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Years ago I read John Cornwell's Hitler's Pope are pretty damning outline of Pius's complicity with the Nazis based upon his abhorrence to communism. A couple of years later the apologia "The Myth of Hitler's Pope by Rabbi David Dalin". Cornwell's book has been shot through with so many holes as I know longer know what to make of it, yet the "Myth" made me feel that I was reading a Vatican p.r. piece. I would love to read the thoughts of the learned folks after my curiosity was rekindled by the god awful movie "Pope Pius XII: Under the Roman Sky star James Cromwell as Pius."
This thread is almost two years old, but there don't appear to be any more recent threads about this.
Anyway, based on my admittedly limited knowledge about Pius XII, I think that it might be a mistake for the Roman Catholic Church to consider him a saint.
However, I don't think that Pius XII should be judged based on the criteria of how we would judge a saint, but rather be judged as a national leader and politician of his times (after all, the Pope is the leader of Vatican City). Based on such a criteria, I don't think that Pius XII was either a particularly good or a particularly bad individual. Based on what I know, it appears that he tried hard to protect the Roman Catholic Church's and the Vatican's interests both before and after he became Pope. Granted, I do think that he might have been able to do more to help the Jews, but this criticism isn't limited to him or to the Vatican/RCC (after all, it can apply to the U.K., the U.S., et cetera as well). Also, it is worth noting that as far as I know, Pius XII did not oppose having Catholic religious leaders/figures and clergy speak out against the Holocaust if they felt that this was necessary. Finally, as for speaking out, it appears that it sometimes had its desired effects (such as when the Nazi killing of disabled people was reduced and forced underground) while at other times it did not (and sometimes even made things slightly worse, such as when the Dutch Roman Catholic clergy protested against the deportation of the Dutch Jews only to see all of these Jews as well as 92 Dutch Christians of Jewish descent (based on Cornwell's data) get deported as well).
a couple links about Gino Bartali. The legendary cyclist who risked his life
to save Jews via the underground network established by the RCC under Pius XII.
The Jews of Italy, like those in Holland and France. were among the last to be rounded up, deported and exterminated.
This was due in part to the fact that those Jews who lived successful middle-class lives in cosmopolitan cities, such as the family of Anne Frank, had more resources than the vast majority who lived a simple, peasant-like agrarian lifestyle in what came to be called the "pale of Jewish settlement"
Nevertheless, by the fall of 1944, Auschwitz had accomplished the obscenity for which it was created, and the machinery of systematic extermination was shut down.
Cornwell's book contains a particularly-detailed account of how the deportation of the Jews of Rome was carried out; if any of Rabbi Davin's supporters can put forth a rebuttal, now is the time to do so.
The Pope could have proclaimed participation in the persecution of Jews to be a great sin, and could have excommunicated any Roman Catholic who did so.
Of course, that would have forced a lot of people to choose faith over comfort, and he'd have lost a lot of people either way--either they'd leave the church or they'd suffer persecution.
Of course, that would have meant the Germans would have sacked the Vatican and jacked all his nice stuff, and probably thrown him in Sobibor.
The Pope chose the only path he could to make sure the Catholic Church continued with its all-important membership numbers and wealth intact. Any form of strong outward moral stand for the Church's principles would have seen it poor and persecuted, and that simply could not be allowed to happen.
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