Talk:Pope Pius XII/Archive 7

Coat of Arms
I don't understand. The coat of arms that is now gone at least said "Pius XII" on it and this new one says nothing. Why was the old version no good but this new version to be trusted?

Additions by Anon 12-29-05
I think 69.110.136.169 made some very good additions. As long as the bulk of Pius XII article is going to be about the late 20th century accusations of anti-Semitism, then the reader is entitled to know just that vis: that the accusations come some 50 years after the fact and that the motives of the accusers have often not been bona fide. This is one reason I think the quotes section (which I know goodoldpolonius would like to remove) should be in chronological order. It would show that prior to the 1990's, there really were no rumblings about Pius XII and it was universally accepted that he did everything he could without causing more tragedy. The fact that detractors surfaced relatively recently, and that their motives have often been dubious is important info and therefor belongs in the article. One has to understand that since the Pius XII article looks less like a biography and more like a forum for adjudicating the propriety of his actions during a 5 year historical window, the article has to include the kind of comments made by 69.110.136.169. For these reasons I revert to the changes made by 69.110.136.169.

UPDATE: Removed the Golhagen quote b/c he is not a "prominent Jewish Leader" but rather an author whose work is not even accepted by most Pius XII detractors. Goldhagen's book "is filled with so many simple errors of fact that it's positively embarrassing to read. These errors of fact combine to create a set of historical theses about the Nazis and the Catholic Church so tendentious that not even Pius XII's most determined belittlers have dared to assert them." See http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/001/806rjxpb.asp

Pius XII Childhood and early Church career December 2005
Biographies should be about the person and Wikipedia should pride itself on being the "go to" source for just this kind of info. Excluding his childhood is not in the best interest of readers and researchers. Let's build a respectable biography, which includes his childhood.

The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany (Pre-WW II)
Since this section is called "The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany (Pre-WW II)" I think this quote is appropriate. I read the reasons for why it was removed but it fits perfectly in this section. I also think the story of Pius XII s embalming and charlatan doctor is kind of funny (albeit sad). COuld we find a way to make it NPOV and get it back in? Maybe remove the charlatan part etc. I see there is an article on the doctor anyway and a link. Your thoughts pelase.

Quotes Section
Hi Izehar. Just a friendly FYI, I just corrected a few dates that were wrong in the previous article. To revert to previous article is to preserve the wrong dates. Just going to rv to this version w/ correct dates. Another user rightfully thought dates next to each quote would be helpful. His thesis is that the positive statements made by Jewish leaders were made before the full extent of the Holocost was known. Fair enough, but the dates he had inserted for Einstein (and the source as well - he said Time magine) were flat out wrong. So to revert is to preserve error. I spent some time cheking on dates and sources and fixed the article to reflect the facts. Please communicate if you think a rv is called for. Thanks!!

Anonymous Protest and Reply
What on earth happened to this article?! It was great a month and a half ago and now it is one big smear job by late 20th century arm chair historians and conspiracy theorists who place credence in the conjecture and bias of disgruntled ex-priests and Dan Brown style opportunists. Why are the quotes from all the noteworthy Jewish people removed? Because a reader won't be able to make up his own mind about quotes? Because conjecture about "secret motives" of everyone from Albert Einstein and Golda Maier should top these people’s own statements? Because they were trying to get support for the nation of Israel? It was in 1958, a decade after Israel was founded that Maier said “During the ten years of Nazi terror, when our people went through the horrors of martyrdom, the Pope raised his voice to condemn the persecutors and commiserate with the victims.” Thus the idea that all the positive statements made by Jews regarding Pius XII were bribery, is untennable and stupid. What was the NY Times and Time magazine trying to gain by praising Pius XII in 1943? Were they scheming for statehood and thought throwing a bone to Pius XII would help? How come the NYT and Time magazine knew of the atrocities and wrote about them and praised Pius XII for speaking out but that is all now censored? No wonder people like Siegenthaler rightfully warn the public that Wikipedia is thoroughly unscholarly and not an academic source. LOL, you guys are so intent on bashing Pius XII and the Catholic Church that you have no objectivity, give the full stage to John Cornwell and his biased disgruntled crew, expunge the statements of everyone from Einstein and Lapide and even imagine that you know Eli Zolli's motives for converting better than the man himself does. LOL! What hubris and bad faith. The hodge podge of faulty logic and conspiracy theories that you rely on all form a neat little package that explains everything and is a substitutte for history and the truth. Thankfully because of the good will of the average person, the crackpot smear job that this article now is won't have any credibility even among those who don't know the full story yet. Just as a baseline matter, why remove that section with all the quotes and even photos and links that took someone (thankfully not me) so much time to create? It's just awful how tilted the article now looks. I can't imagine tuning back the clock on someone's hard work. The quote section was apologetic? The idea that Pius XII was anti-Semitic is apologetic because it argues hard for a position that has no historical basis. It’s an accusation that first appeared in the 1960’s. The accusation is not history – it’s histrionics. Was every last Jew and Gentile around the world so duped by Catholic propaganda machine that everyone conveniently ignored this issue? LOL! Of course I secretly suspect that many of these Wikipedia articles are written by people who simultaneously think 1) Pius XII was anti-Semitic 2) UFOs are very real 3) Klingon will be the linga franca of the 21st century. Over and out. User:70.18.175.213 18:03, 12 December 2005

