Pope: Vatican to open archives on World War II-era’s Pius XII before granting sainthood

https://worldisraelnews.com/pope-vatican-to-open-archives-on-wartime-pius-xii-before-granting-sainthood
Pope: Vatican to open archives on World War II-era’s Pius XII before granting sainthood
 March 4, 2019
Pope: Vatican to open archives on World War II-era’s Pius XII before granting sainthoodIn this file photo dated Sept. 1945, Pope Pius XII, wearing the ring of St. Peter, raises his right hand in a papal blessing at the Vatican. (AP)
“The Church isn’t afraid of history,” Francis said, as controversial wartime pope faces scrutiny ahead of any decision to grant him sainthood.
By Associated Press and World Israel News Staff
Pope Francis says he has decided to open up the Vatican archives on World War II-era Pope Pius XII, who has been accused by Jews of staying silent on the Holocaust.
Declaring that “the Church isn’t afraid of history,” Francis told employees of the Vatican Secret Archives on Monday that the archives spanning the 1939-1958 pontificate would be open to researchers on March 2, 2020.
He said Pius XII’s legacy had been treated with “some prejudice and exaggeration.”
Jews have been seeking the move for decades.
Some said the pontiff turned a blind eye to the Holocaust by not speaking out forcefully.
The Vatican has claimed he worked quietly behind the scenes to save Jews and not to worsen the situation for many, including for Catholics in parts of Nazi-occupied Europe, using behind-the-scenes diplomacy to try to save lives.


The Vatican usually waits 70 years after the end of a pontificate to open archives. There has been pressure to make the Pius XII documentation available sooner, while Holocaust survivors are still alive.
The American Jewish Committee (AJC) welcomed the announcement by Pope Francis.
“For more than 30 years, AJC, the global Jewish advocacy organization, has called for the full opening of the secret archives on Pope Pius XII, to shed light on his activities as pontiff during World War II,” the organization said in a statement.
“Pope Francis’s decision to make these materials now fully open and available for international scholarly research is enormously important to Catholic-Jewish relations,” said Rabbi David Rosen, AJC International Director of Interreligious Affairs, who has met regularly and is said to have raised this issue with Pope Francis and his predecessors.