Background
Following the Nazi takeover, the Catholic Church hierarchy in Germany initially attempted to co-operate with the new government, but by 1937 had become highly disillusioned. A threatening, though initially mainly sporadic persecution of the Catholic Church followed the Nazi takeover. Hitler moved quickly to eliminate Political Catholicism. Two thousand functionaries of the Bavarian People's Party were rounded up by police in late June 1933. They along with the national Catholic Centre Party, ceased to exist in early July, as the Nazi Party became the only legally permitted party in the country. Vice Chancellor Franz von Papen meanwhile negotiated the '' Reichskonkordat'' treaty with the Vatican, which prohibited clergy from participating in politics. Kershaw wrote that the Vatican was anxious to reach agreement with the new government, despite "continuing molestation of Catholic clergy, and other outrages committed by Nazi radicals against the Church and its organisations". The '' Reichskonkordat'' () was signed on 20 July 1933 between the Holy See and Germany. According to historian Pinchas Lapide, the Nazis saw the treaty as giving them moral legitimacy and prestige, whilst the Catholic Church sought to protect itself from persecution through a signed agreement. According to Guenter Lewy, a common view within Church circles at the time was thatAuthorship
A five-member commission drafted the encyclical. According to Paul O'Shea the carefully worded denunciation of aspects of Nazism was formulated between 16 and 21 January 1937, by Pius XI, Cardinal Secretary of State Eugenio Pacelli (later Pope Pius XII) and German cardinals Bertram, Faulhaber and Schulte, and Bishops Preysing andContent
The numbers conform to the headings used in the Vatican'Violations of the Concordat
In the introduction and sections 1–8 of the encyclical Pius XI wrote of his "deep anxiety and growing surprise" on observing the travails of the Catholic Church in Germany with the terms of Concordat being openly broken and the faithful being oppressed as had never been seen before.Race
Pius then affirmed the articles of faith that Nazi ideology was attacking. He stated that true belief in God could not be reconciled with race, people or state raised beyond their standard value to idolatrous levels.Lewy, 1967, p. 157 National religion or a national God was rejected as a grave error and that the Christian God could not be restricted "within the frontiers of a single people, within the pedigree of one single race." (sections 9–13). Historian Michael Phayer wrote: Martin Rhonheimer writes that while ''Mit brennender Sorge'' asserts "race" is a "fundamental value of the human community", "necessary and honorable", it condemns the "exaltation of race, or the people, or the state, or a particular form of state", "above their standard value" to "an idolatrous level". According to Rhonheimer, it was Pacelli who added to Faulhaber's milder draft the following passage (8):First things, Rhonheimer Against this background to the encyclical, Faulhaber suggested in an internal Church memorandum that the bishops should inform the Nazi regime…that the Church, through the application of its marriage laws, has made and continues to make, an important contribution to the state's policy of racial purity; and is thus performing a valuable service for the regime's population policy.Vidmar wrote that the encyclical condemned particularly the purported
11. None but superficial minds could stumble into concepts of a national God, of a national religion; or attempt to lock within the frontiers of a single people, within the narrow limits of a single race, God, the Creator of the universe, King and Legislator of all nations before whose immensity they are "as a drop of a bucket"Historian Garry Wills, in the context of Jews having traditionally been described as deicides, says that the encyclical affirms Jesus received his human nature from a people who crucified him' – not some Jews, but the Jewish people" and that it was also Pius XI who had disbanded the Catholic organization " Friends of Israel" that had campaigned to have the charge of deicide dropped. The charge of deicide against all Jewish people was later dropped during the Second Vatican Council.