Thousand of Wikipedia articles have quotes of similar or more extensive length. Certain folks don't like statements that thoroughly exonerate Pius XII. They give 20 inches to Dan Brown, scorned seminary dropout types and zero column inches to Albert Einstein and Golda Mayer. Anyone who doesn't see the problem with that is an idiot. User:70.18.175.213 21:50, 12 December 2005

I too am alarmed to see how the once-beautiful Pius XII article went down the toilet and is now 90% Dan Brown style nonsense and anti-Catholic diatribe masquerading as scholarship. This version: 14:11, 3 October 2005 Str1977 m (rst balance) is an example when the article was great and within the past 6-7 weeks, a few people have destroyed the article probably b/c it didn't paint the anti-Catholic picture they wanted it to. All the great quotes from prominent Jews have been removed and replaced by Cornwell screed hyperbole. Removing the quotes of every Jew from Einstein to Golda Maier is really a new form of antisemitism, but I am sure that will go right over the heads of the anti-Catholic aparatchiks intent on the triumph of Cornwell's wholly unscholarly and unhistorical text book example of an ad hominem attack. This article is a classic example of the bigger problem with Wikipedia now getting national media attention with the Siegenthaler incident etc. Someone should think about getting this article back into shape - that would be time well spent. I notice the Muslims diligently police their pages and won't permit even the mention of Mohammed's 12 year old wife (fact) but this Pius XII article goes on and on with this BS. Incredible disparity tolerated by Wikipedia! User:70.21.166.96 22:24, 12 December 2005

While I completely agree with the above comment that the article has gone downhill, the anonymous diatribe above does not contribute anything, and is uncivil. Rather than simply protesting stridently, if you think that the 1411, 3 October, version by Str1977 was good, why not just revert to it?

The statement: "Anyone who doesn't see the problem with that is an idiot" is both a personal attack and discounts the fact that many of us DO see the problem. The harshness of your criticism distracts from the fact that it is largely accurate but partly inaccurate. Robert McClenon 22:48, 12 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I find these comments to be rather frustrating, both in tone and content. I did make a number of the edits in question, but I discussed them on this talk page first, and sourced all of them.  Please read the discussion below.  The use of only positive quotes from Jewish sources (When there have been negative ones as well), the failure to mention anything about the International Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission, the Israel Zolli story, etc. all led to an article that left out vital info and was heavily slanted.  If you read the new section, it ends with well-regarded authors praising the Pope and Church for saving huge numbers of lives, it still includes rebuttals of Carroll, it still says he angered Hitler, etc.  However, the article also mentions what the opposing arguments were, and it uses extensive sources on both the positive and negative arguments. Again, the attempt was not to smear Pius XII, but rather to give readers an understanding of the controversy as well, some of which was from well respected sources like the ICJHC, which was appointed by the Vatican. In any case, a reversion of months of work seems like an inappropriate response, given the problems with the original article. --Goodoldpolonius2 00:43, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

