ, p. 284.
- 270Robert Ventresca, Soldier of Christ, p. 240.
- 271BookChina's Church Divided: Bishop Louis Jin and the Post-Mao Catholic RevivalPaul Philip Mariani — Harvard University Press — 2025
- 272Robert Ventresca, Soldier of Christ, p. 242.
- 273Robert Ventresca, Soldier of Christ, p. 246.
- 274Schneider, p. 80
- 275Gerard Noel, Pius XII, The Hound of Hitler, p. 3
- 276See Humani generis.
- 277Noel, p. 9
- 278Noel, p. 4
- 279Newspaper Accounts of the Death of Pope Pius XIICatholic Culture
- 280Lehnert, Pascalina, p. 191
- 281NewsGevonden in Delpher – de Tijd: Godsdienstig-staatkundig dagblad9 October 1958
- 282D44611
- 285MagazineReligion: Pius XII, 1876–195820 October 1958
- 286BookModern MummiesChristine Quigley — McFarland & Co. — 1998
- 287NewsEmbalming of Pope Pius Like That of the Christ11 October 1958
- 288The Man Who Made the Pope ExplodeDan Peleschuk — OZY — 26 May 2019
- 289JournalHow Pius XII DiedPhilip S. Land, S.J. — 8 November 1958
- 290NewsPreservation of popes after death marked by secrecyLaura King — 7 April 2005
- 291NewsEmbalming a Pope26 October 1958
- 292Hebblethwaite, Peter. John XXIII, Pope of the Council (revised edition), HarperCollins: Glasgow. 1994
- 294Paul O'Shea, A Cross too Heavy, Palgrave Macmillan, 2011, p. 2
- 297St. Pius XII? Pope Francis Mulling It Over, Says Vatican SourceAndrea Gagliarducci — August 2013
- 300Report: Pope Secret Vatican archives on Pius not ready to be opened20 January 2014
- 302Dalla Teche Rai un Pio XII inattesoPapa Pio XII — 8 January 2016
- 303Pio XII come Papa Francesco amava incontrare la gentePapa Pio XII — 13 January 2016
- 304Amazing Miracle Story for Pope Pius XII Canonization?Roman Catholic Man — 5 May 2015
- 305Questa malattia non è per la mortePapa Pio XII — 14 May 2015
- 306Time. 16 August 1943.
- 307New York Times 25 December 1941 and 25 December 1942Catholicleague.org
- 308JournalSymposium on Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust in Italy2002
- 309Paul O'Shea; A Cross Too Heavy; Rosenberg Publishing; 2008; pp. 40–41
- 310McInerney, 2001, p. 155
- 311McInerney, Ralph, The Defamation of Pius XII, 2001.
- 312JournalThe Vatican and the 'Jewish Question': The Record of the Hitler Period—and AfterLeon Poliakov et al. — 1950
- 314A Righteous Gentile: Pope Pius XII and the JewsRabbi David Dalin — Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights — 26 February 2001
- 315JournalSymposium on Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust in Italy
- 316Lapide, Pinchas. Three Popes and the Jews, 1967, quoted in Dalin, 2005, p. 11
- 317Lapide, 1967, p. 269
- 318e.g. Gilbert, Martin. The Holocaust, p. 623
- 319"Lapide was in the 1960s an Israeli consul in Milan and was attempting, at the time he made his inflated estimates, to secure Vatican recognition for the state of Israel. Similar motives explain state
- 322Marchione, 2000, pp. 16–17.
- 323Giovanni Sale, Il Novecento tra genocidi, paure e speranze, Jaca Book, Milan 2006, p. 214, quoted in La Civiltà Cattolica, 2009, I 540
- 325Blet, Pierre. Pius XII and the Second World War, Paulist Press, 1999
- 326Phayer, 2000, pp. xii–xiii.
- 329Paul O'Shea; A Cross Too Heavy; Rosenberg Publishing; 2008; p. 38
- 330The Economist, 9 December 2004.
- 332John Cornwell, The Pontiff in Winter (2004), p. 193
- 333Sanchez, 2002, p. 34
- 337Dalin, 2005, p. 3
- 338Rychlak, Ronald J. Hitler, the War and the Pope Genesis Press, Columbus, MS: 2000, pp. 401 ff.
- 341BookTo Hell and Back: Europe 1914–1949Allen Lane — 2015
- 342"brief phases of reassurance about the role of the Pope were followed by waves of critical literature- and counteracted the process of exoneration that had been underway for some years. The focus of r
- 345The Vatican and the Holocaust: A Preliminary ReportInternational Catholic–Jewish Historical Commission — 2000
- 346Preliminary Report, p. 2
- 347Fogarty, Gerard P., The Vatican and the Holocaust, Presentation to the Dominican House of Studies, Washington, D.C., 9 December 2000
- 348Preliminary Report, p. 5
- 349Preliminary Report, pp. 5–10
- 350Question One
- 351Preliminary Report, pp. 10–13
- 352Question 28
- 353Preliminary Report, pp. 13–14
- 354Question 42
- 355Melissa Radler. "Vatican Blocks Panel's Access to Holocaust Archives". The Jerusalem Post. 24 July 2001.
- 356Catholic guiltPeter J. Stanford — 13 October 2003
- 357BookThe Battle for Rome: The Germans, the Allies, the Partisans, and the Pope, September 1943 – June 1944Robert Katz — Simon & Schuster — 2003
- 358Goñi, afterword to the revised 2003 edition, pp. 327–348.
- 359Brown-Fleming, 2006, Chapter 4: "Granting Absolution: Muench and the Catholic Clemency Campaign".
- 360Phayer, 2008, pp. xi–xvi
- 361Phayer, 2008, p. xi
- 362Address at the conclusion of the symposium organized by the "Pave the Way Foundation"Vatican.va — 19 September 2008
- 363Vatican recalls life and teachings of Pius XII 50 years after his deathCatholicnewsagency.com
- 364NewsSynod ControversyRachel Donadio — 9 October 2008
- 366BookChurch of Spies: The Pope's Secret War Against HitlerBasic Books — 29 September 2015
- 368Vatican to unseal archives on controversial WWII pope4 March 2019
- 370No 'smoking gun' yet in Pius XII archives, researchers sayJulia Morris — 20 May 2021
- 372BookThe Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII, Mussolini, and HitlerDavid I. Kertzer — Random House Publishing Group — 2022
- 373The Pope's Secret Back Channel to HitlerDavid I. Kertzer — 31 May 2022
- 374NewsPapa Pio XII sapeva della Shoah: la prova in una lettera scritta nel 1942 da un gesuita tedescoAntonio Carioti — 16 September 2023
- 375NewsLetter showing Pope Pius XII had detailed information from German Jesuit about Nazi crimes revealedNicole Winfield — 16 September 2023
- 377BookThe Pope and Mussolini: The Secret History of Pius XI and the Rise of Fascism in EuropeDavid I. Kertzer — Oxford University Press — 2014
- 378BookIl Cardinale Giuseppe Siri, Arcivescovo di Genova dal 1946 al 1987: la vita, l'insegnamento, l'eredità spirituale, le memorieRaimondo Spiazzi — Edizioni Studio Domenicano — 1990