POPE PETITIONED TO BEATIFY PIUS XII
Two national Catholic organizations, the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights and the Society of Catholic Social Scientists, are working in a joint effort to petition Pope Benedict XVI to expedite the cause for the beatification of Pope Pius XII.
It is our strongly held conviction that Pope Pius XII has been unfairly portrayed as someone who stood silent during the Holocaust. Indeed, we know of no world leader who did more to resist the Nazis and rescue Jews than this great man. To depict him otherwise is to slander him, and this is not something Catholics will ever accept.
Petition to His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI
for the Beatification of Pope Pius XII
With profound respect and sincere devotion, We, the undersigned, humbly request that the cause for the beatification of Pope Pius XII proceed without delay. Pius XII’s virtuous life speaks for itself and is supported by an abundance of incontestable documentary evidence. The truth regarding his service to the Church and the World, as a diplomat and during his pontificate, prior to and through the World War II period, is also historically established. He has been the victim of an unjust smear campaign for fifty years. Now, however, overwhelming evidence has been amassed that proves beyond doubt that he labored without pause for peace, that he sought to assist in every way possible the victims of war, especially Jews, hundreds of thousands of whom were spared through his efforts, and that he constantly warned the world of the horrors of Nazism and Communism. We urge that you honor this holy and brave Pontiff at the soonest possible date.
To sign this petition, click here.
Kiera M. McCaffrey
Director of Communications
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights
catalyst@catholicleague.org
New York, NY 10123
212-371-3191
212-371-3394 (fax)
http://www.catholicleague.org/release.php?id=1356
2 comments:
I'm not a Catholic, so I'm not going to sign. Actually, I practice a form of Judaism and am very sensitive to Holocaust issues, but I am something of an amateur pope-watcher (going to write my undergraduate thesis on the papacy as a political institution) and I think that you are absolutely correct regard Pius XII. I might have preferred it had he been more forceful in his denunciation of Nazism (a la Pius XI), but the "Hitler's Pope" line is absolute hogwash. Everything I've seen shows that Pius XII was doing everything he could to oppose the holocaust while still keeping Catholics off of Hitler's hit list (and his first priority was rightly his own flock). Hopefully there will be more clarity on this when record from his pontificate are unsealed after Benedict XVI's death (though I wish the current pontiff a long reign).
I am also a die-hard supporter of Israel, but in this case there is more than enough evidence of the thousands that the Pope helped save.
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