Defending the Old Testament
Historian Paul O'Shea says the encyclical contains a vigorous defense of theClaimed attacks on Hitler
There is no mention of Hitler by name in the encyclical but the "mad prophet" described in the text may be a veiled reference to him. The Catholic writer Anthony Rhodes wrote in ''The Vatican in the Age of the Dictators:'' "Nor was the Führer himself spared n the encyclical for his 'aspirations to divinity', 'placing himself on the same level as Christ'; 'a mad prophet possessed of repulsive arrogance". Subsequent works have repeated Rhodes' characterization that Hitler is described as a "mad prophet" in the encyclical. Historian John Connelly writes:Some accounts exaggerate the directness of the pope's criticism of Hitler. Contrary to what Anthony Rhodes in ''The Vatican in the Age of the Dictators'' writes, there were oblique references to Hitler. It was not the case that Pius failed to "spare the Führer," or called him a "mad prophet possessed of repulsive arrogance." The text limits its critique of arrogance to unnamed Nazi "reformers".Historian Michael Phayer wrote that the encyclical does not condemn Hitler or National Socialism, "as some have erroneously asserted". Historian Michael Burleigh sees the passage as pinpointing "the tendency of the Führer-cult to elevate a man into god." The relevant passage in the English version of the encyclical is:
17. …Should any man dare, in sacrilegious disregard of the essential differences between God and His creature, between the God-man and the children of man, to place a mortal, were he the greatest of all times, by the side of, or over, or against, Christ, he would deserve to be called prophet of nothingness, to whom the terrifying words of Scripture would be applicable: "He that dwelleth in heaven shall laugh at them" (Psalms ii. 3).(The German text uses the term "", in which the component '' Wahn'' can mean "illusion" or "delusion", while the Italian text uses "''un profeta di chimere''" (a prophet of chimeras; that is, a prophet as the product of the imagination).) Historian Susan Zuccotti sees the above passage as an unmistakable jibe at Hitler.
Fidelity to the Church and Bishop of Rome
Pius then went on to assert that people were obliged to believe in Christ, divine revelation, and the primacy of the Bishop of Rome (Sections 14–24).Soteriology
Historian Michael Burleigh views the following passage as a rejection of the Nazis' conception of collective racial immortality:Burleigh, 2006, p. 19124. "Immortality" in a Christian sense means the survival of man after his terrestrial death, for the purpose of eternal reward or punishment. Whoever only means by the term, the collective survival here on earth of his people for an indefinite length of time, distorts one of the fundamental notions of the Christian Faith and tampers with the very foundations of the religious concept of the universe, which requires a moral order. hoever does not wish to be a Christian ought at least to renounce the desire to enrich the vocabulary of his unbelief with the heritage of Christian ideas./blockquote> The bracketed text is in Burleigh's book and the German version (section 29), but not in the Vatican's English version: ''Wenn er nicht Christ sein will, sollte er wenigstens darauf verzichten, den Wortschatz seines Unglaubens aus christlichem Begriffsgut zu bereichern.''
Compatibility of humility and heroism
Burleigh also mentions the encyclical's rejection of Nazi contempt for the redemptive value of suffering:Burleigh, 2006, p. 19227. Humility in the spirit of the Gospel and prayer for the assistance of grace are perfectly compatible with self-confidence and heroism. The Church of Christ, which throughout the ages and to the present day numbers more confessors and voluntary martyrs than any other moral collectivity, needs lessons from no one in heroism of feeling and action. The odious pride of reformers only covers itself with ridicule when it rails at Christian humility as though it were but a cowardly pose of self-degradation.
Christian grace contrasted with natural gifts
Defense of natural law
Burleigh views the encyclical as confounding the Nazi philosophy that "Right is what is advantageous to the people" through its defense of Natural Law:29. …To hand over the moral law to man's subjective opinion, which changes with the times, instead of anchoring it in the holy will of the eternal God and His commandments, is to open wide every door to the forces of destruction. The resulting dereliction of the eternal principles of an objective morality, which educates conscience and ennobles every department and organization of life, is a sin against the destiny of a nation, a sin whose bitter fruit will poison future generations.The Nazi principle is rejected on the basis that what is morally illicit cannot be of true advantage. Human laws opposed to natural law were described as not "obligatory in conscience". In his history of the German Resistance, Anton Gill interprets the encyclical as having asserted the "inviolability of human rights". Historian Emma Fattorini wrote that the Pope'sindignation was obviously not addressed at improbable democratic-liberal human rights issues, nor was there a generic and abstract appeal to evangelical principles. It was rather the Church's competition with the totalitarian regression of the concept of Volk that in the Nazi state-worship totally absorbed the community-people relationshipThomas Banchoff considers this the first explicit mention of human rights by a Pope, something the Pope would affirm the following year in a little-noticed letter to the American Church. Banchoff writes: "the church's full embrace of the human rights agenda would have to wait until the 1960s".
