Vatican to open archives on WWII pope

Declaring that the church “isn’t afraid of history,” Pope Francis says he will open up the Vatican archives on World War II-era Pope Pius XII, who has been criticised by Jews of staying silent on the Holocaust and not doing enough to save lives.

Describing that criticism as fruit of “some prejudice or exaggeration”, Francis told officials and personnel of the Vatican Secret Archives that the documentation would be open to researchers starting March 2, 2020.

The move could speed up Pius’ path to possible sainthood, a complex process that in Pius’ case bore the weight of questions of what he knew and did about Nazi Germany’s systematic killing of Europe’s Jews.

Pius was elected pope on March 2, 1939, six months before WWII erupted in Europe. He died on October 9, 1958, at the Vatican summer residence at Castel Gandolfo, near Rome.

The Vatican usually waits 70 years after the end of a pontificate to open up the relevant archives. But the Holy See has been under pressure to make the Pius XII documentation available sooner and while Holocaust survivors are still alive.

“The church isn’t afraid of history,” Francis told the archive staff.

He said the Pius papacy included “moments of grave difficulties, tormented decisions of human and Christian prudence, that to some could appear as reticence.”

Instead, Francis said, they could be seen as attempts “to keep lit, in the darkest and cruellest periods, the flame of humanitarian initiatives, of hidden but active diplomacy” aimed at possibly “opening hearts.”

Read the article by Frances D’Emilio in The Australian.