THE RAINBOW SWASTIKA - Scattered Seed Ministries

Secretary of State and soon-to-be Pope Pius XII, was behind the wording of this document
and "behind all the anti-German activities of Rome's policy". (Pinchas Lapide, _Three Popes
and the Jews_, p.120) The Nazi government lodged a harsh protest with the Vatican shortly
afterward (April 12, 1937 - see Georg May, _Kirchenkampf oder Katholikenverfolgung_,
p.582). When Pius XII came to power in 1939, he appeared to adopt a more diplomatic tone,
making his position much harder to identify. [It is not my aim here to evaluate whether Pius
XII did or did not do enough to oppose the Holocaust. There is a great number of published
papers which come to conflicting conclusions, but the prevailing opinion today is that Pius
XII failed abysmally by remaining silent in the face of Nazi genocide. For open-minded
readers, I recommend a documented rebuttal from the Catholic side, which ironically relies on
the research of several Jewish scholars, especially Israeli historian Pinchas Lapide. My goal
here is to show the Nazi response to what Pius XII did say, and to suggest motives for it.] Yet
the so-called "Silent Pope" came under attack in Nazi political cartoons published in _Der
Stuermer_, which showed the pontiff kissing rabbis. (reported to me by German researcher
Robert Jesolowitz, who has them on file)
In what most historians consider a vague protest, Pius XII referred to "those hundreds of
thousands who, without any fault of their own, sometimes only by reason of their nationality
or race, are marked for death or progressive extinction" (Christmas Message 1942). Vague or
not, his message was not missed by the Nazi leadership. Himmler's deputy Reynhard
Heydrich responded with: "The Pope has repudiated the National Socialist New European
Order... He is virtually accusing the German people of injustice toward the Jews and makes
himself the mouthpiece of the Jewish war criminals." (quoted by Lapide, p.137) In Italy, the
editor of _Regime Fascista_ wrote: "The Church's obstruction of the practical solution of the
Jewish problem constitutes a crime against the New Europe." (Michael Schwartz, _The
Persistent Prejudice: Anti-Catholicism in America_, p.246) [Besides the obvious Nazi
conviction that Catholics were heeding a covert call from the Pope for resistance, note the
familiar phrase "New European Order", its only difference being on a regional scale rather
than today's global goal.]
[It can be - and usually is - argued that Pius XII did not do enough, given his vast resources
and global influence. On the other hand, Lapide shows that he did substantially more than
other leaders who were not caught in Hitler's hammer-lock, such as the U.S. government
which turned away Jewish refugees even though immigration quotas left room for over one
million between 1933 and 1943. (Documentation of American inaction is available in _While
Six Million Died_, by Arthur D. Morse.) This sense of perspective is often lost by overreliance
on the 1963 German drama, "Der Stellvertreter" (performed as "The Deputy" in
London that same year), which repeats Heydrich's charge of "war criminal", only this time
presenting the Pope as an accomplice for the Nazi side by his "silence". Aside from the fact
that the charge itself is debatable, I have yet to see anyone portray then-President Roosevelt as
a "war criminal" for his refusal to get involved at a much lower risk.]
[Four points about "The Deputy" which reflect on the NA-Nazi connection: (1) This play
focusing on Pius XII to the exclusion of many other silent "Deputies" was introduced by
playright Rolf Hochhuth as a "fantasy", yet it has come to be regarded by many as a definitive
"work" on the Holocaust Pope. In sharp contrast, many students of the Holocaust have never
heard of Pinchas Lapide's assessment of Pius XII, based not on fantasy but on solid research.
(2) This initiative to elevate Pius to "war criminal" status did not come from the Jewish
community but from post-Nazi Germany, where no small number of unrepentant war
criminals were able to continue their lives - and their occultic beliefs. (3) "The Deputy" was
strongly criticized by Lapide, who said that world Jewry did not endorse this view of