The ultimate problem is not my tone, albeit is is not all that civil. The problem is a hatchet job article on Pius XII. We're interested in the steak not the sizzle here. Substance for the article's sake, not what's happening back stage (discussion page). I would revert but I, unlike someone other people, don't want to undo somebody's hard work (assuming some good stuff has happened since October and is now mixed in with this otherwise horrendous article) and don't want to be in a RV war. Although by rights, because this article is so bad, it should be reverted and whatever is good should have to come back in piecemeal. And frankly, as a matter of honesty, I am generous enough to say "let every piece of smear against Pius XII come into the article" but don't remove all the hard work that was there. I don't know who, (although its there in the history) made great efforts to gather quotes, get a few photos and did a lot of work to document many post WWII comments. Now all we have is the ramblings of a disgruntled drop out seminarian penned in the late 1990's. Absurd that anyone would prefer to include the virtually-21st century Cornwell diatribe and then exclude quotes by everyone from Einstein to Maier's quotes. It crypto-anti-Semitism and the height of hubris to say "well they didn't know what they were saying back in the late 40's and 50's, but we know better now." On another board in another context, a Wikipedia member commented rightfully so, it is always better to expand an article with more information that either explains what you think needs balance. Balance should not be achieved by eliminating stuff. Why on earth would you want to give the vistior to this site less instead of more??? I propose it be reverted to what it was, and those who want to add everything from Cornwell's foments to "Pius XII was abducted by UFO's" be permitted to do so, just under another heading such as "controversy." Every other article works this way, everyone is happy b/c both sides get heard. Also, making a seperate section (however prominent, even at the top if you like) it is a lot easier than trying to integrate it into the main body of the article. I won't revert for now since I do respect the process, the work put into this page, and the scintilla of scholarship still extant in the current article. User:138.89.28.150 03:39, 13 December 2005

Revert of Mid-December 2005
Just a quick note. 1. I looked at much of the "progress" that was made since this October version (which has been restored) and not a lot of progress was there at all. A lot of reverts and some very minor grammer corrections. 2. There is a section on "Criticism of Pope Pius XII" which is absolutely fine and I would encourage anyone wanting to add to that section their most robust arguments against the man to do so there. Make the criticism section 10x's as long as the rest of the article if you so choose. With cut and paste, you can have all the diatribe back in there within 20 minutes. Counter every scrap of evidence that would tend to make Pius look good and add every explanation as to why those quotes from mid-20th century Jews are out of context if you like, but please don't censor and destroy what was one of Wikipedia's better articles. What happened to the article was so dishonest and painted such a lopsided picture that it cried for fixing. Likewsie, the opportunity presented now to add to the criticism section in untrammeled fashion is very fair will better serve the readers of the article. Let's agree on fairness. User:70.21.162.53 15:28, 13 December 2005

Blind rollbacks
Before anyone does a large-scale blind rollback of the article to a version over two months old, it should be discussed in detail. It is not typical in WP to just rollback long-standing articles. All of the changes made were publicly discussed on this page, and consensus was made, step by step. Substantial new content was added, including a lot of info favorable to Pope Pius XII, descriptions of work done by a research council appointed by the Vatican, etc, huge numbers of sourced comments, etc. If you want to re-insert something like the quotes section, do it by hand, rather than by eliminating two months of changes! --Goodoldpolonius2 15:38, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

One last thing. Whatever you think about Pius XII, you have to step back and consider the propriety of having 95% of an article deal with a controversy that arose in the 1960's. It's like having an article on Thomas Jefferson with 2 column inches documenting that he was a founding father, author of the U.S. Constitution, contributor to the Dec. of Independence, etc. and then spending the other 95% of the article on Sally Hemmings. Yes, discussion of Sally Hemmings might sate the titilations of late 20th century minds and give comfort to One-Note Johnny's who grind just one axe, day in and day out, but it would be a gross distortion of Jefferson's life and accomplishments to skew the article in such a manner. In the case of Pius XII, there is no hope that 90% of a Wikipedia article would ever deal with the substance of this man's life. I accept that fact because he is just such a person who attracts axe grinders who got a bee in their bonnet 50 years after the fact (Historical Nota Bene: even though the controversy FIRST appeared in the 1960's, the agitators didn't go into high gear until the mid 1990's). So be it. Let 95% of Jefferson be Sally Hemmings and let 95% of Pius be this canard. You would NEVER see such an article in Britanica or any other scholarly publication, but if Wikipedia wants to permanantly get caught with its pants down on this topic, let it be. But in addition to the diatribe and smear job, just don't remove the bona fide evidence that exonerates the man. That is all this anon asks. User:70.21.162.53 15:42, 13 December 2005