Defense of Catholic schooling
The encyclical also defends the natural rights of parents in the education of their children, and describes as "void of all legality" the "notorious coercion" of Catholic children away from Catholic schooling into interdenominational schools, part of Nazi attempts to monopolize education (sections 33–37).
Call to priests and religious
Pius ends the encyclical with a call to priests and religious to serve truth, to unmask and refute error, with the laity being urged to remain faithful to Christ and to defend the rights which the Concordat had guaranteed them and the Church. The encyclical dismisses " aziattempts to dress up their ghastly doctrines in the language of religious belief.":
Call to parents
Moderation of the encyclical but with warnings
Release
The encyclical was written in German and not the usualLatin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...of official Catholic Church documents. Because of government restrictions, the nuncio in Berlin, Archbishop Cesare Orsenigo, had the encyclical distributed by courier. There was no pre-announcement of the encyclical, and its distribution was kept secret in an attempt to ensure the unhindered public reading of its contents in all the Catholic churches of Germany. Piers Brendon, ''The Dark Valley: A Panorama of the 1930s'', p. 511 Printers close to the church offered their services and produced an estimated 300,000 copies, which was still insufficient. Additional copies were created by hand and using typewriters. After its clandestine distribution, the document was hidden by many congregations in their tabernacles for protection. It was read from the pulpits of German Catholic parishes on Palm Sunday, 21 March 1937.
Nazi response
The release of ''Mit brennender Sorge'' precipitated an intensification of the Nazi persecution of the Catholic Church in Germany.Ian Kershaw; Hitler a Biography; 2008 Edn; W.W. Norton & Co; London; pp. 381–82 Hitler was infuriated. Twelve printing presses were seized, and hundreds of people sent either to prison or the concentration camps. In his diary, Goebbels wrote that there were heightened verbal attacks on the clergy from Hitler, and wrote that Hitler had approved the start of trumped up "immorality trials" against clergy and anti-Church propaganda campaign. Goebbels' orchestrated attack included a staged "morality trial" of 37 Franciscans.Ian Kershaw p.381-382 On the "Church Question", wrote Goebbels, "after the war it has to be generally solved … There is, namely, an insoluble opposition between the Christian and a heroic-German world view". '' The Catholic Herald''s German correspondent wrote almost four weeks after the issuing of the encyclical that:Hitler has not yet decided what to do. Some of his counsellors try to persuade him to declare the Concordat as null and void. Others reply that that would do immense damage to Germany's prestige in the world, particularly to its relations with Austria and to its influence in Nationalist Spain. Moderation and prudence are advocated by them. There is, unfortunately, no hope that the German Reich will come back to a full respect of its Concordat obligations and that the Nazis will give up those of their doctrines which have been condemned by the Pope in the new Encyclical. But it is well possible that a definite denunciation of the Concordat and a rupture of diplomatic relations between Berlin and the Holy See will be avoided, at least for the time being."First Encyclical in German", Catholic Herald, 9 April 1937''The Catholic Herald'' reported on 23 April:
