Auschwitz speech seen as moving but incomplete
By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor
Reuters
Monday, May 29, 2006; 12:36 PM
WARSAW (Reuters) - Pope Benedict's speech in Auschwitz was the most introspective and moving address of his papacy, but some who heard it still thought he did not go far enough.
Ending a four-day pilgrimage to Poland on Sunday, the 79-year-old Pontiff reflected on how hard it was for a German to visit the former Nazi death camp and how challenging the evil committed there was for anyone who believed in a loving God.
His bold decision to ask at the infamous death camp the question that made millions lose their faith after the Holocaust won headlines in many newspapers around Europe on Monday.
"God, why did you remain silent?" Rome's La Repubblica quoted him as asking in reference to the killing there of about 1.5 million people, mostly Jews. Germany's Berliner Zeitung chose another of his blunt questions: "Where was God?"
But just as many commentators focused on what he did not say, especially about Catholic anti-Semitism and the role the Vatican played while the Holocaust was raging.
Some faulted him for not clearly mentioning anti-Semitism, others for saying Germany was taken over by criminals in the 1930s, as if Adolf Hitler had not had any popular support.
John Wilkins, former editor of the British Catholic weekly The Tablet, gave Benedict high marks for the speech but said he felt sensitive issues such as the long history of Catholic anti-Semitism were left out.
MISSED OPPORTUNITIES
"It was a wonderful speech, but I think some opportunities were missed," he told Reuters. "Something could have been said about how many Christians did not act very well back then."
"It's symbolically important that Pope Benedict went to Auschwitz, but I was expecting a different speech," Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League told La Stampa in Turin, noting that the Pope did not expressly condemn anti-Semitism.
Commentators also asked about the Vatican's role during the Holocaust, when Pope Pius XII did not speak out against Nazi oppression of the Jews.
One sore point is that the Vatican has not opened all its wartime files to historians, who want to know what Pius knew, when he knew it and what he discussed with his aides about it.
"While the Pope made clear in Auschwitz that he did not want to close the book on the past, the Vatican is not ready to open its archives from the war years," wrote the Rotterdam daily Algemeen Dagblad.
VERY JEWISH SPEECH
The Paris Catholic daily La Croix said dwelling on what was not in the speech "risks missing the great profundity of what he said" about God's absence or silence in the face of such evil.
"Loyal to his calling as a teacher, Benedict asked the question everyone -- believer or not -- asks."
In Poland, where the media mixed some criticism with mostly positive coverage of the visit, several commentators noted subtler tones than those highlighted abroad.
"The Pope's speech and visit were very Jewish to me," said Stanislaw Krajewski of the Polish Council of Christians and Jews. "The Pope quoted the psalms, which are also part of the Jewish tradition, and that creates a link.
"It was moving when he said clearly that the Nazis, by killing the Jewish nation, aimed to kill God," he said.
"Linking Christianity's roots with Judaism is a strong argument against anti-Semitism," said sociologist Jadwiga Staniszkis. "I think this speech should be read."
1 comment:
The Pope's speech was carefully crafted. This man is a careerist and you can be sure that had he been a bishop in Germany during the war he would have supported Pope Pius in his policy of silencing Catholic opposition in Germany to the National Socialists. The only conceivable exception to this would have been had he judged that there was an advantage to him in opposing the then Pope. You have to wonder when he refers to "our people" in his speech who he really means. Certainly not the Vatican executive at that time whose policy was to silence Catholic opposition throughout the Nazi empire in return for control of Catholic education in Germany and the conquered countries. Also this business of mentioning the carmelites as though the religious orders were inviolate redoubts of humanitarian values is enough to make anyone who has paid the scantest attention to the child clerical abuse scandals of recent years vomit. This man is compulsively political. No mention of homosexuals who were subject to the same regime of anilhation as the jewish people. His recent remarks on homosexuals are calculated to fan the flames of predjucice that these people live with. No mention of his own membership of the hitler youth. In short no acknowledgement of responisbility for the complicity of his organisation and the millions of people they worked night and day to influence and control. A hateful despicable man.
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