 * The tag is because there are huge inaccuracies in the reverted version, inaccuracies which have been fixed in the recent version (Israel Zolli, etc.) but which have been restored with a blind rollback without discussion. I don't want to violate 3RR, but I strongly suggest that someone roll this back to the most recent version of the last two months, and that we work from there to make anonymous happy.  WP does not work with large-scale blind reverts without consensus.  Again, my solution here: restore to the Str1977 version from yesterday. Then we can make whatever changes are needed to make other editors happy.  A two-month rollback and wholesale deletion of sourced content is not a good precedent. --Goodoldpolonius2 15:54, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

UPDATE: Well, as stated above, the work of the past two months has been crossing a fews T's and reverts. Not a lot of substantive progress, objectively speaking. Substantively, what has happened is core information was removed which makes the article sound like an indictment, not a biography. The bottom line is that the quotes from these prominent Jews are like garlic to a vampire for those who do not want to hear the Jewish eye witnesses to WWII speak. There is no defense of removing the quotes of WWII eyewitnesses and inserting Cornwell's polemics. The invitation mentioned above to put every last scrap of diatribe into the "Criticism of Pope Pius XII" is a standing offer, not to mention a smart and fair solution. Since the quotes and positive info was removed really without cause, in the spirit of charity and fairness, you should be willing to spend a few minutes importing all the "damning" evidence back into the article. Put as much of it back in as you like. That's the way you should have done it back in October and that is why you are humbly being asked to do it that way now. Best regards and no hard feelings. User:70.21.162.53 16:03, 13 December 2005

Whatever you think about Pius XII, you have to step back and consider the propriety of having 95% of an article deal with a controversy that arose in the 1960's. It's like having an article on Thomas Jefferson with 2 column inches documenting that he was a founding father, author of the U.S. Constitution, contributor to the Dec. of Independence, etc. and then spending the other 95% of the article on Sally Hemmings. Yes, discussion of Sally Hemmings might sate the titilations of late 20th century minds and give comfort to One-Note Johnny's who grind just one axe, day in and day out, but it would be a gross distortion of Jefferson's life and accomplishments to skew the article in such a manner. In the case of Pius XII, there is no hope that 90% of a Wikipedia article would ever deal with the substance of this man's life. I accept that fact because he is just such a person who attracts axe grinders who got a bee in their bonnet 50 years after the fact (Historical Nota Bene: even though the controversy FIRST appeared in the 1960's, the agitators didn't go into high gear until the mid 1990's). So be it. Let 95% of Jefferson be Sally Hemmings and let 95% of Pius be this canard. You would NEVER see such an article in Britanica or any other scholarly publication, but if Wikipedia wants to permanantly get caught with its pants down on this topic, let it be. But in addition to the diatribe and smear job, just don't remove the bona fide evidence that exonerates the man. That is all this anon asks.

With regard to your concern for going back a few months, that's the first date anyone can find when the article had integrity. As stated above (RV of mid-December 2005), the work of the past two months has been crossing a fews T's and reverts. Not a lot of substantive progress, objectively speaking. Look at the history - 35% of it is reverts. Substantively, what has happened is core information was removed which makes the article sound like an indictment, not a biography. The bottom line is that the quotes from these prominent Jews are like garlic to a vampire for those who do not want to hear the Jewish eye witnesses to WWII speak. There is no defense of removing the quotes of WWII eyewitnesses and inserting Cornwell's polemics. The invitation mentioned above to put every last scrap of diatribe into the "Criticism of Pope Pius XII" is a standing offer, not to mention an intelligent and fair solution. Since the quotes and so much positive info was removed really without cause, in the spirit of charity and fairness, you should be willing to spend a few minutes importing all the "damning" evidence back into the article. Put as much of it back in as you like. That's the way you should have done it back in October and that is why you are humbly being asked to do it that way now. Best regards and no hard feelings. User: 70.21.162.53 16:03, 13 December 2005