/ref>It is understood that the Vatican will reply to the note of complaint presented to it by the German Government in regard to the Encyclical ''Mit Brennender Sorge''. The note was not a defence of Nazism, but a criticism of the Vatican's action at a time when negotiations on the relations between the Vatican and Germany were still in being. It would seem that the Vatican, desirous of finding a modus vivendi, however slight the chance of it may appear, wishes to clear up any possible misunderstanding. On 15 April Cardinal Pacelli received Herr von Bergen, the Reich Ambassador at the Holy See. This was the first diplomatic meeting since the publication of the Encyclical.''The Tablet ''The Tablet'' is a Catholic Church, Catholic international weekly review published in London. Brendan Walsh, previously literary editor and then acting editor, was appointed editor in July 2017. History ''The Tablet'' was launched in 1840 by ...'' reported on 24 April 1937:The case in the Berlin court against three priests and five Catholic laymen is, in public opinion, the Reich's answer to the Pope's Mit brennender Sorge encyclical, as the prisoners have been in concentration camps for over a year. Chaplain Rossaint, of Dusseldorf; is, however, known as a pacifist and an opponent of the National Socialist regime, and it is not denied that he was indiscreet; but he is, moreover, accused of having tried to form a Catholic-Communist front on the plea that he baptized a Jewish Communist. This the accused denies, and his defence has been supported by Communist witnesses.The (censored) German newspapers made no mention of the encyclical. The Gestapo visited the offices of every German diocese the next day and seized all the copies they could find. Every publishing company that had printed it was closed and sealed, diocesan newspapers were proscribed, and limits imposed on the paper available for Church purposes.The true extent of the Nazi fury at this encyclical was shown by the immediate measures taken in Germany to counter further propagation of the document. Not a word of it was printed in newspapers, and the following day the Secret Police visited the diocesan offices and confiscated every copy they could lay their hands on. All the presses which had printed it were closed and sealed. The bishops' diocesan magazines (''Amtsblatter'') were proscribed; and paper for church pamphlets or secretarial work was severely restricted. A host of other measures, such as diminishing the State grants to theology students and needy priests (agreed in the Concordat) were introduced. And then a number of futile, vindictive measures which did little to harm the Church …According to Carlo Falconi: "The pontifical letter still remains the first great official public document to dare to confront and criticize Nazism, and the Pope's courage astonished the world."Falconi, p. 230. Historian Frank J. Coppa wrote that the encyclical was viewed by the Nazis as "a call to battle against the Reich" and that Hitler was furious and "vowed revenge against the Church". Klaus Scholder wrote: According to John Vidmar, Nazi reprisals against the Church in Germany followed thereafter, including "staged prosecutions of monks for homosexuality, with the maximum of publicity".Vidmar, p. 254. One hundred and seventy Franciscans were arrested inKoblenz Koblenz ( , , ; Moselle Franconian language, Moselle Franconian: ''Kowelenz'') is a German city on the banks of the Rhine (Middle Rhine) and the Moselle, a multinational tributary. Koblenz was established as a Roman Empire, Roman military p ...and tried for "corrupting youth" in a secret trial, with numerous allegations of priestly debauchery appearing in the Nazi-controlled press, while a film produced for theHitler Youth The Hitler Youth ( , often abbreviated as HJ, ) was the youth wing of the German Nazi Party. Its origins date back to 1922 and it received the name ("Hitler Youth, League of German Worker Youth") in July 1926. From 1936 until 1945, it was th ...showed men dressed as priests dancing in a brothel. ''The Catholic Herald'' reported on 15 October 1937:The failure of the Nazi "morality" trials campaign against the Church can be gauged from the fact that, up to the beginning of August, the Courts were only able to condemn 74 religious and secular priests on such charges. The total number of religious and secular priests in Germany, according to the Catholic paper Der Deutsche Weg, is 122,792. The justice of such condemnations as the Nazis were able to obtain is more than suspect.A pastoral letter issued by the German bishops in 1938 says "Currency and morality trials are put up in such a way which shows that not justice but anti-Catholic propaganda is the main concern".
