Some progress, but where is the problem ?
- almost the Rotten-Egg Nebula.
amk
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Tuesday, October 19 10:54 AM ET
Catholic-Jewish Team To Study Vatican Wartime Role
By Philip Pullella
VATICAN CITY (Reuters)
A Catholic-Jewish team of scholars will review published material
from the Vatican's World War Two archives in an attempt to shed light on
the Church's role during the Holocaust period, the Vatican said Tuesday.
Vatican and Jewish sources said the Holy See's archives for the period
will not be thrown open directly to the group,
as some Jewish leaders have requested, but the scholars eventually
may receive indirect and partial access.
A Vatican statement said the Holy See and an international
committee of Jewish leaders had agreed to appoint a joint team
"to review published volumes'" of Church archival material.
The six-member team will review an 11-volume study produced
by Jesuit historians between 1965 and 1981 that relates to the
Church's role during World War Two.
The thorniest question that has troubled Catholic-Jewish relations
over the past decades is the role of wartime Pope Pius XII
during the period.
The Vatican has strongly defended Pius, saying he worked
behind the scenes to save Jews from Hitler's Holocaust and did
not speak out forcefully for fear of making the situation worse
for both Catholics and Jews in Europe.
Some Jewish groups have accused Pius of intentionally
turning a blind eye to the Holocaust and have called on the
Vatican to open its archives to qualified outside scholars.
A Compromise Agreement On Access To The Archives
Tuesday's agreement appeared to be a compromise.
The team of three Catholic and three Jewish scholars will
first review the massive published study together, seeking to
resolve outstanding questions and write a report on their work.
The Vatican statement said the joint team could "draw on
the knowledge and assistance of other specialists."
Cardinal Edward Cassidy, head of the Vatican's Commission
for Religious Relations with the Jews, said that if questions
remained after the group reviewed the public material
"they should seek further clarification."
This was an apparent reference to the possibility that the
group might get partial or indirect access to the archives for
the period, which are still closed to outside historians.
Seymour Reich, chairman of the International Jewish
Committee on Interreligious Consultations, welcomed the joint
study as "a useful first step in resolving the matter of the
Vatican's role during World War Two."
Rabbi David Rosen, head of the Israel office of the
Anti-Defamation League and an expert on Vatican-Israeli
relations, said: "I think this is a tribute to the goodwill on
both sides and shows how far we've come in the dialogue."
The names of the Catholic and Jewish scholars would be
announced soon, the Vatican statement said.
Father Pierre Blet, the only surviving member of the Vatican
team of historians who produced the 11-volume study, has said
there is nothing substantial in the secret archives relating to
Pius XII that was not made public.
But several Jewish leaders have said they were aware of
documents sent to the Vatican about the Holocaust during the war
which did not figure in Blet's study.