 * The way to avoid hard feelings is by not undoing many weeks of work without discussing it first. You might very well be right, but Wikipedia doesn't work when people act like this. I am very inclined to roll back to the more recent version and protect the article until everything is hashed out here on the talk page; could someone give me a good reason why I shouldn't? --jpgordon&#8711;&#8710;&#8711;&#8710; 16:24, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

The reason is b/c in all sincerity, look at the history since October. Not much was accomplished except the destruction of an excellent and balanced article. It is very easy to import whatever explanations/counter arguments that anyone wants to to make into the current article which is balanced and thoughtful. The expunging of the quotes and much other good info was very irresponsible as it in fact did destroy a lot of hard work, whereas this revert affects a few punctuation matters. I think when you consider what you want to do, you have to reflect on the fact that what has happened since October has NOT been progress but decay and this is just a rennovation made in the best of good faith. Likewsie, the opportunity stands to build a great "anti-Pius XII" section which already exists in this article. Let's build that and have an article with balance, not an article that does a hatchet job and sounds like a indictment instead of a biography.

One last good reason that is objective: The October article is chock full of info useful to the reader; It's lengthy, with neat sections on various topics filled with facts, photos etc. Whole sections were removed in the December versions and facts were repalced with wild specualtion that came from novels, not history books or eye witnesses. Furthermore, the neat suscint sections were replaced by long screeds that, even if there were some facts in there, made the reader go cross-eyed. The October article is well laid out, rich in facts and data and is the ideal article to add to. It comes complete with a ""Criticism of Pius XII" section ready to go and be built on. Hope that makes sense. Thanks :) User:70.21.162.53 16:39, 13 December 2005


 * Would you just read some of the previous talk section about the problems that were corrected before your "hatchet-job" rollback? You keep using random standards (the old version is even more about the Holocaust, which you said was a problem earlier), like "well laid out" and "ideal article." Just a few of the many problems that were fixed:


 * 1) There are many negative quotes about Pius from Jewish sources (including the Chief Rabbi of Israel) if we include the quotes section, then we should include both positive and negative, this is just ridiculous as is, and reads like a polemic;
 * 2) The Israel Zolli story (told twice!) leaves out the detail that he was rejected by the Jewish community for fleeing during the Holocaust and then chose to convert;
 * 3) The use of non-historians (Syndney Zion?) for the positive arguments, while not giving any of the negative ones raised by various sources;
 * 4) The whole section on Dahlin, but no more than a sentence on all the other critics that he argues against combined;
 * 5) The failure to include anything about the Vatican-appointed International Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission and the questions it raised about Pius's behavior
 * 6) And this leaves out the positive stuff I added: sourced data about the number of Jews saved, quotes from Dahlin rebutting Carroll, etc.
 * It is not your unilateral judgement that rules here it is sources and date. The article you keep reverting to was the one that added to, but you are reverting all of the additions -- you cannot just freeze whatever data you like. Please restore the article, and then we can start to make sourced changes that will work for you.  If you want to improve this article, it is best to be productive, and not antagonistic and not roll-back sourced edits. This will get you nowhere, I guarantee. --Goodoldpolonius2 16:57, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

I accept the decision and agree to work to bring back what I think was improperly removed, although my abiding belief is that such a task was encumbant upon those who removed the good info in the first place. I firmly believe seperate sections are not only a clearer way to present info, but they are extremely useful to researchers who otherwise have to find a needle in a haystack. If someone wants to spend time refuting the quotes, feel free but please don't fuss with the quote section and destroy it which is what led to this problem in the first place. Thanks. User:70.21.162.53 17:13, 13 December 2005