Catholic response
Ian Kershaw wrote that during the Nazi period, the churches "engaged in a bitter war of attrition with the regime, receiving the demonstrative backing of millions of churchgoers. Applause for Church leaders whenever they appeared in public, swollen attendances at events such as Corpus Christi Day processions, and packed church services were outward signs of the struggle of … especially of the Catholic Church – against Nazi oppression". While the Church ultimately failed to protect its youth organisations and schools, it did have some successes in mobilizing public opinion to alter government policies. Anton Gill wrote that, in 1937, amidst the harassment of the church and following the hundreds of arrests and closure of Catholic presses that followed the issuing of ''Mit brennender Sorge'', at least 800,000 people attended a pilgrimage centred on Aachen – a massive demonstration by the standards of the day – and some 60,000 attended the 700th anniversary of the bishopric of Franconia – about equal to the city's entire population. The Vatican's Secretary of State, Cardinal Pacelli (laterPope Pius XII Pope Pius XII (; born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli; 2 March 18769 October 1958) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2 March 1939 until his death on 9 October 1958. He is the most recent p ...), wrote to Germany's Cardinal Faulhaber on 2 April 1937 explaining that the encyclical was theologically and pastorally necessary "to preserve the True Faith in Germany." The encyclical also defended baptized Jews, still considered to be Jews by the Nazis because of racial theories unacceptable to the Church. Although the encyclical does not specifically mention the Jewish people, it condemns the exaltation of one race or blood over another, i.e. racism. Following the issuing of the document, ''The Catholic Herald'' opined that this "great Encyclical in fact contains a summary of what most needs preserving as the basis for a Christian civilisation and a compendium of the most dangerous elements in Nazi doctrine and practice." and that:Only a small portion of the Encyclical is against Germany's continuous violations of the Concordat; the larger part refers to false and dangerous doctrines which are officially spread in Germany and to which the Holy Father opposes the teaching of the Catholic Church. The word National Socialism does not appear at all in the document. The Pope has not tried to give a full analysis of the National Socialist doctrine. That would, indeed, have been impossible, as the Nazi movement is relatively young and it is doubtful whether certain ideas are "official" and essential parts of its doctrine or not. But one thing is beyond any doubt: If you take away from the National Socialist "faith" those false dogmas which have solemnly been condemned by the Holy Father in his Encyclical, the remainder will not deserve to be called National Socialism.Austrian Bishop Gfoellner of Linz had the encyclical read from the pulpits of his diocese. ''The Catholic Herald'' reported:The Bishop of Linz (Mgr. Gfoellner) who has always taken a very strong anti-Nazi and anti-Socialist stand in the district of Austria where there has been most trouble with both views, said before the reading of the document: "The fate of the Church in Germany cannot be a matter of indifference to us; it touches us very nearly." After indicating the reasons the Bishop added that the dangers of German Catholics were also the dangers of Austrian Catholics: "What I wrote in my pastoral of January 21, 1933. It is impossible to be at once a good Catholic and a good National-Socialist,' is confirmed today." Mgr. Gfoellner asked all Catholic parents to keep their children away from any organisation which sympathised with the ideology condemned by the Pope.In April 1938 The Vatican newspaper ''L'Osservatore Romano ''L'Osservatore Romano'' is the daily newspaper of Vatican City which reports on the activities of the Holy See and events taking place in the Catholic Church and the world. It is owned by the Holy See but is not an official publication, a role ...'' displayed for the first time "the historic headline" of "Religious Persecution in Germany" and reflected that what Pius XI had published in ''Mit brennender Sorge'' was now being clearly witnessed: "Catholic schools are closed, people are coerced to leave the Church … religious instruction of the Youth is made impossible... Catholic organisations are suppressed… a press campaign is made against the Church, while its own newspapers and magazines are suppressed…"
Assessments
