If anyone has read any of the articles I write for other sites, you will see that I have been busy lately. It has been awhile (again) since I have been back to the Convent's blog to write. Mia Culpa. Anyway...on to today's subject...

Who is this man and why is he supposed to be Venerable?

MSNBC reported the following:

“JERUSALEM - The Vatican ambassador to Israel threatened Thursday to boycott a Holocaust memorial ceremony next week over a museum’s portrayal of Pope Pius XII’s conduct during the Nazis’ killing of Jews in World War II.

Archbishop Antonio Franco said he had written to the director of the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum asking for the revision of a caption suggesting the wartime pope had been apathetic to the Jews’ plight.

The caption, quoted in the Israeli press, says Pope Pius XII “abstained from signing the Allied declaration condemning the extermination of the Jews” and “maintained his neutral position throughout the war.”"

Did this particular pope remain neutral at times when it counted? He sure did. The following article is from an article on “Jewishvirtuallibrary.org” by By Shira Schoenberg:

“In the spring of 1940, the Chief Rabbi of Palestine, Isaac Herzog, asked the papal Secretary of State, Cardinal Luigi Maglione to intercede to keep Jews in Spain from being deported to Germany. He later made a similar request for Jews in Lithuania. The papacy did nothing.

Within the Pope's own church, Cardinal Theodor Innitzer of Vienna told Pius XII about Jewish deportations in 1941. In 1942, the Slovakian charge d'affaires, a position under the supervision of the Pope, reported to Rome that Slovakian Jews were being systematically deported and sent to death camps.

In October 1941, the Assistant Chief of the U.S. delegation to the Vatican, Harold Tittman, asked the Pope to condemn the atrocities. The response came that the Holy See wanted to remain "neutral," and that condemning the atrocities would have a negative influence on Catholics in German-held lands.

In late August 1942, after more than 200,000 Ukrainian Jews had been killed, Ukrainian Metropolitan Andrej Septyckyj wrote a long letter to the Pope, referring to the German government as a regime of terror and corruption, more diabolical than that of the Bolsheviks. The Pope replied by quoting verses from Psalms and advising Septyckyj to "bear adversity with serene patience."

On September 18, 1942, Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini, the future Pope Paul VI, wrote, "The massacres of the Jews reach frightening proportions and forms."Yet, that same month when Myron Taylor, U.S. representative to the Vatican, warned the Pope that his silence was endangering his moral prestige, the Secretary of State responded on the Pope's behalf that it was impossible to verify rumors about crimes committed against the Jews.

Wladislaw Raczkiewicz, president of the Polish government-in-exile, appealed to the Pope in January 1943 to publicly denounce Nazi violence. Bishop Preysing of Berlin did the same, at least twice. Pius XII refused.”

I recently read an associated press article that said “The Vatican’s ambassador to Isreael attended a Holocaust memorial service Sunday, reversing an earlier decision to boycott the event that threatened to upset fragile ties between Israel and the Holly See. Monsignor Antonio Franco said last week he would skip the ceremony over criticism of the WWII conduct of Pope Pius XII.”

So let me say this about that…for the good Monsignor to deny that there was ever a time when Pope Pius XII turned a deaf ear when it was desperately needed is nothing short of ludicrous. If he really believes that, I have a quit claim deed to the Brooklyn Bridge I would like to sell him. This is the same Vatican with the same Pope that last September gave a speech in Germany about which the BBC reported the following:

Pope Benedict XVI in Germany when he delivered the speach below:

“Speaking in Germany, the Pope quoted a 14th Century Christian emperor who said the Prophet Muhammad had brought the world only "evil and inhuman" things.”

The article later goes on to give the exact quote, by Emperor Manuel II Paleologos of the Byzantine Empire:

“Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.”

Well my friends, this is the same pope who appeared in an interview, before he was pope, where I heard the WORDS COME OUT OF HIS MOUTH – in which he said that all Jews would have to convert to Christianity in order to go to Heaven. What do I think about all this? I think that nothing irritates me more than bigotry to begin with. A bigot is a bigot no matter whose mouth the words come out of. Do I think that Pope Pius XII should be “venerable”? Only God can judge that. It doesn’t matter a fig what the Vatican says about who should be a saint and who shouldn’t – it matter only what God thinks. I only know that there are no divisions in Heaven. I have said it before, I will say it again – there are many paths up the mountain, but they all lead to the summit. There is no Christian Heaven, there is no Jewish Heaven. There is no Muslim Heaven. THERE IS ONLY HEAVEN.

One last note to anyone who may not like Jews: Christ was and is Jewish. His Mother was and is Jewish. The apostles were all Jewish. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t go about insulting the same religion held by the Almighty’s Mother.