 * Thank you for not blindly reverting the article again. I hope we are all able to work together to ensure that this article remains NPOV and informative.  I must agree that the quotes are very interesting, however, to remain unbiased (which I am not, as think Pius' actions in the face of Nazism were unquestionably commendable) we should probably add some negative quotes as well. JG of Borg 17:20, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, I am glad that we have reached a way forward here. I have an issue with the quotes section. I think that the positive quotes without balance or context seem quite biased.  However, I am reluctant to "fix" the problem by simply including negative quotes, as I think that they also create a false impression.  That is why I eliminated the quote section and tried to just state facts, rather than giving random opinions extra weight just because they were said by Jews. With the quote section back, I guess that the only option is to add negatives.  Here are some for discussion:
 * Israeli Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau said in 2000: "Even though the 'Final Solution' was a Nazi invention, not a Church one, the Pontiff who headed the Roman Catholic Church during the Holocaust period, Pius XII, did nothing to either condemn it or protest against it; his standing by while blood was being shed deserves full condemnation, on behalf of future generations as well. At Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, there is an avenue on which every tree is dedicated to the memory of a Righteous Gentile. Had Pius XII fulfilled his basic duty, this avenue would be much longer and the lives of many more Jews would have been saved during those horrible days."
 * Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean and founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center: "The facts are that Pius XII was the best informed leader on what was happening in Europe during the Holocaust. Yet unlike many priests and bishops who risked their lives and showed great courage in defying Hitler, the Pope sat in stony silence as millions of Jews were murdered in the death camps."
 * Do we include these to balance the other quotes? Or do we remove the quote section? Or is there another approach? --Goodoldpolonius2 17:45, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

People will read the article and see that the negative quotes are mostly uninformed. Why not put them back in? JG of Borg 17:46, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Add negative quotes if you like. That's been my point all along. Put in whatever you want. Put in a quote that he was a bank robber if you can find one. Fair minds will discern and I think that's your fear, frankly. Your resurrected proposition that the quote section be removed I think shows you perhaps are not fair minded. Had to laugh - even the atheists have a more balanced section on Pius XII than you guys. LOL! http://atheism.about.com/library/glossary/western/bldef_piusxii.htm I guess there are atheists with morality, just not partisans with axes to grind. User:70.21.152.4 17:50, 13 December 2005


 * You really need to follow civility and assume good faith. Your tone makes dialogue extemely unpleasant. --Goodoldpolonius2 19:08, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Yeah... I like my answer better. Says the same thing without the needless (and baseless) insults.  JG of Borg 15:03, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

9 April cut-off point for( here non-existant) political kick-back Scheme
Is is not holy enough for us to mention the kick-back scheme with Adolf ? It is visible that the absolute cut-off point for the scandalous reichskonkordat kick back / quid pro quo is here, despite source, put at  9 April. It is conveniently massaged in. This is a brilliant whitewash of the Pacelli influence upon the German hierarchy at the time of the scheme. EffK 09:42, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

WP-ART- Article resolution "template" at Vatican Bank
Towards resolving some workable Wikipedia template for this and other Articles, see Vatican Bank -discussion,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Vatican_Bank#Inherently_POV

Pacelli, Nuremberg, Hudal and the Widerstand
It seems apparent that Pacelli was involved with/sympathetic to Bishop Alois Hudal, and that there is a relationship there that is sourceable even apart from the extraordinary reference by von Papen at his trial to a high authority in the Vatican seeking yet another synthesis with the healthy doctrines of National Socialism in 1936.

Since a high authority is not the high authority, it is reasonable to now source the identity of this high authority as in yet another synthesis. I have sourced the Pius XII Widerstand Vatican Exchanges at length, and what is most noticeable is that they reveal a willingness by Pacelli to yet another retention of such doctrines in  even 1943.In short, knock off Hitler himself, but keep the doctrines powering Germany. Keep the war in the East, keep the expansionism and keep the healthy doctrines. It is shocking that the supposedly whiter than white Widerstand figures equally saw this as out-come, however unsuccessfully, through even 1943. That Pius XII went along with it is morally outrageous, given the ICJHC questions, and the reality of Pacelli's knowledge of the mass-murders. Fortunately, as I have before remarked, Churchill et al did not have any such intentions, and distrusted Pacelli for the very reason that this inglorious idea would sap the fighting will entirely. EffK 21:01, 1 January 2006 (UTC)