The Vatican’s dealings with the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich have long been swathed in myth and speculation. After almost seventy years; the crucial records for the years leading up to 1939 were finally opened to the public; revealing the bitter conflicts that raged behind the walls of the Holy See. Anti-Semites and philo-Semites; adroit diplomats and dogmatic fundamentalists; influential bishops and powerful cardinals argued passionately over the best way to contend with the intellectual and political currents of the modern age: liberalism; communism; fascism; and National Socialism. Hubert Wolf explains why a philo-Semitic association was dissolved even as anti-Semitism was condemned; how the Vatican concluded a concordat with the Third Reich in 1933; why Hitler’s Mein Kampf was never proscribed by the Church; and what factors surrounded the Pope’s silence on the persecution of the Jews. In rich detail; Wolf presents astonishing findings from the recently opened Vatican archives―discoveries that clarify the relations between National Socialism and the Vatican. He illuminates the thinking of the popes; cardinals; and bishops who saw themselves in a historic struggle against evil. Never have the inner workings of the Vatican―its most important decisions and actions―been portrayed so fully and vividly.
#8362105 in Books Harvard University Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies 2010-10-31 2010-11-30Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 10.27 x .69 x 6.86l; 1.32 #File Name: 0674051386196 pages
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