The historian Eamon Duffy wrote:In a triumphant security operation, the encyclical was smuggled into Germany, locally printed, and read from Catholic pulpits on Palm Sunday 1937. ''Mit brennender Sorge'' (''With Burning Anxiety'') denounced both specific government actions against the Church in breach of the concordat and Nazi racial theory more generally. There was a striking and deliberate emphasis on the permanent validity of the Jewish scriptures, and the Pope denounced the 'idolatrous cult' which replaced belief in the true God with a 'national religion' and the 'myth of race and blood'. He contrasted this perverted ideology with the teaching of the Church in which there was a home 'for all peoples and all nations'. The impact of the encyclical was immense, and it dispelled at once all suspicion of a Fascist Pope. While the world was still reacting, however, Pius issued five days later another encyclical, '' Divini Redemptoris'', denouncing Communism, declaring its principles "intrinsically hostile to religion in any form whatever", detailing the attacks on the Church which had followed the establishment of Communist regimes inCarlo Falconi wrote:Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...,Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...andSpain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ..., and calling for the implementation of Catholic social teaching to offset both Communism and 'amoral liberalism'. The language of Divini Redemptoris was stronger than that of ''Mit brennender Sorge'', its condemnation of Communism even more absolute than the attack on Nazism. The difference in tone undoubtedly reflected the Pope's own loathing of Communism as the "ultimate enemy."So little anti-Nazi is it that it does not even attribute to the regime as such, but only to certain trends within it, the dogmatic and moral errors widespread in Germany. And while the errors indicated are carefully diagnosed and refuted, complete silence surrounds the much more serious and fundamental errors associated with Nazi political ideology, corresponding to the principles most subversive of natural law that are characteristic of absolute totalitarianisms. The encyclical is in fact concerned purely with the Catholic Church in Germany and its rights and privileges, on the basis of the concordatory contracts of 1933. Moreover the form given to it by Cardinal Faulhaber, even more a super-nationalist than the majority of his most ardent colleagues, was essentially dictated by tactics and aimed at avoiding a definite breach with the regime, even to the point of offering in conclusion a conciliatory olive branch to Hitler if he would restore the tranquil prosperity of the Catholic Church in Germany. But that was the very thing to deprive the document of its noble and exemplary intransigence. Nevertheless, even within these limitations, the pontifical letter still remains the first great public document to dare to confront and criticize Nazism, and the Pope's courage astonished the world. It was, indeed, the encyclical’s fate to be credited with a greater significance and content than it possessed.Historian Klaus Scholder observed that Hitler's interest in church questions seemed to have died in early 1937, which he attributes to the issuing of the encyclical and that "Hitler must have regarded the encyclical ''Mit brennender sorge'' in April 1937 almost as a snub. In fact it will have seemed to him to be the final rejection of his world-view by Catholicism". Scholder wrote:However, whereas the encyclical Divini Redemptoris mentioned Communism in Russia, Mexico and Spain directly by name, at the suggestion of Faulhaber the formulation of the encyclical Mit brennender Sorge was not polemical, but accused National Socialism above all indirectly, by a description of the foundations of the Catholic Church … As things were every hearer knew what was meant when it mentioned 'public persecution' of the faithful, 'a thousand forms of organized impediments to religion' and a 'lack of teaching which is loyal to the truth and of the normal possibilities of defence'. Even if National Socialism was not mentioned by name, it was condemned clearly and unequivocally as an ideology when the encyclical stated 'Anyone who makes Volk or state or form of state or state authorities or other basic values of the human shaping of society into the highest of all norms, even of religious values … perverts and falsifies the divinely created and divinely commanded order of things.'Scholder adds that:The time of open confrontation seemed to have arrived. However, it very soon emerged that the encyclical was open to different interpretations. It could be understood as a last and extreme way by which the church might maintain its rights and its truth within the framework of the concordat; but it could also be interpreted as the first step which could be and had to be followed by further steps.Martin Rhonheimer wrote:The general condemnation of racism of course included the Nazis' anti-Semitic racial mania, and condemned it implicitly. The question, however, is not what the Church's theological position with regard to Nazi racism andHe further writesanti-Semitism Antisemitism or Jew-hatred is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Whether antisemitism is considered a form of racism depends on the school of thought. Antisemi ...was in 1937, but whether Church statements were clear enough for everyone to realize that the Church included Jews in its pastoral concern, thus summoning Christian consciences to solidarity with them. In light of what we have seen, it seems clear that the answer to this question must be No. In 1937 the Church was concerned not with the Jews but with entirely different matters that the Church considered more important and more urgent. An explicit defense of the Jews might well have jeopardized success in these other areas.Such statements require us to reconsider the Church's public declarations about the Nazi concept of the state and racism in the encyclical Mit brennender Sorge. Not only were Church declarations belated. They were also inadequate to counter the passivity and widespread indifference to the fate of Jews caused by this kind of ChristianGuenter Lewy wrote:anti-Judaism Anti-Judaism denotes a spectrum of historical and contemporary ideologies that are fundamentally or partially rooted in opposition to Judaism. It encompasses the rejection or abrogation of the Mosaic covenant and advocates for the superse ...and anti-Semitism, especially when it was combined with newly awakened national pride. The encyclical, then, came far too late to be of any help to Jews. In reality, however, the Church's statements were never really designed to help the Jews. The "Catholic apologetic" described above is something developed after the fact and has no roots in the historical record. Indeed, given the dominant view of the Jews in the Nazi period, it would have been astonishing if the Church had mounted the barricades in their defense. As we shall see, the failure of Church statements about Nazism and racism ever to mention the Jews specifically (save in negative ways) corresponds to an inner logic that is historically understandable—but no less disturbing to us today.Many writers, influenced in part by the violent reaction of the Nazi government to the papal pronouncement, have hailed the encyclical letter Mit brennender Sorge as a decisive repudiation of the National Socialist state and Weltanschauung. More judicious observers have noted the encyclical was moderate in its tone and merely intimated that the condemned neopagan doctrines were favored by the German authorities. It is indeed a document in which, as one Catholic writer has put it, "with considerable skill, the extravagances of German Nazi doctrine are picked out for condemnation in a way that would not involve the condemnation of political and social totalitarianism{ … While some of Pius' language is sweeping and can be given a wider construction, basically the Pope had condemned neopaganism and the denial of religious freedom – no less and no moreCatholic holocaust scholar Michael Phayer concludes that the encyclical "condemned racism (but not Hitler or National Socialism, as some have erroneously asserted)". Other Catholic scholars have regarded the encyclical as "not a heatedly combative document" as the German episcopate, still ignorant of the real dimension of the problem, still entertained hopes of aModus vivendi ''Modus vivendi'' (plural ''modi vivendi'') is a Latin phrase that means "mode of living" or " way of life". In international relations, it often is used to mean an arrangement or agreement that allows conflicting parties to coexist in peace. In ...with the Nazis. As a result, the encyclical was "not directly polemical" but "diplomatically moderate", in contrast to the encyclical '' Non abbiamo bisogno'' dealing with Italian fascism."Church and state through the centuries", Sidney Z. Ehler & John B Morrall, pp. 518–519, org pub 1954, reissued 1988, Biblo & Tannen, 1988,
See also
* Religion in Nazi Germany * Humani generis unitas * Summi Pontificatus
References
Sources
* * * * * * * * * * * * Rohrbacher, Peter (2016)
The Race Debate in the Curia in the Context of “Mit brennender Sorge”
In: Fabrice Bouthillon, Marie Levant (Hrsg.): Un pape contre le nazisme? L'encyclique "Mit brennender Sorge" du pape Pie XI. (14 mars 1937). Actes du colloque international de Brest, 4–6 juin 2015. Editions Dialogues, Brest 2016, S. 93–108. * * *
External links
(The section numbering differs from the German version.)
"'Morality Trials' In The Third Reich"
''The Tablet ''The Tablet'' is a Catholic Church, Catholic international weekly review published in London. Brendan Walsh, previously literary editor and then acting editor, was appointed editor in July 2017. History ''The Tablet'' was launched in 1840 by ...'' 20 June 1936
"An Open Letter to Dr. Goebbels"
, The Tablet 17 July 1937 {{Authority control 1937 documents 1937 in Christianity 1937 in Germany History of Catholicism in Germany March 1937 Nazi persecution of the Catholic Church Encyclicals of Pope Pius XI Anti-fascist works 1930s in modern paganism Modern paganism and politics Christianity and other religions Modern paganism and other religions Works about modern paganism Criticism of modern paganism